How Jaques Invented the Wonderful game of Croquet

Welcome to Jaques Croquet

Thomas Jaques was a farmer’s son of French Huguenot descent. His recent forebears must have found refuge in England sometime after 1685 when the Edict of Nantes forbade Protestantism in France. Thomas was born in 1765 by which time George III had been on the throne for five years and was already fighting a losing battle to retain the American colonies. At home, the Georgian Period was in full flower. Following a country childhood in the Wiltshire village of Grittleton near Chippenham, Thomas, having finished his schooling, left in a wagon for London to seek his fortune. He was, by then, an ambitious young lad of fifteen..

Thomas’s instinct and good sense obviously extended into his private life: at twenty-one, Thomas married Mr Ivy’s niece!

Thomas continued to work for Mr Ivy. Nine years later, his employer, mentor (and uncle by marriage), died. Thomas, now thirty, was so well-versed in his craft that he could take on the business and establish himself as “Thomas Jaques, (Manufacturer of Ivory, Hardwoods, Bone, and Tunbridge Ware)”. Thus, it is from this date, 1795, that John Jaques marks its official beginning.

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