my 2x great grandmother

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Thomas English Pyman married Mary Ann Jobling in October 1865. Not much is known of her or her family background beyond what is available in the public record, and the trail is muddied further by the number of different girls with the same name living in or around Durham at the time - Mary Ann was a popular name, and this one had at least two cousins also called Mary Ann Jobling. There are also a large number of other Joblings in and around Durham and Newcastle during the mid-19th century. Presumably they are all loosely related, but I have been unable to trace this.

Our Mary Ann Jobling was the daughter of one of at least three brothers from South Shields in Durham. The brothers were the children of Henry Jobling (1779?-1839?), a shipwright, and Sarah Knight (b 1781?). By the time of the first Census in 1841, Henry had already died, but his widow Sarah was the keeper of a pub in East Street in the Jarrow district of South Shields, close to the docks. She was sharing those premises with her middle son, also Henry Jobling (b 1804) and also a shipwright, together with his growing family. 

A few streets away in East Holborn, right by the docks, lived the family of Sarah's eldest son James Jobling (b 1802), then a mariner. He was away, presumably at sea, at the time of the 1841 Census, leaving wife Maria, their eldest daughter Elizabeth and little Maria at home. However, our principal interest is in youngest brother Roger Jobling (b 1810), resident at the other end of East Holborn. He describes himself in the Census as a grocer, and lives with his wife Jane, and eldest daughter Sarah.

Roger Jobling had been born in South Shields in 1810, and married Jane Davison (b 1812 in Tynemouth) in 1834. Their first child Sarah was followed by at least two further children, Mary Ann (b 1842) and Roger (b 1845). In 1851, the family was still in East Holborn, and Roger Sr now described himself as a grocer & spirit dealer. Sarah was working for her father (described as "adjusting the business"). In October the following year, however, Jane Jobling died at the age of just 40. Roger married again in 1854 to another South Shields woman, Mary Watson, and a further child followed in 1858, Martha Watson Jobling.

By 1861, the family had moved to 15 Laygate in South Shields, a house apparently owned by, and next door to brother James. Roger is still a grocer, and Mary Ann and Roger live at home, along with little Martha. However Sarah is missing from the family line-up. Could she have died? Or simply married? At some point soon afterwards, Mary Ann met Thomas English Pyman, and the two were married in South Shields in October 1865. How did they meet? Perhaps through her uncle James Jobling, who had by now left the sea and become moderately prosperous as a shipowner. This was undoubtedly a good match for the Jobling family, since the Pymans were already quite wealthy. It was especially significant for Roger: the grocery business was not going well and only two years later he was obliged to file for bankruptcy. His new son-in-law agreed to provide financial assistance, standing as the main trustee for a creditors' arrangement filed by Roger in July 1867. It is perhaps worth noting that Roger's brother James did not feel the need to step in.

Roger had to find a new career following this embarrassment, and by 1871, he had become a life assurance agent. That year, he was resident with wife Mary, son Roger Jr and Martha in Green Street, South Shields. He died the following year. Widow Mary and Martha later moved to Gladstone Terrace (1881). Martha married William Douglass, a clerk at an alkali manufacturer, and they settled in Sydenham Terrace, South Shields. In 1891, they were living there with Mary and their new baby Carlton Douglass (b 1888). Mary Jobling died in 1895; Martha only ten years later in 1905, the same year as Mary Ann Jobling. 

Mary Ann's younger brother Roger doesn't appear to have benefited from her new position. In 1881 he was boarding with a family in Middlesborough while working as a labourer in an iron works. He doesn't appear in the record after that.