This is the sort of thing that one always hopes for – in 2013 I posted the Whaling Journal 1774 of Thomas Atkinson of Kirkleatham and articles about the Atkinson family of Scaling Dam. And recently I was contacted by Stella Richmond Sterry, a descendant of Thomas's sister Jane Galilee (as I am myself) – but she has the family Bible!
And so, armed with all that lovely information, I've been able to do more research on the family. I hope it's (a) of interest and (b) of use to people who are trying to disentangle their own Cleveland Atkinsons.
An extra bonus for me is that I get to go back again to the Civil Wars, which I left reluctantly after finishing work on Alice Wandesford in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms
………
The young Thomas Atkinson who took the whaling voyage in 1774 (you can find it here) was the eldest son of Thomas Atkinson (1722-92), Master of Sir William Turner's Hospital at Kirkleatham.
In 1788, towards the end of his life, Thomas Atkinson senior repaired his father's family Bible, which had been damaged after his father's death in 1755. And in it, very wisely, he left a written record which he entitled "From Oral Tradition". He began with the story of his great-grandfather Atkinson, who was a soldier in the Parliamentarian Army during the Civil Wars – the Wars of the Three Kingdoms – and who lived afterwards at Scaling Dam.
Scaling Dam was (and is) a hamlet more or less half way along the moors road between Guisborough and Whitby. Then, the North Riding of Yorkshire was thinly populated and the moors were wide and empty. The antiquarian Ralph Thoresby, F.R.S., (1658-1725) took the moors road in November 1682 and didn't like it at all, recording in his diary that he travelled "over the rotten Moors for many miles without anything observable."
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The hamlet's name doesn't come from the reservoir which was built there in the 1950s – it appears, for example, as Skallingdam in the 1675 map of John Ogilby. I suspect the hamlet was given its name to show it was a sort of outpost of the village of Scaling but near the dam – the Dam Bridge can be seen on the map above. It was, of course, a very practical place for a settlement, being on the moors road at the junction with the road to Staithes. It isn't surprising to see that the 1888-1913 map shows both a pub and a smithy, both of which must have been there for very many years. Both Scaling and Scaling Dam were in the parish of Easington in Cleveland.
Atkinson the Parliamentarian Soldier
The family didn't remember the Soldier's Christian name, but knew that he had been at the battles of Marston Moor (1644), Naseby (1645), Preston (1648) and Dunbar (1650). The fact that Marston Moor seems to be his first major battle suggests the Soldier was a Northerner, and the fact that he spent the rest of his life in Scaling Dam seems to me to show that he was almost certainly an East Cleveland man. It's hard to think an outsider would find his way to Scaling Dam in the middle of the 17th century.
The Soldier used to talk of the battle of Dunbar, Oliver Cromwell's miracle victory. The histories say that when the right wing of Scottish cavalry broke under the English attack, Oliver Cromwell and General Lambert didn't allow the English troopers to go in pursuit and, as the troopers regrouped, they sang the 117th Psalm
O praise the Lord, all ye nations:
praise him, all ye people.
For his merciful kindness is great toward us:
and the truth of the Lord endureth for ever.
When the Soldier looked back on the battle, Thomas wrote, he used to say of the singing
their Notes were more pleasing to Him who is the Giver of all Victory than the Clashing of Swords and roaring of Canon.
The Soldier was very probably a member of one of Cleveland’s Trained Bands, the local militias made up of householders and their sons, who were obliged to turn out when summoned for training and action. The ability to read and write was spreading fast among the common people at this time, but the sort of family that was liable for Trained Band service would certainly produce a literate man like the Soldier, whose constant reading of Scripture led him to have, as Thomas wrote, "the Bible and Testament almost by Heart".
Soldier Atkinson was in the minority in the North Riding of Yorkshire, which was almost entirely Royalist in sympathy – though many, if not most, people didn't want to choose a side at all and simply wanted to be left in peace. The North Riding gentlemen who supported Parliament had a difficult time raising troops and the troops, when assembled, weren't keen. Sir Henry Foulis reported that a Cleveland foot regiment that had mustered 500 men at Yarm had rapidly dwindled to 80 at the approach of the enemy. (see War in Yorkshire: 1642-1643)
Parliamentarian gentry included the Foulis brothers, whose father Sir David Foulis had been put in the Fleet Prison for several years because he opposed the King’s man, Sir Thomas Wentworth (the story can be found here) but their family estates were at Ingleby on the western escarpment of the moors.
A Parliamentarian gentleman from the close neighbourhood of Scaling Dam was Nicholas Conyers. In fact he came from the parish of Easington itself, being the son of Nicholas Conyers of Boulby, and, like Soldier Atkinson, he was at Marston Moor. Two of his brothers died fighting for the King.
Nicholas Conyers was in the Scarborough garrison under Sir Hugh Cholmley of Whitby when Cholmley changed sides and took the town over to the Royalists in 1643.
Cholmley first made sure that anybody wanting to leave Scarborough before it became Royalist had left the town. Many did, including Nicholas Conyers. If Soldier Atkinson was there with Sir Hugh's forces, he too will have left for the Parliamentarian garrison at Hull.
Atkinson the Soldier was clearly one of the Godly – a Puritan – and committed to Parliament's cause. This makes him an interesting figure in the overwhelmingly Royalist North Riding. Perhaps there were many more like him among the ordinary men of Cleveland, but we only know about the gentry and we don't know how many of the Soldier's neighbours and relatives shared his views. And we don't know what his views were – how ardent a Puritan he was, how radical a Parliamentarian.
Thomas describes the Soldier as a subaltern. I've checked with Phil Philo (do not miss his new blog Of Things Trent-North) and this was not a term used at the time. I think all we can say for definite is that his family remembered that he had men under him. So he could have been a junior officer, or a sergeant or a corporal. Nor do we know if he fought in the foot or the cavalry.
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| Pikemen. Photo by John Beardsworth |
In the same way, Thomas thought that he lived to a very great age "being near a hundred before he died". This isn't any help in identifying him, as the Easington parish registers for the time are fragmentary and don't record the age anyway. But we can certainly say that he was notable in the area, with his past history of bloody and brutal warfare, his command of the Bible and his great age.
After the fighting stopped, everyone must have had to learn to live together and mend the divisions within families and neighbourhoods. It can't have been easy after so many deaths and so much destruction.
We don't know how the Soldier made his living before and after the wars, but we can guess that if his father was a farmer then he wasn't the eldest son, because then he would have been needed on the land. So he would have had a trade. At some point the Soldier married and had at least one son, whose name was John, who was "brought up to the business of a Tanner", so perhaps the Soldier was a tanner himself.
Tanning was a vital industry at this time, with leather necessary for so many things, from boots, shoes and gloves to horse collars, and Scaling Dam was a good place for the tanning process, with water from the Dam Beck nearby. Tanning was done in pits lined with timber. The bark of young coppiced oaks was used, or lime, and the process took time, hard manual labour and skill. Most villages had a leather worker and they were to be found in much larger numbers in towns. Tanners often farmed on the side.
John Atkinson, tanner of Scaling Dam (c1668-1729) & Jane Shepherd (1668-1728)
Thomas Atkinson perfectly remembered his grandparents, John and Jane. They died at about the same time when both were about 60 years old. A Jane Atkinson, wife of John, was buried at Easington on 2 September 1728 and a John Atkinson senior (they had a son called John) was buried on 13 April 1729. I feel confident that they are Thomas's grandparents. It's quite something to think that John saw the reigns of Charles II, James II, William & Mary, Anne, George I and George II.
John Atkinson the tanner was born in about 1668 – after the Restoration of King Charles II, and we wonder how the Soldier felt about that – so we can see that the Soldier may not have come home immediately after the battle of Dunbar in 1650. He may have stayed in the army for a while. And it may be that he was the John Atkinson who was buried at Easington on 23 January 1708.
John Atkinson the tanner married Jane Shepherd. Their grandson Thomas thought she was from Kildale, but she was born in the parish of Lythe. She was one of the daughters of Thomas Shipart/Shepherd of Barnby and she was baptised at Lythe on 29 October 1668. (East Barnby is about 6 miles from Scaling Dam, 1½ miles from Lythe.)
Thomas thought that his grandfather must also have had a sister, who married into the Storrs "of Newton or Barnby" because he remembered his father's cousins John, Henry and Thomas Storr. (Newton must mean Newton Mulgrave, about 4 miles from Scaling Dam in the direction of Runswick.) His grandfather might have had a sister – the Easington records are fragmentary. We don't know how many Atkinsons were living in the parish – there was more than one family by the 1720s – but there is a Mary Atkinson, daughter of John Atkinson of Scaling, who was baptised on 6 April 1667 and who might have been Thomas's great-aunt. But it was his grandmother's sister who married into the Storr family.
Aylce/Ellise Shepherd was another of Thomas Shepherd of Barnby's daughters. She was baptised at Lythe on 26 November 1665 and married Henry Storr at Lythe on 31 January 1681. The Lythe baptismal register lists three sons of Henry Storr: John 1695, Henry 1697 and Thomas 1693.
The children of John Atkinson & Jane Shepherd were, according to Thomas:
- William, who died a bachelor. (He possibly died in 1723: William son of John Atkinson was buried 26 January 1723)
- Mary
- John
- Daniel, who died a bachelor. (He possibly died in 1728: Daniel son of John Atkinson was buried 16 February 1728)
- Ann
- Thomas, born 25 Feb 1696 & baptised at Easington 8 March 1696 – this was Thomas's father
Thomas Atkinson (1696-1755) & Judith Pindar (c1693-?1774) of Scaling
The family Bible in which Thomas was recording "From Oral Tradition" had been bought by his father Thomas in 1728, when he was the father of a young family.
In the record of the family dates, Thomas's father wrote that he and Judith Pindar were married on May Day 1721. This might have been a slip of the pen – or it might have been deliberate. The Archbishop of York Marriage Licences Index shows that the date of the marriage licence obtained by Judeth Pinder was actually 27 March 1722.
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| St Mary the Virgin, Whitby by David Dixon |
Thomas senior carefully noted the day and hour of his children's births:
- Thomas Atkinson junr, born on Friday the 13th April between 9 and 10 at Night 1722 [& baptised 10 March 1722]
- Mary Atkinson, born on Wednesday the 5th of August about 10 o'clock in the Forenoon in the Year 1724
- William Atkinson, born on Friday the 19th of Augt between 10 and 11 o'clock in the Forenoon 1726 [& baptised 21 August 1726]
- John Atkinson, born on Saturday the 10th May between 4 and 5 in the Morning the Sun being about 8 on 10 Min: high. 1729. [& baptised 1 June 1729]
- Jane Atkinson, born on Tuesday the 23rd of February about 5 o'clock in the Morning 1730/1
- Isaac Atkinson, born the 5th of May it being Saturday abt half past 11 o'clock in the Forenoon 1733. [& baptised 3 June 1733]
- Margaret Atkinson, born on Monday the 4th of July at one o'clock in the Morning 1736. [& baptised 14 July 1736]
On 12 September 1788, when he wrote "From Oral Tradition", Thomas junior noted, "All these have been dead many years except Self and Sister Jane".
I think his younger sisters Mary and Margaret may have died young. A Margaret, daughter of Thomas Atkinson, was buried on 28 June 1737 – if she was Thomas's sister, she would have been less than a year old – and a Mary, daughter of Thomas Atkinson was buried 17 July 1741. If she had been Thomas's sister, she would have been nearly 17.
One terrible summer, after Thomas had been Master at Kirkleatham for 4 years, two of his brothers and his father died within weeks of each other. They were, Thomas wrote
swept away by an epidemical Fever which raged in the Neighbourhood of Skaling in the Summer of the Year 1755. My Father was buried on Midsummer Day, Isaac a few days before and John William about three weeks after him
The Easington parish registers record their burials:
Isaac, son of Thomas Atkinson of Scaling dam on 17 June 1755
Thomas Atkinson of Scaling dam on 24 June 1755
William Atkinson of Scaling dam on 13 July 1755
Isaac was 22, William was nearly 29 and their father was 59.
It must have been an appalling time for the family, and in the confusion afterwards the family Bible was quietly taken away from Thomas's mother by a man called Hudson. It was some time before Thomas could recover it and he found it was much defaced by Hudson and his children writing their names and "many Sentences too ridiculous to be seen in a Book of this Sort". The repair of the Bible was part of Thomas's project in 1788 when he wrote "From Oral Tradition".
His father had had no time to make a Will before his death – a pity for me as he almost certainly would have given his occupation – and so Thomas's mother Judith had to take out Letters of Administration on 14 August. So we don't know what Thomas senior did for a living, but the fact that he and two of his adult sons were all in Scaling Dam and caught the fever together suggests they worked together. Perhaps they farmed; perhaps they ran a tannery alongside the farming. At all events, everything had to be sold up. Neither Thomas nor his surviving brother John, who was a shoemaker in Scaling Dam, would be carrying on their father's business.
Thomas wrote that his brother "John died fourteen years ago and left a Widow six Daughters and a Son of the same name".
So John can be identified as the John Atkinson of Easington who married Mary Hudson of Whitby at Easington on 30 June 1757 by banns (John signed the register, Mary made her mark) and his children are clearly the 6 girls and a boy called John who were baptised in Easington. In the case of the baptism of the youngest, Hannah, not only her father's name, John, is given but also her mother's name – Mary:
- Jane Atkinson, baptised 14 May 1758
- Mary Atkinson, 30 November 1760
- Ann Atkinson, 24 February 1765
- Alice Atkinson, 21 September 1767
- Dorothy Atkinson, 18 October 1768
- John Atkinson, 5 July 1771
- Hannah Atkinson, 23 April 1774
Thomas's brother John was buried a few months after Hannah's baptism, on 29 September 1774 – which is, as Thomas says, 14 years before Thomas repaired the Bible. It is the burial register which records John's occupation as a shoemaker. His widow Mary was left with a large family of young children to bring up.
It's possible that Thomas's mother Judith was the Judith Atkinson who was buried at Easington on 8 November 1774. The burial register records that she lived at Roxby, about 3 miles from Scaling Dam, but they would have wanted to bury her with her husband and sons.
Of his sister Jane, Thomas wrote that Jane was still living (in 1788) and "has had three Sons and four Daughters all now living except her eldest Daughter".
I think it's most likely that his sister Jane was the Jane Atkinson of Easington who married Francis Legg of Roxby, in Hinderwell parish church on 18 November 1755. The same clergyman evidently served both Easington church and Hinderwell church, reading the banns at Easington and taking the ceremony at Hinderwell. Of their children, I can find find the baptisms of Mary in 1756 at Hinderwell, and John 1767, William 1770 and Elisabeth 1773, all baptised at Roxby.
Francis Legg, farmer of High Scaling, was buried on 12 February 1792 in Roxby, and Jane Legg, widow, was buried in Roxby on 26 November 1813. She was aged 82, which fits with the age of Thomas's sister – and she had outlived all her siblings.
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