[67] I left school at the end of December ’71 (footnote 1), and in Feb 1872 (footnote 8) went to live with my Uncle James Moores, who had who had a wholesale and retail grocery business at Pendleton, Broad Street, where I only stayed a few months, but enough for me to see round the city and neighbourhood, and make the acquaintance of some more of my relatives. My Father took me to Manchester and stayed a few days, and I went about with him.
Beside my uncle James Moores there were the Hydes, sons of Mr and Mrs Hyde of Aylesbury, nee Sarah (footnote 2) Moores and the daughter of my grandparents, consequently my cousins (see page 6). Mr Hyde who married my Aunt Sarah was a grocer in Aylesbury, and his sudden death drove his wife to insanity; she spent the rest of her life in Stone Asylum. Her son Thomas also died suddenly, dropped dead on the railway platform of Heaton Norris, Lancs. [68] Henry Hyde was a clothier in Manchester, and traded at the Manchester Clothing Co Unlimited, and for a period was prosperous, but on one of his annual holiday trips was so badly injured it kept him away from his business so long that it failed. He subsequently got a position with the Manchester Gas Co as collector. His accident happened thus; he was fond of driving a horse and high dog-cart, and on this particular trip it was over some rough country, so rough indeed that the rig went over the horse and nearly killed the driver, he being pinned under the vehicle. He had a family of about ½ a dozen.
Sarah, the next of the family was married to a farmer, Mr Chas Hart of Upton Grey near Basingstoke; this family I was well acquainted with, and used to visit them from Fleet, and fine holidays I had on their farm and in their home. [69] William was the next; he was salesman at a large furniture store in Salford. I used to visit him and his wife; they had no children. Mary was the next, and a little bit self-conscious – always lived with relatives. Joseph managed one of his brothers clothing shops, was married but had no family.
Another branch of the family was the Boddingtons; my Grandpa’s sister married a Mr Boddington near Aylesbury, but they migrated to Manchester; Henry entered the Strangeways brewery as a clerk, eventually becoming proprietor, and took his son-in-law into partnership, and known as Boddington and Hart they did a very large business (footnote 3). A sister married a Mr Mackie, proprietor and editor of the Warrington Guardian, the daily paper; they were Methodists, and when retired from business followed their favourite preacher to London Kensington. [70] Timothy was a corn merchant in Manchester, and through many ups and downs and going through the courts made a success, eventually paying his creditors in full and interest on their money; they held a public meeting in the Town Hall and presented him with a timepiece. He was a Methodist local preacher, and his wife complained that he was away from home too much. They lived at Eccles near Manchester, famed for its Eccles cakes, very much like Banbury cakes (footnote 4). The son-in-law Mr Leigh was taken into partnership, and the business was known as Boddington and Leigh. Mrs Saunders was a widowed sister and had a large family, so Timothy allowed her to manage one of his Manchester shops.
Manchester consisted of the city of Manchester, the city of Salford and Pendleton, beside several suburbs, small towns in themselves. [71] The river Irwell flowed into the city, and eventually was incorporated into the Manchester Ship Canal, whereby the cargoes of raw cotton were brought from the Carolinas of America straight to the cotton mills of Lancashire, the trade being so extensive as to give Manchester the name of “Cottonopolis”. All these relatives I visited with my father.
My Uncle James being a fervent Calvinistic Baptist, we used to go to Gadsby’s Chapel in the Rochdale Road, about 3 miles from Pendleton, and that we did twice morning and night; that made 12 miles walk on Sunday to Church, but sometimes I used to go to a Congregational Chapel in Salford, just over the Windsor bridge which went over the canal and railroad, both of which went to Liverpool, 30 miles away. This Congregational church had as pastor Rev Hugh Stowel, a noted preacher in his day; also another noted preacher was Rev Alexander MacLaren. [72] I was not at that time conscious of his gift as a preacher, but some years after I heard of his fame and used to read some of his sermons. It is said of the Principal of Manchester Theological College (Primitive Methodist) that he told his students “We tell you what to preach, now go to Dr MacLaren’s and see how it is done”. What a tribute from another denomination, but the PM’s were thoroughly democratic – before they built a College at all, they sent their first student to Spurgeon’s college, and his testimony was that Spurgeon never made any difference between him and his own Baptist students. Although Manchester was the most populous city, it was not the County Town, but Lancaster was; then came Liverpool, Oldham, Bolton and Preston, beside many another thriving town, and Rochdale, the home of cooperation (footnote 5).
[73] I spent a day at Liverpool once, going over the Mersey to Birkenhead, also to New Brighton, a residential place a few miles down the Mersey, and picked up a quart of mussels, which Miss Duckworth (footnote 9) kindly cooked for me when I got home. I used to chop loaf sugar and fill 100lb casks of it, also help to weigh and pack barrels of groceries, all done up in lbs (pounds weight) ready for small stores to sell; also to pack lard in pails of 28lbs.
Peel Park Salford was a grand place, with its museums, and grounds well laid out. The trains of coal carts coming through Pendleton day and night, showed that we were not far from the collieries, but I never went down a coal-pit. There was a large cattle market in Cross land Pendleton, held one day a week, and large railway yards at Ordsal Lane nearby. [74] I once went on a delivery round and passed through Leigh, where we had a customer living in Furze Lane; of this more later. On the way at Worsley I saw barges laden with coal coming on the canal out of a tunnel, and was told that the operators laid on their backs on a plank, and propelled the barge by treading along the ceiling of the tunnel (footnote 6). Also a railway where the truck of coal ran down a decline carrying a horse on a platform at the back, which horse pulled the empty car back up again for another load. A notice displayed outside many houses was “Pop and Nettle Beer”, i.e. Ginger Beer (called pop), and a beer made from stinging nettles, the common beverage of the people of the locality; of course, many drank ordinary beer made from malt and hops, and plenty of it too.
In the fall of that year my father took his annual outing, and took me home; we went by Banbury and bought some of their famous cakes, and Reading [75] where we had a 2 hours wait and so looked over the town and viewed the ruins of an old Abbey. This also is the widely known home of the celebrated biscuit firm of Huntley and Palmers, also Suttons seeds (footnote 7). Then on to Basingstoke and another wait, and at last on to Winchfield where we arrived late at night, and then had a 3 or 4 mile walk home, where we arrived in the small hours of the morning.
Transcriber’s footnotes:
1.
Age 15
2.
Sadly this is wrong … Aunt Sarah married Thomas Page; it was his Aunt
Mary who married Thomas Hyde (family tree in course of correction, June 2019).
The Sarah who married Charles Hart (next paragraph) was his cousin Sarah Ann Hyde,
daughter of Aunt Mary.
3.
Boddingtons is still a popular brand, advertised extensively on TV.
Their web-site (http://www.boddingtons.com/f_index.html)
tells of the history of Boddingtons, especially Henry (1813-1886).
4.
Strangely, Eccles cakes are well known to this day, but Banbury cakes
are not well-known nationally. The other famous “Eccles” was the BBC Goon Show
character, played by Spike Milligan.
5.
He refers to the Cooperative movement.
6.
This was the classic method before motorised canal-boats, used nationwide
7.
Alas, no more – Huntley and Palmers buildings are now an industrial
park, and Suttons seeds have left, but the names remain in local history and in
street names. When house-hunting in Reading in 1981, we looked over “Kate’s house”, at one corner of a block of houses
that Mr Palmer built, giving the 4 corner houses to each of his 4 daughters.
Suttons is now the name of a roundabout and an Industrial estate (both near
where the original business was); but until 1990 there was a Suttons seeds
nursery on the eastern edge of Reading beside the A4, a blaze of
colour.
8. He meant 1871 … he appears in the 1871 census (March-April) as a visitor at James Moores’ place at Salford.
9. Elizabeth Duckworth was James Moores’ housekeeper (1871 census).
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