Rediscovering our rural past, Thomas Ellwood and Mrs W C Williamson

We owe a great debt to the historians of the late 19th century who captured the memories of the people who lived in south Manchester when most of it was still countryside.

Thomas Ellwood and Mrs Williamson were working at a time when the rural communities of Chorlton, Burnage, Fallowfield and Rusholme were on the cusp of disappearing.

Within a generation they had all but gone and with it was went a rich storehouse of stories and popular culture.

Today what was left is fast fading from living memory, so with in another decade I doubt that there will be any left who remember the blacksmith on Beech Road or being sent to one of the local farms to collect fresh milk and butter.

This makes it exciting when there comes along an opportunity to give a wider audience the chance to read about that rural past.

Thomas Ellwood lived here in Chorlton and during the winter of 1885 into the spring of ’86 he collected and wrote accounts of Chorlton dating back into the 17th century.

These were published in the South Manchester Gazette and are available in Central Library, but they are on microfilm which makes them a tad more difficult to read.  Some of the articles reappeared in various church magazines but I have yet to find a complete set outside the Gazette.

In the case of Mrs Williamson her work appeared in a slender edition in 1888 and I have only been able to put my hands on one copy again from Central Library.

However Bruce Anderson whose local history site I have mentioned from time to time has digitized his own copy along with a number of other histories of Burnage, Fallowfield and Rusholme and they appear on Rusholme and Victoria Park Archive at  http://rusholmearchive.org/

‘Sketches of Fallowfield and the surrounding Manors, Past & Present’ By Mrs Williamson, “gives a very interesting account of how Fallowfield developed from fields between Rusholme & Withington in the 14th century, gradually becoming a desirable neighbourhood with church, chapel & schools in the third quarter of the 19th century. 

There are three maps, 1818, 1843 and 1885 that illustrate the changes during these years.”

She lived in Fallowfield with her husband, Professor William Crawford Williamson FRS. He was an eminent Victorian scientist who was appointed as the first Professor of Natural History (Geology, Zoology and Botany) at Manchester in 1851. 

Williamson was one of the great Victorian naturalists who knew and actively corresponded with Charles Darwin, Louis Agassiz, T.H. Huxley and other great scientists of the day. 

He also knew John Dalton and famously tended the great man during his final days, feeding him broth and other liquid sustenance. Williamson trained as a doctor and practised as an eye surgeon as well as pursuing his studies in the natural sciences.”

It is a wonderful book because it draws on the memories of those who experienced that rural life, and was a great help to me when writing my own account of Chorlton in the first half of the 19th century.*

And so for anyone wanting a vivid firsthand account of the handloom weavers of Burnage or the rush cart ceremony of Rusholme, Mrs Williamson and Bruce’s site have got to be worth a visit.

*THE STORY OF CHORLTON-CUM-HARDY, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/the-story-of-chorlton-cum-hardy-new.html

Pictures; Chorlton from the collection of Tony Walker, cover of Mrs Williamson's book from the collection of Bruce Anderson

"I had been bull ward in the bull ring, and once kept one of the gamest bulls in the country,” bull baiting on Chorlton Green

Now every so often you come across accounts of the bull baiting that went on in the township.  

The Bowling Green late 19th century

The stories usually appear on a slow week in one of the local newspapers and are nothing more than a reworking of one of the articles by the historian Thomas Ellwood.

Mr Ellwood wrote twenty-six articles during 1885 and 1886 and these were printed in the South Manchester Gazette.

Part of the value of them is that they drew on the memories of people who had grown up at the beginning of the 19th century and who could recall conversations from the generations before who had lived here during the late 18th century.

So building on Mr Ellwood and avoiding the easy route of plagiarism I dug deep into newspaper reports, census returns and the directories which provided confirmation of what went on in the township on the green over 200 years ago.

"Bull baiting was where bull was pitted against dog in a ring hemmed in by spectators. Our bull ring was situated in the centre of the village green.   The bull was fastened to a chain, about twenty yards long, which allowed him enough space to fight.

The dog’s tactic was to try and seize the bull by its nose but if the bull was well practised at the business, he would endeavour to get the dog on his horns, throw him high into the air and the fall would break his neck or back, but to avoid this, the dogs friends were ready to catch him, so as to break the force of his fall.  Eye witnesses often recalled seeing dead dogs which had been killed during the contest left in the ditches and hedge-rows.

The Horse & Jockey early 20th century

If the bull was slow or just not that good, the dog would not only seize him by the nose, but would hold on till the bull stood still, which was termed “Pinning the Bull”. I suppose to give the bull a chance only one dog was allowed in the ring at a time.

Contests were usually staged during the village wakes, and also at Easter and Whit Week.  Naturally the main sponsors for such events were the landlords of the Bowling Green and Horse and Jockey who had the most to gain from a gang of excited spectators outside their pubs.  

Not that they were alone in profiteering from the event.  The owner of the dog which successfully “Pinned the Bull” was awarded a prize and no doubt some went away the richer having bet on the winner.

There were those in the 1840s who could still remember the notable contests and spoke of the victorious bulls like “Young Fury”, son of “Old Fury” who was regularly brought and baited and the “bull men” like Edward Simmer, commonly known as “Ned” who afterwards was converted to a religious life, and finally became a Methodist local preacher.  

The Bowling Green late 19th century

Or John Cookson who at the inquest of Francis Deakin in 1847 had boasted that he “had been bull ward in the bull ring, and once kept one of the gamest bulls in the country.”  

But its popularity was on the wane and for some years it had all but died out before being revived by a butcher called James Moores, from Deansgate in Manchester.  Not that its revival was greeted by everyone.

There were those who had good reason to regret the appearance of James Moores and his bulls because as he travelled south from the city he brought hundreds “of men of the very lowest character to witness the proceedings.  

The sport, if that is what we can call it suffered another blow when Samuel Wilton enclosed the green in 1818 turning it into his garden."*

*Extract from THE STORY OF CHORLTON-CUM-HARDY, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/the-story-of-chorlton-cum-hardy.html

Pictures; The Bowling Green seen from the east from the collection of Tony Walker and the southern side of the Hotel from Alan Brown's collection, both from the late 19th century and the Horse & Jockey from the Lloyd collection early 20th century

On the parish, seeking benefits in the Stretford of 1807

Mary Crowther was just 18 in 1765 when she was removed from Stretford by the authorities and sent back to Chorlton.

They did this under a removal order which gave them the power to send anyone who had settled in the parish without permission back to the place of their birth.  It was a straightforward piece of economics which was designed to root out anyone who might make a claim on the parish for support in a time of need.

And Mary may well have been just such a person.  In 1765 after arriving back in Chorlton she gave birth to the first of three children all born out of wedlock.

In a period of heightened debate about benefits and the drain on the public purse the actions of St Matthew’s Parish authorities might seem all too familiar.

Now Mary’s story has been well covered already*so instead I shall concentrate on some of the other decisions made by the overseer of Stretford.

The years just before and after Waterloo** were hard times and the parish of St Matthew’s responded to requests for help.  So in the year 1810-11, James Mee the overseer regularly paid out between £40 and £90 a month in relief, with the highest sums in the winter months when little work could be done on the land.

But it was always the bastardy payments which feature prominently.

For women like Mary Crowther who had done penance and had had three illegitimate children between 1765 and 1782 there was a greater recognition of the father’s responsibility. Mary could turn to the law for help and although we have no records for Mary there are other recorded cases.    

And it is those from Stretford which throw a light on how unmarried mothers were treated. These are the Orders for Maintenance of Bastard Children, and Bastardy Bonds which identified the adult male who would support the child as well as other miscellaneous Orders Relating to Bastardy. ***for , and across the country many of these records have survived in greater quantities.

They reveal a straightforward system designed to identify the father and bring him to court.  This might begin with an examination of the mother by a magistrate or if she was already in labour by a midwife.  These Bastardy Examinations were common in the early eighteenth century.    Having achieved the information a Bastardy Warrant was issued ordering a Constable to bring the father before the Magistrate.  If the case was successfully made then a Bastardy Order was issued which identified the man and stipulated the amount he was to pay.

The documents were pre-printed with spaces for the magistrates to write the names of the mother and father and the amount that had to be paid.  Some of the Stretford ones for the years 1702-1811 reveal the estimated costs which the father was expected to pay.  

Often the sum was decided on a yearly basis which would then be paid quarterly.  This amount varied and may have been based on circumstances.

The figure of 26 shillings [£1.30p] for the year payable until the child was fourteen appears in some of the Stretford documents but others set an initial payment to cover the birth ranging from £2 down to 10s. [50p] and specify that further payments should be made weekly.

These also varied from 30d [7p] to 7d [3p].   In some cases the mother was expected to contribute and this could be 18d [7p].

Attempting to make sense of these awards is fraught, but some idea of their monetary worth can be gauged by making a comparison with wage rates and some examples of the cost of living.  Just twenty years later in 1830 Mary Bailey and Higginbotham the farmer agreed an annual salary of £7.10s [£7.50] from which she bought  in January a pair of stays which cost 10s.6d, [52p], in May a new cap worth  1s.8d [7p] and in July repaired her shoes for 2s.8d [14p].  The cost of renting on the Row for a farm labourer varied from 10d [8p] to 5s [25p] a week.    Finally the day rate for women workers in the south west was between 7-10d [3p].

Against this backdrop of wages, and spending the magistrates determined that the cost of maintaining an illegitimate child was 7d [3p] a day and this was slightly more generous than the 26 shillings {£1.30p].

So in the year 1807 which seems typical, Catherine Ashcroft received 5/- on April 28th, the widow Pinnington 2/6d and Margaret Thompson 3/-

But the system was flawed and there were many in the early nineteenth century who said so.    The moralists argued that payments to a single mother only encouraged illegitimacy and they may even be evidence to suggest they were partly right.  Both here in the township and in the Parish of Ironville in Derbyshire and no doubt many other areas,  some woman gave birth to a number of children out of wedlock. Their story is also covered in my book.

The next task will be to trawl the records and see what happened to Catherine Ashcroft, the widow Pinnington, and Margaret Thompson.

I suspect that their stories will be like many of the women from Chorlton, who went on to get married, although in the case of Mary Crowther she did not, living out her days with one of her sons in a wattle an daub cottage on the site of the Trevor arms on Beech Road.

And as ever I stand by a correction from Bill Sumner who wrote "The Stretford records you allude to were not in the Parish of St Matthew as that church was not then built, they are the records of Stretford Old Chapel and much more can be read of similar cases in The History of the Old Chapel of Stretford by Sir Bosdin Leech. Charles Walker of Barlow Hall settled later in Longford House Stretford and became Poor Law Guardian for Sretford, he ruthlessly cut down on the number of persons receiving benefit from the town excluding all who were originally from elsewhere".

Pictures, Mary Crowther's gravestone from the collection of Andrew Simpson,  map of Stretford from Greenwoods map, courtesy of Digital Archives, 1818, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/  Bastardy Orders, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council

*The Story of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, Andrew Simpson 2012, the History Press, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/A%20new%20book%20for%20Chorlton
**The Battle of Waterloo 1815
***  St Matthew Overseers of the Poor,  Manchester Archives L89/9/14

Neglected stories ........ handloom weaving in Chorlton

Now if you have been on one of those history walks around town chances are that at some point the guide will enthusiastically point to a building with long windows on the upper floor which were “to give the maximum amount of natural light for a handloom weaver.”

And then there might follow an impassioned lecture on the noble life of the handloom weavers who were to be squeezed by the coming of the factory system.  All of which is true up to a point.  Some weaving families could command a very good standard of living into the 19th century and there is something quite attractive about a life where all the family were collectively engaged in all the processes of carding, spinning and weaving, working at their own pace and free to pursue other interests.  As Marx said “to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner.”

But there is also a lot of romantic tosh written about handloom weaving.  It was by the 19th century an increasingly unprofitable way of earning where the majority of weavers were competing against the industrialization of the different processes, were at the mercy of the middlemen and had to foot the cost of maintaining a workshop.

I doubt that many have seriously researched the extent to which the townships around the south of the city had their own weavers.  But there is evidence for them in Stretford, Urmston, Withington and Burnage and here in our own village.

In some places the records are fairly slim but in others the stories are rich and detailed.  Now I want you to read the book so I shall be outrageously selfish and limit myself to stating that the evidence is there in the census records in newspapers and in the oral testimony recorded just thirty years after the last remaining weavers were plying their trade in some of our townships.

In the June of 1832 20 cottages with their loom houses  at Barlow Moor, came up for auction, while just 25 years earlier here in Chorlton, George Jones who had described his occupation as weaver baptised his two children at the Methodist chapel on the Row*.  

Nor was he alone, because during the same period he was joined by another two weavers who had walked over from Stretford and another from Withington to baptise their children in the same chapel.

*The Row is today Beech Road

Pictures; Liverpool Road, circa late 18th century from the collection of Andrew Simpson, advert from the Manchester Guardian June 9th 1832