Thomas Jolly (1629-1703), eldest son of Major James Jolly, was perhaps the most famous member of the family. He followed in his father's footsteps. He had a zeal for dissenting or "independent" religion and is best remembered, alongside Samuel Eaton, as a founding figure in the Congregationalist Church (which merged in 1972 with the Presbyterian Church to form the United Reform Church).
According to the Dictionary of National Biography, Thomas was born at Droylesden, near Manchester, in September 1629 and was baptised at Gorton.
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He went up to Trinity College, Cambridge in 1645 but left without graduating. He returned to Lancashire in 1649 and established a "gathered church" at Altham, near Whalley. After the Restoration, Thomas got into trouble for refusing to use the Book of Common Prayer and was arrested. He was released after taking an Oath of Supremacy. He was re-arrested and forcibly prevented from preaching. Under the Uniformity Act of 1662, Jolly was forced to resign his living.
Inset: The market cross at Standish |
He moved to Healey, near Burnley, but was arrested once again in 1663 on suspicion of "keeping a conventicle". He was released, re-arrested and spent the winter incarcerated in York Castle. He was released and re-arrested on the same charge in 1664, incarcerated in Lancaster Castle, then released in 1664, only to be re-arrested. Throughout this period, Thomas received protection from the Hoghton family.
In 1667, Thomas bought a farmhouse at Wymondhouses, near Clitheroe, but was arrested in 1669 under the Five Mile Act for preaching at Altham. He spent six months in gaol in Preston.
Jolly was a pamphleteer, his best-known tract being A Vindication of the Surey
Demoniack. Published in 1689, the pamphlet was a defence of Richard Dugdale, of Surey, near Whalley, a young man reputedly possessed of spirits "as real ... as any in the gospels". Lumby (1995) places the incident at Surey firmly within the county tradition of witchcraft - the "Lancashire witch-craze"
- that first flared up in the Pendle area in 1612 claiming the lives of
six witches. Thomas died on 14 March 1703 at Wymondhouses. Thomas' brother John, son Timothy and grandsons John, Timothy and Thomas, all became nonconformist ministers. His brother Nathan
married the half-sister of the celebrated nonconformist divine Adam Martindale.
For further information, see:
| Fishwick, H, ed. | The Note Book of the Rev Thomas Jolly, 1671-93, and an Account of the Jolly Family of Standish, Eaton and Altham (Chetham Society, Vol XXXIII, 1894) |
