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Stotts The Cloggers – Fornication Not Allowed!
Bob and Gladys Stott  My father’s only sister was Gladys Dunkerley, born on December 3rd 1901 in Oldham. She was the daughter of Billy Dunkerley and Selina Martin. As a young child Gladys lived with her parents in several different houses in Oldham, but when she was seven years old the family moved to Failsworth, where Gladys was to spend the rest of her life.
She must have been close to her mother, as the only daughter, and like Selina became an accomplished dressmaker, but she was also a clever hair stylist with her own studio in Yorkshire Street, Oldham and later at the prestigious Lewis’s store in central Manchester.
Gladys’ life would not have been too difficult, in spite of the advent of the First World War and the subsequent boom and bust in the cotton industry, for her father initially had a good job as the overlooker of the modern Regent cotton mill in Failsworth. He also became a member of the local council for the Conservatives and was its chairman a record four times, and a magistrate. Unfortunately Billy became unemployed in the 1920s when the cotton industry suffered the first downward lurch of what was to become its terminal decline. Thereafter he obtained employment as a brewer’s representative. But by then Gladys would have been earning her own living.
Gladys eventually attracted the attention of Robert ‘Bob’ Stott, a Failsworth boy, the son of Robert Stott a fellow Conservative councillor of Billy Dunkerley, who had also been the council chairman – in his case three times. No doubt Billy and Robert would have given the courtship of their progeny a ready blessing, and the happy couple were married at St. John’s church in Failsworth on 29th August 1931. By about 1933 they had settled in a brand new semi-detached house at 16, Lord Lane in Failsworth, their home for the rest of their lives. Bob and Gladys never had children. Bob died in 1968 and Gladys in 1975.
Bob Stott was born about 1902. He was an amiable chap, comfortably built, not too tall and with a twinkle in his eye. He owned a boot and shoe repair business with premises on Oldham Road in Failsworth, at number 260/262. In his youth he was a clogger and on his retirement I remember that his old clogging knives were sent to leper colonies in Africa. This curious circumstance was because a Burnley clogger, Richard Turner, had taught lepers to make wooden sandals rather like the Dr. Scholl’s sandals of later years[1]. I wonder if it made the wearers talk gradely! There's a nice Lancashire dialect poem about clogs here.
A prestigious moment for Bob, and Gladys, occurred on 21st October 1964 when, with Bob as President, he and Gladys hosted the Annual Dinner of the Manchester, Salford & District Master Bootmakers & Repairers Association at the Southern Hotel in Mauldeth, Manchester (see photo).
The Clogging Business Bob was the third generation of cloggers in his family and inherited the business from his father. It was founded by his grandfather, Benjamin Stott, who seems to have been a Manchester man. Benjamin Stott married Philis Taylor in 1857 at St. John’s church in Manchester and it was probably then that he established his business. He was certainly at 260 Oldham Road in Failsworth by 1881, and may have been there earlier. However the 1861 census shows him at Watch Cote in Failsworth, and in 1871 the enumerator found him at Dob Lane, at the Newton Heath end of the town. Benjamin clearly wanted a business that handled more work than he could do himself for in July 1858 he took on an apprentice, the indenture for which has survived (see image above) and whose rather interesting contents are as follows: (Circular stamp at top with Crown and ‘Manchester 5.11.58 2)
Embossed with Crown and ‘Two Shillings Six Pence’ [Stamp Duty]
Stamp also shows ½ Dr Sheet [Unclear]
Has Crest with ‘Honi Soit Que Mal Y Pense’
This Indenture Witnesseth That John Timmis doth put himself Apprentice to Mr. Benjamin Stott to learn his Art and with him after the Manner of an Apprentice to serve from the 10 of July 1858 unto the full End and Term of 4 Years from thence next following to be fully complete and ended During which Term the said Apprentice his Master faithfully shall serve his secrets keep his lawful command every where gladly do… [nor?] shall do no damage to his said Master nor see to be done of others but to his Power shall tell or forthwith give warning to his said Master of the same Event shall not waste the Goods of his said Master nor lend them unlawfully to any person shall not commit fornication nor contract Matrimony within the said Term shall not play at Cards or Dice Tables or any other unlawful Games whereby his said Master may have any loss with his own goods or others during the said Term without Licence of his said Master he shall neither buy nor sell goods shall not haunt Taverns or Playhouses nor absent himself from his said Masters service day or night unlawfully But in all things as a faithful Apprentice he shall behave himself towards his said Master and all h… [blank] during the said Term
And the said Benjamin Stott him said Apprentice in the art of Clogger and Sole Maker which he useth by the best means that he can shall teach and Instruct or cause to be taught and instructed Finding unto the said apprentice sufficient Meat Drink Lodging and all other necessaries during the said Term John Timmis 4 Shillings per week for the first 12 Months and 5 Shillings and 6 pence Per week for The Second 12 Months 7 Shillings per week for the Third 12 months and 8 shillings and 6 pence per week for the 4 12 months.
And for the true performance of all and every the said Covenants and Agreements either of the said Parties bindeth himself unto the other by these Presents In Witness whereof the Parties above named to these Indentures interchangeably have put their Hands and Seals the 10th day of July 1858 and in the Twentieth Year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lady the Queen by the Grace of God of the united Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland QUEEN Defender of the Faith and in the Year of our Lord One Thousand Eight Hundred and fifty eight
[Signed] Benjamin Stott
John Timmis X his Mark
Witness Richard Rydings
JOHN Timmis Jnr [last word unclear]
The Amount of the Money, or the value of any other matter or thing given or agreed to be given with the Apprentice, by way of Premium, must be truly inserted in words at length; otherwise the Indenture will be void, and double such amount or value forfeited.
 The need for apprentices soon disappeared for Benjamin and Philis were quick to start a family and although the first two children, born in 1859 and 1860 were girls, Sarah and Jane, in 1863 Robert (Bob’s father) appeared, followed by James in 1864. That made the score at two all. In 1866 Elizabeth put the girls in front again, but James, about 1870, and Walter, about 1873, soon gave the boys the advantage. Both sides were drawn about 1874, when Mary appeared, and the girls gained a narrow win with the birth of Anna in about 1877. Final score: nine children, five girls, four boys, one tired mother.
Trade for the clogger in the industrial areas of northern England was good in the second part of the nineteenth century – and indeed into the first decades of the twentieth century – so Benjamin was on to a winner and must have been quite prosperous. He would have needed to be to feed nine children. By 1881 both Robert and John Stott were working for their father and had apparently completed their apprenticeships, for they are listed as ‘cloggers’ in the census return. By 1891 their youngest brother, Walter had joined them, but James escaped to the cotton industry and became a piecer!
Benjamin did not have things entirely his own way as regards clogging in Failsworth, for about 1889 a competitor set up in business only a short distance away at 278 Oldham Road – and what is worse the newcomer was an outsider. His name was William Tuson and he was from Whittle-le-Woods, south of Preston. We don’t know why William Tuson went to live in Failsworth, but he certainly stayed. In the end he had two shops there and his oldest son, Richard, set up another in nearby Hollinwood.
I wonder what the Stotts made of the Tusons – for through my mother I am William Tuson’s great grandson. In the end, I am happy to report, my two uncles, Bob Stott and Richard Tuson – both grandsons of the founders and who inherited their businesses (as boot and shoe repairers), came to be good friends and often enjoyed a pint and a natter together at some local hostelry.
The Stott family evidently preserved John Timmis’ indenture (which was kindly passed to me by an aunty, Brenda Dunkerley), and I wonder if old Benjamin Stott ever got it out and told his three clogging sons that he expected them to abide by its terms and conditions while apprentices. He might have got his way with regards to fornication and unlawful games, but haunting of taverns? Fat chance, I’ll bet!
References [1]. “In 1962 a doctor in the south of England visited Burnley at the suggestion of a colleague, Grace Ingham, doing leprosy work in Africa. He sought someone who could make a clog sole from the block. A newspaper appeal reached Richard Turner, son of a clogger and himself a seatsman who had taken into shoe repairing such skill as to be voted ‘Britain’s Champion Shoe Repairer’ in 1951 and 1961. As a result of their discussion, Mr. Turner went to the Oji River Leper Colony on the River Niger, Biafra, in January 1963 and for six weeks gave basic training with his stock knives to the lepers, using the plentiful local wood. A type of wood-soled sandal was made to replace the rubber-tyre shoes the lepers wore.
Those native African patients needed something to support their injured feet. Dick gave them lessons in his own time and at his own expense, teaching them to shape wood and fasten uppers to them. Bisana and zigba replaced alder and beech. I have since been in touch with Dr. Felton Ross of the All-Africa Leprosy and Rehabilitation Training Centre at Addis Ababa, who praises Dick’s work. He told me that, due to the acute difficulties of foot disorders, a sandal type of clog, very similar to the modern Scholl’s sandal, is preferred and is very helpful in healing foot ulcers.
Mr Turner … made a film of what he saw. When shown locally on his return, it made £200 for LEPRA. Two years later he went to Uganda on a similar mission with his stock knives. Those knives will never wear out, though they do require sharpening….
Dr. Ross, working with them in Biafra and Ethiopia, has reported on the paediatric value of what we may call clogs to his patients.”
From: Dobson, Bob, 1979, Concerning Clogs, pp. 23-24, Dalesman Books.
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