#108, Edward COBBOLD

After Bury St. Edmunds Grammar School Edward went up to Trinity College, Oxford on 6th November 1816 and then on to St. Alban Hall. He took his BA in 1820, was ordained deacon (Norwich) in 1822 and became curate at Blaxall the same year. He proceeded to MA in 1823, was ordained priest (Norwich) in 1824, becoming Rector of Watlington, Norfolk on 25th June that year. Ten days earlier, in London, he had married Louisa Plestow whose father was the Patron of the Watlington living.

Five years later on 18th August, on the granting of a personal union between the two parishes, he was inducted at Holy Trinity, Long Melford, Suffolk where his father was Patron. Holy Trinity is unquestionably one of the finest churches in Suffolk. He was to stay there for the rest of his life. It seems that many of his duties at Long Melford were actually carried out by his brother Richard's son, Edward Augustus Cobbold (#172). Like other members of his family he liked to write and a number of his works are listed in the British Library: 'An Appeal to Humanity', 'The Galley', 'The Litany in Blank Verse' and 'The Georgics of Virgil in Heroic Couplets'.

In later life he made at least three patent applications; in 1842 for 'Instruments for Writing or Marking', in 1843 for 'Supporting and Propelling Bodies on Water' and in 1859 for 'Pens and Penholders'. These applications may have been attempts to relieve what he saw as a shameful financial situation. At one stage his rectory was sequestrated for debt and this together with some family worries led him to commit suicide at Hatchett's Hotel in London on 27th of September 1862.