The unfortunate Edwin Orphan: 1832

In January 1832, a young man called Edwin Orphan came before the magistrates.  He had smashed windows in Guisborough parish church because, he explained, he needed a shelter.  He had no money and nowhere to sleep and he begged the magistrates earnestly to find him work.  They sentenced him under the Vagrancy Act to a month's imprisonment in the North Riding House of Correction – that is, Northallerton Gaol.

Edwin was aged 20, 5 feet 3 inches tall, with a ruddy complexion and brown hair and eyes.  His sightless right eye was turned outward and his nose, too, turned a little to the right.  He could read and write and had evidently received some education, and he came originally from Kent.  

He must have presented a forlorn spectacle when he came out of gaol because Mr William Shepherd, the Governor of the House of Correction, gave him three shillings as he left.  He couldn't find any work and that was all the money he had to live on.  He said he had been on the road for two years, mostly begging.

These were eventful times of disruption and change.  

Only two years earlier, riots had begun in Kent with the smashing of threshing machines.  Destruction and burning had spread across the south and east as farm labourers rioted in furious protest against low wages, harsh conditions and the mechanisation that was taking the bread from their mouths.  Letters threatening retribution for past wrongs or demanding money by menaces were sent to farmers, parsons and landowners; they were signed by "Captain Swing".  

By the beginning of 1832, a pandemic of Asiatic Cholera had been spreading across the country for several months.  This was a frightening new visitation.  Some Cleveland parishes, like Guisborough, had followed government directives and quickly taken measures to clear away dung heaps and the filth that flowed from privies, pigsties and cesspools – the "nuisances" that were to be found beside houses and along the streets of any early 19th century town or village.  Some villages – like Hutton Rudby – hadn't taken any action as yet.      

Meanwhile, political and public ferment were in the air as Lord Grey's reforming Whig ministry pushed ahead with parliamentary reform and a young Charles Dickens would very soon begin work as a parliamentary reporter – The Pickwick Papers was only four years in the future.

Edwin found his way to Stokesley, where he found a bed in Mr Fortune's lodging house.  The flax-spinning mill of Thomas Mease, the Methodist class leader and entrepreneur, was in full operation behind the High Street while work was underway on his New Mill beside the river, but Edwin turned his attention to Mr Fidler, whose house and water corn-mill stood on the eastern edge of the town.

Between 6 and 7 o'clock in the evening of 9 February, the miller left home to go into town.  As he passed a barn, Thomas Fidler thought he saw a man he knew standing there, so he went up to him to have a word.  He realised he was mistaken and didn't know the man at all so he remarked only that it was a fine night and went on his way.  Not long afterwards he was told that the man actually had a letter for him.  Meeting his servant Ann Garth in town, he sent her to find out.  Edwin Orphan hadn't moved from the spot.  She asked him if he had a letter for Mr Fidler?  He said yes, and he handed it to her.  Back at the mill, she gave it to Thomas Fidler junior.  He and his sister read it and, alarmed, sent it on to their father, who was still in town.  When Mr Fidler read it, he went to find the constables Mr Norton and Mr Hebden.  This is what the letter said:

Thursday, 9th Feb 32

Sir – The writer, being in want of the common necessaries of life, is compelled to adopt the alternative of demanding a sum of money from you, according to your ability.  Do not disregard this notice, for desperate extremity will be revenged upon society; and should you refuse your aid, your life may be taken, and your property destroyed by

SWING 

An answer is requested, directed, to A.B., Mr Fortune, Lodging-House, Stokesley, this day.
To Mr Thomas Fidler, miller, Stokesley

The constables immediately began to hunt for the man, searching every pub, beer shop and lodging house in Stokesley but could not find him.  They went back three times to Fortune's lodging-house, but he hadn't returned there.

At about 7 o'clock the next morning, Edwin Orphan went up to Constable Hebden and asked him if they had been searching for him last night?  Constable Hebden replied that they had been looking for the man who wrote the letter to Thomas Fidler and Edwin said, "I am the man who wrote the letter."  He told them he was nearly starved to death and had nowhere to go – and that at one point in their search they had actually touched his feet.

On Thursday 5 April 1832 he came up before the North Riding Sessions at the Court House in Northallerton.  He was charged with having written and sent a letter to Mr Thomas Fidler, demanding money of him with menaces and without any reasonable or probable cause.  It was a serious charge, a felony charge.

After the case for the prosecution had been heard and the evidence of the Fidlers, Ann Garth and Constable Hebden had been given, Edwin Orphan was called to make his defence.

How startled the court must have been at his response – so striking a response that the newspapers, including several beyond Yorkshire, quoted it in their reports:

Before the minister of justice strikes the blow he is about to hurl at my liberty, I would say a few words, yet such an awe pervades my mind at addressing you, in the midst of such a concourse of people, that I fear lest I should give utterance to any expression offensive to your better cultivated minds.  I hope to guard against it, but should I fall into the error, condescend to pardon it, and impute the fault rather to my ignorance than my wish to be irreverent.

This is the second time I have been confined within the walls of a prison.  Some of you, gentlemen, are acquainted with the nature of my first offence; you know the motive that actuated me to commit that offence, and my wish, entreaty, and prayer, during that confinement; but either I was deemed unworthy of the boon I sought after, or no plan could be devised, whereby you might rescue the wretched object before you from that condition which compelled him to commit actions, which, under other and happier circumstances, his heart would abhor – his soul revolt at.

However, the expiration of my confinement arrived.  Mr Shepherd, whose kindness I shall long remember, gave me three shillings; with that solitary exception, I had but this prospect before me, either to beg my bread from door to door, as I have oft before done, or to throw myself at once upon the laws and justice of my country, for protection and support.  I well know the misery and privations that attend a vagrant's life; and I resolved, in preference, to take those steps which have led me to your tribunal.

Gentlemen, from my earliest recollection down to the present moment, I have been the victim of treachery, deceit, and fraud.  Man, base man! has laid the foundation of my utter ruin.  'Twas man's villainy that robbed me of a parent's care – that deprived me of that situation in life in which Providence was pleased to place me.  

To detail all the events of my life would be too tedious for you to bear with me, too painful for me to relate; let it suffice to say, that I am indebted to mendicants for all the miseries I have undergone, and have yet to suffer.  Yes, gentlemen, it was mendicants that robbed me of a parent's care.  I left them at an early age, and went to London, where I was without a friend, and fell among a lot of swindlers, whose dupe I became, and was educated by them, and made an instrument of their villainy.  They dragged me through all those scenes of life which the imagination of man could conceive, or wickedness devise.

But when the Almighty imparted reason and understanding, whereby I might discern between good and evil, I forsook the path of the wicked, and resolutely determined to follow that which was good.  I left my companions, and for two years have I travelled about the country, crying out of wrong, but no man regarded, – no eye spared – no heart pitied – no hand would rescue me from my forlorn condition, and place me in any honest calling, where I might live in humble credit to myself, and no disgrace to the community.  No, I was spurned and persecuted from town to town, as a vagrant and scamp; while misery, affliction, and privation, followed hard after me, and pursued me to the gates of the grave.

At length desperation seized me, infuriated madness took possession of my soul, and forced me into the commission of offences, for one of which I have suffered punishment; for the other I await your decision.

And for what are you going to punish?  Not for a propensity to vice – not for a depraved disposition, but because I am poor, wretched, and forlorn.  Methinks this is strange humanity – hard-hearted charity.  But I will not endeavour to extenuate the offence I have committed, nor will I plead in mitigation of the punishment you may think I deserve.  

All I fear is, that you will not punish me in a way that will deter me from committing similar, or worse offences in future.  What will it avail me, should you confine me a second time in your jail, and then turn me out as a dog, and worse than a dog?  Believe me, it will do no good; it will harden my heart against the laws of my country, which I would fain respect and love.  It will render me callous to the vicissitudes of fate, and when again liberated, I fear I should become a confirmed Ishmaelite, – my hand would be raised against society, and every honest man's hand against me.  Then in the name of society and justice, on behalf of my wretched self, – yea, I would ask you in the name of Almighty God, that you will either find me a settlement, or send me out of the country.

I say, transport me from my native land, if nothing else can be done for me; for in it I am a misery and burden to myself – a pest and a nuisance wherever I approach.  If indeed you will do this for me, if you will hearken to my petition, and grant my request, in conclusion I will promise you this, – when the law of England is wreaking its vengeance on extreme misery, when the justice of my country is sporting with the pangs of the afflicted, then, even then, will I pour forth my fervent supplication to a throne of grace, that blessings may descend upon each individual of my country, far different to any I ever enjoyed: and that none of your posterity may suffer similar sorrows to those experienced by the unfortunate, afflicted, and friendless Orphan.

So the unfortunate Edwin had no "settlement", which was the basis of the old Poor Law and where a pauper could claim relief, and he couldn't conceive how he could escape the life of a vagrant and an outcast.  But the Jury wasn't in the job of giving him an occupation and he had admitted to the felony already.  

The sentence was a foregone conclusion and Edwin Orphan was found guilty.  But the Chairman of the Jury, after commenting upon the enormity of the offence, sentenced him to be transported, not for a term of years, but for life.  On hearing the sentence, Edwin collapsed in the dock – "evidently exhausted", one newspaper wrote,  "completely overpowered" wrote another.

If Edwin's impassioned speech sounds as though it was inspired by the stage, that isn't surprising – the authorities in New South Wales recorded Edwin's occupation as "Strolling Player" and it can only have been Edwin who gave them the information.  

Edwin's story is rather mysterious and leaves a lot of gaps.  Who were his parents?  What was the "situation in life" into which he had been born?  When he says "mendicants" does he really mean beggars or is he referring obliquely to a travelling theatre company?  Did he run away from home to go on the stage?  Or was he born into a theatre company and learn his eloquence, not through reading, but through acting?

Dickens knew very well the world that Edwin described and perhaps Edwin's sad story comes to life for us, nearly 190 years later, because it reminds us of Dickens' novels.  When Edwin speaks of the swindlers who used him as their dupe, we can't help but think of 'Oliver Twist', which Dickens began to write in 1836.  Edwin's dramatic speech seems to belong to 'Nicholas Nickleby' (1838) and the world of Vincent Crummles' theatre company.  But there was no kind author to give Edwin a happy ending.  No wonder the Nottingham Review, when it picked up the story, called it a "Singular Case of Misery and Misfortune".

A fortnight after his trial, Edwin was taken from Yorkshire to the prison ships.  On the Hulk Ganymede at Woolwich, it was noted that Northallerton Gaol reported his character as "Indifferent – consorted with vagrants".  On the Leviathan at Portsmouth, they recorded that he was healthy and of orderly conduct.

Convict ships in the East India Docks in 1851

On 23 July 1832, the Parmelia set sail for New South Wales.  Edwin was one of the 200 convicts on board.  They arrived on 16 November after four months at sea.  And so he achieved his wish – if he really did wish to be transported.  

In 1841 he applied for a Ticket of Leave, which would allow him to work for himself on certain conditions – he would have to stay in a specified area, report regularly to local authorities and, if at all possible, go to church on Sundays.  He was unsuccessful but he tried again seven years later and on 1 June 1848, after 16 years in the colony, his Ticket of Leave was granted.  And after that point I can find no more about him.

......

Back in Cleveland, Mr Thomas Fidler and his family continued at the mill for many more decades.  Fidler's Mill itself was demolished in 1983 in spite of strenuous efforts by the Stokesley Society.  They saved the mill wheel however, and that can be seen in the carpark near the bridge.

Mr William Shepherd had followed his father Thomas Shepherd in the post of governor at Northallerton.  Being a governor was a family occupation.  William had two brothers, James and Thomas.  In 1832 James was Governor of the Castle of York and Thomas was governor at Wakefield, having succeeded James to the post.  Thomas died of cholera not long after the Parmelia took Edwin Orphan from England.

When James retired because of ill health in 1840, the post of Governor of the Castle fell vacant.  The men who put themselves forward for election were: William Shepherd; Edward Shepherd, who was either William's son or his nephew; and the under-gaoler at the Castle, John Noble, who was married to William's sister.  John Noble was elected.  In 1842, when William's mother old Mrs Shepherd died, the notice inserted in the newspapers by the family proudly stated that her son-in-law was Governor of the Castle, her son William was governor at Northallerton and her grandsons were governors at Wakefield and Beverley.  

William stayed at Northallerton for the rest of his career.  He had been kind to Edwin Orphan in giving him three shillings, but the prison under William Shepherd did not have a good reputation at all.  The 'Northallerton Hell' was the name given to it by the Chartists (see The Treadmills of Northallerton)

William retired to Whitby where he died at home at Normanby Terrace in 1867, aged 80.

Notes

For more on the cholera pandemic 1832, see Chapter 11. 1832: The year of the Cholera

For more stories of transportation and convict life, see 
Hard labour & transportation to Tasmania: Northallerton, April 1841 
William Orton, forger of Hutton Rudby 

and
Hutton Rudby 1876 to 1877: the Albion Sailcloth Mill

9. Royalist disaster & private grief: 1645-7

On 14 June 1645, the New Model Army – Parliament's new national army – inflicted a decisive defeat on the Royalists at the Battle of Naseby in Northamptonshire.  It was a disaster for the King.  His army was shattered and his private papers had fallen into Parliament's hands.  They published them.  Now people could see that they had been right to fear that he planned to bring an army of Irish Catholics over to fight in England.  He was negotiating to do just that, and he was trying to get money and mercenaries from abroad.  

The last hopes were fading for the Royalists.  In Wensleydale, John Scrope had been holding Bolton Castle for the King.  It had been under siege since the autumn of 1644.  Now, although there was no chance of relief, the garrison held out until all their supplies had been eaten – including the horses and all the animals – and then they surrendered in November 1645.  Parliament ordered the castle to be slighted, and some of it was demolished. 

Bolton Castle

By then Sir Thomas Danby and Lady Danby were back in their own house at Thorpe Perrow.  His estates had been seized by the Sequestration Committee because he had fought for the King, but in each county there was a Committee for Compounding with Delinquents, which could let the men have their lands back if they pledged never to fight against Parliament again and if they paid a fine – a useful way for the new government to raise money.  Sir Thomas's fine was heavy, but by 1645 he had paid up and he and Catherine were at home again.  

She was now expecting her sixteenth child.  Ten of her babies had lived to be baptised but the others were stillborn, Alice remembered, from frights caused by fire in her chamber, by falls and other accidents.  She had been married at the age of fifteen and she was now thirty.  Tender-hearted and sweet-natured, she was badly grieved by the war and the state of the country and she dreaded to think what the future might hold.  She had been left during the war to manage the estate and household while her husband was away in the King's service and only able to come back rarely and she had missed him badly.  She had been vexed and troubled by the many alarms and difficulties caused by the presence of the Scots soldiers quartered on her.  She had been very unwell during this pregnancy and now she went into labour earlier than she expected.  She couldn't get her old midwife because she was in Richmond, which was shut up by the plague.  And the baby was a breech presentation, coming – as Alice said – double into this world.  

At last she was delivered of a fine boy after a long and very hard labour.  He was named Francis after Alice's little godson, his elder brother who had died that summer of smallpox.  Catherine was in dreadful pain, unable to sleep or eat.  The women of her family came to her.  Her sister-in-law Lady Armitage and her aunt Mrs Norton had been with her when Alice came to take their place.  Catherine was making her preparations for the good death which was of such paramount importance at the time, praying for her family and for peace in England, and entrusting her children to her husband's care.  After a week, Alice's grief for Catherine was such that she became ill herself.  Mrs Wandesford came with her careful young servant Dafeny Lightfoote and sent Alice home.  

Catherine loved Dafeny dearly and now Dafeny was always with her.  At last, with her head on Dafeny's breast, she said, "I am going to God, my God now."  Dafeny spoke to her bracingly, saying she hoped God would spare her to bring her children up.  "How can that be," said Catherine, "for I find my heart and vitals all decayed and gone.  No.  I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ, which is best of all."  She died on 20 September 1645 about a month after giving birth and was buried at Masham two days later.  Her funeral was held at night, according to Alice's recollection, because the Parliamentarian and Scots soldiers would not let a sermon be preached.

On the other side of the country, the Wandesfords' friends in Chester were in trouble.  

Though the Battle of Naseby had left the King with no realistic chance of winning, the fighting continued across the kingdoms.  In parts of the West Country, the Midlands and Wales, men grew so weary of the plundering, ill-disciplined troops that they banded together to try to keep both armies out.  

Chester was still held for the King and had been under siege, off and on, for a year.  In September 1645, as Catherine Danby's life drew to a close, the city found itself under a new assault.  This time, the siege was total and it lasted until February 1646.  By the time the Royalist commander Lord Byron was finally persuaded by the Mayor to surrender, the poor were dying of hunger.  The loss of life, the damage and destruction had been huge.  After the siege was over, plague swept through the city, taking a fearful toll of the starved and homeless poor.  Alice and her mother were profoundly grateful that they had escaped.

Lord Byron (1599-1652)

The King, the Scots and the cancellation of Christmas: 1646-7

Oxford had been the King's capital city since 1642.  The University was on his side – the townspeople were not.  He had returned there in November 1645, hoping to begin again with a new campaign in the spring, but his plans fell through.  Parliamentary troops besieged the city – and then they discovered to their amazement that the King had escaped.   On 27 April 1646, with his hair cut short, wearing drab clothes and a false beard, he had slipped out of Oxford with two companions.  

He had been in secret negotiations for a separate peace with the Scots, but his arrival at their camp outside the siege of Newark took them completely by surprise.  The Scottish general in charge was David Leslie, the man to whom Mrs Wandesford had gone for help against Captain Innes.  Now he needed to get the King away at once to the Scots garrison at Newcastle.  So the King ordered the reluctant Royalist commander of Newark to surrender so that the Scottish army could leave.  On 8 May the Scots broke camp and set off north with the King. 

They kept him as an open prisoner in Newe House, a mansion with extensive grounds inside Newcastle's city walls.

Newe House, see Tyne & Wear Museums blog

From there – when he wasn't playing golf – the King plotted.  He carried on negotiations with both the Scots and the Parliamentarians, trying to exploit the divisions between them, and he intrigued with his exiled Queen, trying to get troops from Ireland and France.  He didn't succeed in any of it.  

The war was over and the Scots were negotiating with Parliament for payment towards the arrears of wages owed to their troops, after which they would leave England.  Abandoning hope of coming to an agreement with the King, the Scots handed him over to Parliament in January 1647.  

Parliamentarian troops took over his custody and the Scots marched out of Newcastle, with the fishwives pelting them and shouting "Judas" because they thought the Scots had sold the King.

In February 1647, Parliamentarian troops appeared in the North Riding, travelling south with the King.  The road lay through Northallerton and they stopped the night there at the house of the Metcalfe family, opposite the parish church.  The grief of people like the Wandesfords can be imagined – for them he was, as Alice said, a holy, pious prince who fought God's battles against his enemies, a nursing father to his three kingdoms.  

The Porch House, Northallerton: where Charles I stayed in 1647

The next grief to strike Alice's poor mother was the loss of her brother Sir Edward Osborne.  In spite of his own cares and sorrows, he had been a constant support to his widowed sister.  He had spent heavily in the King's service and been obliged to pay a large fine to get back his sequestered estates.  He had retired to live quietly at Kiveton with his second wife Ann, never ceasing to grieve for his son Edward, killed in the roof collapse at York in 1638.  It was because of some excellent melons from his gardens at Thorpe Salvin Hall and Kiveton, Alice said, that he was taken ill.  He ate a little too much – the melons were too cold for him – and he was thrown into a vomiting and diarrhoea that exhausted him past recovery.  He died a few days later on 9 September 1647 to the great distress of his family, and was buried in the chancel of Harthill church.  He was fifty-one.

While the grieving Mrs Wandesford was running her household and providing for her children like the skilful housewife that she was – Alice remembered her careful huswifery – constant in her charitable works and always remembering the needs of the newly homeless clergymen and their families who would appear at her door, Parliament was running the country.  This wasn't to everyone's liking.  

Parliament was proving highly efficient at collecting taxes – revenue much needed for the Army, which was getting worryingly radical and deeply involved in politics – and hard times under the King's rule were beginning to fade from memory.  Not everyone greeted the destruction of paintings, statues and decorations in their parish church with joy.  Theatres had been closed since 1642.  And now Christmas was cancelled.  

The English loved Christmas.  The church services were only part of it – all classes in England celebrated the twelve days with food and drink, parties and revels, while the Presbyterian Scots had banned Christmas several years earlier because it was Catholic, superstitious, not mentioned in the Bible and led only to drunkenness and debauchery.  Parliament had established a new pattern for public worship and the Feasts of Christmas, Easter and Whitsun were banned.  No more sinful behaviour to bring down God's wrath upon the kingdom – the recent war showed where that had led.  No special church services, everyone to go to work, shops to be open, no hanging up the holly and the ivy, and absolutely no partying.   

The ban probably hardly mattered to the family at Hipswell, in mourning for Sir Edward Osborne.  Tucked away in Catterick, and careful not to draw hostile attention, Mr Syddall was still able to celebrate Holy Communion for them and a quietly held Christmas service could go unnoticed.  But in Kirklington, under the eye of the Presbyterian minister Mr Nesbit, the villagers will have missed their Christmas service and the only safe way to entertain friends in anything like the proper style would be after dark, secretly, fairly quietly and behind closed doors.

News would come to the Wandesfords that in some places across the country there had been riots over the ban.  Armed force was needed to stop the partying in Kent, where the usual Christmas football game was played in Canterbury, and in Westminster the churchwardens of St Margaret's were arrested for failing to stop a Christmas day service.

And at intervals news came of the King.  

First he was held by Parliament, then he was taken by the radicals of the Army.  Then he escaped.  And then, like his grandmother Mary, Queen of Scots, when she thought she would find a friendly refuge with Elizabeth of England, Charles made a fatal misjudgment of character.  He didn't go to Berwick and the support of the Scots.  He went to the Isle of Wight, thinking the governor would protect him and help him get to France.  Instead, he found himself imprisoned at Carisbrooke Castle.  

Notes

This period of the wars is called the English Civil War 1642-46

The Tyne & Wear Museums blog has more pictures of the Newe House, which was later known as Anderson Place.  It stood just off Pilgrim Street.

Sir Edward Osborne's gauntlets, said to have been worn by him in the war, are on display in Harthill church; his helmet was stolen in the 20th century.  See here 

Next: 10. The Man of Blood & the English Republic: 1648-1650 

Hard labour & transportation to Tasmania: Northallerton, April 1841

Each one of these cases brings us a little glimpse of the past.  I think the information might also prove useful to family historians.

These are the details of people brought before the North Riding Sessions in Northallerton in April 1841 at the same time as John Dale, Simpson Adamson and Sarah Adamson.  The story of Dale and the Adamsons can be found in Frederick Cator's trunk goes missing.

You can see that prisoners were still convicted even when they abandoned the item they were trying to steal.  In young Henry Richardson's case, he threw back on the hedge the stockings that he had planned to steal, but when that charge was put together with a previous conviction for felony, it earned him 7 years' transportation.  And of course the felonies are all crimes against property, while the grandfather who tried to rape his little granddaughter was tried for a misdemeanour.

And what was "hard labour"?  The treadmill.  For a description of Northallerton Prison – the "Northallerton Hell" as the Chartists called it – see The Treadmills of Northallerton and the wikipedia description of the Penal treadmill.

From the Yorkshire Gazette, 10 April 1841

Misdemeanant

William Best (71) – charged with assaulting on 7 March at Thirsk Mary Ann Storey "a child only 8 years of age" with intent to commit a rape.  The prisoner is grandfather to the child.  2 years' hard labour

Felonies

Jacob Granger (18) of Dalton – charged with having stolen a sovereign from G Robinson of Dalton, labourer.  1 month's hard labour.

Thomas Adamson (22) and George Stockton (39) – charged with having on 20 January stolen 2 pigs' heads, 8 pigs' feet, 7 hens and 1 cock, from a barn belonging to George Fawcit of Hawsker-cum-Stainsacre, farmer.  Adamson pleaded Guilty, Stockton Not Guilty.  Both 6 months in the House of Correction

John Carrol (24) of Middlesbrough – charged with having on 13 January stolen a shovel from a cart of manure belonging to Robert Barron of Middlesbro', cartman.  Carrol was seen working with the shovel on which was branded "R Barron".  Some time afterwards it was seen that the name was cut off the shovel, which Carrol still kept.  6 weeks' hard labour

Stephen Moody (15) – charged with stealing a sixpence and seven pennies from James Stewart, keeper of a beer-house in Middlesbrough.  Prisoner was caught by Stewart with the money in his hand.  The jury found him guilty but recommended mercy because "We think it is his first offence".  Chairman said he was afraid it was not.  Prisoner had been convicted of rioting in Middlesbrough the year before.  6 months' hard labour and to be once severely whipped.

Harriet Newill Horsley (18) – charged with stealing 9½ yards of printed cotton from Mary Easterby of Whitby.  Mary Easterby had bought some cotton of a travelling man and took it to Margaret Burton's house, who put it in a basket.  Harriet Horsley was there.  A few days afterwards Mary Easterby went to Mrs Burton's house but the cotton was gone.  Horsley told the constable that she had pawned it with James Appleby, where it was indeed found.  In her defence, and to the amusement of the court, she said repeatedly that there were nearly 10 yards, not 9½.  She said Mrs Burton had sent her to do it and had drunk some ale bought with the money.  1 month's hard labour

John Bennison (24) of Fryup – charged with having on 15 March stolen oats belonging to Mr W Keld Agar, farmer of Fryup, for whom he had worked.  Mr Agar had suspected thieving was going on, had kept watch and seen Bennison taking oats from the stable.  2 months' hard labour

Joseph Barker (22) of Great Smeaton – charged with stealing hay from Daniel Hossick Alderson of Linthorpe, gentleman on 24 February.  Alderson was a gentleman farmer living at Marsh House near Linthorpe (Marsh House Farm was demolished in about 1937).  Mr Alderson also occupied a farm at Great Smeaton.  The prisoner had a stable near Mr Alderson's cow-house, one of whose hinds (labourers) had suspected theft and had therefore marked a quantity of his master's hay with a stick. The hay was missed and found in the prisoner's stable, with the stick, and there were bits of hay strewn between the cow-house and the stable.  Prisoner said he'd bought it from a man from Osmotherley.  2 months' hard labour

John Hewison, out on bail – pleaded guilty to having stolen wheat from Mr Gordison, a respectable farmer living near Thirsk.  Mr Gordison had winnowed a quantity of wheat from the barn beside his house and on 8 January he took some wheat to Thirsk market.  One of his servants saw someone hiding a sack among some chaff which was in a stackyard.  The servant found the sack in which was some wheat.  In the evening they saw Hewison take the sack and begin to make off with it.  When challenged by Mr Gordison, he threw it down and ran off.  He was taken into custody a few days later.  1 month's imprisonment.

George Theasby, out on bail – pleaded guilty to stealing £3 19s 9d from Ann Sotheran of Newton-upon-Ouse near Easingwold.  Also charged with stealing £2 15s from her.  He was clerk and confidential servant to Mrs Sotheran, lime merchant at Newton, and the money had been paid to him on her account.  Sentence delayed.

Sarah Wilcox (40) of Rowton – pleaded guilty to stealing 1 iron chain, back band and other articles from William Fawcitt.  6 months' hard labour

John Batty (17) of Leeds – pleaded guilty to stealing 1 pair of boots belonging to Thomas Green of Mansfield, labourer, from a stable at Mansfield.  Batty was a chimney-sweep and had been called in by Green to sweep his chimney.  While the family weren't looking he took the boots from the stable where they were hung up.  1 month's hard labour

William Bradley (19) of Stokesley – charged with stealing a quantity of iron from the mill of James Blacket of Stokesley.  1 month's hard labour

Daniel Barker (52) and Daniel Barker the younger, of Appleton Wiske – charged with stealing 1 great coat, 1 horse's head brush and 1 pair of gloves from Robert Atkinson of Swainby, carrier.  Not Guilty.

Sarah Garth (41) and Jane Garth (13) both of Guisborough – charged with stealing lambs' wool yarn from John Smith of Guisborough, druggist.  Each to serve 1 month's hard labour

Henry Temple (57) of Borrowby – charged with stealing 8 bushels of barley and 2 sacks from Mr Thomas Rose, farmer of Boltby, who had put in his barn on 13 March 6 sacks, each containing 4 bushels of barley, slightly mixed with oats.  Next day 2 of them were gone.  In the road near Temple's house were the marks of a horse's feet matching the shoes of a horse in Temple's stable.  When Constable Little of Thirsk searched the house, he found the barley and also 2 sacks from which the marks had been cut out.  Also charged with having been convicted of a felony in Co Durham.  7 years' transportation

I haven't been able to find a record of Henry Temple arriving in Australia, so I wonder if he died on the voyage out.

Henry Richardson (16), late of Hutton Rudby – charged with stealing a pair of cotton stockings belonging to Thomas Sterling and a cotton shirt belonging to Joseph Coates of Thirsk.  The stockings had been washed and hung on a hedge to dry on 11 February.  A carrier saw Richardson take them off the hedge, roll them up and put them in his pocket but, seeing he was watched, throw them back on the hedge and run away.  Guilty.  Further charged with having been convicted of a felony at the last Sessions.  The prosecution then said that the charge of theft of the shirt would be dropped.  7 years' transportation.

This record in convictrecords.com.au shows that Henry Richardson was taken from the hulks to the convict ship John Brewer, which set sail from Sheerness in December 1841 to Tasmania. We can see from the record in the Digitalpanopticon.org that Henry said he was born in "Stously" workhouse (the old dialectal  pronunciation of Stokesley, often spelt Stowsla) and the details on Foundersandsurvivors.org show that he said he had no relations.   

His conduct record shows that he was 5 feet 5½ inches tall, with a fresh complexion, an oval face, brown hair and hazel eyes.  He could neither read nor write.  He had been convicted for vagrancy and theft, his character was "very bad" and the record shows he was in constant trouble in Tasmania.  It is a sad catalogue of solitary confinement and hard labour.  His record (see Image 164) shows he was again convicted of stealing and was sent to the harsh conditions of the penal settlement on Norfolk Island, where he was found dead on 30 October 1850.

Yorkshire Gazette 5 June 1841

Convicts

On Wednesday morning, the following convicts were removed from York Castle in pursuance of their sentences, to be delivered on board the Fortitude hulk, Chatham.  For life, John Mitchell, and Wm Kenworthy.  For fourteen years, Wm Bean, George Sayers, and Joseph Day.  For ten years, Edwin Pinder, John Moore, John Scofield, and James Naylor.  For seven years, Henry Temple, Henry Richardson, Nathan Hart, Samuel Fletcher and George Taylor

This paper by Hamish Maxwell-Stewart and Rebecca Kippen is a fascinating study of Sickness and Death on Male and Female Convict Voyages to Australia 

The Treadmills of Northallerton

The new "retail and leisure destination" to be built on the site of the former prison in Northallerton is to be called "the Treadmills"

Along with many others, I have always thought this name showed distinctly poor taste and by chance I've just come across this, from R P Hastings' Chartism in the North Riding of Yorkshire and South Durham, 1838-1848, (Borthwick Publications, 2004)

Chartism was a nation-wide, radical, grass-roots, movement of the working classes calling for reform and, above all, for the vote.

Noting the local Chartists' tendency to exploit "every propaganda opportunity", Dr Hastings writes:

Northallerton House of Correction had an unenviable reputation.  Samuel Holberry, the young Sheffield Chartist leader, had become a martyr overnight when he died in 1842 at York Castle after imprisonment in Northallerton.  His associate, John Clayton, had died in Northallerton.  North Riding Chartists then took up the case of William Brook, a Bradford Chartist who had been 'reduced from a stout athletic man to a mere skeleton' in the 'Northallerton Hell'.  

Clayton, Brook and others, the Chartists claimed, had been subjected illegally to work on the treadmill.  Northallerton and Brompton Chartists raised a fund to enable Brook to buy his own provisions and petitioned the Home Secretary for his release.  Isaac Wilson, a Brompton weaver and Chartist leader, became treasurer and made weekly prison visits.  Donations came from as far afield as Dundee, Trowbridge, Spitalfields, Brighton and Abergavenny as well as Darlington.  

This is an excerpt from the "Proposed National Petition, to be signed throughout the country, and entrusted to the care of the "Political Prisoners' Release and Charter Petition Convention" from the Chartists' newspaper The Northern Star of 20 March 1841.  This section deals with the "Northallerton Hell" and the treadmill.  (The "silent system" had been introduced to Europe from the USA; under it, strict silence was enforced at all times.)

That in the Gaol of Northallerton, six Chartist prisoners, whose sentence was merely imprisonment, were put to hard labour, on the treadmill, contrary to law. 

That William Brook, one of the said prisoners, who had been convicted of sedition and conspiracy, at the same time as Peddie [convicted in 1840 at York], and whose sentence was three years, fell off the mill; and, though he informed the Visiting Surgeon, that he was frequently troubled with a cramp, yet he was forced, contrary to his sentence, to work upon the wheel, for nearly one calendar month, until removed by an order from the Most Honourable the Secretary of State for the Home Department. 

That your petitioners have been informed that John Clayton, a Chartist, who lately died in Northallerton House of Correction, had been sentenced to solitary confinement, upon a charge of violating the silent system. 

That your petitioners have every reason to believe, from what they have heard of the conduct of the authorities of the prison, that he came to his death in consequence of the cruel manner in which he was treated. 

That Wm Martin, who had been confined in the said House of Correction, Northallerton, was removed to Lancaster Castle, in consequence of the severity of the silent system, and of the tyranny of Wm Shepherd, the superintendent. 

That your petitioners have likewise been informed that the physical condition of the prisoners in the House of Correction, Northallerton, is deteriorated not only by the hard labour of the mill and the horrid silent system, but by the filthy manner in which they are obliged to sleep; that they have been for a fortnight at a time without a clean shirt, and their beds infested with vermin; that the only place where they are permitted to wash, is at a stone trough in the yard, and the superintendent is in the habit of coming to the yard gate and shouting to the petty officers to report the men for being too long washing themselves; that some of the prisoners have been punished for using too much soap, which is a proof that the object of the Governor is to enrich himself instead of attending to the comforts of the unfortunate convicts.

An overview of the history of imprisonment and an illustration of prisoners working on the treadmill, from Henry Mayhew's The Criminal Prisons of London (1862) can be found here.

Financial disaster comes to Michael Hughes of Yarm, June 1743

This is a glimpse of the life of Michael Hughes of Yarm.  He had extensive premises in Yarm and had bought land, farms and houses from Bedale to Hurworth.  Did he expand too quickly?  Was it a mistake to build the malt-kiln and the granaries and the warehouses?  Was his mercery business over-stocked with expensive luxuries?  It all came to disaster in the end, but it gives us so much interesting information on the way.

In 1743 he had property in Hutton Rudby, Thornton in Cleveland, Maltby in Cleveland, Appleton Wiske, Great Smeaton, Hurworth, Catterick, Richmond, Bedale, Brompton, Osmotherley, as well as his properties in Yarm itself, including the newly-built Malt Kiln with land going to the Tees where he had a wharf for shipping his goods.  Everything was to be sold to satisfy his creditors in auctions that took place in Hutton Rudby, Yarm, Darlington, Richmond and Northallerton. 

It must have created a sensation at the time.

Newcastle Courant, 11 June 1743

To be Sold respectively to the Highest Bidder,

At the following Times and Places,

By the Assignees of a Commission of Bankrupt lately awarded against MICHAEL HUGHES, of Yarm, Merchant,

The several LANDS and TENEMENTS herein after mention'd, late the Estate of the said Bankrupt, viz. 

On the 28th of June inst. between the Hours of Two and Five in the Afternoon, at the Dwelling House of George Whorlton in Hutton near Rudby, three new built Dwelling Houses, with the Garths and Appurtenances thereunto belonging, situate in Hutton aforesaid, now tenanted by William Peacock and others, at the yearly Rent of 5 l. or thereabouts. 

On the 29th, between the Hours of Ten and Twelve, at the House of Widow Barley, Innholder, in Yarm, several Dwelling Houses, with a Blacksmith's Shop, Stable, Garth or Orchard, and near an Acre of Meadow Ground thereto belonging, situate in Thornton, in Cleveland, now lett to George Tunstal and others, at the yearly Rent in the whole of 8 l. 13s.  And between the Hours of One and Four of the same Day, and at the same Place, an improveable Freehold Estate, with a good Farm House, and all other convenient Housing thereon, situate at Maltby, in Cleveland, of the yearly Rent of 36 l. 

On the 30th, between the Hours of Ten and Twelve, at the said Widow Barley's, a Farm in the Township of Appleton upon Wiske, of the yearly Value of 13 l. held by Lease for a Term of 2000 Years under the reserved annual Rent of 3s.  And between the Hours of One and Four of the same Day, and at the same Place, An improveable Freehold Farm, lying at Entercommon, near Great Smeaton, of the yearly Value of 20 l. and upwards; on which two last mention'd Farms are also good Farm Houses, and all other Conveniences for Tenants, in Good Repair. 

On the 4th of July next, between the Hours of One and Four, at the House of Mr John Yorke, Innholder, in Darlington, An improveable Freehold Farm, lying in the Township of Hurworth, with a good Farm House, and other Conveniences thereon for a Tenant, in good Repair, of the yearly Value of 24 l. and upwards. 

On the 5th, between the Hours of Ten and Twelve, at the House of Mr Ralph Hawxwell in Catterick near Richmond, The said Bankrupt's Life Estate in some Lands lying in Richmond Town Fields, of the yearly Value of 6 l. 10s. or thereabouts.  Also at the last mention'd Day and Place, between the Hours of One and Four, A well built Freehold Dwelling House, with the Appurtenances, situate in Catterick aforesaid, in the Possession of Mr James Mewburn, or his Assigns under the clear annual Rent of 10 l. 

On the 6th, between the Hours of Ten and Twelve, at the House of Mr Careless, in Northallerton, A Freehold Close in Bedale, of the yearly Value of 3 l. 10s. or thereabouts; the same Day and Place, between the Hours of One and Four, Some Copyhold Houses, with the Appurtenances, in Brompton near Northallerton, of the yearly Value of 5 l. or thereabouts; and on the same Day, and at the same Place, between the Hours of Four and Five, A Copyhold House, with the Garth and Appurtenances thereunto belonging, situate in Osmotherley, in the Possession of Robert Fryar, at the yearly Rent Forty and Two Shillings, or thereabouts.  And 

On the 7th, between the Hours of Ten and Twelve, at the said Widow Barley's House in Yarm, A Freehold Close in the Parish of Yarm aforesaid, of the yearly Value of 5 l. or thereabouts; between the Hours of One and Four, the same Day and Place, The Freehold Dwelling House, Shop, Ale-houses, and Granaries, on the East Row or Side of the Town of Yarm aforesaid, late in the said Bankrupt's own Occupation; and between the Hours of Four and Seven of the same Day, and at the same Place, Another Freehold Dwelling House, with the Shop and Appurtenances thereto belonging, and also several Stables, Granaries, Ware-houses, and a Malt Kiln, all new built, on the Backside of the last mention'd Dwelling House, and extending to the River Tease [Tees], with a convenient Key [Quay] or Wharf for the shipping or unlading of Goods.  The said last mention'd Dwelling Houses adjoin upon each other, fronting the Market-place; and the same, with the Granaries, &c. are every way commodiously situate for Trade.  For further Particulars enquire of Mr David Burton, Attorney, in Yarm aforesaid. 

Likewise to be sold, at the said Bankrupt's Shop and Ware-houses in Yarm, all his Stock in Trade, consisting of Grocery, Mercery, Haberdashery, Distillery, Linen and Woollen Drapery Wares, with a large Quantity of Men and Womens Hats, Black Velvet Caps, and several other Goods and Merchandises.  The Sale will begin on Tuesday the 14th inst. and Attendance will be given there every Thursday and Tuesday following, till the whole be sold.  Such Tradesmen as are inclined to buy any of the Goods by Wholesale, are desired to attend the four first Days of Sale

Evidently there were too few customers for all the Hats and Caps and so forth, because soon this advertisement appeared:

Newcastle Courant, 18 June 1743

Whereas it hath been formerly advertised, that all the Stock in Trade, late of Michael Hughes, a Bankrupt, was to be sold at his Shop and Ware-houses in Yarm, and that such Tradesmen as were inclined to buy any of the said Goods by Wholesale, were desired to attend the first four Days of Sale, which said four Days being now past, and a considerable Quantity of the said Goods, particularly Broad Cloths, Dyers Goods, Leaf and Cut Tobacco, Distilled Liquors of all Sorts, Apothecarys Drugs, and Linen Cloth, are remaining yet undisposed of.  Notice is hereby given, that such Persons as are inclined to buy all or any of the said Goods now remaining in the Wholesale Way, may attend at the said Bankrupts Shop in Yarm aforesaid, the 28th and 30th Inst. and on the 5th and 7th of July next, when the said Goods will be sold by Wholesale, at reasonable Rates.

And finally Michael Hughes' Commissioners in Bankruptcy were ready to make payments to his creditors:

Newcastle Courant, 3 March 1744

The Commissioners in a Commission of Bankrupt, awarded and issued against Michael Hughes, late of Yarm, in the County of York, Merchant, intend to meet on the Twenty-eight Day of March instant, at Eleven in the Forenoon, at the House of Mrs Margaret Ellis, Innholder, at the Sign of the Anchor and Crown, in Yarm aforesaid, in order to make a Dividend of the said Bankrupt's Estate, when and where the Creditors, who have not already proved their Debts, are to come prepared to do the same, or they will be excluded the Benefit of the said Dividend

The Teesside Archives catalogue shows that it holds deeds from the 1720s relating to purchases of property by Michael and his wife Mary.

Haggitt Hill farms in 1805

York Herald, 8 December 1804

To be Let

On Wednesday the twelfth day of December, 1804, at the House of Mr Godfrey Hirst, Innholder, in Northallerton, between the hours of two and six o'Clock of the same day, subject to such Conditions as will be then and there produced; 

All that Farm, consisting of an excellent Dwelling-House, a Barn, Stables, Cow-houses, and other suitable Outbuildings adjoining thereto, with several Closes or Parcels of Arable, Meadow, and Pasture Ground, containing together 150 Acres or thereabouts, now in the occupation of Thomas Brignal. 

Also, All that other Farm, consisting of a very good Dwelling-house, a Barn, Stables, and other Outbuildings adjoining thereto, with several Closes or Parcels of Arable, Meadow and Pasture Ground, containing together 145 Acres or thereabouts, now in the occupation of John Brigham. 

Both the above Farms are situate within a Ring-Fence at Haggatt-Hill, in the parish of Hutton Rudby, in Cleveland, and pay a small Modus in lieu of Hay Tithe. 

N.B.  The Tenants will show the Premises, and for further Particulars apply to Mr Dinsdale, of Middleham, the Owner; or Mr Calvert, Land-Surveyor, in Richmond.

Haggitt Hill lies to the west of the A19 and is near to East Rounton, which was then part of Hutton Rudby parish.

Godfrey Hirst was the landlord of the Golden Lion in Northallerton.

Thorpe Underwood Hall: 1912

I can date this Knight, Frank & Rutley brochure from the final pages, because they advertise  auction sales due to take place in May and June 1912.

Amongst the landed estates and large country houses featured is Thorpe Underwood Hall, Ouseburn.  This had been built only a few years earlier and was designed for Frederick William Slingsby by the York architect Walter Henry Brierley.

Between 1885 and 1926 he was responsible for over 300 buildings, including schools, churches, houses and civic buildings across the North, amongst them Northallerton County Hall – and, in 1923-4, the restoration of All Saints’, Hutton Rudby.  The extensive work on the church took eight months, and during that time the congregation was ferried out by bus to services held at Drumrauch Hall.

Thorpe Underwood Hall stands close to the site of the old Thorpe Green Hall, which had been destroyed by fire at the end of the 19th century, and which is remembered now for its connection to the Bronte family.

Thorpe Underwood Hall 1912

Anne Bronte lived at Thorpe Green as governess to the Robinson family.  She was joined by her brother Branwell, but his time there was to precipitate the crisis that led to his death.

The Monk's House mentioned in the Particulars (where it is claimed to be C16 – it is actually C17) was the home of Branwell while he was tutor to the Robinsons’ son.  His ink drawing of the back of the house is well-known, cf p282 of The Art of the Brontës by Christine Anne Alexander.

Thorpe Underwood Hall 1912

By direction of W SLINGSBY, Esq.

YORKSHIRE
Within 2 1/2 miles Cattal Station, 5 miles Alne, 12 miles York and 11 miles Harrogate

A Fine Modern Mansion of Elizabethan Design
known as
"Thorpe Underwood Hall"
Ouseburn

Between Harrogate and York
Extending to about 178 Acres

The Hall is most conveniently arranged on 2 Floors
Oak-panelled, and fitted throughout with every
Modern Convenience.  Electric Light Installed.  Accom-
modation: Large Oak-panelled Hall measuring
36ft. by 20ft., Billiard Room 27ft. by 20ft.,
Drawing Room 29ft. by 18ft., Dining Room
29ft. by 18ft., Morning Room, Boudoir, Business
Room, 20 Bed and Dressing Rooms, 2 Bathrooms
Park of nearly 100 Acres
Stabling for 8 horses

Cottages
Attractive Pleasure Grounds

The Historic 16th Century Monk's House
is included

The Property is situated in the Middle of the York and Ainsty
Hunt and within reach of the Bramham Moor and Bedale Hunts

Illustrated Particulars on Application
Auctioneers & Land Agents Messrs Knight, Frank & Rutley,
10, Hanover Square, London, W.C.

Thorpe Underwood Hall is now a school. 

Hutton Rudby between the Wars: in newspaper cuttings

These notes were taken years ago, from a scrapbook that somebody lent me.  I think, as is often the way with newspaper clippings, they were mostly undated (I don’t like to think that I didn’t copy out the dates!) but I think they are interesting all the same …and I have been able to date most of them ...

The funeral took place at Hutton Rudby yesterday of Mr John Barnabas Smith, one of the best-known residents of the parish, and the proprietor of one of the oldest businesses on Teesside.  Mr Smith, who was 73 years of age, had all his life enjoyed excellent health, and as recently as Saturday he spent his leisure hours digging in his garden.  On Tuesday morning he got up at his accustomed time, and after breakfast set off, as was his wont, to walk to Potto Station.  So regular had he been in his habits that many residents of Hutton Rudby have set their clocks by him as he passed to the station in the morning when on his way to business.
Shortly after passing the Village Hall in course of erection in Lodge-lane [it was built in 1927], Mr Smith was seen to fall to the ground.  He was taken into Mr McKinney’s house, and Dr Proctor was called to him …

[Sister: Mrs Scaife.  Niece: Miss Finlayson.  J B Smith worked for Joshua Byers & Co, timber merchants of Stockton, which was taken over by Mr John Wilson Watson, and J B Smith finally became proprietor of the business.  He never married and in the 1911 Census was living at Jubilee Cottage on North Side, near to the (Wesleyan) Methodist Chapel]

Joseph Mellanby Mease

 ---------------------

January 1928
Mr Joseph Mellanby Mease, of Leven Valley House, the oldest inhabitant of Hutton Rudby and the oldest reader of the Northern Echo, has died at the age of 100 …

[He attributed his great age to an open-air life, plenty of sleep and always having been abstemious.  Never smoked until he was over 80, and after that had a cigarette after supper every night.  In early days was chief clerk at the chemical works in Jarrow owned by a member of the Mease family.  Came to Hutton Rudby in 1858 as manager of a corn mill, on the site of which the police constable’s house now stands.  Three years later he lost his arm when his sleeve was caught in the machinery.  When the Northern Echo had its jubilee in 1920 he was one of the 3 or 4 people who proved they had taken the paper from its first number, and he was presented with a silver teapot]

---------------------

Hutton Rudby Bridge
Reporting to the Highways Committee of the North Riding County Council with regard to the Hutton Rudby bridge, the County Surveyor states:-

The property on the south side of the river which obscures the view at the foot of Hutton Rudby bank is offered for sale at £1,750.  The property consists of a mill and 4 occupied cottages.  If the property were pulled down a good improvement would be effected.  The cost of clearing the site and making good would probably be covered by the value of the scrap material from the buildings.  The property adjoins the Bridge road which is maintained by the County Council.  The continuation of the Bridge road in either direction is a district road between Stokesley and East Rounton.
[The Mill and cottages were demolished in the 1930s to widen the road, which was dangerously narrow at that point]

---------------------

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

Chapter 9. Mr Barlow & his Neighbourhood

Robert may have already visited his brother James in Hampshire, but it is possible that he had never set foot in England before his arrival in early 1831.

He was instituted vicar of Hutton Rudby on 3 January [1], and arrived in the parish a short while later [2], a young and energetic man dressed in the usual clothes of a gentleman – it was not then customary for clergymen to wear clerical dress. 

There was no parsonage house at Hutton Rudby.

Mr Grice had lived in Hutton and purchased property of his own in the parish, and Mr Shepherd seems to have rented Hutton House from Lady Amherst.  An earlier vicar, George Stainthorpe, had lived in Rudby "in a house which I farm of the Honourable Colonel", George Cary. 

Accompanied by his wife and possibly one of his spinster sisters to keep her company, Mr Barlow settled into a comfortable house a little way outside Enterpen.  This had previously been known as Suggitt's Grove, and had been the home of Benjamin David Suggitt, the gentlemanly yeoman farmer who had built the Primitive Methodists their chapel.  The planting of an avenue of lime trees had given rise to a new and more genteel name, Linden Grove, and it now belonged to Suggitt's nephew, Dr George Merryweather of Whitby.  Merryweather, who was the inventor of the  Tempest Prognosticator, a device using leeches in jars to forecast bad weather, let the property, with some additional farmland, to Mr Barlow.