If there were ever any pictures of the people who lived in Warburton Street at the beginning of the last century they have all been lost, or at best sit in an album, or cupboard, unlikely ever to see daylight.
And that is a shame because we know who they were, and something of their lives and families.
By extension it is possible to uncover many of the residents of the five cottages on the south side of the street back to 1845, along with the man who built and owned them.
The question as ever, is who to pick, and just what their stories might tell us about Didsbury.
I started with 1911, partly because I had the street directory for that year in front of me, and because the 1911 census was the most detailed of the eight census returns for the years 1841-1911.
Of the five, number 2 was occupied by John Crompton and Sons, and was listed as “paint stores”, no, 4 was William Richardson, plate layer, and no.6 was Mrs. Emma Smith who described herself as “Householder, but who I know was a “launderess”.
To which I can add that later in 1911, no 8, was home to the Schofield family, and that Mr. Walter Schofield was a “night soil man", and at no. 10 were the Blomileys, two of who worked as labourers, one was a charwoman and the youngest member of the family was a “gardener’s apprentice”.
And to complete the picture, while Mrs. Smith lived alone in her four roomed cottage, the six members of the Schofields has to manage in their two up two down, and the Blomiley’s to squeeze their lot into just three rooms.
The occupations of our residents might seem at variance with the popular image of Didsbury as a well healed and comfortably prosperous suburb of Manchester, but amongst the professionals, and wealthy business families there were still many who made their living from servicing “the better off”.
Mrs. Smith would have washed their linen, young Jane Blomiley cleaned their houses, and Mr. Schofield and one of the Blomiley’s were engaged as night soil men removing the contents of the privies of the rich.
And that left Mr. William Richardson a platelayer who ensured that the tracks on the stretch of line from Didsbury Railway Station to Manchester Central were up to the scratch.
But instead of these families it is the story of Miss Elizabeth Jane Dean who captured my interest.
In the January of 1911 she was living on the opposite side of street, by the April had moved to Countess Road, of Hardman Street and earlier had lived at both no. 4, as well as no. 1 Warburton Street.
Added to which she spent her early years in the heart of the city in the space between the Rochdale and Ashton Canals behind Great Ancoats Street.
She was born in Didsbury in 1860 and was living on Warburton Street by the following year with her mother and sister. Over the next few years, the family moved to Hardman Street, but are lost to the records after 1866, until Elizabeth Jane turned up in Ancoats on Lees Street in 1871, living with her grandmother.
Just where her mother was living is unclear, and a decade later Elizabeth Jane is just a few streets away, staying with her uncle and aunt, and described herself as a “Winder”, before reappearing in Didsbury, back with her mother on Warburton Street in 1891.
Trying to unpick the story underneath the census return is complicated, open to speculation and may just not be my business.
But her mother at some point had married a Mr. Blomiley, but by 1891 was a widow.
She shared the house with a son who carried the name Blomiley, and Elizabeth Jane, and a grandson aged two, whose surname was Dean.
It would be easy to leap to the conclusion that the young grandson was Elizabeth Jane’s, and certainly a decade later Elizabeth Jane acknowledged that this was her son and records a second one born in 1896 when she would have been 36.
All of which is rather murky and leaves me reflecting on what Elizabeth Jane might have made of her life in the city, in an area sandwiched between those two canals, and surrounded by textile factories, iron works and coal yards.
It goes without saying that this new world of noise, steam, and drab streets would have been a world away from Didsbury which in the 1870s still had the appearance of a rural community even if it was filling up with houses and people.
I cannot be sure just when Elizabeth Jane gave up the factory and the house on the street by the canal, but her eldest son was born in Didsbury in the summer of 1888, which gives us a possible date.
Her later life was spent as a “tailoress”, and the last reference to her so far comes from the 1911 census which records her living on Countess Street, just minutes away from where she began life in 1860, living with her eldest son, and an Elizabeth Ann Woods aged 31.
A decade earlier Miss Woods was described as the foster sister of our Elizabeth Jane, which raises some intriguing questions about who her parents were given that she lived at no. 4 Warburton Street with Mary Blomiley and Elizabeth Jane.
So that is about it.
We began on Warburton Street, and have pretty much ended up there, having travelled into the city and back out again, explored the occupations of some of the residents and along the way discovered a little of the life of one Didsbury resident.
But not quite, because just as I was finishing, I came across Mary Dean, who had been born in 1828, baptized in St James Parish Church, and at the age of 32 had given birth to Elizabeth Jane. Her father was a handloom weaver, and in 1841 the family lived in Barlow Moor.
Ten years later and Mary was a employed as a house servant at Mersey Bank House in Heaton Norris, whose owner was the grand Sir Ralph Pendlebury, who proudly recorded on his census return that he was not only a Knight but a factory owner, “employing 170 hands”.
All of which I think will takes us off on a new journey.
 |
| No. 4 Warburton Street, 2020 |
By extension it is possible to uncover many of the residents of the five cottages on the south side of the street back to 1845, along with the man who built and owned them.
The question as ever, is who to pick, and just what their stories might tell us about Didsbury.
I started with 1911, partly because I had the street directory for that year in front of me, and because the 1911 census was the most detailed of the eight census returns for the years 1841-1911.
Of the five, number 2 was occupied by John Crompton and Sons, and was listed as “paint stores”, no, 4 was William Richardson, plate layer, and no.6 was Mrs. Emma Smith who described herself as “Householder, but who I know was a “launderess”.
To which I can add that later in 1911, no 8, was home to the Schofield family, and that Mr. Walter Schofield was a “night soil man", and at no. 10 were the Blomileys, two of who worked as labourers, one was a charwoman and the youngest member of the family was a “gardener’s apprentice”.
And to complete the picture, while Mrs. Smith lived alone in her four roomed cottage, the six members of the Schofields has to manage in their two up two down, and the Blomiley’s to squeeze their lot into just three rooms.
The occupations of our residents might seem at variance with the popular image of Didsbury as a well healed and comfortably prosperous suburb of Manchester, but amongst the professionals, and wealthy business families there were still many who made their living from servicing “the better off”.
 |
| Barlow Moor, 1854 |
And that left Mr. William Richardson a platelayer who ensured that the tracks on the stretch of line from Didsbury Railway Station to Manchester Central were up to the scratch.
But instead of these families it is the story of Miss Elizabeth Jane Dean who captured my interest.
In the January of 1911 she was living on the opposite side of street, by the April had moved to Countess Road, of Hardman Street and earlier had lived at both no. 4, as well as no. 1 Warburton Street.
Added to which she spent her early years in the heart of the city in the space between the Rochdale and Ashton Canals behind Great Ancoats Street.
She was born in Didsbury in 1860 and was living on Warburton Street by the following year with her mother and sister. Over the next few years, the family moved to Hardman Street, but are lost to the records after 1866, until Elizabeth Jane turned up in Ancoats on Lees Street in 1871, living with her grandmother.
 |
| Elizabeth Jane's Manchester, 1881 |
Trying to unpick the story underneath the census return is complicated, open to speculation and may just not be my business.
But her mother at some point had married a Mr. Blomiley, but by 1891 was a widow.
She shared the house with a son who carried the name Blomiley, and Elizabeth Jane, and a grandson aged two, whose surname was Dean.
It would be easy to leap to the conclusion that the young grandson was Elizabeth Jane’s, and certainly a decade later Elizabeth Jane acknowledged that this was her son and records a second one born in 1896 when she would have been 36.
All of which is rather murky and leaves me reflecting on what Elizabeth Jane might have made of her life in the city, in an area sandwiched between those two canals, and surrounded by textile factories, iron works and coal yards.
It goes without saying that this new world of noise, steam, and drab streets would have been a world away from Didsbury which in the 1870s still had the appearance of a rural community even if it was filling up with houses and people.
I cannot be sure just when Elizabeth Jane gave up the factory and the house on the street by the canal, but her eldest son was born in Didsbury in the summer of 1888, which gives us a possible date.
Her later life was spent as a “tailoress”, and the last reference to her so far comes from the 1911 census which records her living on Countess Street, just minutes away from where she began life in 1860, living with her eldest son, and an Elizabeth Ann Woods aged 31.
A decade earlier Miss Woods was described as the foster sister of our Elizabeth Jane, which raises some intriguing questions about who her parents were given that she lived at no. 4 Warburton Street with Mary Blomiley and Elizabeth Jane.
 |
| Heaton Bank House, 1851 |
We began on Warburton Street, and have pretty much ended up there, having travelled into the city and back out again, explored the occupations of some of the residents and along the way discovered a little of the life of one Didsbury resident.
But not quite, because just as I was finishing, I came across Mary Dean, who had been born in 1828, baptized in St James Parish Church, and at the age of 32 had given birth to Elizabeth Jane. Her father was a handloom weaver, and in 1841 the family lived in Barlow Moor.
Ten years later and Mary was a employed as a house servant at Mersey Bank House in Heaton Norris, whose owner was the grand Sir Ralph Pendlebury, who proudly recorded on his census return that he was not only a Knight but a factory owner, “employing 170 hands”.
All of which I think will takes us off on a new journey.
But before I do, I am adding a comment from John S Horton, "Sir- regarding the gentleman engaged as a plate layer, being an ex railwayman born in Didsbury but growing up in Kent, 'platelayers' worked on and were allocated 'patches' of line for which they were responsible for maintaining, not only the track but also the vegetation on the embankments and drainage, but the 'patch' was only 2 miles long, and therefore the gentleman would not have been responsible nor would it be possible for him to maintain the line as far as Manchester Central. Such a distance would have engaged several Plate layers or even gangs to maintain however I am happy to be corrected if my understanding is incorrect".
Adding, "sorry to have disrupted your wonderful tale, - the platelayer would have been under the authority of the “District Engineer” . Said platelayer would notify the signalman of his “direction of work” be it towards “Withington and Albert Park” Station ( Down Line) or towards the bridge over the track carrying “Kingsway”., (Up Line).
The signalman would notify the platelayer of any reported track issues by train crew, be it “wet patch” caused by blocked drainage, making the train bounce as it went over and if at line speed could cause a derailment, engaging the platelayer having to “dig out the offending patch and re pack with fresh ballast” or by simply jacking up the track with his portable bottle jack and placing a simple soup tin full or less of small stones/ gravel to level the track up. I could go on and on but don’t want to bore you lo
".
Location; Didsbury, Manchester, and Heaton Mersey
Pictures; No. 4 Warburton Street, 2020, from the collection of Andrew Simpson, Barlow Moor, 1854, & Heaton Mersey, 1854, from the OS map of Lancashire, 1854, Elizabeth Janes’ Manchester between the two canals, 1894 from the OS map of South Lancashire, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/
Location; Didsbury, Manchester, and Heaton Mersey
Pictures; No. 4 Warburton Street, 2020, from the collection of Andrew Simpson, Barlow Moor, 1854, & Heaton Mersey, 1854, from the OS map of Lancashire, 1854, Elizabeth Janes’ Manchester between the two canals, 1894 from the OS map of South Lancashire, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/
Hi Andrew, another intriguing tale. Please keep them coming. And when all these restrictions are over let's meet for a bite to eat at No 4!
ReplyDeleteAndrew
A plan Andrew
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