|
|
John William Dunkerley and Harriet Eliza Riches
Beginnings John William Dunkerley was the third child of William and Sophia Dunkerley. He was born in March 1857 at Glodwick Lane in Oldham and was to have two older brothers and two younger sisters. He may have been named John after his maternal grandfather, John Barrett. Life was probably fairly uncomfortable for John William as his father seems never to have settled into any skilled occupation and probably changed jobs quite frequently. When John was born his father was a labourer in a machine works but four years later he was a machine painter and later he is listed as a wood polisher.
The accommodation in Glodwick Lane may have been at Sugar Meadow but by 1861 the family were at Greenfield Gate. Both of these comprised small cottage dwellings where water had to be drawn from a local source, and at that time there would have been something of a rural feel to the area. However the burgeoning cotton industry at Bottom o’ th’ Moor in Oldham, together with its industrial pollution, was rapidly encroaching from the north.
In 1869 when John William was only twelve years old his father died and Sophia was left with five children to care for. John’s two older brothers, Joseph and James, would have been working, and John no doubt was soon found employment to bring a third wage into the house. The 1871 census shows Sophia and her five children, plus a sister, living at Burton Street, probably still in the Glodwick Lane area. John was then a cotton piecer, which means that he worked for a spinner who operated a cotton mule. It was the piecer’s job to join together parted ends of yarn so that spinning could continue uninterruptedly. There were often two piecers, a little piecer, generally a young lad, and a big piecer. The hope of the piecer was for promotion to mule spinner, which was a skilled and comparatively well-paid job. There is reason to suspect that John may have worked at the Greenbank Mill Complex at the north end of Glodwick Lane. John’s oldest brother, Joseph, was also a cotton piecer, and his other brother, James, was a warehouseman.
The Norfolk Connection The next information that I have about John relates to his marriage in December 1878 at St. Mark’s church in Glodwick, to Harriet Eliza Riches. Harriet was not a local girl – far from it. She was born at Buxton, a small village in Norfolk, north of Norwich. She was the fifth of nine children born to Edmund Riches and Elizabeth Tompson, both from Norfolk. The various children were born in several different villages round  the area which this may suggest that Edmund was something of an itinerant worker. However by the birth of the youngest child, in about 1866, the family were in Norwich.
‘Riches’ is a surname strongly rooted in East Anglia, especially Norfolk, and there are family graves in Buxton (Norfolk) and other local churchyards. Further information about the branch of the Riches family of relevance to this story can be found here.
At some time between 1866 and 1871 (probably no later than 1870) Edmund and Elizabeth moved with their family from Norwich to the cotton districts of Lancashire. To put it mildly, this is a surprising move to have made and one wonders why, if they were determined to move away from Norfolk, they did not go to London, to Grimsby (then an important fishing port), to Birmingham, or to West Yorkshire, all of which were nearer. The migration of Edmund, Elizabeth and their family may have been part of a wider movement. 'During the first half of the 19th century Norfolk’s farmers became more and more prosperous however this was not to last. In the second half of the century cheaper grain began to be imported from America and Norfolk’s farmers began to suffer. People began to leave the country in favour of the towns and industrial areas[1].' A family history website hosted by Frank Ives provides a much more specific insight. An article in 'The Bacup Times' of 20th November, 1875 carrying the healine 'Importation of Millhands' reads as follows. On Wednesday evening, about 50 farm labourers with their wives and families from Norfolk arrived at Bacup. They were under the care of Mr J. H. Turner and had been brought to work at the mills of Messrs Joshua Hoyle & Sons Ltd, both at Bacup and Sharneyford. Homes and houses had been provided for the strangers and in consequence of the wetness of the evening, a conveyance was placed at the disposal of those who had to go to Sharneyford[2].' This type of movement was certainly not unique. For example, a recent 'Who Do You Think You Are' programme on the BBC (that of Jeremy Paxman?) revealed a plan earlier in the nineteenth century by Sufffolk Overseers of the Poor to move paupers away from the area to relieve the pressure on the Poor Rate. Again, Lilian Brown, who married Raymond Cooper in Oldham, described elsewhere on this site, was the daughter of a Norfolk man who was born in 1878. Another example is that of the Eves family who moved from Norfolk via Cheshire to Rochdale. Clearly there was an incentive to move un- or under-employed people away from East Anglia to the booming cotton districts of Lancashire. The pull of employment in the cotton districts may have been much wider than East Anglia. It was also during the 1870s that Sarah Hales and her cousin Mary Jane Roberts made the surprising move from Shropshire to Oldham, and perusal of the census entries for the Lancashire towns at this time show the appearance of many Irish, Scottish and Yorkshire workers. It is difficult now to imagine the prestige of towns like Oldham, which was then a cradle of technology and the world's greatest cotton spinning town, or Blackburn and Burnley, then great centres of cotton weaving, but the late nineteenth century was their time in the sun of economic success and prosperity. Migration at that time must have been greatly facilitated by the existence of the railway network, allowing long journeys to be made with comparative ease. At first Edmund and his oldest son went to work in a calico printing works near Accrington while Elizabeth and the rest of the family took up residence north of Littleborough, near Rochdale. At some time during the following decade the family moved to Oldham, which was to be their permanent home. It was there that four of the children married, including Hariet Eliza. It was there too that both Edmund and Elizabeth died. No doubt the Riches’ rural Norfolk accents would at first have attracted considerable curiosity in Lancashire, but at least they appear to have found continuing employment in their new surroundgings.
Married Life After their marriage in 1778 John and Harriet lived in Oldham. The 1881 census found them at number 3 Back Marsh Street and John had achieved the coveted rank of mule spinner. Back Marsh Street appears to have been at Mount Pleasant, north of Lees Road and still very close to where John was brought up. They already had one child, named Sophia after her grandmother.
By the time of the 1891 census the family had moved to what was probably a better house at 68 Wellyhoe Street, about half a mile to the east in Clarkesfield. This would have been a modern brick-built terraced house. Living with John and Harriet were Sophia and three younger children, Sydney, James and Stanley; there had been a fifth child, William, born in 1881 but he died aged five months and was buried in the grave of his paternal grandfather, also William, at Greenacres cemetery. John was now described as a cotton spinner’s minder, which may suggest that he had received some small promotion.
By 1900 the family had relocated to 14 Ethel Street, on the Hathershaw side of Oldham, near to Ashton Road. Sophia had evidently caught the eye of a young man of her own age called George Spalding, who lived at number 18 in the same street, for they were married in the parish church of St. Paul. The 1901 census shows them living with John and Harriet at 14 Ethel Street, and they eventually had six children, four of whom had children of their own.  On George and Sophia’s marriage certificate John William was described as a spinner. He is likely to figure again on the 1911 census, when it becomes available, for the death reference seems to be in the September quarter of that year, in Oldham. He appears to have survived Harriet who probably died in the first quarter of 1905, also in Oldham.
I am very pleased to have been contacted by living relatives of the second child of George Spalding and Sophia Dunkerley, Caroline Spalding, who have kindly provided me with a substantial amount of information about the Spalding family and the descendents of George and Sophia. I would always be pleased to receive contact from other relatives also. One of Caroline's brothers was James Dunkerley Spalding, who married Nellie Burns at Oldham St. Paul's in 1934. He was a fireman in Oldham but sadly died in the Manchester blitz at Trafford Park just two days before Christmas in 1940. He is listed as a civilian on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website and left two children. This page was last modified on Monday, January 21, 2008 |
|