This branch of the Scaife family originated in the Thirsk area of North Yorkshire. They descend from a Leonard Scafe, yeoman. For several generations the family were tenants of the Frankland family of Thirkleby. In the 18th Century, one part of the family had settled in Oldstead near Kilburn, where farming and carpentry were their usual occupations.
In the early 19th Century, members of this family moved to Sheffield. A marriage between Francis Scaif and Ann Scafe in Kilburn (1810) means that some of the descendants of the Oldstead Scaifes are also related to another branch of Scaifes. Ann's ancestors were living in Derbyshire at the end of the 18th Century. Her father was John Scaif huntsman. The two branches are likely to be related, but quite how is not yet clear.
One theory is that the descendants of Leonard Scafe's eldest son Richard (whose own descendants were numerous) formed the branch from which John the huntsman was descended. This would make the intermarrying Scaifes cousins many times removed. A notable descendant in this family was Francis Scaife, a hotelier of Upper Brook Street in London (1790 - 1851). He married Maria Powell, whose sister Jane was the mother of the victorian artist William Powell Frith, famous for his colourful painting "Derby Day".
Artists's impression of a Mowbray Scaife