Great Great Grandfather Mark Lawrence: Carpenter and Builder. Whom he married I do not know but he had three sons:

Mark Lawrence — remained with father in business.

Edwin Lawrence — learnt the business and went to London in the building trade. Became knighted as Sir Edwin Lawrence and became M.P. for Truro, Cornwall. He hought the old site at St. Agnes where he built a house for his family. He endowed Fifty Pounds per year to house to help keep a district nurse for St. Agnes.

John Lawrence — married Joan Thomas. And had four children John, Ann, Mark, William, Jane. John and Joan were my great-grandparents and they lived at Goonvrea in a farm called Bolster Farm.

The son John, my grandfather’s brother, went to London and was Chief Engineer to the Peak Frean Biscuit manufacturers, where Arthur Gilbert [my father] worked as a clerk when he left home first.

Ann Lawrence married James Nettle, who was a farmer in a small way. She had 8 children. She kept a shop in Goonvrea after being widowed relatively young.

Mark James Lawrence married Susan Roberts were my grandparents, producing three children, William Mark and Annie. There were four other children who died as babies.

William Lawrence went to Canada and had 3 children. One girl married a doctor.

Jane Lawrence married Joseph Estlick who was a mine manager and lived with her family in Brazil for 25 years. They had 7 children; some went to America and others are scattered.

My grandmother, Susan Roberts, was one of a family of 14 with twelve growing to adulthood and getting married. They nearly all went to America, one boy married and went to New Zealand. My Great Grandfather on the Roberts’ side was an Assayer in the Tin Mines.

With his mother, Annie Trewartha, née Lawrence, and sister, Mildred

Although my name labels my Cornish roots, I was born in Devon in 1947. For 18 years I lived in a small village called Ide, close to the City of Exeter, but far enough away for it to be a separate community.

I was the youngest of three, with an older brother, Mark, and a sister, Angela. My father, who died in 1981, was brought up in Newton Abbot, in Devon. My parents met in Chapel Porth, near St Agnes, as my mother, Mary Coleman, lived there with her parents, Thomas and Ada Coleman, close to her maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Beck née Bennett from Yorkshire.

My father is connected to Chapel Porth through his mother’s family – the Lawrences. My great great grandfather, Mark Lawrence, was Captain of the Wheal Lawrence mine not far from Wheal Coates. Our Trewarthas all have Truro-based connections as well with my paternal grandfather being a local trader.

Wheal Coates: home of the Norkins

At the age of 11 I attended Exeter School, in Heavitree, between 1958–1965 and completed undergraduate and graduate studies at Swansea University to become a probation officer (PO). I worked as a PO for ten years in the north of England and as a child protection officer for another six years before moving to Dundee University to teach on their Graduate Social Work programme.

I have lived and worked in London since 1996 having retrained and qualified as a counselling supervisor and chartered psychologist.