Revd Henry Clarke of Guisborough (1813-61)

On 15 March 2013, I wrote a blogpost about John and William Richardson, doctors and brothers, who were the mayors of Stockton-on-Tees and Middlesbrough in the 19th century and I illustrated it with photographs from old albums – a photograph of each brother, as I thought.

But I was wrong – or, to be more exact, it was probably my great-great-aunt who was wrong – in labelling a photograph "Dr William Richardson" when it was actually a picture of the Revd Henry Clarke of Guisborough (1813-61).  I know this because I've been contacted by his great-great-grandson, who has a framed photograph with an inscription on the back to prove it definitively!

So here is the Revd Henry Clarke, looking very relaxed:

Revd Henry Clarke of Guisborough (1813-61)

Miss Margaret Clarke (1833-97), "highly-respected Northern educationist"

Margaret Clarke belonged to the generation of pioneers in women’s education. She was born in 1833 in the parsonage in Wolviston, Co Durham, one of a large but impecunious family.  She didn’t follow the paths we might have expected for a woman of her time – she didn’t marry, she didn’t become the useful spinster aunt and she didn’t become an unregarded and underpaid governess.  She became a gifted teacher, a skilled networker and a good administrator and businesswoman.

Margaret Clarke's origins

Her father was the Revd Lancelot Christopher Clarke (1793-1864).  He was born in Stanhope, Co Durham; his father, the Revd John Clarke, was then perpetual curate of St John’s Chapel in Weardale.  John Clarke must have made his way on his own merits.  A History of Northumberland in Three Parts by John Hodgson (1820) says that he was born in 1756 in the Morpeth deanery in “a solitary farm-house, called Ridpath, within the boundary of the Wallington estate, and on the north side of Harwood and of Fallowlees-burn”. 

He had no patron to give him a living with a substantial income but must have had a friend at Durham Cathedral because in 1802 he was made a Minor Canon and in 1808 the Dean and Chapter appointed him vicar of Billingham where he stayed until his death in 1831.  He wrote several tracts (A Brief Illustration of the Morning Service, &c and others) which were printed at Durham and later reprinted in an edition edited by his son.  His position at the cathedral must have been useful in obtaining from the Dean and Chapter the preferment of the chapelry of Wolviston – which lay within the parish of Billingham – for his son Lancelot.

So Lancelot came to Billingham as a boy of about 14 and it was there that he met his future wife, Isabella White (1800-73).  They married in 1819 after Lancelot came down from Emmanuel College, Cambridge and was priested at Durham.  

Isabella was born and brought up at Brook House, Billingham.  Her father Robert White was the farmer there; her mother Margaret Blackburn came from Guisborough.  Brook House Farm lay not far from Billingham Mill, just above the mill race which led into Billingham Beck.  An industrial estate covers the site now.  

Lancelot and Isabella began their married life in Billingham and their first two children were born there.  They moved into Wolviston Parsonage in 1823.

Wolviston was enticingly described in An historical, topographical, and descriptive view of the county palatine of Durham of 1834 – the year after Margaret was born – as “pleasantly situated on the turnpike road between Sunderland and Stockton ... The soil on which it stands is dry, and the southern prospect is extensive and beautiful”.  It was a sizeable village, with “several good houses” and must have been a lively place as it contained 6 public houses, a spirit & porter merchant, 5 shopkeepers, a corn-miller, 4 butchers, 2 gardeners, 2 stone-masons, a bricklayer, 4 joiners & cartwrights, 2 blacksmiths, 2 tailors, 2 shoemakers and a saddler.  

The young vicar was full of energy.  On 23 January 1830, the Durham Chronicle reported that he had – by his “zealous exertions” – led villagers from Wolviston to the aid of people fighting a fire that had broken out “in some wooden sheds, used as workshops, adjacent to the splendid mansion of the Marquis of Londonderry”.  Luckily there was a strong wind blowing from the north east so that the fire did not reach the “noble Marquis’s Orangery” or threaten “his Lordship’s magnificent house”.

During that year, the chapel at Wolviston was enlarged by the addition of “a neat, elegant steeple, of polished Yorkshire stone” which, according to the Durham Chronicle of 25 December 1830 “is now seen to tower up in the centre of the village, presenting to the eye quite a new and highly ornamental feature in the scenery of the surrounding neighbourhood.  The whole has been effected by means of voluntary contributions”.  The chapel re-opened just before Christmas with Lancelot giving “an appropriate and impressive sermon”.  We can’t see Lancelot’s church now – I see from the Victoria County History that it was rebuilt in 1876.

By that time Lancelot and Isabella already had five children.  There were to be several more – they had eleven children, as far as I can see.  Margaret was the seventh, baptised on 16 March 1833.  It was a full household and by 1841 it also included his mother-in-law, Mrs Margaret White.  

I think money must always have been tight, as the stipend was not generous and Lancelot had so many mouths to feed.  The 1834 View of the County Palatine shows that he was then running an Academy.  He later tried his hand at farming, but it evidently didn’t answer the purpose because by the early summer of 1847, when Margaret was 14, his financial situation came to a terrible crisis and he ended up in Durham Gaol as an Insolvent Debtor.  He spent four months in gaol.  Perhaps he was helped by friends or family, because he was able to come to an arrangement with his creditors and I’m glad to say that he seems to have bounced back.  The day after his appearance before the Durham County Court he was at the third Annual meeting of the tenantry of the Londonderry estate enjoying a good dinner with the other local clergy.  But it must have been a searing experience for the family.

Margaret's education and early career

Unsurprisingly, Margaret was sent to the Clergy Daughters School at Casterton, where she could be educated cheaply.  This was the later incarnation of the school at Cowan Bridge, which was described so vividly and unfavourably by Charlotte Brontë in Jane Eyre.  The school had moved to the healthier situation of nearby Casterton in 1833, eight years after Charlotte and her sisters were removed from the school by their father.  

We find Margaret there, aged 18, in the 1851 census together with her younger sister Mary Ann, aged 14.  Margaret was one of the older pupils and I think she must have stayed on as a Pupil Governess because her obituary in the Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough records that she went from there to become an associate of the Sisterhood of Holy Trinity, Oxford.  

The Society of the Holy and Undivided Trinity was an Anglican Sisterhood which ran a convent school in Oxford – the buildings now form part of St Antony’s College.  There she must have gained more teaching experience.

I suspect that during her later years at Casterton she encountered Miss Dorothea Beale, who was superintendant of the school during 1857, because in 1860 Margaret was invited onto the staff of the Cheltenham Ladies’ College, where the celebrated Miss Beale was Principal.

Margaret sets up her own school

Margaret remained there five years and then, in 1865, set up her own small school at the Old Hall, Kirkleatham – the building we now know as Kirkleatham Old Hall Museum.  She had made good use of her time at Cheltenham and clearly had made some very useful connections.  Here is her advertisement from 1868:

Newcastle Journal, 19 December 1868

HOME EDUCATION – MISS CLARKE, Kirkleatham Old Hall, Redcar receives TEN YOUNG LADIES to educate on a system adapted to the highest purpose of Education.  The domestic arrangements are those of a private family.  Terms from £60 to £100 per annum, according to age and requirements.  There are two Vacancies.  References can be given to the Dowager Viscountess Barrington, the Lady Ponsonby, the Rev Canon Woodford (Vicar of Leeds), Dr Acland, F.R.S., Regius Professor of Medicine, Oxford, &c

Margaret was targeting the affluent market and had references – and fees – to match.  She soon realised that she could build on her growing success and decided to relocate to London where it would be very much easier to find staff of the calibre she required.

She took a house in Warrington Crescent, Maida Vale, in a terrace of tall white-stuccoed Italianate town houses.  They were five stories high including the servants’ quarters on the top floor and only recently built.  There she and her sister Catherine (who seems to have been generally known as Kate) set up their school.

At the time of the census in 1871 they occupied numbers 26 and 28 Warrington Crescent and their widowed mother and older sister Elizabeth were there with them.  The school remained popular with parents from the North, and among the 15 pupils were four from Yorkshire and three from Newcastle.  A closer inspection of the census details reveal that two of the Yorkshire girls were from Middlesbrough and that they were girls who have featured on this blog before: Annie and Ellen Richardson, aged 14 and 13, the daughters of Dr John Richardson and his wife Margaret Elizabeth Weatherill.

Expansion of the school & the last years of the Misses Clarke

Perhaps Margaret was always on the lookout for a large house in its own grounds, because it was not long before she took out a lease on Brondesbury Manor House in Willesden.  The buildings dated mainly from the late 18th century and early 19th century; the grounds had once been landscaped by Repton, who commented favourably on its hill-top position.  The railway had reached Willesden and from the late 1860s houses for merchants and City professionals were being built.  It must have seemed a very appropriate area.  Margaret took possession in around 1881 and seems to have begun building work to make the buildings ready for occupation by the girls.

The 1881 census shows that the school had expanded dramatically.  Margaret and Kate now had three houses, numbers 24, 26 & 28 Warrington Crescent.  The seven teachers (described by Miss Clarke as “governesses”) included a young French-born British woman and a young woman from Germany, so we can see the pupils were learning both French and German.  The housekeeping staff consisted of a housekeeper, an accountant, a matron, a cook, 2 parlourmaids, 5 housemaids and a kitchenmaid.  

There were 48 pupils aged mostly between 14 and 18, the youngest child being 10 years old.  They included four girls from overseas (India, Cape of Good Hope, Portugal and Canada) and several from the North of England – a girl from Newcastle, another from Kendal, and Elizabeth Faber, the daughter of Henry Grey Faber, solicitor in Stockton-on-Tees, and Kathleen Newcomen, whose father owned Kirkleatham Hall, the great house that was demolished in the 1950s.

By 1891, the school had expanded further still.  Brondesbury Manor was nearly ready for full occupation and in the meantime the census shows that the sisters now had four houses in Warrington Crescent – numbers 24, 26, 28 & 30.  The pupils, teachers and domestic staff were divided between the houses.

In Number 24, there were 12 girls, four of them from Yorkshire, living under the supervision of three teachers.  One taught German & Music, another English & Music and the third taught English.  In Number 26, Miss Kate Clarke presided over the domestic staff – a secretary, a matron (from Gateshead), a housekeeper, a cook, parlourmaid, 5 housemaids, a kitchenmaid and a 15 year old boy as a page.  There was another Music teacher living there.  In Number 28, an English teacher and a French teacher were in charge of 14 pupils, including 2 from Yorkshire and one from Tynemouth.  In Number 30, yet another English teacher had the charge of 7 girls (including one from Nova Scotia and another from New Zealand).  Also living there were a carpenter, a housekeeper, and a 13 year old described as School Boy.  Clearly the school prided itself on music and English – masters will have visited the school to teach other subjects.   

At Brondesbury, the census reveals Margaret presiding over three teachers (one taught German & music, the other two English) and 27 pupils, including a girl from Australia.  She was assisted by a manageress born in Wynyard, Co Durham, and her staff consisted of a ladies’ maid, parlourmaid, 4 housemaids, a cook and a houseboy.  A gardener and his family lived in the Manor House Cottage.  Staying with Margaret was an old pupil, Miss Agatha Skinner, aged 33.

While Miss Kate Clarke stayed in Warrington Crescent, chiefly with the younger girls, work continued apace to build a school chapel.  The building was largely financed by a generous donation from Miss Agatha Skinner, and the chapel was dedicated on 7 June 1892 by the Rev W H Cleaver.  The first Confirmation was held by the Bishop of Marlborough, Alfred Earle, whose daughter was a pupil.  Soon afterwards the houses in Warrington Crescent were given up, and all the girls moved into the Manor House, which had been extended to accommodate them

Miss Margaret Clarke presided over the Manor House for only a few more years.  She died on 11 February 1897 at the age of 64.  Her obituary in the Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough on 26 February called her 

“a once well-known [clearly her renown in London did not count] and highly-respected Northern lady educationist ... known to the leading educationists of the day as one only second to the late Miss Buss [of the North London Collegiate School for Ladies] in powers of organisation and devotion to her work.”

Kate Clarke carried on the school for the next two terms, but it must have been a very difficult time and she must have been very glad to find a buyer quite quickly.  This was Miss Lucy Helen Muriel Soulsby, headmistress of Oxford High School, who arrived at the school in September 1897 and took it over completely from Kate at the beginning of 1898.  Kate lived only two years longer.  She died on 11 February 1897, aged 59.

The two Misses Clarke had not only made their school a resounding educational success, they had also made a substantial fortune.  When Margaret died in 1897, she left £8,114 10s 1d; Kate’s estate (which obviously included the sale of the business) amounted to £18,717.  

Brondesbury Manor House School under Miss Soulsby (1856-1927)

Miss Soulsby – such an apt name, I feel it would have been chosen for her by Charles Dickens – had bought the school with her own objective already fixed in her mind.  Her mother was the strongest influence in her life and, in the words of the Dictionary of National Biography, Miss Soulsby reverenced “the power of the home”.  She intended to put character-building ahead of academic achievement and she intended to form “fine wives and fine mothers”.  

She drew further inspiration from the works of John Keble, Charlotte M Yonge and Elizabeth Missing Sewell (who, with her brothers, has already appeared in this blog), emphasising the importance of developing spirituality and self-discipline.  She was clearly a very charismatic character and was very much in the public eye, a great committee woman, traveller and writer of pamphlets and books.  Unsurprisingly, she opposed female suffrage.  

She retired from the school in 1915, leaving it in the hands of Miss Frances Abbott, but she was still very much in charge.

During this time, Northern families remained loyal to the school, perhaps unconscious of the changes that had taken place.  Mrs Margaret Richardson, who had sent her daughters Annie and Ellen to Miss Clarke’s school in the 1870s, sent her stepdaughters Averil and Madge Buchannan there as well.  They evidently remembered their schooldays with affection because they sent their own daughters there after the First World War.  Alas, by then the school was not the congenial place they remembered, and several of the girls were actively unhappy while all of them seem to have resented the petty discipline and the poor academic performance.

Memories of the school in the early 1920s

Mary Hurst attended the school between 1921 and 1923.  The best that can be said for it, as far as I can see, is that it gave her plenty of time to daydream during lessons; she had two novels, Thy People and The Bond of the Spirit, published by Hodder & Stoughton in 1928 and 1930.

In her unpublished memoirs, Mary left a vivid portrait of the school, which her sister-in-law Katharine Stubbs described tersely with the words, “Lousy education.  Sadistic discipline.  Good on arts.”  Interesting to note that Mary came to Brondesbury from the Oxford convent school in which Miss Clarke had once taught, and which Mary found preferable in terms of education, discipline, kindness and lack of silliness about boys.

Brondesbury Manor House, c1921

Mary wrote that even in the years that she spent at Brondesbury, Miss Soulsby still “periodically made formidable descents on the school to see that [her customs] were being duly continued”.

Here is her description of the school regime:

When the present girls left they did not become simply old girls but some sort of flower, the earlier Miss Soulsby generation being Rosemaries and the later Water Lilies, but the original Manor House-ites, to whom my mother-in-law and her sister belonged were simply called “Miss Clarke’s old girls”.  I fancy Miss Clarke, an uncompromising Puseyite lady devoid of whimsies, would not have approved of all the horticulture.

Brondesbury crest

We were given over to the care of our respective “school mothers” for the first two weeks of school life.  It was a good idea, and conscientiously did my worthy if uninspiring “mother” perform her heavy task.   

She made me rise at 6.30 in order that no possible thing should be left undone to ensure a tidy bedroom.  The bedrooms were inspected when we were at Prayers and the names of the untidy people and their offences were read out by the Head at breakfast.  It was an offence to have a piece of cotton on the floor, a corner of blanket hanging crooked on the chair when the bed was stripped, a blind out of line or a single dead flower in your vase.   

You belonged to a block house, a group of seven or eight girls under a Captain.  “Lucknow” was the Scottish block-house where I, who have not a drop of Scottish blood in my veins, spent two terms; but indeed I started in the Kitchener’s Army block-house and ended as Captain of Revenge, the Navy one, without the faintest connection with either.   

The untidy offender followed her block-house Captain upstairs and picked up the cotton or whatever it was.  If there was no excuse the whole blockhouse lost the Red Star for that week.  It taught us neatness all right, but when I tell you that we lost the Gold Star for a word spoken at any time in the bedrooms (the worst offence of all), the Green Star for a word in the passage, half another star for a shoe adrift in the boot-room, half for any unpunctuality and another whole star for an untidy drawer, you can imagine life was rather hazardous.   

Every morning our persons were inspected from hair to shoes in a vaguely military manner by the Blockhouse Captain and her lieutenant, and it went ill with you if the white starched apron in which each girl was clad had a tear or a button missing.  

The rooms in which the girls slept were named after places that appealed to the imagination of Miss Soulsby.  The landings on the first and second floors were named after her favourite countries – Spain, Italy, France, Greece, etc – and the rooms were named accordingly.  Mary seems to have been in an Algerian section, sleeping in the room called Timgad, which led out of Tiemcen.  The 6th form room was called Byzantium.  The passage by the garden door where girls could read the Illustrated London News was called The Fourth Estate.  I see from a map I found amongst Katharine Stubbs’ papers that the naming extended to the garden, where could be found Bunyan’s Arbour, Little Gidding, Tigris, Arabia and a path named Path to Fairyland and St Hilda’s.

We were placed in classes for sitting, standing and walking.  I soon acquired a more poker-like posture, but my walk was beyond either threats or entreaties.  We were exhorted to strive to be Harebells, which involved always being very straight-backed, courteous and tidy and thus gaining the right to wear a brooch with a harebell upon it. 

At the beginning of every term came the ceremony of obtaining a motto for your cubicle.  “Ich Dien” and “Noblesse Oblige” were the most popular, but “I can because I must and by God’s help I will” was quite a good second.  The mysterious “Here Stand I.  I can no other,” and “Here or nowhere is America,” were low on the list.  “Don’t think of the carriage-in-pair in front but the donkey-cart behind” was deservedly rejected, and “He is so much in love with misery who likes to sit down on his own little handful of thorns” (a most uncomfortable bed-time thought) was at the very bottom.  Miss Soulsby’s passion for mottoes ran riot in every corner but was there or was there not a glint of humour in putting “E’en the light harebell lifts its head exultant from her airy tread” over the school’s main staircase?   

Miss Soulsby was present in person and we were told to bow or curtsey low to her when we entered the drawing-room.  Distracted by seeing a youthful mistress appearing, far too daringly, as an ancient Briton in a hearthrug, bangles and enough brown stain to render Dominion bathroom unusable for days, and hampered by shortsight, I prostrated myself before the only strange lady in view, who turned out to be the Normanbys' governess, who was visiting Katharine Phipps [daughter of Lord Normanby], only to be later confronted by a prodigious vision in a Mary Queen of Scots mantilla, who was obviously the great Lucy S.

There is a photograph of Miss Soulsby in the mantilla on the Brent Museum & Archives website.

The Sunday routine sounds particularly uninviting:

A Manor House Sunday began for those who had not been to Early Service, with shortened prayers before breakfast and after breakfast a promenade round the grounds as on weekdays, only always with hats on because of it's being Sunday.  This was known as First Walk. 

Then we sat in the schoolroom and learned alternate verses of a poem from The Christian Year, then we were herded into the Chapel for Morning Service ending abruptly with Ante-Communion but no communion to follow.  After this came Long Walk which was the only walk taken outside the garden, and the neighbourhood was so dreary that this hardly caused surprise.   

Then we stood in twos in the schoolroom and said our verses from The Christian Year.  After lunch came First Sweet Walk, round and round the garden again, everyone with hats on.  Then the actual sweet-eating, an unseemly exhibition in the Boot-room where you were often unable to have any of your own sweets as they had to be universally distributed and greedy people always asked if they could take two.  Then there was the Second Sweet Walk, followed by the oasis of silent reading from which we were rushed to Chapel for Church History or some such.   

Then tea, and after tea we all took chairs and trailed into the drawing-room where there was hymn-singing (it was amazing that in a finishing-school where so much weight was given to music there was hardly a girl who could play for this adequately).   

After hymn-singing there were readings from George Herbert and The Pilgrim's Progress, Miss Abbott having previously recorded the Stars of each block-house on a special board prepared by the Bell-ringer and had a good stare at any star-losing culprit, who had to stand up for the purpose.   

Then we went back to our class-rooms and wrote our home letters.  Then we had supper and some more improving reading in the drawing-room and then went, exhausted, to bed.  

Only one girl in the Sixth Form in Mary’s time passed Matriculation.  It is cheering to note that Miss Soulsby’s strong aversion to women’s suffrage had no effect on the girls of Mary Hurst’s time.  She herself was already very politically aware and her father Gerald Berkeley Hurst, Conservative MP for Moss Side, Manchester, always impressed upon his daughters and granddaughters that they must vote, because women had died for them to be entitled to do so.  Katharine Stubbs, on leaving school, went and helped a friend’s family electioneering in Eastbourne, while Katharine Phipps, always known to her schoolfriends as a Communist, went to work in the East End at the Camberwell settlement.

Miss Soulsby died on 19 May 1926, and the school continued – but with something of a change of direction.  It was examined and approved by the Board of Education and it gained a science laboratory.

The school went on to have several new manifestations.  

In 1934, after a move from Brondesbury to Cranleigh, Surrey, it became known as Brondesbury-at-Nanhurst.  Brondesbury Manor House, described as “shabby-looking”, was bought by a builder and demolished to make way for housing.  In 1941 the school evacuated to Shakenhurst Hall in Cleobury Mortimer, Shropshire.  The following year it moved again, to Stocks House near Tring, where it became known as Brondesbury-at-Stocks.

And it was there that Miss Clarke’s school at last came to an end in 1972.

Sources: 

Unpublished memoirs of Mary Hurst

Information sent to Katharine Hill née Stubbs in 1987 by the Grange Museum, London Borough of Brent: copy of the Silver Jubilee issue of the Brondesbury Magazine 1930

Notes left by Margaret Isobel Stubbs née Buchannan

Photographs by Katharine Stubbs

Toft Hill Farm, Hutton Rudby in 1728

An early glimpse of Toft Hill Farm, off Black Horse Lane, Hutton Rudby:

Newcastle Courant, 29 June 1728

To be SOLD

A Convenient Farm called Toft-hill, containing about 100 Acres of very good arable, meadow, and pasture Ground, well Fenced and Watered, and lying altogether nigh Hutton Rudby, being Freehold Lands, and of the yearly Value 47 l. or thereabouts; Whoever is desirous of purchasing the same, may apply to Mr John Preston of Stokesley Attorney at Law, or to Mr Anthony Aysley of Hutton Locrass [Lowcross], who will treat about the Sale thereof.

New Close Farm, Hutton Rudby in 1806

York Herald, 8 March 1806

CLEVELAND

TO BE SOLD BY AUCTION 

On TUESDAY the FIRST day of April next, at THOMAS SMITH'S, the GOLDEN LION, Stokesley, in the county of York, at FOUR o'clock in the afternoon 

A VALUABLE and DESIRABLE FREEHOLD ESTATE, situate at HUTTON RUDBY, in Cleveland, in the county of York, at an easy distance from Cleveland Port, the Town and Port of Stockton on Tees, the Market Towns of Northallerton, Thirsk, Stokesley, and Yarm; late the residence of Mr JAMES APPLETON, and now in the occupation of THOMAS KELSEY, consisting of a genteel, modern, well-built DWELLING-HOUSE, with convenient and extensive Barns, Stables, and Outoffices, all in most excellent repair, and ONE HUNDRED and FORTY-TWO Acres, by estimation, of valuable Arable, Meadow, and Pasture LAND; the whole forming a most desirable residence for a Gentleman Farmer. 

For particulars apply to Mr JAMES APPLETON, of Nunthorpe, near Stokesley, or of Mr WARDELL, Attorney, Guisbrough*.

March 6, 1806

New Close Farm, which is still a Valuable and Desirable residence but no longer a working farm, as it has only 20 acres, lies south of Hutton Rudby, off Black Horse Lane.

*Not so much a typo as one of the variant spelling of Guisborough during the C19

Papers deposited at NYCRO

I have now deposited all the papers relating to John Richard Stubbs with the North Yorkshire County Record Office.

The deposit includes his diaries and also family letters mainly from the 1870s.  The letters from Ellis Macfarlane of Helensburgh written during their engagement and in the early years of their marriage are particularly lively and interesting, as are the letters from John's mother.

Anne Weatherill's diary from 1863 – which is such a tiny scrap of a document that over the years the family has had several moments of fearing we had lost it – is now also safely at NYCRO, I'm glad to say!

William King Weatherill of Guisborough: a sad story

Far off in Sydney, Australia, Richard Ord Todd and his aunt Isabella had photographs of her nephew William King Weatherill of Guisborough and his children.

(William was the brother of Annie Weatherill, whose diary I posted on 1 December 2012.)

William King Weatherill was born on 22 November 1844. These photos, taken in Harrogate, show him apparently in the prime of life and with everything before him.

William King Weatherill (1844-77)

He was married to Hannah Maria Pickersgill and they had two children.

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Here is his son Thomas, and below, his daughter Mary. 

But William had known a good deal of sadness.

The Ords of Guisborough

Richard Ord Toddwas born in Guisborough.  His mother was Elizabeth Mary Poynter, the daughter of John Poynter and Ann Ord.  Here she is, with her husband Edward:

Edward and Elizabeth Todd

So the Revd Richard Ord Todd of Sydney was connected to the Ords of Guisborough, and the family photographs in Australia include pictures of the Ords.

The family is best remembered now for its most famous member, John Walker Ord, author of A History of Cleveland:

John Walker Ord

John Walker Ord was the son of Richard Ord (1783-1879), a tanner and leather merchant, prominent in the public life of Guisborough, whose obituary in the Whitby Gazette records

The deceased whilst in the prime of life took a great interest in everything relating to the welfare of the town – was connected with nearly every public body in the district, and for over twenty years was vice-chairman of the Guisborough Guardians.  In politics he was a Liberal, and was a great support to the local party in the stirring times of the reform agitation.  

Richard Ord (1783-1879)

Richard Ord's wife was Ann Walker, whose great grandmother was the Dame Walker who is said to have taught Captain James Cook to read as a boy.

At least, that's what his obituary says but my Australian contact has pointed out :

I know that the obituary of Richard Ord states he married Ann Walker, the great great granddaughter of Dame Walker however her name was Ann Ovington and Richard and Ann were married 20 Jun 1805, her parents were William Ovington and mother Elizabeth Wood. Ann's grandparents were William Ovington Snr and Ann Walker the daughter of Dame Walker.

Another of their sons was Richard Ord junior (1807-77).  He was a currier and leather-seller, for many years an Alderman of Stockton and Mayor of the town in 1865.  Although of retiring disposition and having suffered some ill health he was a justice of the peace until his death.  He died at his home in Bowesfield Lane in October 1877.

Richard Ord jnr (1807-77)

The photographs show that Richard Ord senior was a keen supporter of cricket in Guisborough.  He he is (back, right) with the Cricket Team:

Guisborough Cricket Team

The family of the Revd Thomas Todd, Rector of Kildale

In February 2013 I mentioned the family of the Revd Thomas Todd, Rector of Kildale, and his wife Elizabeth Jackson.  She was born in Wilton, the eldest daughter of George Jackson of Lackenby and his wife Margaret Rowland.

Widowed at the age of 52, Elizabeth left Cleveland to join her married daughter Margaret on the Isle of Man.  She was accompanied by her two unmarried daughters, Isabella and Rhoda, and the infant motherless children of her eldest son, Edward.

Isabella and her nephew Richard Ord Todd both emigrated to Australia, and it's from there that I have been very glad to receive a selection of Todd family photographs taken in Yorkshire, the Isle of Man and Australia.  They came to my correspondent via her mother from the last survivor of the Todds there.

Here is Mrs Elizabeth Todd, in her new life on the Isle of Man:

Mrs Elizabeth Todd 1808-79

And here is her daughter Isabella.  She went out to Australia as a governess in 1880, a few years after this photo was taken:

Isabella Mary Todd 1837-1907

Here is her younger sister Rhoda.  She was the principal of the Cleveland Private School at Douglas, IoM, and this photograph shows her looking appropriately scholarly:

Rhoda Anne Todd 1839-1927

I think that these two girls, photographed at the studio of G. Wallis, Union Place, Whitby, look very like Isabella and Rhoda, but I leave it to readers to judge for themselves:

My Australian contact points out that they can't be - the photo must date from after 1860 and they would be older than that.  But they certainly look like Todds!

Their eldest brother Edward Todd was a chemist & druggist.  On 17 October 1861 he married Elizabeth Mary Poynter (1841-66) in Guisborough.  She died on 2 July 1866 leaving Edward with a two-year-old daughter and a three-month-old boy, Annie and Richard.

Here are Edward and Elizabeth in happier days:

Edward Todd and his wife Elizabeth Poynter

Edward must have found himself unable to manage with his little children and so entrusted them to the care of his widowed mother and spinster sisters.

I think the photograph below must have been taken after Elizabeth's death.  Certainly Edward looks more careworn here, and he is accompanied not by his young wife, but by his dog.  Perhaps his mother wanted a photograph of him to take with her when she left for the Isle of Man with his little children:

Edward Todd 1834-1916

Ten years after Elizabeth's death, Edward remarried in Wolverhampton.  He and his wife Margaret Griffiths had two children, Frederick John Todd (1878-1939)and Elizabeth Margaret Todd (1881-1950).

His first son, Richard Ord Todd, became a bank clerk.  Here he is, photographed as a young man on the Isle of Man:

Richard Ord Todd 1866-1953

Local solicitors and World War One

The Record of Service of Solicitors & Articled Clerks with His Majesty's Forces, 1914-9 contains a list of lawyers who served during the First World War.

It isn't complete.  This can be seen from the fact that it does not include George William Wynne Barnley of the Royal Garrison Artillery.  He was one of the local solicitors to win the Military Cross (four more are listed below).

George William Wynne Barnley was the son of George Edward Barnley, solicitor, and his wife Emily.  The elder Mr George Barnley was born in Teignmouth, Devon; the younger was born in Middlesbrough in 1883.  The 1911 Census finds the family living in Danby. 

Edinburgh Gazette, 26 September 1918
Capt. (A./Maj.) George William Wynne Barnley, M.C., R.G.A.
For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty in command of his battery.  By his untiring energy and skilful arrangements the battery occupied many positions during the retreat, and was brought out of very difficult situations without the loss of guns, stores or transport.  It never failed to answer all calls made for maintenance of fire in support of infantry.
(M.C. gazetted 3rd June, 1918) 

Northumbrian Heavy Battery RGA - GWW Barnley is 2nd from left

This story was told with great affection by those who knew him: 
George Barnley suffered from a slight stammer.  On one occasion he led his men forward with the cry, "F-f-follow m-me, men!" and disappeared into a water-filled crater, from where he could be heard to shout, "D-don't b-bloody well f-follow me here!"

Old picture postcards

More from Ellis Stubbs' postcard album:

Guisborough Priory and Lily Pond

Old Ormesby

Roseberry Topping

Trafalgar Terrace,Coatham

Loch Katrine

High Row, Reeth

Sandsend

(Sorry about the sloppy photography - I was watching the Tour de France in the Dales at the time!)

Jacques-Emile Blanche

I've just added this update to the post on The 'Skirt Dance' of the two Savile Clarke girls:

Update 4 July 2014: for information on Jacques-Emile Blanche, see Artist in Focus (July 2014) on the Public Catalogue Foundation website

Women's Institute Drama Festival held at the Middlesbrough Little Theatre, 5 May 1956

Bolton-on-Swale
In Merry Wives of Windsor

F Crankshaw
J Gibson
R Heylings
R Hills
E Shield
K Barber
H Gibson
J Nelson
K Chapman
N Mason
J Hills
W K Gibson

Melsonby
In Mary Frobisher by F Sladen-Smith

K Dunn
N Hawitt
M Gregory
I Elliott
G Milner
G Simpson
M Dodsworth
J Morton

Guisborough
In Closed Windows by Nora Ratcliff

E Taylor
E Payne
M Pilkington
C Oliver
A Armin
K Jackson

Well & Snape
In Two of Us by Elma Verity and Jack Last

F Bell
G Sampson
F Nelson
M Craddock
J Dawson
D H Owen

Hutton Rudby
In Mad Hatters in Mayfair by Barbara Van Campen

I Shore
C Honeyman
A Atkinson
J Hardcastle
H Carpenter
R Swales
P Deacon
M C Reauley

Nunthorpe
In Staff Room by Albert Claydon

B Colwell
R Masters
J C Marr
M Stubbs
M Ballingall
P Bilton
K Marr
E Winney

North Cowton
In Women within Walls by A J Bradbury

G Stevenson
C Bainbridge
J Murray
M Marley
D Allison
A M Boddye

Hutton Bonville
In One Crowded Hour by Conrad Carter

K Donald
M Duffield
R Donald
M Andrews
M Bosomworth
D Bell
M Foster
D Porritt

A further detail to the story of Kitty Martineau

I have just found a note – as I continue to go through the last of my papers – to add to the story of Katherine Dawson Martineau, as told in the story of Helen Savile Clarke and her daughters.  (The series of posts on Henry Savile Clarke, his wife Helen Weatherill and their daughters begin here)

Kitty, a beauty with "violet eyes," died a few days after the birth of her son Esmond, on 7 December 1901.  She was looking quite well and was receiving visitors, when she called, "Nurse! nurse!" and died.

The story comes from her second cousin Madge Buchannan and may be true.

Her death certificate gives the cause of death as:

Alcoholism, eight months
Child Birth, four days
Acute Uraemia, four days
certified by Robert Boxall, M.D., of 40 Portland Place, Marylebone, present at the death

I didn't include this detail in the original piece, partly as I felt unqualified to comment on it, and partly because I couldn't quite bring myself to do so at the time.

On looking into it further, I think all I can comment is:

As far as I understand, "uraemia" is a term which was first used in 1840 to describe a patient in renal failure.  In this case it may be more an observation of symptoms than a diagnosis.  I notice that the Revised US Standard Certificate of Death instructions to be found in Mortality Statistics, vol 9 by the US Board of Census (1909), states

“Never report mere symptoms or terminal conditions such as […] “Uraemia” […] when a definite disease can be ascertained as the cause.  Always qualify all diseases resulting from childbirth or miscarriage."

I think all that can be ascertained (in the absence of someone experienced in historical medical terminology) is that she died four days after child birth and that her kidneys had probably failed.  

And to think of that beautiful woman, who had lost her parents and her sisters so suddenly and in such a short space of time, suffering from alcoholism through her pregnancy – that's just too sad to comment on.

The family of the Revd Henry Clarke of Guisborough (1813-61)

I have just come across these notes made by the late Miss Grace Dixon, noted Guisborough historian.  They end with a lovely reminiscence of Guisborough in the early twentieth century:

Henry Clarke, master mariner of Whitby, died 1780.  Wife was Joan.

Henry Clarke, only son (presumably to have survived infancy?) married Elizabeth, who was buried in Guisborough 30/7/1827 aged 79, described as "widow of H. Clarke, late of Whitby"

Henry Clarke, solicitor, (1785-1862) married Elizabeth Hutchinson of Guisborough in 1811.  He had a brother John and 3 sisters.  He was in Guisborough in the early C19.
Elizabeth was born Guisborough and died 1862, aged 75, one week after her husband's death.
Both were buried in Guisborough.

Reverend Henry Clarke (1813-1861) not born Guisborough, married (1840) Catherine Francis Dawson, b Ripon.  She died 1852 aged 33.  First wife.

Children:

Henry Savile, b1841 married Helen Weatherill; 3 daughters [he was baptised Henry Clarke - the name Savile appears later]
John William "Jock" (1842-1921) married Marjorie Gow of Cambs in 1877; no children
Rev Arthur Dawson b1843, living 1922.  Became priest in 1883, but in holy orders only until 1889
Francis (1845-1900) Professor of Music in Guisborough [he was baptised Francis Savile Clarke]
Cecil James b1846
Catherine b1849

Reverend Henry married as his second wife Ann Louise Weatherill in 1857.  He became incumbent of St Nicholas, Guisborough, in 1836 when two of the Williamson family, father and son, curates, died of cholera.
He was the first incumbent to inhabit the new parsonage of Guisborough from 1859 but did not live to see it become a Rectory.
A plaque in Latin was erected to his memory on the south side of the chancel in the church.
Ann Louise Clarke survived her husband and remarried.

John William Clarke was the Land Agent to the Gisborough estate, and must have had many differences of opinion with Wm Richardson in the latter's work for Guisborough Council.  Mrs Channon [the late Mrs Diana Channon, daughter of William Richardson] remembers seeing Mr Clarke

"turn out of his stable yard at Kemplah House to go up to Gisborough Hall in a dogcart with a 'Tiger' with top hat and cockade on the back seat and a dalmatian dog running underneath.  All of them (except the dog) suitably clad.  A lovely sight."

23 February 2021:  Another detail on the Revd Henry Clarke

The Revd Henry Clarke, who had been appointed to the perpetual curacy of Guisborough in 1836, married Catherine Frances Dawson, daughter of the late William Dawson of Azerley Hall near Ripon, on 13 May 1840 at Guisborough.

A note in the Walter Brelstaff Archive shows that there is a memorial on the wall of the south aisle of Guisborough parish church to a Mrs Anne Pullan, who died on 24 January 1838 at the age of 42.  She was the widow of William Dawson of Azerley Hall when she married Edward Pullan of Skelton.  This probably explains how Catherine Dawson came to Cleveland.

Arthur John Richardson of Guisborough 1895-1915

This verse was found by the late Miss Grace Dixon among the Chaloner papers, according to a note in my files.

It relates to "Jock" Richardson of Miltoun House, Guisborough.  He was in barracks in Newcastle, training for the Front, when he died of meningitis a few weeks before his twentieth birthday.

The lines, written by his great-uncle George Buchannan of Whitby, must echo the feelings of many families whose loved ones died in uniform, but not in action:

2nd Lieut. A. J. B. (Jock) Richardson

Obt. Jan. 4th, 1915

Not on the battle field, yet none the less

He died for England: in her hour of stress

And peril, his young life he freely gave,

And rests with honour in his quiet grave.

News from Guisborough & Stockton: January 1877

From The Weekly Exchange
(price One Penny)

Thursday 25 January 1877

LOCAL AND DISTRICT NEWS

GUISBOROUGH

MARRIAGE OF MR J W CLARKE. -
The bells of the Parish Church rang merrily last Thursday in celebration of the wedding of Mr J W Clarke, agent to Admiral Chaloner, and Miss Marjorie Gow, daughter of Mr Gow, agent to Sir Walter Trevelyan, Northumberland.  The marriage took place at St George's Chapel, Hanover-square, London.

Jock Clarke was a son of the Revd Henry Clarke of Guisborough (1831-61) and brother of author and journalist Henry Savile Clarke.

................................

STOCKTON

NIGHT TURNED TO DAY AT TEES-SIDE IRONWORKS.

A scientific novelty has been brought to the aid of our local industry.  A few evenings ago, passengers by the Quayside at Stockton or over the bridge may have been a little startled by the perception of a brilliant light located on the southern side of the river.   It was not like a flare, nor the glare of a furnace; and gas, or any ordinary illuminator, was out of the question.

It was the novelty of which I have spoken.  Messrs Head and Wrightson having a pressure of work on hand, and short days to do it in, bethought them of the beautiful expedient by which Messrs Hopkins, Gilkes and Co. have turned night into day for convenience in the building of Tay Bridge.

This they have done by the use of two of Gramme's electro-magnetic machines, which are fixed in a building close to the foundry engine and driven from it.  The electric current so generated is conveyed through insulated wires to two of Serrin's lamps, which are fixed in sentry boxes on the top of the hill overlooking the works.  Each of the lamps gives the light of a thousand candles, which is cast by a parbolic [sic] reflector in the direction required.  

Work proceeds in the night almost as freely as in the daytime; and the range of the illumination may be judeged of by the fact that in the hours of darkness the time can be read on a watch two miles away from the lamps.  On a smaller scale, Messrs Head and Wrightson have called into requisition the electric light.  They are perfectly satisfied, I understand, with their experimental lighting up on the occasion mentioned, though the important adjunt, a reflector, was wanting; and I believe it is their intention to perfect the apparatus for ordinary use.  I expect the example will be widely followed. - "Local Gossip," South Durham and Cleveland Mercury

The Middlesbrough Weekly Exchange: news of Cleveland industry, 1 March 1877

from The Weekly Exchange
(Price One Penny)

1 March 1877

CLEVELAND IRON MARKET
MIDDLESBRO', TUESDAY

The iron market was but thinly attended to-day, and there was not much business transacted.  Prices are still tending downwards owing to the want of enquiry, the following being the quotations: – No. 1, 48s; No. 3, 44s 6d, f.o.b.; No. 4, 43s 6d; forge 43s net; truck brands 6d less, Bars very flat, but no specifications are coming to hand.  Plates keep firm as makers have work in hand.


EXPLOSION AT MIDDLESBROUGH
EIGHT PERSONS INJURED

Shortly before seven o'clock on Wednesday morning an explosion occurred at Messrs Hopkins, Gilkes, and Co's Teesside Ironworks, Middlesbrough.  Although the explosion is not accompanied by much injury to property, yet the results were such as to place the lives of eight persons in jeopardy.

At the time named a number of men employed in their works were sitting around a ball furnace getting their breakfast before commencing work, when a portion of refuse from the iron in the furnace, which is known as "tap" or "cinder," fell out of the furnace into the ash hole, which is always supplied with water; and the "tap" being heated to such an intensity that it ran like water; an explosion at once took place, and inflicted scalds and burns on a boy named Jeremiah Modigan and seven men, named John Barrit, Thomas Reddan, Michael McManus, Arthur Lochrane, Owen Thomas, John Shean, and Francis Fillijalick.

The two last-named were taken to their homes, their injuries not being so severe, but the other six were very severely burned, and they were conveyed to the North Riding Infirmary.


GUISBOROUGH
ACCIDENT AT CHALONER MINE

While a man named William Smith was charging a hole he had drilled in the ironstone with powder, preparatory to firing it, by some means the powder caught fire, and exploded, completely blowing the man over and seriously injuring his face, which got dreadfully burnt.  He was afterwards removed to the Miner's Accident Hospital at Guisborough.


NORTH RIDING INFIRMARY. – Report for week ending Feb 23, 1877. – In-patients – admitted during the week, 6; discharged cured, 3; relieved, 1; died, 0; remaining in the house, 41.  Out-patients: New cases, 17; number attended this week, 109.  The following contributions are thankfully acknowledged:- B Samuelson and Co (firm), £30; papers and periodicals from Mrs Bolckow, Messrs R Simpson, H G Reid, Burnett and Hood, the Middlesbrough Printing Co., and the Railway Station boxes.


SUPPOSED LOSS OF A TEES BUILT STEAMER WITH ALL HANDS

Lloyd's Committee has posted the screwsteamer James Mason as missing.  She sailed from Cardiff with a cargo of coals for Gibraltar, and has not been seen since.  She was a steamer of 870 tons gross, 99 nominal h.p., built at Middlesbrough in 1872 classed 100 A1 at Lloyd's, and owned by Messrs Dixon and Harris, of London.  She was worth about £18,000, and her cargo about £12,000.

Sanitary matters in Guisborough, 1877

Glimpses of the work of local government from 1877:

From The Weekly Exchange
(price One Penny)

Thursday 25 January 1877

TO SCAVENGERS AND OTHERS,

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN, that the Local Board for the District of Guisbro', in the County of York, are prepared to receive TENDERS for the removal of house refuse from premises, and the cleansing of earth closets, privies, ashpits, and cesspools, and for the carting away of street sweepings within their district for twelve months, commencing on the 1st March next, on either or both of the following conditions, viz:-

1.  The refuse, night soil, ashes, manure, &c., so removed to be the property of the contractor
2.  The same to be the property of the Board.  All the manure and other matters aforesaid must be removed to the Board's depot, and in a proper cart or carts provided for them.

The Contractor will be required to enter into an agreement with the Board for the due performance of his duties, a draft of which agreement can be seen at my office at any time between the hours of 10am and 4pm.
Sealed Tenders to be sent in to me on or before the 26th inst.

MICHAEL HUNT, Surveyor,
Fountain-street, Guisbrough

From The Weekly Exchange
(price One Penny)

Thursday 1 March 1877

GUISBRO' RURAL SANITARY AUTHORITY

The usual fortnightly meeting of the Authority was held on Tuesday, Mr D T Petch in the chair.  Mr Cully, the Government Inspector for the Northern District was present, and there was a larger attendance of Guardians than usual.

The Clerk (Mr Buchannan) reported that proceedings for the closing of Agaer's property at Coatham, were pending before the magistrates.  Mr Coulson had connected his drain at Coatham.  Mr Semple had asked if the Board had assumed the responsibility of keeping the drain in order, when he (the clerk) had informed him that the junction had been made by order of the Authority, and the Authority were prepared to bear the onus of the act.  In the matter of Harrison's claim for surveying Moorsholm, the clerk was instructed to offer him again the sum of £6. 2s in full settlement of his claim without prejudice.

Mr Cully then addressed the Board at considerable length on the extension of the district of the Medical Officer.  Stokesley, South Stockton and Redcar ought to be included in the district, and he thought the Local Government Board would use pressure to compel them to come in.  The district with these extensions would be a workable one, and might be effficiently superintended and more economically than the present more restricted district.

When these alterations were made, Mr Cully pointed out that it would be best for the Authority to engage their Medical Officer for a term of years.  He proposed a meeting of representatives from the Guardians and Local Board interested at Middlesbrough, perhaps on Wednesday next.  When he met these representatives he would be better prepared to lay the scheme before them.

Some further discussion having taken place on the matter, the report of the Medical Officer (Dr Keith) was read and adopted.  A death from typhoid fever was reported as having occurred in Pearl-street, Saltburn, and the officer was of opinion it had arisen from the air being poisoned with sewer gas.  The owner had intimated his willingness to have the whole of the house drainage ventilated and put in an efficient state.

The call upon the various townships in the district of the Authority was signed, the total amount being £297. 16s. 4d. for special, and £795 for general expenses.  This was the whole of the business.

Local solicitors in 1886

from Waterlow Bros & Layton’s Legal Diary and Almanac for 1886

Extracted from:

List of Country Solicitors
Corrected by comparison with the Roll of the Incorporated Law Society; the list of Commissioners to administer oaths, and list of Perpetual Commissioners, and from direct correspondence

Perpetual commissioners were those appointed to take acknowledgments of deeds made by married women.  This finally became unnecessary after the Married Women's Property Act 1882.

The year stated against each entry is the date of admission to the Roll.  

The name in brackets is that of the firm, but it is not always stated.  

The name in italics is that of the firm of solicitors that acted as the solicitor’s London agents.

Coatham, near Redcar (Yorks.)

Meek, J M (M.A.) – 1872, p. com. and at Middlesborough ..... Adam Burn

Spry, S – 1876, com. oaths, and at Middlesbrough and South Bank ..... Williamson, Hill & Co

Wethey, R E – 1884, 5, Albert-road, and at Middlesboro' ..... Smiles & Co


Guisborough (Yorksh.)

Buchannan, A – 1870, com. oaths, clerk to lieutenancy of North Riding, coroner for Langbaurgh East district, clerk to guardians and rural sanitary authority, clk. to Guisbro’ local and burial bd., Guisbro’ school bd., Skelton local bd. and burial bd., and Brotton local bd., hon. sec. South Durham and North Yorkshire law soc., solr. to Guisbro’ and dis. bldg. soc ..... Pitman & Son

Carrick, W L – 1880 ..... Gray & Mounsey

Ord, C O – 1840, p. com., com. oaths ..... R M & F Lowe

Richardson, W – 1882 ..... Pitman & Son

Trevor, W C – 1866, p. com., com. oaths, deputy clk. of the peace for North Riding, clk. to mags. for div. of Langbaurgh East, and at Northallerton ..... R M & F Lowe


Hutton Rudby (Yorks.)

Kindler, A W – 1882, and at Stockton-on-Tees ..... H F Wood

People of Hutton Rudby in the C18/19: Mease to Mundale

... from my working notes ... accuracy not guaranteed ... for explanatory note, see post of 14 Feb 2013



Mease

Update 29 Feb 2020:  John Mease bought the disused buildings of the Hutton paper mill and installed machinery for a water-powered flax-mill in 1834.  For a full account, see Hutton Rudby 1834-1849: the Flax-Spinning Mill by the bridge

For an account of Thomas Mease and the flax-spinning mills of Stokesley, see the series of articles posted on 29 Feb 2020 beginning The linen mills of Stokesley & Hutton Rudby: 1823-1908

John Mease’s grandfather Solomon Mease (1731-1801) b Great Ayton, married Jane Humphrey and had 4 children.  He was the son of a weaver and trained as a weaver himself.  He inherited money and his wife brought him a good portion, but in the words of his son John, his “love for cards and drink was such that he was sold up in a few years”.  He joined the army and served as a sergeant in the American Wars.  Solomon’s son John Mease (1767-1849) was a grocer in Stokesley.  He married Isabella Turnbull, and they had 5 children:  Thomas, Isabella, John, Rachel and Mary.  His very interesting diary contains many references to the religious problems of the day and to Methodism.

Joseph Mellanby Mease (1827-1928) was the son of Thomas Mease, John's elder brother.  Well-educated and well-read, he had lost an arm in an accident in one of his father’s flour mills – according to a newspaper article written in his old age, it was the Hutton mill.  Joseph Mease was chief clerk at the chemical works in Jarrow owned by a member of the family.  He came to the village in 1858 as manager of a corn mill “on the site on which the police-constable’s house now stands”.  Three years later he lost his arm through his sleeve being caught in the machinery.

Joseph Mease’s wife ran a school, assisted by her daughter Jenny.  Mrs Mease’s school is mentioned in the Hutton School log book in 1879.

1841 Census:  John Mease 40 merchant and Mary Mease 30 and Edward 4 (not born in county) in the household of Thomas Pilter

11 May 1868:  Codling mortgage:  North Side ppty bounded by John Mease to W and Miss Righton and George Davison to E, and occupied by James Stephenson

1872 Post Office Directory:  Rudby:  Joseph Mellanby Mease, registrar of births & deaths

“Given by Mr Mease” 2s 6d “Sacrament Money” in Lent 1873

John Mease died 1876 and his wife Hannah Maria Geldart in 1851:  tablet in church

Joseph Mellanby Mease was the registrar who recorded the death of Mr Barlow in 1878.  
In ‘Northern Primitive Methodism’, there is a reference to a Mr  Mellanby in Greenhow.

EB 38:  1816:  Henry Mellanby of Stockton gent was witness