Defective bottles at Seaton Sluice: 1835

A chance find which has turned up among my family's papers – a furious letter about defective bottles.  No idea how it ended up in a solicitor's offices in Middlesbrough …

On Thursday 23 July 1835, a young man called John Latimer Nichol dashed off an angry letter to a Mr John Jobling of Seaton Sluice, the busy little port close to the village of Hartley in Northumberland.

John Latimer Nichol was a 28 year old merchant, born in Gateshead and working in the City of London.  Among their other business ventures, he and his father Anthony Nichol were in partnership with Ingleby Thomas Miller from Shincliffe, Co Durham as Nichol & Miller, bottle merchants in London.  New stock for their warehouses was shipped in bottle sloops to their premises at Dowgate Wharf on the Thames, near today's Cannon Street Station.  There was a booming market for bottles in the capital.

Nichol & Miller's bottles came from the North East, where the vast majority of glassmaking was carried out – there were bottleworks on the Rivers Tyne and Wear and the Northumbrian coast, supplying customers across the world.  

The region had all the advantages of cheap coal for the furnaces (glassmaking was a very convenient sideline for colliery owners) together with established shipping routes and easy availability of raw materials.  In 1790, the North East mostly made wine and claret bottles but when, during the 1820s, bottled beer began to be exported to hot climates, the manufacturers began to produce beer bottles.  

It's possible that Nichol & Miller dealt exclusively with the bottleworks at the bustling seaport of Seaton Sluice, acting as their London outlet.

John Jobling, who would soon receive this angry letter, came from a family that was of very considerable importance in Seaton Sluice.  He was the son of James Jobling who, in partnership with John Carr, had been running the Hartley coalmines since 1809.  They had prospered and, besides their collieries, brewery and malt kilns, Mr Jobling and Mr Carr had taken over the Hartley Bottleworks in 1820.  

The works had been founded at Seaton Sluice by Thomas Delaval in 1763 and had swiftly grown into a huge concern – production had reached 1,740,000 bottles a year by 1777.  The following year, the first of three cone-shaped bottle houses was built to replace the old square buildings, their more powerful draught enabling more efficient furnaces.  There would be six of them eventually, dominating the skyline for the next 150 years and useful as sea marks to sailors. 

Seaton Sluice:  OS 1896 
CC-BY National Library of Scotland

In 1835 John Jobling was agent for the bottleworks of Messrs John Carr & Company.  Aged 42 and unmarried, he lived with his widowed mother and spinster sisters at the large, thatched Jacobean house called Seaton Lodge.  

This was originally the home of the Delaval family and was later occupied by the Delavals' land agent.  It was a picturesque old house, described in John Robinson's Illustrated Handbook to the Rivers Tyne, Blyth, & Wansbeck in 1894 in glowing terms – this was 22 years after the bottleworks and its smoky chimneys stopped work:

The situation of the house is all that can be desired, sheltered on all sides from the storms of the coast, the views from its windows up the charming dene, the sheet of water flowing in front of its terraced walks; while behind is one of those old fashioned gardens which delight the eye of all lovers of romantic landscape gardening.

Seaton Lodge from A History of Northumberland 1893

John Latimer Nichol wrote in such haste that his handwriting is a scrawl and he made a mistake with the date, giving it as 23 June 1835.  (It looks as though a later hand, possibly that of John Jobling himself, has corrected this to 23 July).  The letter was posted that very day and is marked

Z

JY 23

1835

He had just returned from a meeting with an important customer, who had sent for him to explain why they wouldn't be buying from Nichol & Miller in future.  John Latimer Nichol couldn't blame him.  He had been shown the product of one of his major rivals, and the difference in quality between Jobling's bottles and those bought from Cookson & Coulthard of South Shields was all too obvious.  Jobling's goods were not only inferior in colour and finish, but they were noticeably lighter and they gave way "at the shoulder".  John Latimer Nichol wrote bitterly, 

It is of little use our holding a stock of bottles which is only saleable till Mr Coombs or Mr Coulthard walk in & shew theirs

This was the third large business house whose custom they had lost and he wasn't going to order from Seaton Sluice again unless John Jobling could assure him that they would match the quality of bottles from Cooksons of South Shields and from Ridleys of Newcastle.

 

He asked John Jobling to meet his father Anthony Nichol in Newcastle to see 

if some thing cannot be done to meet our opponents in this matter for I have no fancy for carrying on my business at a rivals sufferances

This is John Latimer Nichol's letter – in some places I have had to make a guess at a word, and I've marked this with square brackets.  

He begins with a note of a "Fresh Order" for the bottleworks – 150 dozen olive bottles with long necks and some large pottle bottles.  A pottle bottle held 4 pints or half a gallon.  

John Jobling, Esq.,

Seaton Sluice

near North Shields

Fresh Order

Wanted

150 dozen Olive qty – long necks & hollow [printed/fronted]

immediately

& some Pottle Bottles 145 oz ordered 25 June – We have [some/more] to go on with –

             

London 23rd June /July/ 1835

Dear Sir,

I have tonight written to my Father with a list of Bottles which we want, but we cannot positively order them till we know whether you can produce them of the same blue Cast as Cookson & Coulthard & Ridleys Co. do – for it is of little use our holding a stock of bottles which is only saleable till Mr Coombs or Mr Coulthard walk in & shew theirs – 

I have today been sent for to one of our principal customers for larger bottles – & the bottles he shewed me of Cookson & Co's make were so superior in colour, finishing about the mouth &c – that I did not wonder at his leaving us – Besides I weighed 3 Round Pottles – 2 of Cooksons weighed 3 lb 4 oz & 3.6 – Unfortunately whilst ours weighed 2.4 of the same size (145 oz)

It is not therefore to be wondered at that ours should give way in the shoulder – This is the third large House whose Custom we have lost from the inferiority of our bottles in Colour (more especially) – & finishing – 

Be good enough to see my Father in Newcastle on Saturday – you will probably find Mr Miller there also – and let us know if some thing cannot be done to meet our opponents in this matter for I have no fancy for carrying on my business at a rivals sufferances – 

I am dear Sir

Yours truly

for Partners & Self

John L Nichol

Unfortunately, we don't know the outcome of his letter …

Further notes

The picture of Seaton Lodge is from A history of Northumberland (issued under the direction of the Northumberland County History Committee) 1893

For the extract from John Robinson's Illustrated Handbook to the Rivers Tyne, Blyth & Wansbeck (1894) see here

Pigot's Directory 1828/9: Seaton Sluice, Northumberland

Seaton Sluice, or Seaton Delaval, is a small sea-port and township in the parish of Earsdon, in Castle ward, about three miles and a half south of Blyth, and is remarkable for its harbour, which is considered a great curiosity, being completely the work of art; the entrance to it from the German ocean is by a deep canal, cut out of solid rocks, and guarded by immense locks. Vessels of three hundred tons burthen can lay here completely sheltered from all winds, beneath high grounds, by which this dock is surrounded. The coal trade here is the chief business, besides which there are extensive bottle works, belonging to Messrs. Carr and Co. and a large brewery of Messrs. Jobling and Co.  About a mile to the west is Delaval park, the property of Sir Jacob Astley; the hall was destroyed by fire, together with a greater part of the splendid furniture, on the 3rd of January, 1822, and it remains now in ruins.  In 1821, 240 inhabitants formed the population of this township, but the number has increased since that period to nearly 400 persons.

Carr, John & Co., coal owners, merchants & bottle manufacturers – John Jobling, agent

Gentry & Clergy:  Jobling, John, esq.. Seaton lodge 

1839 Robson's London and Birmingham Directory & in the 1843 Directory

Nichol & Miller, Bottle merchants, Dowgate wharf, Upper Thames st

Nichol A. & Son, Merchants, Dowgate wharf, Upper Thames st

Anthony Nichol of Newcastle (c1783-1852)

Anthony, the son of Anthony Nichol, was baptised at Gateshead on 22 April 1783.  He married Elizabeth Latimer, the daughter of John Latimer of Kirklinton, Cumberland and they had several children.

He is described as a Wharfinger (the keeper or owner of a wharf) in the parish register for his son John Latimer Nichol's baptism, moved for a time to London and later returned to the North East and became a managing partner of the Newcastle Broad and Crown Glass Company.  He died on 14 May 1852 at Number 5 Jesmond High Terrace, where he and his family had lived for some years.  

Gateshead Observer, 15 May 1852

At No 5, Jesmond High-terrace, on Friday (yesterday), aged 69, Anthony Nichol, Esq., JP

Anthony was buried in Jesmond Old Cemetery.  He was one of three Anthony Nichols, all related to each other:

Newcastle Journal, 5 March 1836

To readers and correspondents

Mr Anthony Nichol – We learn that considerable inconvenience has arisen from our having accidentally omitted to state, in our last, that the worthy Councillor of the above name, to whom we then made allusion, on the subject of the attack upon this paper, is Mr Anthony Nichol, broker, Quayside, and who resides at the Spital Tongues.  Mr Anthony Nichol of the Crown Glass Works is one of the Magistrates, whilst Mr Anthony Nichol, chemist, of the Quayside, has no connection with the Corporate Body.  All the three gentlemen are relatives

John Latimer Nichol (1807-63)

John Latimer Nichol was born on 14 August 1807 and baptised at Gateshead on 10 September 1807, the son of Anthony Nichol, wharfinger, and Elizabeth, daughter of John Latimer of Kirklinton, near Carlisle.

He married his first cousin Caroline Stephens Latimer on 11 July 1838 at Headington near Oxford – the story of their lives can be found here at The Latimers of All Saints Parish in Oxford and Headington by Stephanie Jenkins

John Latimer Nichol died on 6 November 1863 at the age of 56.  He was buried at the West Norwood Cemetery

Durham County Advertiser, 13 Nov 1863

In London, at De Crespigny Park, Denmark Hill, on the 6th inst., after 16 months of intense suffering, John Latimer Nichol, Esq., only son of the late Anthony Nichol, Esq., of Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Ingleby Thomas Miller (1788-1856)

Ingleby Thomas Miller was the son of Mr Ingleby Miller of Shincliffe.  He was born on 9 August and baptised on 17 September 1788 at St Oswald's, Durham.

He is described in the censuses, directories and newspaper notices as, variously, a coal merchant, coal factor, brewer and corn factor.  In the 1841 and 1851 censuses he can be found in London living at 12 Upper Bedford Place in Bloomsbury with his wife Dorothy and their sons Ingleby Thomas Miller junior (a solicitor), Ambrose (a merchant) and younger children Mary, Ann and Charles.

He died on 30 December 1856:

Durham Chronicle, 9 January 1857

30th ult., Ingleby Thomas Miller, of 12 Upper Bedford Place, Russell Square, aged 69

John Jobling (1793-1849) of Seaton Sluice

John Jobling and his brothers and sisters were the children of James Jobling (1763-1826) and Susanna Lambert (1773-1853).  

James Jobling was a colliery viewer (that is, manager) when he went into business with John Carr, who had farmed at Ford in Northumberland.  They took the lease of the Hartley coal mines in 1809 and, colliery owners and merchants, they took on the glass works at Hartley in 1820; their company ran the bottle works until its closure in 1872.

John Jobling was baptised at St Peter's, Wallsend on 17 November 1793.  By the time his sister Isabella Margaret was baptised on 3 June 1811 the family had moved to Seaton Sluice and she was baptised at Earsdon parish church.

James Jobling died on 1 October 1826

Newcastle Courant, 7 October 1826

On Sunday last, at Seaton Lodge, James Jobling, Esq. in his 64th year, universally esteemed and regretted.  His remains were accompanied to the grave by a great concourse of relatives and friends, including a numerous body of workmen and dependants, whose unaffected grief bore testimony to the great loss they had sustained

John Jobling continued to live at Seaton Lodge with his widowed mother and unmarried sisters Mary, Susan, Dorothy and Isabella.  

His life was not without excitement – he had a narrow escape in 1832 as a notice in the Newcastle Chronicle of 24 March makes clear

about 7 o'clock in the Evening of Wednesday, the 7th Day of March instant, as Mr John Jobling of Seaton Lodge was riding on his Way Home from Walker, when in the Lane leading from the North Shields Turnpike to Long Benton, in the County of Northumberland, he was maliciously shot at and wounded by some evil-disposed Person or Persons unknown … 

The large reward of 200 guineas was offered for information on the "evil-disposed Person or Persons" with the King's Pardon for anyone who actually turned the perpetrator over to justice,  

Such Reward to be paid on Application to Messrs Carr and Jobling; or Messrs Swan and Hemsley, Solicitors, Newcastle upon Tyne.

John Jobling died on 22 March 1849 in Newcastle at the age of 56; his sisters continued at Seaton Lodge for the rest of their lives.  They were still there at the time of the appalling disaster at Messrs Carr Brothers' Hartley Colliery in 1862.  Mary and Susan were alive to see the end of the bottleworks in 1872 and lived into their eighties; Susan was the last survivor, dying aged 84 in 1886.  

The Jobling sisters are celebrated in the entry on Seaton Lodge in the Illustrated Handbook to the Rivers Tyne, Blyth, & Wansbeck:

the last residents associated with [Seaton Lodge's] history being the Misses Joblings, who have won for themselves an undying fame for their acts of charity and native patriotism; they also had the unique honour of being the two best swimmers in the North of England, and in summer and winter took their daily dip in the sea, with a swim of half a mile out or along the coast.

They had become local celebrities.

Glass making

The development of the glass industry on the Rivers Tyne and Wear, 1700-1900 by Catherine Ross

Seaton Sluice and Old Hartley Local History Society: The Bottleworks

Blythtown.net: Seaton Sluice Bottleworks 

Fine photos and a great deal of information on the Fabulous North website

Cylindrical English Wine and Beer Bottles 1735-1850 by Olive R Jones, Studies in Archaeology Architecture and History (Canada)

The letter is now at the Northumberland Archives