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Colonel May's Ancestors

At what period the Mays first settled in Basingstoke it is difficult to tell. The immediate ancestors of Lieut.-Colonel John May, those who founded the brewery business in Basingstoke, appear to have come from Brimpton, just on the borders of Berkshire, where they had carried on the business of millers, but it is extremely probable that the Mays of Brimpton had originally migrated from Basingstoke, perhaps in the troubled days of the Civil War, and that when the country had quieted down again they returned.

This much is certain. There were Mays living in Basingstoke fully 350 years ago, for the name occurs amongst a list of the members of the Guild of the Holy Ghost in 1557. Some forty years later a Henry May wrote an account of the adventures and disastrous expedition of Sir James Lancaster to the East Indies. As this gallant sailor, who is justly regarded as the founder of our trade with the East Indies, was a native of Basingstoke, and up to the time of his death showed great attachment for it, it is very probable that the narrator of his experiences in his first voyage also belonged to Basingstoke, and possibly he was one of those mentioned among the Brethren of the Guild of the Holy Ghost.

That the May family continued in Basingstoke is shown by an entry in the churchwardens' accounts that in 1622 jasper May paid 2s. for the ringing of the knell at his wife's death. Again, about the year 1685 a John May of Worting, as shown by an heraldic visitation taken the following year, married Elizabeth Coleman. By the way it may be mentioned that if this John May took no part in municipal affairs, he yet has the distinction of having married into a municipal family, for members of his wife's family held the mayoralty no less than eleven times. It is further very probable that he was a relative, possibly a brother, of the first May who became Mayor of Basingstoke.

This was Charles T. May, who was elected a burgess in 1704, so that this record of a distinguished family fitly commemorates the bi‑centenary of the May municipal history. In 1710 Charles May was advanced to the Aldermanic bench, and in 1711-12 he filled the chair, since filled no less than nineteen times by bearers of his name. His municipal career was, however, cut short, for in September, 1714, he died of the small-pox.

In 1715 a Daniel May was elected a burgess, but he resigned in 1718. Thenceforth the name of May does not appear in the municipal annals till 1783, when Thomas May, sen., was elected a burgess. He was not, however, sworn in on account of non-residence, and after a lapse of twelve years Charles May was elected in his place. Meanwhile, in 1794, Thomas May, jun., had been elected a burgess. It is probable that the Thomas May, sen., who was not sworn in on account of non residence, lived at Brimpton, but was elected a burgess owing to his business connections with the town, as the brewery business was established in 1750. The younger Thomas May was evidently one of the partners in the business at the time of his election as a burgess, and he continued to be associated with it till the time of his death.

The Charles May who was elected in 1795 was a younger brother of the Thomas May who was elected on May 3rd, 1794, and with whose remarkable municipal history we must first deal. Thomas May must early have shown great aptitude for municipal work, for he was only a burgess eleven months. On April 7th, 1795, he was made an Alderman, and in 1796 he was chosen to fill the Mayoral chair, so that municipal promotion came thick and fast. He was destined to become a record Mayor, for he subsequently filled the chair no less than ten times, viz., in 1802-03, 1805-06, 1814-15, 1820-21, 1823-24, 1826-27, 1829-30, 1832-33, 1834-35, 1836-37. He was the last Mayor for a complete year (1834-35) under the old order of things, and the first for a complete year (1836‑37) under the new order constituted by the Municipal Corporations Act. In passing it may be noted that the transformation Mayor who had to close up the old and inaugurate the new order was Mr. John Simmons, a descendant of whom is now associated with the business of which Lieut.-Colonel J. May is the head, and who worthily represents the borough on the County Council.

The mayoralties of Thomas May seem to have been closely connected with royal events, for he was Mayor in the year of the death of George Ill and the accession of George IV, again on the death of George IV and the accession of William IV, and for the last time in the year in which that monarch died and Queen Victoria came to the Throne, and the year, it may be noted, in which Lieut.-Colonel May was born.

In the chair or out of the chair, he was one of the leading townsmen of Basingstoke. It is recorded that on April 24th, 1823, "Thomas May, Esq., a magis­trate," accompanied the then Mayor and their officials in "beating the bounds" of the borough, and at the time of his death he had ‑ for many years been a Deputy Lieutenant of the County. That he was well-known and highly steemed in the County is shown by the fact that some of the most distinguished men in the County were frequently entertained at his house, amongst them being the then Speaker of the House of Commons (Mr. Shaw Lefevre, afterwards Lord Eversley). He at one time held the post of Paymaster in the Hampshire Cara­bineers, thus evincing an interest in the reserve forces of the country, which has been amplified by his descend­ants. He died on June 4th, 1843, aged 78, and was buried nine days later beneath the shadow of the Parish Church. He has left behind him a name which will be imperishable in the annals of Basingstoke, and a record of municipal service excelled by no one in the kingdom. It may here be mentioned that Mr. Thomas May lived and died in the Brewery House (now the residence of the manager), and that his brother Charles occupied Brook House, now the residence of Mr. Alderman Wadmore,

And now we turn to the municipal history of the younger of the two brothers, the Charles May who was elected a burgess in 1795, and an Alderman in 1810. The year following his election as Alderman he was first chosen to fill the chair which his elder brother had already filled three times. This year, 18 11-12, was by a curious coincidence the centenary of the mayoralty of the Charles May whose career was cut short by small-pox. The election of the second Charles May to the Mayoral chair was a very different affair to what Mayoral elections are today, for it is recorded that "his election took place on 2nd September, 1811, in the parish of Cliddesden, in the presence of four members of the Corporation, at the dwelling house of Thomas Robins, gentleman, Mayor of the said town, who was confined to his bed by illness." One wonders how long were the speeches made in that bedroom in proposing and seconding the election of Charles May. No doubt the newly-elected Mayor went back to the "Motte Hall" and "refreshed "his colleagues of the body Corporate. Charles May was Mayor for the second and last time in the year 1817-18. He, however, lived more than twenty‑six years after this, dying on February 10th, 1844, aged 77, thus surviving his elder brother by only eight months. Though he was not Mayor after 1818, he continued in the Corporation until the coming into force of the Municipal Corporations Act at the end of 1835, thus completing forty years of municipal service. Like his brother, he took a share of military work, serving as lieutenant in the Volunteer Corps raised in the town at tie time of the expected invasion of the country by the first Napoleon in 18o3.

The municipal work of the family was continued, or rather shared in, by Charles May's son, also named Charles, who first entered the Corporation in 1824, and was Mayor in the year 1839-1840, the year, by the way, which witnessed the completion of the railway from London to Southampton, the sections between London and Basingstoke and Winchester and Southampton having been opened two years earlier. This was his only Mayoralty, as he died a few months after quitting the chair, viz., on January 11th, 1841, at the early age of forty. The municipal work in which he and his father and uncle had taken part was destined to be taken up a quarter of a century later by his second son, who was then only 31 years of age. It is worthy of note that both the great uncle and the grandfather of Lieut-Colonel J. May survived his father, the one by two and the other by three years.

Reverting to Colonel May's father, we may mention that he too was inspired with patriotism, and did his part on behalf of the reserve forces of the country. He served as a trooper in the Hampshire Carabineers, and in this connection a good story may be told. It was at the time of the agricultural riots, which raged fiercely in this part of Hampshire. The Yeomanry were called out to put down the riots, but frequently they came very near being put down by the rioters. On one such occasion a handful of/troopers, of whom Charles May was one, had to dispel a gang of rioters from the precincts of Messrs. May and Co.'s brewery farm. The rioters seemed inclined to treat the soldiers to very short shrift, when Thomas Wright, the faithful servant of Thomas May, approached the leader of the gang and said to him, "Don't you know who that is?" pointing to Trooper May - "Why, that's Charles May, the brewer." "Oh!" said the leader of the gang, with an expression more forcible than polite, "we musn't hurt he, or we shan't get no beer." And so the rioters departed,

Colonel May's mother, who was a daughter of the late Mr. John Simonds, banker, of Reading, died on August 25th, 1873, within a week of her sixty-ninth birthday. As Mrs. May was born in 1804, the publication of this volume marks yet another centenary.

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