Peter Brocklehurst
It was a long road that led me to Peter. When discussing the family with my father, many years ago, he mentioned that he’d had an aunt who he thought had ‘married a Brocklehurst’. I wondered what one of those looked like…
Like many stories in family history, this one turned out to be almost as misleading as it was helpful and led me through a maze, from which, after several false turns, I eventually emerged with a good story.
William Dunkerley, who married Sophia Barratt in 1848 had six children, of whom the second was James and the last was Sarah Hannah. I descend on a line from James to another William and then to James Leslie. Peter came from Sarah Hannah who married James Meredith Butterworth. Their daughter was Edith who married Peter’s father, Andrew Lawton Brocklehurst, and, with the benefit of hindsight, that now looks fairly simple.
The trouble was that my great grandfather, James Dunkerley, also had a daughter called Sarah Hannah, and in her infinite wisdom she decided to marry the younger brother of James Meredith Butterworth, whose name was John. It was this Sarah Hannah who was my father’s aunt, and there was no Brocklehurst attached!
The puzzle was solved partly via the internet, and partly in the Local Studies centre in Oldham. My wife and I followed the trail through the electoral rolls and on into a series of historic ’phone books. To our astonishment we came up with an address in Chadderton Park Road where, apparently, I had a hitherto unknown living relative. It seemed that I might eventually be able to observe a Brocklehurst in its natural habitat!
It didn’t seem right to just knock on the door and say ‘I’m a cousin that you didn’t know you had’, but, since it was lunch time and we wanted a break from our rolls and directories, my wife and I thought we’d take our sandwiches, purchased at Sainsbury’s, and eat them in Chadderton Park Road. Then, at least, we might see the Brocklehurst haunt before concocting a letter of introduction to send to them after we returned home. Imagine our consternation when we found the house we were seeking graced by a ‘For Sale’ notice in the front garden, and, worse, one that was over-stamped with the word ‘Sold’. I had visions of the Brocklehurst getting away! Finishing our sandwiches, my wife and I decided to take our courage in both hands and try to make contact. What might we find? Would there be anyone in? What kind of a reception might we get? Were Brocklehursts fierce? Such were our concerns as we took the plunge and rang the bell.
To our relief, a very nice-looking lady opened the door, and I set out to try to cover 175 years of family history in about ten seconds. Fortunately we were invited to enter, not required to retreat, and were shown into a rear room where, finally, I was able to observe the essential Brocklehurst characteristics.
Peter and I got on immediately – in fact we and our wives all got on at famously. It was easy because Peter seemed to be interested in everything – a real polymath. It wasn’t long before, over a nice cup of tea, we were exchanging tales of recent history. There is much – too much – that I don’t know about Peter, but I gathered he had done a good deal in computing and found out that he was an active Freemason. He professed much interest in my background in geology and travel, and listened with close attention as I explained our common family history. Later my wife and I visited Peter and his wife at the bungalow they moved to, and he and I corresponded from time to time by e-mail and enjoyed the occasional chat on the ’phone. Peter was quick to pass on cyber-jokes that took a poke at the nonsense inflicted upon us by politicians, and I often chuckled at them. I think he probably felt an affinity to the Antient Order of Grumpy Old Men!
It tickled me that Peter got interested in family history – I think I infected him! Of course I’d ‘spoiled’ the fun he could have had chasing up the Dunkerley side of his family, but he told me that he was well into a complex series of relationships on the Brocklehurst side of things.
Peter told me that his grandfather returned from Russia in 1917, fleeing the Bolshevik revolution; he died aged 56. When he arrived in England he 'phoned his father in law, Andrew Lawton, to ask him for money to help him get back home, but Andrew Lawton said 'You've got this far without any help, you can get yourself home!'.
Peter's grandfather was a hard man and made Andrew start work every day at 5.30 am and do two hours learning about the cotton trade before starting his normal day’s activities. Andrew was always in the cotton trade. He started as an office boy and rose to become Chairman of Belgrave Mills. About 1917 he was an office boy at John Shaw’s and by 1928 was the Secretary there. By 1930 he had the unusual role of Salesman/Secretary. He lived in Grange Avenue and married in 1932. The mill at that time was virtually closed, except that Andrew kept a nucleus of key people and bought spun cotton from other mills, which he re-branded and sold on. This was about 1932-36 when trade was extremely difficult.
Peter told me that when he was a boy he was often taken to the cotton mill that his father ran, and that the secret of his father’s success, at a time when most other mills were closing down, was in his intimate knowledge of the raw cotton that he bought. Peter believed that the kind of knowledge that he had of the Lancashire cotton trade in those times had not been recorded and he was working on compiling this information at the time of his death. I do not know how far he had got in this project, but his wife has said that she will preserve his research of the cotton trade and his family history in case either his son or his brother wish to continue with it.
Peter had a first-class intellect and was good company. I shall miss him. His loss at a relatively young age is a great one and it will be hard for those he has left to come to terms with his absence. The consolation, perhaps, lies in remembering the zest he had for life and the knowledge that his faculties were always undiminished.
This page was last modified on Sunday, March 01, 2009