Carrying coal by donkey

"There are those yet in Cleveland who can remember coals being conveyed into the country across the backs of donkeys."

wrote John F Blakeborough in his newspaper column on 14 May 1904.  Two Hutton Rudby men were, he said,

"perhaps the principal coal carriers in Cleveland."

John Fairfax-Blakeborough (1883-1976), as he was later always known, was at the beginning of his career as a well-known journalist and author.  Like his father Richard, he had a great interest in North Riding history, tales and dialect, and he had a column called 'By-Gone Cleveland' in the Northern Weekly Gazette.  This cheery weekly paper, with its household tips and Children's Corner, was popular with Hutton Rudby families who must have been particularly interested in this story.  

The older villagers will have known all about the two men concerned and they will have recognised a mistake in the names.  Blakeborough gives the names as George Dickenson and John Bowran, but they were actually George Dickinson and John Bowman.

They were "ass-colliers" by occupation and they were married to sisters.  John Bowman had married Margaret Best, daughter of papermaker Martin Best, in 1838.  George Dickinson married her sister Ann in 1840.  The two families lived near each other on Enterpen until the Bowmans moved round the corner onto South Side.

Before the railways came, Blakeborough explained, coals were brought into Cleveland by donkey all the way from Durham, a two days' journey.  After the Stockton & Darlington Railway opened in 1825, the coals were brought from the Durham coalfields to Yarm.

"They had droves of donkeys, and all in a line about twenty or thirty of these would start away for Yarm in charge of one or two men, and headed by a pony as their leader.  At each side of them was a bag resting on a pad, so that when the bags were filled the weight would not rest on the unprotected backs and produce a sore.  Each animal carried 16 stones of coal, and the mules 24 stones."  

(Mules can carry much heavier loads than horses or donkeys, cf The Donkey Sanctuary's explanation.)  

The 16 stones of coal – 2 hundredweights (102kg) – and the 24 stones for the mules were accurately measured out at Yarm at the start of the journey.  People in Hutton Rudby thought that by the time the sacks reached them, the bags were mysteriously lighter and they got short measure.

When they reached journey's end at Hutton Rudby, George Dickinson and John Bowman turned the donkeys out on the village green.  In the morning they would round them up and start back for Yarm.  If they had to stop somewhere else and spend the night away from home, they didn't hesitate overmuch before turning the animals out into someone else's field.  They could be on their way before anyone detected them because they had their leading pony well trained.  They could summon it with a "peculiar blowing noise" and it would make for the gate, all the other animals following behind, and the procession would be on the road in no time.

A couple of newspaper reports show that this didn't always work.  In fact, it was always rather risky.  

On 20 May 1843 John Bowman had been working with Joseph Richardson, an older collier who lived on South Side.  William Hugill, a tenant of Lord Feversham, had found their donkeys grazing on his farm in Bilsdale and had gone to the magistrates.  The charge was that they had "wilfully and maliciously consumed the grass" in William Hugill's fields "by depasturing a number of ponies, mules and asses therein."  They were fined two guineas plus costs.

Towards the end of their careers John Bowman and George Dickinson were caught out twice in a matter of weeks.  In May 1866, P.C Smith found them letting 6 mules and 3 asses stray on the highway for three days.  George was fined 5 shillings with 9 shillings costs, and John 5 shillings and, for some unexplained reason, 18 shillings expenses.  At the beginning of July the animals had been found on the highway again and the two men were again up before the Bench.  Unsurprisingly, the fines were heavier – four times heavier.  George had to pay £1 plus costs of 8 shillings and sixpence and John was fined £1-2s-6d (one pound two shillings and sixpence).

George died three years later, in his late fifties.  John outlived him by eight years, dying aged 72 in 1877.

Durham Donkey Rescue

Court cases reported in
The Cleveland Repertory, 1 June 1843
Richmond and Ripon Chronicle, 2 June 1866
York Herald, 7 July 1866

The Cleveland Repertory and Stokesley Advertiser was a Stokesley newspaper launched by printer William Braithwaite in 1843  

Charles Hall goes coursing greyhounds, 1818

York Herald, 12 December 1818

In addition to the several convictions which have lately taken place in Cleveland, under the game laws, John Leng, of Bilsdale, carpenter, was convicted before the Very Rev. the Dean of York, on Friday week, in the penalty of £20 for setting snares in the estate of Sir Wm Foulis, at Ingleby Greenhow, on Sunday the 29th ult. and Charles Hall, of Hutton, near Rudby, labourer, was convicted on the same day before Sir W Foulis, in the like penalty, for coursing with greyhounds, without having obtained a game certificate

I think this is the Charles Hall mentioned in my research notes (People of Hutton Rudby in the C18/19):-

30 Nov 1817:  Charles Hall of Whorlton married Mary Taylor otp [of this parish].  Their children’s baptisms:  Jane 1818, Elizabeth 1819, Charles 1821, John 1823, Benjamin 1827, Robinson 1829, Marianne 1831, Isabella 1837.  Charles is described as farmer 1818-9, and labourer thereafter.  Their son Benjamin married in 1851 and remarried in 1861.  Charles died in 1854 a60.  His family’s gravestone [MI 396] is near the cholera mound, and records Charles, Elizabeth his daughter who d1844 a22, and Mary his wife

(On the subject of the Game Laws, it looks as though Gentlemen & Poachers: The English Game Laws 1671-1831 by P B Munsche is definitely the book to read.  I see from the 'Look Inside' preview pages on Amazon that Charles Hall should have paid £1 a year tax for keeping a greyhound.)

Counting Sheep in the Bilsdale dialect

A note made in 1972 by Katharine Isobel Ellis Hill (1905-2005) of the old words for counting sheep.

It was dictated to her some time in the 1940s by Robin Megginson (1928-2022).  She said he learned it from his maternal grandfather Joseph Featherstone, who was born & bred & farmed in Bilsdale.  Joseph and his wife Elizabeth retired to live at Woodbine Cottage, Easby and Robin grew up there with them after his mother's death when he was very small.  Joseph Featherstone was born in 1866.

Katharine Hill noted that she has used "the best phonetic spelling I can devise".

It is similar to the counting used in the Lake District.

Yan (or Yëan)
Tan
Tethera
Methera
Mimps
Orvers
Dorvers
Slëaters
Yanaboove
Tetheraboove

News from Brotton, Bilsdale and Castleton: 1 March 1877

From The Weekly Exchange
(Price One Penny)

Thursday, 1 March 1877

LOCAL AND DISTRICT NEWS

BROTTON

NEW RECTORY. – The erection of the new rectory for the Rev J Bell, M.A., has just been commenced by Mr Thomas Dickinson, builder, of Saltburn, from plans prepared by Messrs Ross and Lamb, architects, of Darlington


BILSDALE

ACCIDENT. – A narrow escape from drowning happened one day last week, near Bilsdale.  Mary Ann Collier, the wife of William Collier, Carnforth, who lives in one of the Mount Cottages, was across at the village of Chop Yat, with her two children. 

The road is over a foot bridge across the beck, and the latter being rather swollen with the late heavy rains, on returning, the elder child, about 4 years of age, slipped off the bridge into the stream.  At the place where the bridge crosses is a whirlpool of great depth, but the mother, fearless of any danger where the life of her child was concerned, dashed into the water and rescued the child, though not without difficulty. 

The husband had just returned from work, and the cottage being only about fifty yards from the beck, hearing a scream, he rushed off to the water's edge in time to assist his thoroughly exhausted wife and child home, where, it is needless to add, they were soon delivered from their uncomfortable situation.


CASTLETON

ALLEGED BREACH OF THE EDUCATION ACT.

At the Guisbrough Petty Sessions on Tuesday, before Canon Yeoman, R Yeoman, and James Merryweather, Esqs., James Raw, woodman, Castleton, who did not appear, was charged by Mr Appleton, schoolwarden, with neglecting to send two of his children to school.  The children, the warden stated, had missed 14 times during the past few weeks.  The case was adjourned for a short while for the production of the bye-laws of the Board.  On returning into court, Mr Appleton produced the bye-laws, stating in answer to the Bench that he was not aware there was any sickness in the family.

Hannah Watson was then charge with not sending two of her children to school at Danby, by the same officer.  The defendant was a widow, with a family of five children.  She lived close to the school, and had been warned of the non-attendance of her children.

Isaac Smith was similarly charged.  He was a millwright, and had not a large family.  The child had only attended seven times in January.

Order made to attend school and pay the costs.

Allan Bowes Wilson of Hutton Rudby & the artist Ralph Hedley

There is an interesting and close link between the Wilson family, who owned the Hutton Rudby sailcloth mill,

Hutton Mill, seen from the Rudby side of the river

and the Newcastle painter and artist, Ralph Hedley (1848-1913), many of whose paintings can be seen in the Laing Gallery.     

For years Hedley was out of fashion and his paintings were destroyed or thrown away – but more recently they have come back into favour as a record of ordinary life in the North East in the late 19th century.

George Wilson, founder of the family linen business at Hutton Rudby, had four sons and one daughter.

The eldest, James Alder Wilson, became Rector of Crathorne.  The youngest, John George Wilson, after excelling as an athlete at school and at Oxford, became a solicitor in Durham.  He inherited Staindrop Hall, on the condition that the family surname was changed to Luxmoore.  Allan Bowes Wilson and Thomas Bowes Wilson, the second and third sons, took over the sailcloth manufactury on their father’s death.

Allan Bowes Wilson, c1903

Thomas married and lived at Enterpen Hall.

Allan – though gossip has it that he kept a mistress in the village – never married and lived with his unmarried sister Annie in Hutton House, on the Green.

John George Wilson (1849-c1930) was Ralph Hedley’s solicitor, friend and patron.  He was a keen buyer of Hedley’s paintings and carved furniture and recommended the artist to friends.

Ralph Hedley lived in Newcastle from the age of two, but he had been born at Gilling West near Richmond and he returned to the North Riding as often as he could – Runswick Bay was a favourite destination.  He specialised in scenes of ordinary working life, using his sketchbook and making notes in preparing his paintings, and also even taking photographs.

Allan Bowes Wilson (c1839-1932) also collected Hedley’s work.

He commissioned Hedley to paint the Bilsdale Hunt, arranging with him by letter to meet several of the huntsmen at Spout House, Bilsdale. I don’t know how the picture came to be used as an advertisement for Bovril, but I believe the artist wasn’t very happy.

'Counting the Bag'

The nearby Sun Inn was also the setting for Hedley’s 'Counting the Bag' which was painted in 1902 and bought by Allan Bowes Wilson.

Another of Hedley’s works, ‘The Brickmakers’, was painted somewhere near Hutton Rudby:

Sketch for 'The Brickmakers'

John Millard’s book ‘Ralph Hedley: Tyneside Painter’ is only available second hand at the moment, so I hope he'll forgive me including the sketch for ‘The Brickmakers’ which features as an illustration in his book.

It has been suggested that the scene depicted is somewhere near Faceby Manor, but perhaps one of you will have a better idea?


Many thanks to Clodagh Brown, great-granddaughter of Ralph Hedley, who contacted me to tell me of this fascinating link and for all her information.

For more on the Wilson family, see this blogpost on James Wilson, the founder of their fortunes.