Thomas Petter.

Thomas Petter (1783–1863, father of Gervase) was a brickmaker and farmer who (presumably) was the tenant of 12 acres in Fyning, a hamlet of Rogate near Chichester in West Sussex.

The farmhouse (Hambledon House) still stands and was sold for £995,000 in 2013!

As you may know from WikiTrees, Thomas and Sarah Tipper (1791–1864) had 11 children, of whom Gervase was the fifth; the marriage was in 1811 and there is almost literally one child every two years until 1834, although there is a gap between 1829 and 1832, which may be deaths. Clearly the farm could sustain that many mouths but although Gervase was still there in the 1841 census, aged 22, by 1861 only Edward (the fourth) and Carolina (the eleventh) are still at home.

By 1851, Gervase is in Tottenham, and the next year, the year before his marriage, we can place him in Castle Place (a street that no longer exists), as the lodger of James Cornell in a 'cottage' (probably a small terraced house) off the Tottenham High Road, because he was involved in a case at the Central Criminal Court over the theft of a rabbit! 
Tottenham was then still fairly rural and not yet the slum it became in the 1870s, so this may not be as far down the ladder as it seems. What he was doing, and where he housed Eliza and the five children is still a mystery.

Thanks Barbara