James Pike
Mayor of Oxford 1855/6
James Pike (1811–1879) was the son of John and Maria Pike. He was born on 3 July 1811, and baptised at St Thomas’s Church in Oxford on 26 July 1811. His older siblings John and Miltadah had also been baptised there, in 1804 and 1808 respectively.
Pike’ss first wife, Sarah, died at the age of 23 and was buried at the Oxford Wesleyan Chapel on 22 December 1835. She is described in the register as being “the wife of James Pike, of Walton Place, St Thomas”.
Jackson’s Oxford Journal of 3 March 1838 announced the marriage of “Mr James Pike of this city” to Mary Anne Burnett, daughter of the late Richard Burnett, Esq. of Dublin. Their first child was born in Dublin, but the following year they settled in Oxford. Pike was described as a hop merchant in the parish register at his daughter’s baptism in Oxford in June 1839, and as a “Hop, & Lead, & Window Glass Merchant, Cut Glass Manufacturer, & Staffordshire & China Warehouse” of George Street, Oxford in Hobson’s Commercial Directory for 1839.
James and Mary Anne Pike had nine children. Pike was a Methodist, but his first four children were baptised in his local parish church (which changed when St Paul’s opened in 1844); but from 1847 the children are baptised in the forerunner of the present Wesley Memorial Church in New Inn Hall Street:
- Marion Pike (born at St Anne’s in Dublin on 25 November 1838, baptised at St Thomas’s Church, Oxford on 6 June 1839)
- James Burnett Pike (baptised at St Thomas’s Church on 12 January 1842)
- Elizabeth Maria Pike (baptised at St Paul’s Church on 25 March 1844)
- Charles Frederick Pike (baptised at St Paul’s Church on 6 March 1846)
- Florence Matilda Pike (baptised at the Wesley Memorial Church on 22 December 1847)
- Kathleen Sophia Pike (baptised at the Wesley Memorial Church on 3 April 1850)
- Edith Pike (baptised at the Wesley Memorial Church on 15 December 1851)
- [Richard] Walter Pike (baptised at the Wesley Memorial Church on 8 September 1853)
- Ella Clarinda Pike (baptised at the Wesley Memorial Church on 1 July 1859).
The 1851 census shows Pike as a hop merchant of 39 living near Worcester College with his wife and five of his nine children. They have five servants: a nurse, cook, housemaid, and two nursemaids. Gardner’s Oxford Directory of 1852 lists James Pike & Co. of Worcester Street as a Hop Merchant and a Window Glass & Lead Manufacturer.
In 1855 Pike was elected Mayor of Oxford for 1855/6. He was not only the first Oxford Mayor ever chosen directly from the common councillors, but as a Wesleyan he was also the first nonconformist Mayor. He acknowledged the “peculiar honour” of his appointment, but claimed that although he preferred another system, he did not consider himself a dissenter from the Establishment.
The death of Pike’s youngest son, Walter, at his Worcester Street home at the age of ten on 8 October 1863 was announced in Jackson’s Oxford Journal two days later.
In later censuses, Pike’s address is given specifically as Worcester House, 1 Worcester Street. In 1861 six of his nine children are living at home, and the family has four servants. The family is still there in 1871, with Elizabeth, Florence, Kathleen, Edith and Ella still at home. Five months after this census, however, on 29 September 1871, PIke’s wife Mary Ann died at the age of 54; a death announcement was inserted in Jackson’s Oxford Journal on 7 October 1871.
Pike is not listed in any directories after that date, and it appears that he moved away from Oxford to Charlton in London after the death of his wife, as the announcement of his death in Jackson’s Oxford Journal of 15 March 1879 reads as follows: “March 7, at his residence, 19, Victoria-road, Charlton, James Pike (late of the City of Oxford, J.P.) in the 68th year of his life.”
See also:
- 1841 Census (St Thomas), 891/18/12
- 1851 Census (St Thomas), 1728/417
- 1861 Census (St Thomas), 896/49
- 1871 Census (St Thomas), 1441/26