Thomas Seppings (1754-1835) of Creake married in Aug 1770 Anne Brereton (bapt. 15 March 1756 at Brinton) They had a son Thomas (1777- Dec 1856) who appears to have lived at South Creak, then in 1841 at White Hall, Syderstone. The son, Thomas married a Brereton cousin.
I dont know of a direct connection between the Seppings above who had Brinton connections and Nelson.
Thomas Seppings the father was related to the Seppings of Fakenham, but I cant at the moment retrieve the exact relationship. A Steppings descendant in Norfolk showed me a family tree drawn in 1996 which connected the branches. I guess that it would be possible on that to identify which Robert and Thomas (there were a number of Seppings with these names) were likely to be the owners of the Fakenham house.
One of the Seppings of Fakenham was a Sir Robert Seppings (1767 -1840) and he had naval connection as wikipedia records
Quote:
Seppings was born at Fakenham, Norfolk, and in 1782 was apprenticed in Plymouth dockyard. In 1800, when he had risen to be master shipwright assistant in the yard, he invented a device which greatly reduced the time required to repair the lower portions of ships in dry dock when compared with the laborious process of lifting then in vogue. His plan was to make the keel of the ship rest upon a series of supports placed on the floor of the dock and each consisting of three parts - two being wedges arranged one on each side of the keel at right angles to it, with their thin ends together, while the third was a vertical wedge fitting in and supported by the lower pair. The result was that it became possible in a comparatively short time to remove these supporting structures by knocking out the side wedges, when the workmen gained free access to the whole of the keel, the vessel remaining suspended by the shores. Soon, his creation became commonly known as "Seppings Blocks." For this invention Seppings received £1000 from the Admiralty, and in 1804 was promoted to be a master shipwright at Chatham.
I believe Sir Robert's connections with Fakenham may have been limited since according in ODNB he was was adopted by his mother's brother who was John Milligen a retired naval captain living in Plymouth.
He would presumably have come to Nelson's attention as a result of his work in The Plymouth dockyards, especially when his invention was used in Sept 1800 for the docking of the San Jospeh in consequence of which the navy board awarded him £1000, and the Royal Society of Arts awarded him a gold medal in 1803. perhpas with his wealth this is the Robert became owner of the house in Fakenham, and if personally known to Nelson then there could be a connection from the visit arose.
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