Allen Family at Stockcross

What did they put in the water at Stockcross?  

I am just wondering as my great-grandad George Allen was born at Stockcross in 1831. He was a gardener but astonishingly he married three times and even more amazing he celebrated his golden wedding with his third wife.

The family story is that he didn't like children yet he fathered an awful lot!  This has been told to me by my aunt Doris Lacey who remembers her own childhood in the First World War and being rather frightened of George. He must have been tough to have worked as a gardener, became a widower twice, married three times, fathered three families and lived to the grand age of 94 !!  

I visited Stockcross in the 1980's and wondered as I walked in the churchyard whether great-grandad had tended the gardens there. I picked a sprig from an ancient yew tree there and took it back with me to give to my aunt - being blind and a great age herself she took a lot of pleasure from holding things in her hands and using her sense of touch. Perhaps this very tree was one planted by her grandfather?