So began a report in the Wellington Journal on Saturday 14 September 1889 (page 7) – a report so long that I have only included the above paragraph in this website’s Education in the news page. More of the article deserves to be seen however, and commented on: hence this post.

There are two things about the news story that are of particular interest to me. Firstly, it looks back at, and provides an insight into, the foundation of Waters Upton’s school. Since I have failed to find much newspaper coverage from the time when the school was proposed, built, and opened, this is valuable information. Along with this information there are also opinions about education provided – or rather, not provided – in Waters Upton before the school existed.

Secondly, the support that was needed for Waters Upton to establish its school (and then to expand and maintain it) becomes apparent. A community that extended well beyond the boundaries of this small parish was essential for success.

Let’s continue with the Journal’s report, and set the scene…

As the article continues, some idea of the extent of the support network enjoyed by Waters Upton becomes clear. Some of the people named were residents of the parish, and some were the neighbouring parishes of Ercall Magna and Bolas Magna (a few of them may be familiar if you have read Late Victorian Christmases in Waters Upton). Many however were from further afield…

With the scene set, and the supporting cast introduced, the Reverend John Bayley Davies takes centre stage. The indefatigable rector was, I believe, the driving force behind the establishment, and the success, of Waters Upton’s school. He was soon talking about the subjects that I have expressed interest in…

There are a few things to unpack from the above, especially the second paragraph. First of all, was there really no school in the parish back in 1869? That depends on how you define ‘school.’ It is certainly true that at the time in question, there was no educational establishment in Waters Upton receiving Government funding and inspection.

Yet, if you look at the census returns for Waters Upton up to 1871 (and at other sources for the years before the 1841 census) there were teachers in the parish. Most, I believe, were teaching in what were termed ‘dame schools.’ The establishment run by Mrs Anne Walker (assisted by her daughter Sarah by the time of the 1871 census) was probably a step up from the others, and survived well beyond the opening of the village school. Several of Rev Davies’ predecessors also took in boarding pupils, for a fee, at the rectory.

So, there were certainly places within the parish where children could be taught – and if we look just a little beyond the parish boundary there were at least a couple more educational facilities that some from Waters Upton might have attended.

I will write in more detail about these various schools and teachers at another time; for now I will just say that the Rev Davies probably had good grounds for fearing “that many the children grew up very imperfectly educated”! And the rector was absolutely right to say that the Education Act of 1870 🡕 “put them all upon their mettle”. Under that Act, in 1873 the Education Department issued a notice that galvanised Rev Davies, and his supporters within and beyond the parish, into action.

That notice basically gave the residents of Waters Upton, Cold Hatton and neighbourhood an ultimatum. In a nutshell it said: A school for 100 children is needed in your area. If one is not provided voluntarily (for example, a ‘National School’ like the many others already established elsewhere by the Church of England) a ‘Board School’ (non-denominational, managed by an elected board, and paid for in part from the rates) will be established. A ‘voluntary’ school, tied to the Church, which would receive Government grants (and inspections) but not impose upon the ratepayers, was seen as the way to go. This took some determination. A lot of help was required – and was readily given…

John Bayley Davies then mentioned the bazaar held in 1876 to clear the initial debt on the newly-built school, and praised the “excellent teacher” then in place (Amelia “Minnie” Amos, who would soon be leaving – her story, and those of the other teachers at the school, will be told in due course).

After the conclusion of Rev Davies’ speech the sale of work was formally opened: “Lady Mabel Kenyon-Slaney came forward amid considerable applause, and in a few neatly-chosen words, declared the sale open, and wished the promoters every success.” (This was followed by many more words from her husband, Colonel William Kenyon-Slaney, the local MP.)

According to the Wellington Journal, “Business was then briskly proceeded with, the ladies using their proverbially persuasive powers with highly satisfactory results.” Including donations, £89 18s. 8d was raised over the two days of the sale. If you would like me to share the details, by reproducing the rest of the newspaper article, leave a comment and I will add a Part 2 to this post!

🡐 Part 1

I have little doubt that Dorothy Tudge was one of the first Shropshire women to volunteer for the Women’s Land Army. Pinning down exactly when she became a ‘Land Girl’ is tricky though, given that the date is not shown on her WLA index card. Also, that card recorded Dorothy’s age as 29, which if accurate (hint: I’m pretty sure it wasn’t!) would mean that she joined in 1936, well before pre-WW2 recruitment had started.

There’s a little more to be gleaned from that index card. Dorothy’s WLA number was 3872, and her address was her family home: Whittingslow, Marshbrook, Shropshire. Her occupation when she joined was ‘Poultry worker’; her qualifications were “6 years practical experience in poultry work, specializing in laying battery work.” Evidently she had moved on from the dairy work she trained for in the mid-1920s.

Waters Upton

Dorothy expressed a preference for ‘mobile’ rather than local service, and she was duly placed on a farm at the other end of the county; her stint as a poultry worker at Waters Upton was most likely her first ‘posting.’ She was recorded on the National Identity Register on 30 September 1939 at The Grange, where she lived with 70-year-old widow Edith Moore and Edith’s daughter Eileen.

This type of accommodation for Land Girls 🡕 was known as private billets. Treatment of WLA ‘guests’ in such billets varied – I hope Dorothy’s experience was towards the ‘one of the family’ end of the scale. I suspect that her farming background would have counted very much in her favour.

While part of me wonders about the specifics of what her poultry work involved, another part of me wants to know how Dorothy spent her time when she was wasn’t working. Did she explore the local countryside? Take walks into the village to visit the shop or post letters, engaging in cheery exchanges of greetings or conversation along the way? Take part in evening social functions in the old school room (though these seem to have mainly taken the form of whist drives!)? She would almost certainly have accompanied Mrs Moore and her family to church services on Sundays.

I’ll write in more detail about the Moore family at a later date. Suffice to say for now that the 1934 Kelly’s Directory showed Edith’s husband Robert Edward Moore, farmer, at the Grange Farm; he died in 1935 and the 1937 Kelly’s Directory lists his son Robert Henry Moore in his stead. From the 1939 Register we can see that Edith continued living at The Grange, while her son Robert was based, with his wife and children, at The Grange Cottage (a little further down Catsbritch Lane). Robert was described in the Register as a ‘Mixed Farmer.’ I suspect that he did not have a poultry unit himself – I think it more likely that a tenant renting one of his cottages did, on a piece of land that went with the cottage.

There were three cottages, and nearly 190 acres of land, attached to The Grange Farm. All of this property was sold in September 1941 when the Moores moved on from Waters Upton. Perhaps that was when Dorothy departed too.

Much Wenlock, then Whittingslow once more

By July 1942, Dorothy was based on the other side of Wellington from Waters Upton, at Bradley Farm, just North of Much Wenlock. I know this because of a lengthy report in the Shrewsbury Chronicle of 23 October 1942 (page 8) headlined “Petrol Rationing Offences.” Miss Constance Jean Conroy was at the centre of this case, as the person who illegally received and used petrol coupons; she was fined £40 in respect of eight offences. Dorothy Tudge, one of the parties who had transferred coupons to Miss Conroy, was fined a grand total of £1!

Meanwhile, other members of the Tudge family were also involved in the war effort. Dorothy’s father William was a Lieutenant in the Whittingslow Home Guard Platoon (Shrewsbury Chronicle, Fri 21 May 1943, page 4). Her brother Herbert meanwhile had joined the RAF. His active service was sadly short-lived…

While confirmation that Herbert was a prisoner of war was good news considering the alternative, this meant that he spent most of the war in Stalag Luft III. The Shrewsbury Chronicle of 22 December 1944 (page 5) conveyed the news that Herbert’s parents had received a photo showed Herbert and other officers taking part in a play staged at the prison camp, “Blithe Spirit,” in which Herbert played a female part. A copy of the photo appeared in the paper’s edition of 12 January 1945 (page 6).

Notices in the Shropshire press towards the end of 1944 suggest that Dorothy Tudge was by then back on ‘home turf’ and had, along with her cousin Helen Maybery, turned her hand to rearing pigs. Those notices (including one on the front page of the Shrewsbury Chronicle of 13 Oct 1944) related to the annual sale of pedigree and commercial pigs at Shrewsbury, scheduled for 27 October. Those entering animals to the sale included “Misses Tudge and Maybery, Marshbrook (Large Blacks)”. After that, news on Dorothy’s whereabouts and activities is hard to find for a while. Let’s return to her obituary to pick up the latter part of her story.

Wadhurst

Dorothy’s father William Tudge went to Wadhurst too. He was included in the household at Great Durgates Farm on the 1955 electoral register for the East Grinstead Constituency. Sadly, he had died by the time the register came into force in February that year. The Wadhurst burial register shows that he was buried at the parish church on 10 December 1954.

Dorothy, as her obituary shows, became an active member of the local community she had joined. I have not found any information about the ‘other local activities’ she supported, or which charities she worked for. Her involvement with the local Women’s Institute, however, can be tracked – in part – via newspaper reports.

The earliest such report that I’ve discovered dates from June 1965, when Dorothy was one of three WI members who got full marks in the competition “My prettiest piece of china” (Kent & Sussex Courier, 4 June, page 16). Dorothy is recorded as Treasurer in 1969 (same title, 21 February, page 13), and in 1973 her efforts to collect information and photographs relating to the early years of Wadhurst WI were publicised (same title, 1 June, page 2, and Sussex Express, 5 October, page 20). The final snippet that I’ll share appeared in the Sussex Express, 30 December 1976, page 26:

Dorothy’s obituary in The Courier concluded by noting that her funeral took place on 13 December 1976, at Tidewell. Her mother, after dying at the age of 97, joined her there in 1982.

A gravestone in Tidewell churchyard marks the spot where the former Land Girl of Waters Upton and her Mum lie together in eternal and well deserved rest.

Recently I looked again at one of the people recorded at Waters Upton when the National Identity Register was compiled at the end of September 1939. Dorothy M Judge, born 15 January 1907 – why could I find no other records for her? Looking again at an image of the register page, the answer dawned on me: I had misread Dorothy’s surname, the ‘J’ was in fact a ‘T’. Oops. (The transcribers working for Ancestry and Findmypast made the same mistake; I have submitted corrections to both.)

With Dorothy’s true name established I could finally find and link together records relating to her, and piece together what remains of her story. Where better to start than at . . . the end? Well, it struck me that Dorothy’s obituary, the ‘potted history’ of her life shared by way of remembrance just after her death, provides a framework upon which a more detailed account could be constructed – and can now be shared.

Stepaside

As we have seen, Dorothy Mary Tudge was born in January 1907, in Shropshire. I think the exact location was most likely the place where she and her family were enumerated on the 1911 census: Stepaside. This lies on the edge of the parish of Stokesay, then part of the Ludlow Registration District 🡕 in which Dorothy’s birth was duly registered 🡕. It also lies right next to the village and parish of Onibury.

The household at Stepaside recorded on the 1911 census was headed by Dorothy’s father William Bradford Tudge, aged 29, a farmer born at Leominster in the neighbouring county of Herefordshire. William’s wife was Mary Eleanor, 26, a native of nearby Wistanstow. She had been married to William for five years (their wedding took place at Stokesay on 14 March 1906 🡕) and two children had been born of their union. Dorothy, then 4, we know about of course. The other child was a very new addition to the family: Herbert John Charles Tudge, age “under one month.” Enumerated with the Tudges were a maternity nurse, a ‘lady help,’ a general domestic servant, and a cowman.

Stepaside Farm was still this family’s home in 1913, when William Bradford Tudge, “farmer & prize cattle breeder,” was listed in that year’s Kelly’s Directory of Shropshire 🡕 as part of the entry for Onibury (the snippet from the directory, on the University of Leicester website 🡕, is used under a Creative Commons licence 🡕). His details appeared just below those of his father John, who farmed at Duxmoor. These listings were repeated in the 1917 directory (viewed at Ancestry: Herefordshire and Shropshire Directories, 1917).

By 1921, William Bradford Tudge had taken his family to live with his parents John (71) and Helen (68) at ‘Duxmore’. William’s occupation was given as “Assisting Father.” Dorothy, then aged 14, was not with her family however. She was instead boarding elsewhere in the county.

Wellington

Hiatt Ladies’ College in Wellington was Dorothy Tudge’s home away from home, presumably for several years. This institution was established in 1847 🡕 by Mrs Elizabeth Hiatt, née Keay (whose Crudgington-born father John, incidentally, was baptised in November 1801 at Waters Upton). Allan Frost, author of a book on the history the college, is quoted by the Shropshire Star in 2019 🡕 as saying that it was “the first college intended purely for the education of young ladies in the country.”

It appears that the college did an excellent job too. A list of students with top educational attainments published in The Educational Times of 1 February 1906 (pages 91 🡕 and 92) includes five names from Elizabeth Hiatt’s establishment, and there are other examples to be found.

The census of 1921 shows that in addition to the head, May Margaret Daniels, there were 11 other mistresses, teaching English, French, science, history, music, art, and gymnastics. In addition the college had a matron, an assistant matron, and a nurse. Dorothy Tudge was one of 55 pupils, aged from 10 to 17, most of whom came from Shropshire and the neighbouring counties of Cheshire, Staffordshire and Warwickshire.

I would love to know what Dorothy’s educational accomplishments were during her time at the college, not to mention her other experiences and how she adjusted to a very different way of life after her childhood on a farm. Who were her friends? What did they get up to when not in class? Did they break the rules, and if so, were they caught?

Cwm Head, Radbrook, and Whittingslow

As for the length of time Dorothy attended Hiatt Ladies’ College, my guess is that she was there from around 1917 to about 1923. A report in the Wellington Journal of 19 January 1924 (page 5) then places her back in the South of Shropshire, and pursuing an interest in dairy work. The report, covering a meeting of the Salop Agricultural Committee, noted that:

Did Dorothy delay taking up her ten week scholarship? Or did she stay at Radbrook for a lot longer than ten weeks? Some 18 months after the above report, the same newspaper carried (on 25 July 1925, page 5) details of the distribution of prizes at Radbrook Technical School. Amongst those presented with certificates and prizes by Lady Harlech was Miss D Tudge, who received a school certificate for dairy work – first class.

Over nearly all of the following 15 years, Dorothy seems to have ‘flown under the radar’ as far as the press was concerned. In complete contrast, her father and her maternal aunt, Mrs (Katie) Maybery, were regularly in the local newspapers thanks to their prize-winning herd of dairy Shorthorn cattle. From earlier examples of this media coverage (including the Shrewsbury Chronicle, 8 Apr 1932, page 8) it appears that the herd was established at Cwm Head around 1926, before the operation moved (in about 1929 I believe) to nearby Whittingslow Farm, Marshbrook. Though she spent time away from her family, these farms – especially Whittingslow – were home.

Surrey, and back to Shropshire

Dorothy spent at least part of this time living – and presumably working – in Surrey. Electoral registers record her there in 1930 and 1931 living at 75 Langley Park Road, Sutton, with Ada and Caroline Absale (sadly, she probably didn’t make jokes about them descending vertical rock faces or the sides of tall buildings with the aid of ropes). She also appeared in a 1933 electoral register, at Chalklands, Woodland Road, Little Bookham, with Thomas and Edith Weaver.

Those few occasions when Dorothy’s name did appear in the papers during this period were sad ones – the funerals of her grandparents. The last of these events was the interment of Dorothy’s paternal grandmother Helen Tudge, who died in on the 4th, and was buried on the 8th, of February 1937. Reporting on Helen’s death and funeral, the Shrewsbury Chronicle (12 Feb 1937, page 16) noted that she was a member of the local Women’s Institute and the Women’s Conservative Association, as well being a “fervent church woman”. At least one of those things would rub off on Dorothy.

Two years later, Britain was at war, and members of the Tudge family stepped up to play their parts. For Dorothy, this would include working at Waters Upton.

Part 2 🡒

🡐 Part 1 (A Man Missing)

It appears that Thomas Plant of Waters Upton originated from Mucklestone, a parish which back then included parts of both Shropshire and Staffordshire. The baptism of “Tho: Plant Son of John Plant & Eliz: his wife” took place on 18 September 1726 🡕 (making Thomas just under 50 rather than “upwards of” that age at the beginning of 1776). Then, on 4 September 1750 🡕 and also in Mucklestone, the wedding of “Thomas Plant & Ann Thomas both of this Parish by Banns” took place.

The Thomas Plant who was baptised in 1726 would have been 23 or maybe 24 years old when the above marriage took place, so I think the chances are good that he was the groom. What, though, are the odds that he was also the Thomas Plant who, with wife Ann, had children at Waters Upton a few years later and, later still, went a-wandering just before the snowfall of the century?

Another question: there was a gap of about five years between the marriage of Thomas Plant and Ann Thomas in 1750, and the first baptism of a child of Thomas and Ann Plant at Waters Upton in 1755 – were there any children born in that gap who might belong to this family?

In my attempt to answer the second question, I turned to Findmypast. This website has excellent collections of digitised and indexed parish registers from both Shropshire and Staffordshire (although oddly, while there are images of the register containing Thomas Plant’s baptism, that register has not been indexed). In addition, they have a very useful way for subscribers to search for vital events from across their record sets. This allows us to look for events falling within a range of distances from a particular place.

“Daughter[s] of Thomas & Ann Plant of Chetwyn Parish”

After using this search functionality I found myself focussing on two of the baptisms it revealed, both falling in the period from 1750 to 1755, and both at Hinstock (about seven miles away from Mucklestone, as the crow flies). First, on 6 Aug 1751 🡕, there was Mary. Then, on 20 May 1753 🡕, there was Elizabeth. Each of these girls was described in the parish register as being a “Daughter of Thomas & Ann Plant of Chetwyn Parish”.

For ‘Chetwyn,’ by the way, read Chetwynd: the Plant family had probably, erm, planted themselves somewhere in the north of that parish, such as Sambrook. At that time Hinstock’s church would have been closer than the one in Chetwynd village (Sambrook St Luke 🡕, shown on the map below, was not built until 1856).

Depending on exactly where in the northern part of Chetwynd parish the Plants were living, the distance by road from their abode to Waters Upton might have been somewhere between six and eight miles, or thereabouts. Did the Plant family of Chetwynd travel those roads and become the Plant family of Waters Upton? After researching their children, I believe they did.

My attempts to find out what happened to the Plant children have met with mixed results. The fate of Thomas Plant junior was all too easy to determine. Turn over a leaf of the Waters Upton parish register, from the pages showing his baptism in 1759, and you find the burial of the same “Thomas Plant the Son of Thomas and Ann Plant”. He was laid to rest on 11 August 1761, his second birthday having been his last. As for the sisters of this unfortunate boy, I’ll look at them in order, from the youngest to the eldest.

Margaret Plant was baptised in the month following her brother Thomas’s burial. It appears that she may have married in her home parish – at the age of 42. Banns of marriage between “Thomas Groom of the Parish of Bolas, Bachelor, & Margaret Plant of this Parish, Spinster” were published on three successive Sundays, May 1, 8 and 15, prior to the nuptials at Waters Upton on Monday 16 May 1803.

I have looked for baptism records for any children who may have been born of this union, in case the bride was another, younger Margaret Plant, but have found none.  Neither, sadly, have I found death or burial records that I can link with any certainty to Thomas or Margaret, confirming their ages.

Even more speculative are my conclusions regarding Martha Plant. She may have married Edward Podmore at Chetwynd on 29 December 1781 🡕. If she did, she might have ended her days in that parish: Martha Podmore of Chetwynd End, age 70, was buried at Chetwynd on 6 December 1824 🡕.

“Elisabeth, the base-born Daughter of Ann Plant”

For Ann, there is another entry in the Waters Upton parish register besides her baptism which almost certainly relates to her – and to her daughter. On 7 March 1776 “Elisabeth, the base-born Daughter of Ann Plant by Edward Jones of Kidderminster” was baptised.

I am not at all certain what happened to baby Elizabeth, although I hope she survived, thrived, and was supported financially by the man who fathered her out of wedlock. I don’t think Ann married Edward Jones. She may have been the Ann Plant who wed a man whose name has been transcribed as John Esbury, at Stoke Upon Tern on 23 June 1778 🡕.

Further guesswork is all that I can offer in the case of Ann’s sister Elizabeth Plant. She was possibly the bride of Thomas Talbot, in a marriage solemnised at Church Aston on 28 December 1776 🡕. She might then have been the widowed Elizabeth Talbot of Chetwynd Heath who was buried 6 April 1783 🡕 at Chetwynd.

For the firstborn child of Thomas and Ann Plant I believe I can offer greater certainty. Following the publication on 20 and 27 November and 4 December 1774 of Banns between “Thomas Cartledge and Mary Plant both of this Parish”, that couple were married at Waters Upton shortly afterwards on 15 December. Both parties made their marks rather than signing the register. One of the witnesses who likewise made her mark was Ann Plant, who was likely to have been either the mother or the younger sister of the bride.

Mary, you might remember, was one of the two Plant girls baptised at Hinstock. This marriage, I think, confirms her (and her sister Elizabeth) as part of the Plant family of Waters Upton. In which parish Thomas and Mary Cartledge remained after their wedding. Five children, Sarah, Mary, John, Elizabeth and Thomas, were born to this couple, all baptised in the church of St Michael in the latter half of the 1770s and the early 1780s, the surname in each case written as Cartlidge.

“Thos. Plant a Pauper”

Let’s return to the parents of these children, Thomas and Ann. There are burials for both of them in the Waters Upton register. “Ann, the Wife of Thomas Plant, aged 62” was interred on 9 May 1780. Despite the slight age discrepancy, I think that makes her “Ann ye daughter of John Thomas of [probably Napley – part of the page is missing] Laborour”, baptised 30 January 1720/21 🡕 at Muckleton.

Notice that the register entry for Ann’s burial refers to her as the wife, not the widow, of Thomas Plant. Thomas did survive the spectacular snowfall of January 1766, and at some point he did return to Waters Upton. His burial, on 27 December 1785, was entered in the parish register as “Thos. Plant a Pauper, aged”. Possibly the clerk meant that Thomas was aged as in old, but more likely I think is that Thomas’s age was never ascertained and the register entry was left incomplete.

Wait though – Thomas, a farmer in 1776, was a pauper at the time of his death? This is entirely possible. He may have been what we would now call a smallholder, renting and cultivating (and/or grazing livestock on) a  relatively small acreage. And he may have suffered a setback, in the form of crop failure, diseased livestock, or personal ill-health for example, which left him unable to keep the farm and support himself in his later years.

Perhaps Thomas’s trip to Staffordshire (or wherever he actually went!), followed by his failure to return home for a couple of months or more, was the first sign that things were not well with him, with his farm, or with his finances. In which case, a cynic might take the view that Thomas’s ‘afflicted friends’ were actually creditors trying to track down the man who owed them money.

I prefer to believe that Thomas had friends who genuinely cared about him. Friends within his local community who were so concerned by his disappearance in the dreadful winter weather of January 1776, that they were prepared to pay for notices in newspapers in the hope of finding him alive and reuniting him with his family. Thomas Plant, the blue-suited ‘stout made man’ of Waters Upton, may have ended his days financially impoverished, but well off in that priceless commodity known as friendship.

Imagine being the “afflicted Friends” – or indeed the family – of Thomas Plant. Off he went one day, saying he was visiting friends in the next county, but two months later he had not returned and no word had been received as to his whereabouts. Concern for Thomas’s wellbeing was heightened by the severe winter weather that followed his departure. The above notice in the Shrewsbury Chronicle continued:

“there never was known in this kingdom so deep a snow”

The description of the snowfall, and the fear expressed that it may have proved to be terminal for Thomas, were not exaggerations. Back on Saturday 13 January, the Shrewsbury Chronicle had reported (on page 3) that “the amazing fall of snow on Saturday night and Sunday last” had rendered the roads from Wolverhampton to Birmingham, and from there through Coventry to London, “intirely impassable.” Furthermore, a woman had been found dead in the snow in Worcestershire.

By the following Saturday, more reports of people lost in the snow had been received, and the Chronicle’s editor stated (again on page 3):

Difficulties were still being experienced during the ensuing week. Along with snow-related reports from around the country however, the Shrewsbury Chronicle of 27 January also carried (on page 3 once more) news of local acts of charity. In Shrewsbury itself, William Pulteney and John Corbet, esquires, had paid for nearly 40 wagonloads of coal to be distributed among the poor of the town. A similarly generous helping of coal was also given to the poor of Shrawardine and Montford, by Lord Clive. And thanks to Lord Pigot, “a loaf and cheese were given to every person in Bridgnorth that would accept of them”  – that edible offering was accepted by nearly 900 people!

“The Wings of small Birds were so frozen that they fell to the ground”

Another source of information on the severity of the weather in Shropshire at the beginning of 1776 is the parish register of Whittington. In that register the rector, Reverend William Roberts, liked to record far more than just baptisms, weddings and burials. His entries for 1776, which I have transcribed from copies of the original register at Findmypast (another transcript can be found on Mel Lockie’s website 🡕) began:

After a couple of baptisms, Rev Roberts’ weather observations continued at the end of January and into February:

I think you can now fully appreciate the severity of the weather which descended upon Shropshire and many other parts of England, on the evening of the day after Thomas Plant left his home in Waters Upton in January 1776. Was he lost, or can we find the poor man?

To clarify: I’m not suggesting that we invent time travel and go back to look for our missing man. What I am wondering is, can we find Thomas in the records, and can we determine whether or not he survived, and returned to Waters Upton?

“A stout made Man”

Sadly I’ve found nothing about Thomas in the newspapers following the appeal that was made two months after he set off for Staffordshire. However, that appeal (a version of which also appeared on page 3 of Aris’s Birmingham Gazette on 11 Mar 1776) concluded with information about Thomas, to aid in his identification:

How fantastic to have this pen-picture of our wanderer from Waters Upton! If, by the way, you are intrigued (as I was) by the ‘Basket Buttons’, they were often known as Dorset buttons 🡕 and were hand-made by “repeatedly binding yarn over a disc or ring former.” Very popular in the 18th century apparently. Not that this helps us in tracking down Thomas!

A more useful piece of information for our purposes is Thomas’s age. It’s a little vague, and might not have been entirely accurate, but it helps to narrow down the field when searching for him in the records. In addition, we know that although he lived in Shropshire, he (supposedly) left home to visit friends in Staffordshire. Might he have had family in that county too?

To the above leads, I can add more from my abstracts of baptisms at Waters Upton. There are four, in the latter half of the 1750s and another in 1761 which are of particular interest. Anne, Thomas, and Margaret, children of Thomas and Ann(e) Plant, were baptised on 18 May 1755, 25 March 1759, and 26 April 1761 respectively. In between the first two of those children, with no parents named but almost certainly another child of Thomas and Ann, there was Martha Plant, baptised on 2 October 1757. I think it is reasonable to conclude that these were children of the man who went walkabout from Waters Upton in 1776.

This information allows a search not only for Thomas Plant’s own baptism, but also for his marriage to Ann. Carrying out such a search, I soon spotted parish register entries which very likely recorded both of these events.

Part 2 (A Man Found) 🡒

A little while ago I bought a postcard which bears a Waters Upton postmark. It does not add to my limited collection of village views – the scene on the rather grubby front of the card depicts Edgbaston Old Church, Birmingham. But it was probably posted by someone living in Waters Upton, or at least close enough for their mail to be franked there, someone named Elizabeth. Who was she?

“Dear Master David” wrote Elizabeth, “Many thanks for P.C how splendid to hear you are in the top form I hope to meet you next time through [= though?] if possible I was so disappointed Much love to you”. The postcard was franked on 11 May 1908.

The recipient

At least the identity of the postcard’s recipient was fairly easy to establish. The card was addressed to Master D. G. Loveday, care of W. Deedes Esq, Mill Mead, Shrewsbury. At the top of the list of results when searching the 1901 census at Findmypast for D* G* Loveday is 4-year-old David G Loveday. He was living at the Manor House in Williamscote, in the Oxfordshire parish in which he was born: Cropredy.

The birth of David Goodwin Loveday, mother’s maiden name Cheape, was registered in the second quarter of 1896 in Banbury registration district. Googling David’s full name generates results from Wikipedia and other websites, showing that he was born on 13 April 1896, was educated at Shrewsbury School, and was an Anglican bishop who died 7 April 1985.

I decided to find out more about David Loveday and his family in the hope that this might help to reveal the identity of Elizabeth. David’s father was John Edward Taylor Loveday. John was born in the first half of 1845 at East Ilsley in Berkshire, where his father (as per the censuses of 1851 and 1861) was Rector. He seems to be best known for printing, “with an Introduction and an Itinerary”, his great grandfather John Loveday’s manuscript Diary of a Tour in 1732 through parts of England, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland. (This tour was probably number 23 in a list of 126 Tours by John Loveday compiled by some of his descendants.) He was educated at Exeter College, Oxford, where he matriculated on 11 June 1862, aged 17.

John Edward Taylor Loveday married Edinburgh-born Margaret Cheape on 15 Oct 1874 at Cameron, in Fife, Scotland. The couple made their home at Williamscote House (the above-mentioned ‘Manor House’), where they were enumerated with their first five children in 1881. John was described as a “Landed Proprietor & Magistrate for Counties of Oxford & Warwick”. They had five more children over the course of the next 15 years, of whom David Goodwin Loveday was the youngest.

It turns out that David was not the first of the Loveday children to spend time in Shrewsbury. The 1901 census records his brother Henry Dodington Loveday, then aged 20 and an articled clerk to a solicitor, lodging with the family of clergyman William Leeke at the Abbey Foregate Vicarage. Another brother, Alexander, was also living in Shrewsbury when the 1901 census was taken. Aged 12, he was boarding at the school his brother David would later attend, Mill Mead, a private establishment under the headmastership of Wyndham Deedes.

Elizabeth . . . who?

The Lovedays’ connections with Shrewsbury might explain how the mysterious Elizabeth became a friend of the family. Was there a lady of that name living in Waters Upton in the early 1900s who looks like a suitable candidate? Of the several Elizabeths on the 1901 and 1911 census returns for the parish, one stands out: Elizabeth Yonge.

Elizabeth Mary Hombersley Yonge, née Groucock, was the wife of the Rev Lyttleton Vernon Yonge. Rev Yonge was a son of Vernon George Yonge, also a clergyman, and part of a prominent Staffordshire family which had its seat at Charnes Hall. Lyttleton was born at the Rectory in Great Bolas, received his education at Cambridge, and although he resided at Waters Upton he was vicar of Rowton, in Ercall Magna parish. Elizabeth, who was also from the parish of Bolas Magna, was a daughter of Thomas Groucock (a farmer of 180 acres in 1881), and of Elizabeth Groucock née Dickin, who was descended on her mother’s side from the Wase family of Waters Upton Hall.

The social standing of the Yonges (and perhaps also the subject of the postcard’s picture) makes Elizabeth my top ‘suspect’ in a case which is not so much a ‘whodunnit’ as a ‘whopostedit’. All I am lacking is any direct evidence that the Yonges and the Lovedays actually knew each other!

Maybe one day I will find that David Goodwin Loveday’s early education, before he went to Shrewsbury School, was as a pupil boarding either with Lyttleton Vernon Yonge or with his fellow clergyman and Waters Upton resident, John Bayley Davies? Or perhaps I will find a document written (or least signed) by Elizabeth, so that I can compare it with the writing on the postcard at the centre of this mystery. Her signature should appear in the Waters Upton marriage register, but the register begun in 1837 is still in use and has not been deposited at Shropshire Archives. The probate copy of her will, a digitised version of which I have obtained from HMCTS via the Gov.UK website, is typewritten and bears no signature.

So is this the end of my investigation? Not quite. Because while looking at the other Elizabeths of Waters Upton, I found another line of enquiry.

Coincidence or connection?

The Elizabeth who piqued my interest was Elizabeth Emma Ball. She was a daughter of William Abraham Richard Ball and his wife Sarah, née Cureton. This Elizabeth spent the early part of her adult life working as a servant before moving back to Waters Upton between 1901 and 1911. There is nothing to suggest that she met the Lovedays unless perhaps she worked for one or more of them as a servant, but if that was the case the development a postcard-exchanging relationship with David Goodwin Loveday seems unlikely. However, if she didn’t know the Lovedays personally, Elizabeth may have known of them, through her younger sister…

Mary Ann Ball was born at Waters Upton on 13 February 1877. By 1891, when she was 14, she was in service, working as a nurse for the family of John Bayley Davies at Waters Upton Rectory. A decade later she was in Shrewsbury, living and working as a housemaid at a house in Belle Vue Road. Then, in 1909, she married Thomas Henry Kimnell.

Thomas was born at Wardington in Oxfordshire on 25 August 1878 and was enumerated there with his family on the censuses of 1881, 1891, and 1901. When the latter census was taken, Thomas was 22 and, like his father, he was an agricultural labourer. Whether his fortunes changed before or after his marriage is unclear, but change they most certainly did. The 1911 census recorded him not as a labourer but as a farmer, working on his own account. With wife Mary Ann and daughter Eva Mary (born 14 March 1910) he was living at Williamscote in Wardington parish.

A second daughter, Helen Elizabeth, was born at Williamscote on 22 February 1914, but the Kimnells’ third and last child, Alice, was born at the end of 1917 or in the first quarter of 1918 on the other side of the River Cherwell in the parish of Bourton. Almost certainly the family was living there when the Banbury Guardian of 5 Jul 1917 reported on a military tribunal at which Thomas, a farmer of 107 acres, successful claimed exemption. From the 1921 census and National Identity Register of 1939 it appears that the family remained there for more than 20 years, at Pewet / Peewit Farm (highlighted on the map above).

Thomas Henry Kimnell of Williamscote died on 16 June 1965 at Woodford Halse in Northamptonshire; his estate was valued at £4531. Mary was also of Williamscote at the time of her death on 17 February 1969; given that her death was registered at Daventry she too may have died at Woodford.

Did the references to Williamscote in the preceding paragraphs cause you to think back to the earlier part of this story, relating to the Loveday family? The hamlet of Williamscote, although lying in the parish of Wardington, is a stones-throw from Williamscote House in neighbouring Cropredy parish (the boundary is shown in purple on the map below). The 1911 Kelly’s Directory of Oxfordshire lists Thomas H Kimnell right after John Edward Taylor Loveday under Williamscote! Coincidence? Quite possibly, but I think there’s a good chance that it isn’t.

William Ball was well known in Waters Upton so both the Davies family and the Yonges would have been familiar with his daughters, all the more so in the case of Mary Ann given her employment at the Rectory. If, as I have theorised, Elizabeth Yonge was a friend of the Lovedays, this might mean that she was in a position to help bring about the union of Thomas Henry Kimnell (who the Lovedays may have known, perhaps as an employee?) and Mary Ann Ball.

Ultimately, this is speculation and does not prove anything conclusively. The puzzle of the postcard’s sender remains officially unsolved – a one-place study ‘X File’. At least for now. One further possibility for acquiring a sample of Elizabeth Yonge’s handwriting and/or signature remains. Dave Annal recently reported on Twitter that he managed to obtain a copy of an original will from HMCTS, although he did have to wait 16 months!

Picture credits: Front and back of postcard, author’s own images. Extract from Ordnance Survey 25 Inch mapping (1892-1914) showing Williamscot House reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland under a Creative Commons licence. Extract from Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 mapping (1937-61) showing Great Bourton, Pewet Farm and Williamscot reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland under a Creative Commons licence. Extract from Ordnance Survey 6 Inch mapping (1888-1913) showing Williamscot House and Williamscot reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland under a Creative Commons licence.

Non-Coronation celebrations

The coronation of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra was originally scheduled to take place on 26 June 1902. Elaborate preparations had been made and foreign dignitaries had gathered, but a last-minute medical emergency forced the pomp and pageantry to be postponed. Just two days before the big event, Edward ended up on a table in Buckingham Palace’s Music Room, where surgeon Sir Frederick Treves performed an operation to drain his Majesty’s abdominal cyst.

Although the coronation itself could not proceed as planned, Edward insisted that this should not prevent regional celebrations (and the serving of special dinners to 500,000 of London’s poor) from going ahead. It was in these circumstances that somewhat muted celebrations took place in Shropshire. Let’s return to the Wellington Journal of 28 June 1901:

Committee members, music, and medals

What a great line-up of local talent on the organising committee for these celebrations! Two clergymen (Lyttleton Vernon Yonge and John Bayley Davies), a clergyman’s wife (Elizabeth Mary Hombersley Yonge, née Groucock), five farmers (William Jervis, Bernard Morrison Needham, John Shakeshaft – who was also a corn and coal merchant, Richard Allen, and Henry James Jones), a butcher (Alfred Henry James), a carpenter and wheelwright (Alfred Ridgway), a shoemaker (Samuel Thomas Bennett), a railway platelayer (Samuel Woolley), and a former tailor who became the local relieving officer and registrar of births and deaths (William Abraham Richard Ball). All were enumerated at Waters Upton on the census of 1901 – I have hyperlinked each of their names to their household’s entry on my abstract of that census.

As for the Waters Upton Brass Band, how I wish I could find out more about it. I think it likely that the band’s musicians were drawn not just from Waters Upton but also from neighbouring villages and hamlets too. The band leader, for example, was almost certainly the John Davies who was master of Crudgington School from around 1880. The earliest mention of the band I have found so far was in the Wellington Journal of 8 June 1889. The paper reported that “The Waters Upton Brass Band, under the able leadership of Mr. John Davies,” marched as part of a procession celebrating the anniversary of the Waters Upton lodge of Oddfellows.

Almost certainly this was “the Tibberton and Waters Upton Brass Band” which headed a similar procession four years later (Shrewsbury Chronicle, 16 June 1893) and “the Cold Hatton brass band, which played selections on the ground, Mr. J. Davies conducting” at a parish church bazaar held at Waters Upton in 1901 (Shrewsbury Chronicle, 7 June 1901). After playing at the Coronation celebrations in 1902, and leading another Oddfellows’ procession to Waters Upton church the following year (Shrewsbury Chronicle, 19 June 1903), the last reported ‘gig’ for the Waters Upton Brass Band, conducted by Mr Davies, appears to have been a fund-raising event for parochial work at Crudgington in 1904 (Shrewsbury Chronicle, 24 June 1904). The John Davies whose death at the age of 62 was registered in the first quarter of 1906 at Wellington, was very likely our band leader.

Something else I’d love to know is whether any of the Coronation medals issued to the children of Waters Upton have survived, perhaps in the possession of their descendants? (An example of a Coronation medal – not necessarily representative of those issued at Waters Upton as designs varied – is shown here.) Mrs. Rider of Crescent House, Wellington, who supplied the medals, did not live in the village but through her late husband Dr John Rider – a descendant of the Wase family of Waters Upton Hall, had connections to it. Both Mr and Mrs Rider were buried in Waters Upton churchyard.

A second celebration

This story of Coronation celebrations at Waters Upton in 1902 is not quite over. The King and Queen were finally crowned, following Edward’s recovery, on the ninth of August – and his subjects could mark the occasion with unmuted merriment.

The fact that the reconvened Coronation was scheduled for a Saturday was not entirely welcome. The editor of the Wellington Journal opined in his newspaper on August 2nd, that “It would be difficult, we fancy, to imagine a more awkward time to celebrate the King’s Coronation than on a Saturday, for in nearly every town in England this is a very busy day, and one on which shopkeepers are apt to rely in making up for a probably cash deficiency on the other days of the week, and when the working classes do most of their shopping.”

The parishioners of Waters Upton responded to the potential problems of a Saturday celebration by holding their second Coronation ‘do’ on the following Tuesday. The Reverend Yonge once again chaired the organising committee and made his grounds available, and William Ball reprised his role as “the energetic hon. secretary and treasurer.” The day’s events were similar to those of the original Coronation celebrations, with some elements missing but others added – and with a note of sadness regarding the health of the Rector, as the Wellington Journal of 16 August reported:

Picture credits: Edward VII and Alexandra, adapted from a public domain image at Wikimedia Commons. Tuba from Etienne Mahler at Flickr, public domain image. Coronation medal from Wikimedia Commons contributor Helensq; used under a Creative Commons licence. Coronation of Edward VII in Westminster Abbey from Library of Congress via getarchives.net; no known copyright restrictions.

< Back to Part 2.

What an interesting evening this is turning out to be – I must travel back to Waters Upton in the late 1860s more often! ‘Local talent’ performing along with accomplished amateur vocalists and musicians from a little further afield is proving to be a great combination. Speaking of those who have come from beyond the immediate locality, here comes Mr Palmer again.

Duet, ‘Come where my love lies dreaming,’ Mr Palmer and friend.

There are murmurs of approval in the schoolroom at the sight of Moses Palmer preparing to deliver his third song this evening. Rightly so, as Mr Palmer’s musical talents are well known in north-east Shropshire – and not just as a singer.

Local papers show that Moses Palmer was conductor of the Oakengates Choral Society from the mid-1850s (Newport & Market Drayton Advertiser, 1 June 1855; Shrewsbury Chronicle, 2 November 1855), provided guidance to St George’s Choral Society when it was formed in 1859 (Wellington Journal, 7 May 1859; Eddowes’s Shrewsbury Journal, 11 May 1859), and played a leading part in the formation of the Coalpit Bank Choral Society the following year (Shrewsbury Chronicle, 9 March 1860).

Several of the concerts put on by those choral societies with Moses Palmer’s involvement were for charitable purposes. I think it’s quite likely that Mr Palmer is here tonight because the man for whom money is being raised by this event, John Preece, lives in the same part of Shropshire.

A hush is now descending, and the performance is beginning; here are the words (from The Guiding Star Songster, published a couple of years ago in 1865) if you’d like to follow along. If you haven’t jumped back in time with me to witness this live performance, I’ve also found an audio recording of a much later rendition, which although delivered by different artists (and a larger number of them) will give you a good idea of what we’re listening to, here in 1867.

Come where my love lies dreaming,
Dreaming the happy hours away,
In visions bright redeeming
The fleeting joys of day;
Dreaming the happy hours,
Dreaming the happy hours away,
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Is sweetly dreaming the happy hours away.

Come where my love lies dreaming,
Is sweetly dreaming, her beauty beaming;
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Is sweetly dreaming the happy hours away.
Come with a lute, come with a lay,
My own love is sweetly dreaming, her beauty beaming;
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Is sweetly dreaming the happy hours away.

Soft is her slumber, thoughts bright and free
Dance through her dreams like gushing melody;
Light is her young heart, light may it be,
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Dreaming the happy hours,
Dreaming the happy hours away;
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Is sweetly dreaming the happy hours away.

Intermission…

Time travel does not always go smoothly, unfortunately –sometimes it’s as if we lose our internet connection during an online presentation and then we’re ‘back in the room’. I’m not really au fait with the mechanics behind at all, but it might be a problem with the flux capacitor, or a random burst of chroniton particles causing a kind of ‘time burp’, or maybe even eddies in the space-time continuum. Whatever the cause, in being whipped out of time and then plonked back exactly where, but not exactly when we were, we have missed four performances.

The newspaper report of this evening’s event gives us some idea of what happened in our absence, but some elements remain a mystery. “Beatrice (pianoforte and organ flutina), Miss Titley and Mr T. Hughes.” What was performed here? Quite possibly it was an air from the tragic opera Beatrice di Tenda. Mr T Hughes was presumably not the Mr Hughes we have already heard from (and who performed the next number). Miss Titley was very likely one of Waters Upton’s own, Mary Jane Titley, daughter of Thomas Titley, a butcher, and his wife Elizabeth, née Icke. If so, she was, like Miss Shakeshaft who we met earlier, another young performer.

“Song, ‘The Village Blacksmith,’ Mr. Hughes.” What a shame we missed this! The words of the song can however be found woven into my article Blacksmiths in Waters Upton. And you can listen to a more recent performance of it on YouTube. Next came “Song, ‘Poor old Joe,’ Mr. Palmer.” Now, this is a ‘plantation song’ and as such, contains terminology which isn’t really acceptable in the 21st century, so I’m going to skip past it.

“Grand valse, Miss S. J .Shakeshaft.” This might have been one of any number of tunes with ‘Grand Valse’ in their titles, played on the pianoforte – possibly René Favarger’s Grande Valse de Salon, published in 1860. The performer I’m much more certain about: Sarah Jane Shakeshaft of Cold Hatton, daughter of farmer Joseph Shakeshaft and his wife Martha, née Wright. She must be about 18 right now, and I think that’s her over there looking suitably pleased having acquitted herself well in what was probably her first performance in front such an audience. We are back in the schoolroom, and the next song is about to be delivered.

Song, ‘A Motto for Every Man,’ a Friend.

The vocalist here is, I think, one of the friends brought over by Moses Palmer. The song was written by Harry Clifton (pictured below) and is also known as “Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel.” Once again, I’ve found the words – in Songs for English Workmen to Sing, published this very year (1867)! Plus, in case the words alone make the song sound rather dull, there’s a fabulous recording of it being sung by Stanley Holloway.

Some people you’ve met in your time, no doubt,
Who never look happy or gay:
I’ll tell you the way to get jolly and stout,
If you will listen awhile to my lay.
I’ve come here to tell you a bit of my mind,
And please with the same if I can:
Advice in my song you will certainly find,
And “a motto for every man.”

Chorus.
So we will sing, and banish melancholy;
Trouble may come, we’ll do the best we can
To drive care away, for grieving is a folly;
“Put your shoulder to the wheel,” is “a motto for every man.”

We cannot all fight in this “battle of life,”
The weak must go to the wall,
So do to each other the thing that is right,
For there’s room in this world for us all.
“Credit refuse,” if you’ve “money to pay,”
You’ll find it the wiser plan;
“And a penny lay by for a rainy day,”
Is “a motto for every man.”

A coward gives in at the first repulse;
A brave man struggles again,
With a resolute eye, and a bounding pulse,
To battle his way amongst men;
For he knows he has one chance in his time
To better himself if he can;
“So make your hay while the sun doth shine!”
That’s “a motto for every man.”

Economy study, but don’t be mean:
A penny may lose a pound:
Through this world a conscience clean
Will carry you safe and sound.
It’s all very well to be free, I will own,
To do a good turn when you can;
But “charity always commences at home,”—
That’s “a motto for every man.”

To be continued.

Picture credits. Extract from sheet music for Come Where My Love Lies Dreaming: Image from University of Texas Arlington Libraries website, and used under a Creative Commons licence. The Village Blacksmith, sheet music cover: Public domain image from Picryl. Harry Clifton (1863): Public domain image from Wikimedia Commons.

< Back to Part 1.

It’s Wednesday 20 January 1867 and we’re sat in the school room at Waters Upton, trying our best not to be noticed. Luckily the assembled audience, containing many of the neighbourhood’s farming folk and others of a similar social standing, are focussed on the Reverend Halke. As it happens, he is delivering the next ‘act’. Are you sitting comfortably? Then we’ll continue.

Reading, ‘Mrs. Gamp’s Tea Party,’ J. T. Halke.

For those unfamiliar with the works of Charles Dickens (in our present company, surely not many!), the Reverend Halke explains that the passage he will read is from The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit. A hush falls over the room as those around us, many of whom are used to hearing the cleric reading on Sundays from an altogether different book, await this new experience.

“And quite a family it is to make tea for,” said Mrs. Gamp; “and wot a happiness to do it! My good young ‘ooman”—to the servant-girl—“p’raps somebody would like to try a new-laid egg or two, not biled too hard. Likeways, a few rounds o’ buttered toast, first cuttin’ off the crust, in consequence of tender teeth, and not too many of ‘em; which Gamp himself, Mrs. Chuzzlewit, at one blow, being in liquor, struck out four, two single, and two double, as was took by Mrs. Harris for a keepsake, and is carried in her pocket at this present hour, along with two cramp-bones, a bit o’ ginger, and a grater like a blessed infant’s shoe, in tin, with a little heel to put the nutmeg in; as many times I’ve seen and said, and used for caudle when required, within the month.”

As the privileges of the side-table—besides including the small prerogatives of sitting next the toast, and taking two cups of tea to other people’s one, and always taking them at a crisis, that is to say, before putting fresh water into the tea-pot, and after it had been standing for some time; also comprehended a full view of the company, and an opportunity of addressing them as from a rostrum, Mrs. Gamp discharged the functions entrusted to her with extreme good-humour and affability. Sometimes, resting her saucer on the palm of her outspread hand, and supporting her elbow on the table, she stopped between her sips of tea to favour the circle with a smile, a wink, a roll of the head, or some other mark of notice; and at those periods her countenance was lighted up with a degree of intelligence and vivacity, which it was almost impossible to separate from the benignant influence of distilled waters.

But for Mrs. Gamp, it would have been a curiously silent party. Miss Pecksniff only spoke to her Augustus, and to him in whispers. Augustus spoke to nobody, but sighed for every one, and occasionally gave himself such a sounding slap upon the forehead as would make Mrs. Todgers, who was rather nervous, start in her chair with an involuntary exclamation. Mrs. Todgers was occupied in knitting, and seldom spoke. Poor Merry held the hand of cheerful little Ruth between her own, and listening with evident pleasure to all she said, but rarely speaking herself, sometimes smiled, and sometimes kissed her on the cheek, and sometimes turned aside to hide the tears that trembled in her eyes. Tom felt this change in her so much, and was so glad to see how tenderly Ruth dealt with her, and how she knew and answered to it, that he had not the heart to make any movement towards their departure, although he had long since given utterance to all he came to say.

Duet, ‘The Minute Gun at Sea,’ Mr. Palmer and friend.

Now Mr Palmer returns to the spotlight. Last time he was part of a quartet (performing The Village Choristers), now he’s about to sing a duet from Up All Night or The Smuggler’s Cave, a comic opera written way back in 1809 by Samuel James Arnold, with music by Matthew Peter King. I took the liberty of stopping off in 1870 on my way here to pick up a copy of Diprose’s Standard Song Book and Reciter, which has the following version of the song (showing which parts are sung by each character). A minute gun, incidentally, is a cannon or gun fired at one-minute intervals as a sign of distress.

Juliana: Let him who sighs in sadness here,
Rejoice, and know a friend is near.

Heartwell: What heavenly sounds are those I hear?
What being comes the gloom to cheer?

1st: When in the storm on Albion’s coast,
The night watch guards his weary post
From thoughts of danger free,
He marks some vessel’s dusky form,
And hears amid the howling storm,
The minute gun at sea,

2nd: The minute gun at sea;

Both: And hears amid the howling storm,
The minute gun at sea.

2nd: Swift on the shore a hardy few
The life-boat man with a gallant crew,
And dare the dang’rous wave;
Through the wild surf they cleave their way,
Lost in the foam, nor know dismay—
For they go the crew to save,

1st: For they go the crew to save.

Both: Lost in the foam, nor know dismay—
For they go the crew to save.

1st: But O, what rapture fills each breast

2nd: Of the hopeless crew of the ship distressed.

Both: Then landed safe, what joys to tell
Of all the dangers that befell!—

1st: Then is heard no more,

2nd: By the watch on the shore,

Both: Then is heard no more, by the watch on the shore,

Both: Then is heard no more, by the watch on the shore,
The minute gun at sea.

Song, ‘The Fidgety Man,’ Mr. Hughes.

Now Mr Hughes is taking his second turn, but I need to pop back to 1870 to find a copy of his song even though it means missing his performance. (I think I’ve found it in Sharp’s New London Songster, but if this is it – and it’s the only song of this title I can find – it’s a strange choice for man to sing! Have a look and make your own mind up.)

Reading, ‘The Boy and the Beads,’ Mr. Weaving.

Edward Weaving is the Master of the Industrial School in the former workhouse buildings just beyond the parish boundary, near Cold Hatton. He and Mrs Weaving started there in 1860 and although they don’t yet know it, next year (1868) Mr Weaving will become the Master of the Drayton Union Workhouse. (Shhh, don’t tell – spoilers!) In the here and now, he’s going to read from Dickens’ Pickwick Papers. I wonder if he also recites this passage to his inmates?

“By the bye, Bob,” said Hopkins, with a scarcely perceptible glance at Mr. Pickwick’s attentive face, “we had a curious accident last night. A child was brought in, who had swallowed a necklace.”

“Swallowed what, Sir?” interrupted Mr. Pickwick.

“A necklace,” replied Jack Hopkins. “Not all at once—you know that would be too much; you couldn’t swallow that, if the child did—eh, Mr. Pickwick? ha! ha!”—Mr. Hopkins appeared highly gratified with his own pleasantry; and continued—”No, the way was this;—child’s parents were poor people who lived in a court. Child’s eldest sister bought a necklace—common necklace, made of large black wooden beads. Child being fond of toys, cribbed the necklace, hid it, played with it, cut the string, and swallowed a bead. Child thought it capital fun, went back next day, and swallowed another bead.”

“Bless my heart,” said Mr. Pickwick, “what a dreadful thing! I beg your pardon, Sir. Go on.”

“Next day, child swallowed two beads; the day after that, he treated himself to three, and so on, till, in a week’s time, he had got through the necklace, five-and-twenty beads in all. The sister, who was an industrious girl, and seldom treated herself to a bit of finery, cried her eyes out, at the loss of the necklace; looked high and low for it; but, I needn’t say, didn’t find it. A few days afterward, the family were at dinner—baked shoulder of mutton, and potatoes under it—the child, who wasn’t hungry, was playing about the room, when suddenly there was heard a singular noise, like a small hailstorm. ‘Don’t do that, my boy,’ said the father. “I ain’t a doin’ nothing,’ said the child. ‘Well, don’t do it again,’ said the father. There was a short silence, and then the noise began again, worse than ever. ‘If you don’t mind what I say, my boy,’ said the father, ‘you’ll find yourself in bed, in something less than a pig’s whisper.’ He gave the child a shake to make him obedient, and such a rattling ensued as nobody ever heard before. ‘Why, it’s in the child!’ said the father: ‘he’s got the croup in the wrong place!’ ‘No, I haven’t, father,’ said the child, beginning to cry, ‘it’s the necklace; I swallowed it, father.’—The father caught the child up, and ran with him to the hospital—the beads in the boy’s stomach rattling all the way with the jolting; and the people looking up in the air, and down in the cellars, to see where the unusual sound came from. He’s in the hospital now,” said Jack Hopkins, “and he makes such a strange noise when he walks about, that they’re obliged to muffle him in a watchman’s coat, for fear he should wake the patients!”

“That’s the most extraordinary case I ever heard of,” said Mr. Pickwick, with an emphatic blow on the table.

“Oh, that’s nothing,” said Jack Hopkins. “Is it, Bob?”

“Certainly not,” replied Mr. Bob Sawyer.

“Very singular things occur in our profession, I can assure you, Sir,” said Hopkins.

> On to Part 3.

Picture credits. Mrs. Gamp Makes Tea: Sketch by ‘Phiz’ (Hablot K Browne), scanned by Philip V Allingham and taken from The Victorian Web. Extract from sheet music for The Minute Gun At Sea: Original image from Trove; out of copyright. Mr Pickwick: Public domain image from Wikimedia Commons.

What a joy to find (in the Wellington Journal, 2 March 1867) details of the first amateur entertainments performed in Waters Upton! And what a joy it must have been for those who witnessed those events too. No doubt songs were sung and tales were told regularly on an informal basis in both of the village inns, and of course entertainments could be attended in Wellington (and possibly in other, larger villages in the district). Never before however had anything quite like this happened in Waters Upton itself.

Behind the joy was a tale of tragedy, and heroism (the full story of which I have written for the Railway Work, Life and Death project). On 29 December 1866 John Preece, a railway porter and gate keeper at Wombridge in Shropshire, had saved the life of a child who strayed onto the railway tracks as a train was approaching. The cost to John was a terrible one – struck by the engine, he was left with injuries so severe that he was taken to the Salop Infirmary in Shrewsbury. There, it was found necessary to amputate John’s right foot and hand, and the whole of his left arm below the shoulder. A subscription was set up “to alleviate the suffering incurred in this act of courage and humanity” (Eddowes’s Shrewsbury Journal, 16 January 1867).

The entertainments at Waters Upton were arranged to contribute to the funds being raised for the gallant Mr Preece and his family (he had a wife and two children). The first was held on Wednesday 20 January and the second, “given for the amusement of the working classes” on the following Friday (Wellington Journal, 2 March 1867).

The man occupying the chair at the entertainments, the Reverend J T Halke, was the subject of my first post to this blog: John Thomas Halke and the Church of Waters Upton. As you will soon see, he also contributed readings to the proceedings (and was clearly one of Charles Dickens’ many fans). Few if any of the other performers were Waters Upton residents, but several lived close by on the eastern side of Ercall Magna parish and others came from further afield.

Rather than simply give you the names of those who played, sang and read, and of the pieces they performed, as listed in the report from the Wellington Journal which I have quoted from above, I am going to try something a little different. Put on your most old-fashioned formal wear and prepare to step back in time, as I attempt to recreate an evening of songs, music, and readings in mid-Victorian rural Shropshire.

Grand march (pianoforte and organ flutina), Miss Humphreys and Mr. Hughes.

Unfortunately we have arrived just after the opening number, but that does mean we can make an unobtrusive entrance during the applause and take our seats at the back. The newspaper report of this evening’s programme tells us that a ‘grand march’ was just played, but there are several ‘grand marches’ so there’s no telling which one this was. I’m not sure who Miss Humphreys is. Mr Hughes on the other hand I believe have read about in the Shropshire papers, appearing at concerts as a member of the Shrewsbury Vocal Union. Have you ever seen a flutina before? It’s a type of accordion. Ah, we’re almost ready for the second item.

Glee, ‘The Village Choristers,’ Mr. Palmer and friends.

I’ve not seen him before, but I’m pretty sure this is Moses Palmer of Redlake, over in Wellington. He’s given quite a few songs and recitations, sometimes accompanied by friends as now, and also by his son and daughter (I read about that in the Shrewsbury Chronicle of 8 January 1864). Would you believe he’s actually a mining agent / engineer? This is a glee for four voices, which should be interesting; here is one version of the words (which I found in a programme for the Wells Harmonic Society’s 1848-9 season) if you’d like to follow along:

Come, Brothers, tune the Lay,
For all who can must sing to-day.
Ye jovial Sons of Song!
Here at Pleasure’s summons throng.
Now pray let all be Harmony,
Beware, beware,
Now pray let all be Harmony,
Take care, take care,
That all who hear may praise the strain,
Again, and yet again.
Tra, la, la, &c.

Now I with PRIMO start,
I’ll take the {SECOND / BASSO} part,
The rest will try their choral art.
Now you, Sir, mind what you’re about,
Keep Time, or else you’ll all be out.
Now pray let all be Harmony,
Take care, take care,
That all who hear may praise the strain,
Again, and yet again.
Tra, la, la, &c.

So far there’s nothing wrong.
For ever live the Soul of Song!
Let all the burthen share,
And Music’s glorious praise declare.
Bravissimo! what Harmony:
Aha! aha!
Sweet Harmony, brave Harmony:
Aha! aha!
It is indeed a noble strain,
We’ll have it yet again.
Tra, la, la, &c.

Song, ‘Let us all speak our minds,’ Miss Shakeshaft.

Now, if I’m not mistaken this is young Charlotte Emma Shakeshaft, daughter of William and Sarah at Cold Hatton, just north of here in Ercall Magna. She doesn’t know it yet but she’s going to marry William Henry Atcherley from the Moortown, a little west of us and also in Ercall Magna. He’s her second cousin on their mothers’ sides (they have shared Icke ancestry) – and also my first cousin four generations removed. So many things we have to keep quiet about when we go back in time! Anyway, for those unfortunate enough not to have travelled back to 1867 with me, here are the words and a rendition of the song on YouTube:

Men tell us ‘tis fit that wives should submit
To their husbands, submissively, weakly,
Tho’ whatever they say their wives should obey,
Unquestioning, stupidly, meekly.
Our husbands would make us their own dictum take
Without ever a wherefore or why for it.
But I don’t and I can’t, and I won’t and I shan’t!
No, I will speak my mind if I die for it.

For we know it’s all fudge to say man’s the best judge
Of what should be, and shouldn’t, and so on,
That woman should bow, nor attempt to say how
She considers that matters should go on.
I never yet gave up myself thus a slave,
However my husband might try for it.
For I can’t and I won’t, and I shan’t and I don’t,
But I will speak my mind if I die for it.

And all ladies I hope who’ve with husbands to cope,
With the rights of the sex will not trifle,
We all, if we choose our tongues but to use,
Can all opposition soon stifle.
Let man if he will then bid us be still,
And silent, a price he’ll pay high for it.
For we won’t and we can’t, and we don’t and we shan’t,
Let us all speak our minds if we die for it.

This song was only published four years ago in 1863. It sound like an early feminist statement, but it might not be all that it appears. It was written by a man (William Brough), is intended as a comedic if not a satirical song, and at least one performer of the piece in the music halls sings it as “Mrs Naggit”. Mark my words though, in time the ladies will turn the tables and adopt this as a suffrage song!

> On to Part 2.

Picture credits.Musical notes: Public domain image from Pixabay. Flutina: Modified from a photo by Wikimedia Commons contributor Bpierreb; used under a Creative Commons licence. Sheet music for Let us all speak our minds: From 8notes.com; used under a Creative Commons licence.