IOO YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (28th Jan. - 3rd Feb. 1919)
This week's stories include the murder trial of Annie Houghton who'd carried out an abortion that went wrong, the "evil" theft of coal from Ravenhead Colliery's waste heap, the first female charged with playing pitch and toss appears in court, plans are revealed for the first council estate in the borough, the St Helens Fire Brigade's annual report and action to improve the health of the town.
We begin on the 29th when an inquest was held in St Helens Town Hall on Robert Roberts from Dorothy Street in Thatto Heath. Three days earlier he had been killed down the King pit of Lea Green Colliery (pictured below - left to right Old pit, King pit and Queen pit).
The miner had been carrying out roofing work with his brother Richard when a large stone knocked down a supporting bar and struck him along with fireman Alfred Gilling. The latter – from Gertrude Street in Thatto Heath – was hospitalised but not seriously hurt.
The Inspector of Mines told the hearing that the underground roof at that point had been bad but it had been well supported by props. Everything had been done, he said, that could have been done to make the place safe. Robert Roberts had essentially been unlucky, like so many other miners.
Last December the verdict of an inquest jury was that Edith Lamb from Greenfield Road had died from acute peritonitis brought about by "the performance of an illegal operation to procure abortion by Annie Houghton." On January 30th the 50-year-old chemist's wife from Talbot Street appeared at Liverpool Assizes charged with wilful murder. However Annie was acquitted due to the high standard of proof required for such a conviction.
The jury were given the option of bringing in a verdict of manslaughter but it seems could not be certain beyond reasonable doubt that the abortion had caused the woman's death. However Annie had also been charged with using an instrument to procure miscarriage. In an unusually lengthy hearing on the following day she was found guilty and sent to prison for six years.
The first female to be charged with playing pitch and toss appeared in the St Helens Police Court on the 30th. Thirteen-year-old Lilian Parr along with14-year-old Edward Riley – both from Union Street (near North Road) – had been seen by a plain-clothes policeman on wasteland.
They were playing the game in which the person who throws a coin closest to a mark gets to toss all the players' coins, winning those that land heads up. Pretty innocuous by today's standards but a century ago it was considered evil and a lot of police time went into catching offenders.
PC William Murrant told the court that Lilian and Edward's hands were covered in dirt, suggesting they had been playing the game for some time. The Chairman of the magistrates told Lilian Parr that she was the first girl to have been brought before the Bench for playing pitch and toss. Cllr. Arthur Rudd said they did not want her to have a conviction, so she and Edward would be bound over on good behaviour for six months and ordered to pay 5 shillings costs.
A century ago the Chief Constable of St Helens Police was also in charge of the town's Fire Brigade – indeed some of his officers doubled as firemen. That was largely because there weren't many fires then with electrical appliances yet to make a big impression in houses and industry.
False alarms and hoaxes were also rare as not many people owned telephones and smoke detectors that could be triggered by such things as cooking fumes had yet to be invented. In the flats where I live there is never a fire but a fire engine still visits us at least half a dozen times a year!
This week the Chief Constable issued his annual report in which Arthur Ellerington stated that his Fire Brigade had only received eighteen calls in 1918, down eleven on the previous year. A serious fire was determined as one causing over £1,000 worth of damage and there had not been any within the St Helens borough. However two serious fires outside of the borough had been attended last year.
There had been a less serious blaze in Haydock that the brigade had not been turned out for. That was because Haydock Urban District Council would not pay for their services. Last September it was decided that Haydock would be charged when the St Helens Brigade put out their fires.
A similar model already applied in Rainford, with an annual retaining fee having to be paid, along with payments for each call out. Haydock had refused to cough up, so the brigade would only go to their fires if they were considered serious.
However most of the £110 cost of putting out the eighteen fires in St Helens (one had been a well-intentioned false alarm) had been clawed back from insurance companies. So it seems that it was more of a principle than a financial reason for not going to Haydock.
There used to be three pubs in St Helens named after Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson (possibly four). As well as the well-known Bridge Street hostelry, there were two pubs called Lord Nelson, with one being in Parr Stocks Road and the other in College Street. It was in the latter where the offence of selling whisky at an excessive price and unauthorised quantity was alleged to have taken place.
It seems odd today that a doctor should write a prescription for whisky but it was a common event a century ago, as alcohol was believed to have medicinal value. Dr Robinson Officer from Cowley Hill Lane had given Ann Roberts a note for drink for her sick son-in-law and she took it into the Lord Nelson.
Barman Robert Clare poured two glasses of whisky into Ann's empty bottle and charged her three shillings. Upon leaving the pub the woman examined the whisky and decided that she'd not been given enough. One might expect that she would have returned to the Lord Nelson to complain but instead saw Sgt. Gleave who conducted a police investigation into the alleged crime.
This led to 67-year-old licensee Mary Clare and her son Robert facing two charges in the Police Court on the 31st. The main allegation was that Ann Roberts had been served whisky three-eighths of an ounce less than was ordered.
The regulations on food and drink prices and quantities imposed by the Defence of the Realm Act were still in force and a lengthy hearing considered the various technicalities of the offences. In the end one charge was dismissed and on the other concerning excessive price, Mrs Clare was convicted and fined £3.
On the 31st the St Helens Reporter stated that the Corporation had for some time been in negotiation to purchase Sir David Gamble's Windlehurst estate (pictured above). A housing scheme was being planned to help alleviate the severe shortage of homes, which would become the first council estate in the borough.
It would also be on what we now call green belt land (although privately-owned), as the Reporter described: "The extensive grounds, with one of the most picturesque settings in the district, would provide a splendid site for, say, a garden suburb."
Last year a report into the schoolchildren of St Helens had criticised the "evil home conditions" that many youngsters endured. The St Helens Medical Officer in his annual reports had also attacked the ignorance amongst many parents concerning hygiene and disease. So a range of efforts were being made to improve the health of the town, which included eleven free weekly public lectures in the Town Hall.
The talk on the 31st was called 'The Care of the Body' with other titles being 'How to Keep Healthy', 'Women's Ailments', 'Diseases Caused by Food', 'What To Do in a Case of Illness' and 'The Care of the Home'. There were also two lectures called 'The Prevention of Venereal Disease', with one being for men only and the other just for women.
Colliery waste heaps contained a mix of dirt, spoil and unsaleable coal and were usually off limits to the public. However with coal having been rationed, Ravenhead Colliery had decided to give poor people access to its waste heap so they could pick the poor quality coal for free.
However in a case in the Police Court on February 1st a magistrate described this concession as an "evil". The remarks were made by John Willis from Sutton after Margaret Brennan from Liverpool Street appeared before the Bench charged with stealing colliery coal.
In her defence the woman said her coal ration was only 100 cwt a week, which was quite insufficient to warm her home, particularly as she had several young children. Margaret told the court that she had begged "nearly on my knees" for a greater ration without success and so had resorted to theft.
Timekeeper Thomas Ashton said the colliery waste heap with free access was only five minutes away from where the woman had stolen the coal. Hearing that Margaret was the third woman charged with the same offence this week, John Willis on the Bench said: "I am afraid the evil is giving them permission to take it off the [spoil] bank at all."
The Chairman of the magistrates agreed, suggesting the firm would have to consider withdrawing the privilege as it was encouraging people to help themselves to coal. Margaret Brennan was fined 12/6.
And finally Rainford Urban District Council held a special meeting on the 3rd to decide on how the returned local soldiers and prisoners of war should be welcomed home. It was decided to entertain them at a social gathering, which would be held in a month's time and a special committee was organised to make the arrangements.
Next week's stories include the identification of the Eccleston Hill skeleton, the Boundary Road man who wanted police protection from his wife, the woman given a "thump on the nose" in Ormskirk Street, the six women whose dole payments were stopped after refusing to work as housemaids, the Newton Road brick thrower returns to court, more on the borough's first council estate and why hundreds of benches in Lancots Lane were up for sale.
We begin on the 29th when an inquest was held in St Helens Town Hall on Robert Roberts from Dorothy Street in Thatto Heath. Three days earlier he had been killed down the King pit of Lea Green Colliery (pictured below - left to right Old pit, King pit and Queen pit).
The Inspector of Mines told the hearing that the underground roof at that point had been bad but it had been well supported by props. Everything had been done, he said, that could have been done to make the place safe. Robert Roberts had essentially been unlucky, like so many other miners.
Last December the verdict of an inquest jury was that Edith Lamb from Greenfield Road had died from acute peritonitis brought about by "the performance of an illegal operation to procure abortion by Annie Houghton." On January 30th the 50-year-old chemist's wife from Talbot Street appeared at Liverpool Assizes charged with wilful murder. However Annie was acquitted due to the high standard of proof required for such a conviction.
The jury were given the option of bringing in a verdict of manslaughter but it seems could not be certain beyond reasonable doubt that the abortion had caused the woman's death. However Annie had also been charged with using an instrument to procure miscarriage. In an unusually lengthy hearing on the following day she was found guilty and sent to prison for six years.
The first female to be charged with playing pitch and toss appeared in the St Helens Police Court on the 30th. Thirteen-year-old Lilian Parr along with14-year-old Edward Riley – both from Union Street (near North Road) – had been seen by a plain-clothes policeman on wasteland.
They were playing the game in which the person who throws a coin closest to a mark gets to toss all the players' coins, winning those that land heads up. Pretty innocuous by today's standards but a century ago it was considered evil and a lot of police time went into catching offenders.
PC William Murrant told the court that Lilian and Edward's hands were covered in dirt, suggesting they had been playing the game for some time. The Chairman of the magistrates told Lilian Parr that she was the first girl to have been brought before the Bench for playing pitch and toss. Cllr. Arthur Rudd said they did not want her to have a conviction, so she and Edward would be bound over on good behaviour for six months and ordered to pay 5 shillings costs.
A century ago the Chief Constable of St Helens Police was also in charge of the town's Fire Brigade – indeed some of his officers doubled as firemen. That was largely because there weren't many fires then with electrical appliances yet to make a big impression in houses and industry.
False alarms and hoaxes were also rare as not many people owned telephones and smoke detectors that could be triggered by such things as cooking fumes had yet to be invented. In the flats where I live there is never a fire but a fire engine still visits us at least half a dozen times a year!
This week the Chief Constable issued his annual report in which Arthur Ellerington stated that his Fire Brigade had only received eighteen calls in 1918, down eleven on the previous year. A serious fire was determined as one causing over £1,000 worth of damage and there had not been any within the St Helens borough. However two serious fires outside of the borough had been attended last year.
There had been a less serious blaze in Haydock that the brigade had not been turned out for. That was because Haydock Urban District Council would not pay for their services. Last September it was decided that Haydock would be charged when the St Helens Brigade put out their fires.
A similar model already applied in Rainford, with an annual retaining fee having to be paid, along with payments for each call out. Haydock had refused to cough up, so the brigade would only go to their fires if they were considered serious.
However most of the £110 cost of putting out the eighteen fires in St Helens (one had been a well-intentioned false alarm) had been clawed back from insurance companies. So it seems that it was more of a principle than a financial reason for not going to Haydock.
There used to be three pubs in St Helens named after Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson (possibly four). As well as the well-known Bridge Street hostelry, there were two pubs called Lord Nelson, with one being in Parr Stocks Road and the other in College Street. It was in the latter where the offence of selling whisky at an excessive price and unauthorised quantity was alleged to have taken place.
It seems odd today that a doctor should write a prescription for whisky but it was a common event a century ago, as alcohol was believed to have medicinal value. Dr Robinson Officer from Cowley Hill Lane had given Ann Roberts a note for drink for her sick son-in-law and she took it into the Lord Nelson.
Barman Robert Clare poured two glasses of whisky into Ann's empty bottle and charged her three shillings. Upon leaving the pub the woman examined the whisky and decided that she'd not been given enough. One might expect that she would have returned to the Lord Nelson to complain but instead saw Sgt. Gleave who conducted a police investigation into the alleged crime.
This led to 67-year-old licensee Mary Clare and her son Robert facing two charges in the Police Court on the 31st. The main allegation was that Ann Roberts had been served whisky three-eighths of an ounce less than was ordered.
The regulations on food and drink prices and quantities imposed by the Defence of the Realm Act were still in force and a lengthy hearing considered the various technicalities of the offences. In the end one charge was dismissed and on the other concerning excessive price, Mrs Clare was convicted and fined £3.
It would also be on what we now call green belt land (although privately-owned), as the Reporter described: "The extensive grounds, with one of the most picturesque settings in the district, would provide a splendid site for, say, a garden suburb."
Last year a report into the schoolchildren of St Helens had criticised the "evil home conditions" that many youngsters endured. The St Helens Medical Officer in his annual reports had also attacked the ignorance amongst many parents concerning hygiene and disease. So a range of efforts were being made to improve the health of the town, which included eleven free weekly public lectures in the Town Hall.
The talk on the 31st was called 'The Care of the Body' with other titles being 'How to Keep Healthy', 'Women's Ailments', 'Diseases Caused by Food', 'What To Do in a Case of Illness' and 'The Care of the Home'. There were also two lectures called 'The Prevention of Venereal Disease', with one being for men only and the other just for women.
Colliery waste heaps contained a mix of dirt, spoil and unsaleable coal and were usually off limits to the public. However with coal having been rationed, Ravenhead Colliery had decided to give poor people access to its waste heap so they could pick the poor quality coal for free.
However in a case in the Police Court on February 1st a magistrate described this concession as an "evil". The remarks were made by John Willis from Sutton after Margaret Brennan from Liverpool Street appeared before the Bench charged with stealing colliery coal.
In her defence the woman said her coal ration was only 100 cwt a week, which was quite insufficient to warm her home, particularly as she had several young children. Margaret told the court that she had begged "nearly on my knees" for a greater ration without success and so had resorted to theft.
Timekeeper Thomas Ashton said the colliery waste heap with free access was only five minutes away from where the woman had stolen the coal. Hearing that Margaret was the third woman charged with the same offence this week, John Willis on the Bench said: "I am afraid the evil is giving them permission to take it off the [spoil] bank at all."
The Chairman of the magistrates agreed, suggesting the firm would have to consider withdrawing the privilege as it was encouraging people to help themselves to coal. Margaret Brennan was fined 12/6.
And finally Rainford Urban District Council held a special meeting on the 3rd to decide on how the returned local soldiers and prisoners of war should be welcomed home. It was decided to entertain them at a social gathering, which would be held in a month's time and a special committee was organised to make the arrangements.
Next week's stories include the identification of the Eccleston Hill skeleton, the Boundary Road man who wanted police protection from his wife, the woman given a "thump on the nose" in Ormskirk Street, the six women whose dole payments were stopped after refusing to work as housemaids, the Newton Road brick thrower returns to court, more on the borough's first council estate and why hundreds of benches in Lancots Lane were up for sale.