150 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK 2 - 8 MARCH 1876
This week's many stories include the plans to build a new parish church in Rainford, the tragic suicide in St Helens Canal, the Liverpool Road lodging house shawl theft, the duck stealing in Parr, the poker bashing in Gerards Bridge and the cruel miner that blinded a pit pony.
We begin at the monthly meeting of St Helens Town Council in which it was decided that two stained glass windows would be installed in the new Town Hall that was close to being completed. One window would be sited on the main staircase and the second in the partition between the council chamber and the gallery of the assembly room. The type of gas fitting to be used in the new Town Hall was also approved.
Last month it was reported that the existing parish church at Rainford (pictured above) was "old and incommodious" and badly in need of being replaced. One of the walls of the nearly 200-year-old building was bulging and there was insufficient space for the congregation. Lord Derby had donated £2,000 to kick-start the fundraising to build a replacement church and this week a meeting of a building committee was held at Alpine House in what is now known as Church Road (then called Chapel Lane).
Liverpool architects Aldridge and Deacon attended the meeting to submit rough plans of a building capable of holding 550 persons. It was decided that the church should be set back from the road and the architects were instructed to prepare more detailed plans. The new church was expected to cost £5,000 but Lord Derby‘s generous donation had stimulated further amounts and a total of £4,370 had now been promised. There were 22 members on the fundraising committee and each was allotted a particular area of the district to collect more donations.
The St Helens Newspaper gave an unusually long account of the inquest on Elizabeth Leadley, which took place this week at the Talbot Hotel in Duke Street. The 18-year-old had drowned herself in St Helens Canal but the exact reason was unknown. Lizzy – as her family and friends knew her – had been in service at the Salisbury Hotel in Salisbury Street and had had what appeared to be only a minor tiff with her boyfriend.
Elizabeth had subsequently made clear her intention to drown herself and PC Daniel Callister told the inquest that he had spent three days dragging the canal to locate the girl's body. He eventually found her in water near Pocket Nook at the rear of Latham's timber yard, fully dressed but wearing "neither bonnet nor shawl". She was, however, carrying a photograph – or "likeness" as it was described in the newspaper account – of her young man inside her purse.
There was another crime this week that falls into my "brainless" category in which a thief steals from his or her lodging house and then decamps. In doing so it took little detection work to figure out that they were the thief. Such persons rarely went far and were soon in police custody after pawning the stolen goods – often after taking them to a pawnshop in the same street. And as stealing was taken very seriously in the 19th century, the individual could expect a prison sentence.
What was different in the case of Ann Johnson was that she remained in her Liverpool Road lodging house after nicking two shawls. Whether she thought that would remove her from suspicion, I don't know. But she took the shawls to a pawnshop in Liverpool Road and once the lodging house keeper's wife discovered they were missing, the police were informed.
They went straight to the pawnshop and found one of the shawls and in searching Ann Johnson's room discovered the other. In St Helens Petty Sessions this week Ann Johnson pleaded guilty to the charge of theft and she was sentenced to one month's imprisonment with hard labour.
John Murray and James Smith were also in court charged with stealing two ducks. The fowl belonged to George Swift who ran a beerhouse in Ashcroft Street. His wife Ann told the court that on the previous Sunday morning about 7 o’clock she had observed the two men in her backyard but upon them seeing her they both went away.
On going outside she found that a padlock had been wrenched off and that a duck and a drake were missing. Shortly afterwards Murray and Smith returned to the house and cheekily asked for some beer. Alcohol was not legally allowed to be served on a Sunday morning and so Ann said she had refused them. But she also asked them whether they had taken the ducks, which they denied.
However, she followed the pair to the house where they lived and found a bucket in the back kitchen with blood in it. There were also feathers lying about and the wing of a duck. Despite Murray's wife admitting that the ducks had been killed, cooked and partly eaten, the pair denied the offence but were found guilty and sent to prison with hard labour for a month.
Pokers were the main weapon of choice for many people, especially women, and were often used to bash their foe over the head. I always think it's miraculous that more people did not die from such poker blows. This week Margaret Coleman appeared in court charged with using a poker to assault Mary Collins in Gerards Bridge.
The two women had rowed after Mary had gone to a neighbour's house to return a clothes prop that she had borrowed. Margaret seized a poker and struck Mary on her head, inflicting what was described as a severe wound that bled profusely. It was claimed that Margaret was about to attack Mary again but a neighbour had restrained her.
The 1870s was an era when those engaged in the stealing of shawls and ducks were treated harshly – but not those who used violence unless it was deemed excessive. What Margaret Coleman had done with a poker did not pass the threshold for severity and so she was only fined 10 shillings and costs.
The St Helens Newspaper was published on the 4th and featured an advert for a St Patrick's Day celebration in the Volunteer Hall that was offering: "Grand musical entertainment and pantomimic tableaux entitled The Triumph over St. Patrick over Satan, brilliantly illuminated with coloured fire."
On the 6th in the Petty Sessions, Henry Cowell was charged with a shocking act of animal cruelty. The man was employed at Pilkington's St Helens Colliery and he had struck a pit pony in the eye with a pick shaft. The eye burst and the animal was blinded. The cruel Cowell was fined £3 and costs, or two months imprisonment if in default.
Including court costs, the amount he had to pay would likely have been the equivalent of three weeks' wages and so it's likely that the brutal man would have ended up in prison where he clearly belonged.
Kirkdale Gaol was also the temporary abode of Hannah Glynn after she had wounded Mary Brown by striking her in the face with a glass bottle. A wound that extended from one cheek to the other was created and the St Helens magistrates committed the 35-year-old charwoman with no prior convictions for trial at the next assizes hearing in Liverpool. In April a judge deemed that the threshold for severity had been passed and Hannah Glynn received a sentence of six months imprisonment with hard labour.
St Helens Newspaper courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the pigeon shooting on Croppers Hill, the spelling bee that was held in Waterloo Street, the clog kicking of constables in Parr and the stealing from the till of the Swan Inn in Cotham Street.
We begin at the monthly meeting of St Helens Town Council in which it was decided that two stained glass windows would be installed in the new Town Hall that was close to being completed. One window would be sited on the main staircase and the second in the partition between the council chamber and the gallery of the assembly room. The type of gas fitting to be used in the new Town Hall was also approved.
Liverpool architects Aldridge and Deacon attended the meeting to submit rough plans of a building capable of holding 550 persons. It was decided that the church should be set back from the road and the architects were instructed to prepare more detailed plans. The new church was expected to cost £5,000 but Lord Derby‘s generous donation had stimulated further amounts and a total of £4,370 had now been promised. There were 22 members on the fundraising committee and each was allotted a particular area of the district to collect more donations.
The St Helens Newspaper gave an unusually long account of the inquest on Elizabeth Leadley, which took place this week at the Talbot Hotel in Duke Street. The 18-year-old had drowned herself in St Helens Canal but the exact reason was unknown. Lizzy – as her family and friends knew her – had been in service at the Salisbury Hotel in Salisbury Street and had had what appeared to be only a minor tiff with her boyfriend.
Elizabeth had subsequently made clear her intention to drown herself and PC Daniel Callister told the inquest that he had spent three days dragging the canal to locate the girl's body. He eventually found her in water near Pocket Nook at the rear of Latham's timber yard, fully dressed but wearing "neither bonnet nor shawl". She was, however, carrying a photograph – or "likeness" as it was described in the newspaper account – of her young man inside her purse.
There was another crime this week that falls into my "brainless" category in which a thief steals from his or her lodging house and then decamps. In doing so it took little detection work to figure out that they were the thief. Such persons rarely went far and were soon in police custody after pawning the stolen goods – often after taking them to a pawnshop in the same street. And as stealing was taken very seriously in the 19th century, the individual could expect a prison sentence.
They went straight to the pawnshop and found one of the shawls and in searching Ann Johnson's room discovered the other. In St Helens Petty Sessions this week Ann Johnson pleaded guilty to the charge of theft and she was sentenced to one month's imprisonment with hard labour.
John Murray and James Smith were also in court charged with stealing two ducks. The fowl belonged to George Swift who ran a beerhouse in Ashcroft Street. His wife Ann told the court that on the previous Sunday morning about 7 o’clock she had observed the two men in her backyard but upon them seeing her they both went away.
On going outside she found that a padlock had been wrenched off and that a duck and a drake were missing. Shortly afterwards Murray and Smith returned to the house and cheekily asked for some beer. Alcohol was not legally allowed to be served on a Sunday morning and so Ann said she had refused them. But she also asked them whether they had taken the ducks, which they denied.
However, she followed the pair to the house where they lived and found a bucket in the back kitchen with blood in it. There were also feathers lying about and the wing of a duck. Despite Murray's wife admitting that the ducks had been killed, cooked and partly eaten, the pair denied the offence but were found guilty and sent to prison with hard labour for a month.
Pokers were the main weapon of choice for many people, especially women, and were often used to bash their foe over the head. I always think it's miraculous that more people did not die from such poker blows. This week Margaret Coleman appeared in court charged with using a poker to assault Mary Collins in Gerards Bridge.
The two women had rowed after Mary had gone to a neighbour's house to return a clothes prop that she had borrowed. Margaret seized a poker and struck Mary on her head, inflicting what was described as a severe wound that bled profusely. It was claimed that Margaret was about to attack Mary again but a neighbour had restrained her.
The 1870s was an era when those engaged in the stealing of shawls and ducks were treated harshly – but not those who used violence unless it was deemed excessive. What Margaret Coleman had done with a poker did not pass the threshold for severity and so she was only fined 10 shillings and costs.
The St Helens Newspaper was published on the 4th and featured an advert for a St Patrick's Day celebration in the Volunteer Hall that was offering: "Grand musical entertainment and pantomimic tableaux entitled The Triumph over St. Patrick over Satan, brilliantly illuminated with coloured fire."
On the 6th in the Petty Sessions, Henry Cowell was charged with a shocking act of animal cruelty. The man was employed at Pilkington's St Helens Colliery and he had struck a pit pony in the eye with a pick shaft. The eye burst and the animal was blinded. The cruel Cowell was fined £3 and costs, or two months imprisonment if in default.
Including court costs, the amount he had to pay would likely have been the equivalent of three weeks' wages and so it's likely that the brutal man would have ended up in prison where he clearly belonged.
Kirkdale Gaol was also the temporary abode of Hannah Glynn after she had wounded Mary Brown by striking her in the face with a glass bottle. A wound that extended from one cheek to the other was created and the St Helens magistrates committed the 35-year-old charwoman with no prior convictions for trial at the next assizes hearing in Liverpool. In April a judge deemed that the threshold for severity had been passed and Hannah Glynn received a sentence of six months imprisonment with hard labour.
St Helens Newspaper courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the pigeon shooting on Croppers Hill, the spelling bee that was held in Waterloo Street, the clog kicking of constables in Parr and the stealing from the till of the Swan Inn in Cotham Street.
This week's many stories include the plans to build a new parish church in Rainford, the tragic suicide in St Helens Canal, the Liverpool Road lodging house shawl theft, the duck stealing in Parr, the poker bashing in Gerards Bridge and the cruel miner that blinded a pit pony.
We begin at the monthly meeting of St Helens Town Council in which it was decided that two stained glass windows would be installed in the new Town Hall that was close to being completed.
One window would be sited on the main staircase and the second in the partition between the council chamber and the gallery of the assembly room. The type of gas fitting to be used in the new Town Hall was also approved.
Last month it was reported that the existing parish church at Rainford (pictured above) was "old and incommodious" and badly in need of being replaced.
One of the walls of the nearly 200-year-old building was bulging and there was insufficient space for the congregation.
Lord Derby had donated £2,000 to kick-start the fundraising to build a replacement church and this week a meeting of a building committee was held at Alpine House in what is now known as Church Road (then called Chapel Lane).
Liverpool architects Aldridge and Deacon attended the meeting to submit rough plans of a building capable of holding 550 persons.
It was decided that the church should be set back from the road and the architects were instructed to prepare more detailed plans.
The new church was expected to cost £5,000 but Lord Derby‘s generous donation had stimulated further amounts and a total of £4,370 had now been promised.
There were 22 members on the fundraising committee and each was allotted a particular area of the district to collect more donations.
The St Helens Newspaper gave an unusually long account of the inquest on Elizabeth Leadley, which took place this week at the Talbot Hotel in Duke Street.
The 18-year-old had drowned herself in St Helens Canal but the exact reason was unknown.
Lizzy – as her family and friends knew her – had been in service at the Salisbury Hotel in Salisbury Street and had had what appeared to be only a minor tiff with her boyfriend.
Elizabeth had subsequently made clear her intention to drown herself and PC Daniel Callister told the inquest that he had spent three days dragging the canal to locate the girl's body.
He eventually found her in water near Pocket Nook at the rear of Latham's timber yard, fully dressed but wearing "neither bonnet nor shawl".
She was, however, carrying a photograph – or "likeness" as it was described in the newspaper account – of her young man inside her purse.
There was another crime this week that falls into my "brainless" category in which a thief steals from his or her lodging house and then decamps.
In doing so it took little detection work to figure out that they were the thief.
Such persons rarely went far and were soon in police custody after pawning the stolen goods – often after taking them to a pawnshop in the same street.
And as stealing was taken very seriously in the 19th century, the individual could expect a prison sentence.
What was different in the case of Ann Johnson was that she remained in her Liverpool Road lodging house after nicking two shawls.
Whether she thought that would remove her from suspicion, I don't know. But she took the shawls to a pawnshop in Liverpool Road and once the lodging house keeper's wife discovered they were missing, the police were informed.
They went straight to the pawnshop and found one of the shawls and in searching Ann Johnson's room discovered the other.
In St Helens Petty Sessions this week Ann Johnson pleaded guilty to the charge of theft and she was sentenced to one month's imprisonment with hard labour.
John Murray and James Smith were also in court charged with stealing two ducks.
The fowl belonged to George Swift who ran a beerhouse in Ashcroft Street.
His wife Ann told the court that on the previous Sunday morning about 7 o’clock she had observed the two men in her backyard but upon them seeing her they both went away.
On going outside she found that a padlock had been wrenched off and that a duck and a drake were missing.
Shortly afterwards Murray and Smith returned to the house and cheekily asked for some beer.
Alcohol was not legally allowed to be served on a Sunday morning and so Ann said she had refused them.
But she also asked them whether they had taken the ducks, which they denied.
However, she followed the pair to the house where they lived and found a bucket in the back kitchen with blood in it. There were also feathers lying about and the wing of a duck.
Despite Murray's wife admitting that the ducks had been killed, cooked and partly eaten, the pair denied the offence but were found guilty and sent to prison with hard labour for a month.
Pokers were the main weapon of choice for many people, especially women, and were often used to bash their foe over the head.
I always think it's miraculous that more people did not die from such poker blows.
This week Margaret Coleman appeared in court charged with using a poker to assault Mary Collins in Gerards Bridge.
The two women had rowed after Mary had gone to a neighbour's house to return a clothes prop that she had borrowed.
Margaret seized a poker and struck Mary on her head, inflicting what was described as a severe wound that bled profusely.
It was claimed that Margaret was about to attack Mary again but a neighbour had restrained her.
The 1870s was an era when those engaged in the stealing of shawls and ducks were treated harshly – but not those who used violence unless it was deemed excessive.
What Margaret Coleman had done with a poker did not pass the threshold for severity and so she was only fined 10 shillings and costs.
The St Helens Newspaper was published on the 4th and featured an advert for a St Patrick's Day celebration in the Volunteer Hall that was offering:
"Grand musical entertainment and pantomimic tableaux entitled The Triumph over St. Patrick over Satan, brilliantly illuminated with coloured fire."
On the 6th in the Petty Sessions, Henry Cowell was charged with a shocking act of animal cruelty.
The man was employed at Pilkington's St Helens Colliery and he had struck a pit pony in the eye with a pick shaft. The eye burst and the animal was blinded.
The cruel Cowell was fined £3 and costs, or two months imprisonment if in default.
Including court costs, the amount he had to pay would likely have been the equivalent of three weeks' wages and so it's likely that the brutal man would have ended up in prison where he clearly belonged.
Kirkdale Gaol was also the temporary abode of Hannah Glynn after she had wounded Mary Brown by striking her in the face with a glass bottle.
A wound that extended from one cheek to the other was created and the St Helens magistrates committed the 35-year-old charwoman with no prior convictions for trial at the next assizes hearing in Liverpool.
In April a judge deemed that the threshold for severity had been passed and Hannah Glynn received a sentence of six months imprisonment with hard labour.
St Helens Newspaper courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the pigeon shooting on Croppers Hill, the spelling bee that was held in Waterloo Street, the clog kicking of constables in Parr and the stealing from the till of the Swan Inn in Cotham Street.
We begin at the monthly meeting of St Helens Town Council in which it was decided that two stained glass windows would be installed in the new Town Hall that was close to being completed.
One window would be sited on the main staircase and the second in the partition between the council chamber and the gallery of the assembly room. The type of gas fitting to be used in the new Town Hall was also approved.
One of the walls of the nearly 200-year-old building was bulging and there was insufficient space for the congregation.
Lord Derby had donated £2,000 to kick-start the fundraising to build a replacement church and this week a meeting of a building committee was held at Alpine House in what is now known as Church Road (then called Chapel Lane).
Liverpool architects Aldridge and Deacon attended the meeting to submit rough plans of a building capable of holding 550 persons.
It was decided that the church should be set back from the road and the architects were instructed to prepare more detailed plans.
The new church was expected to cost £5,000 but Lord Derby‘s generous donation had stimulated further amounts and a total of £4,370 had now been promised.
There were 22 members on the fundraising committee and each was allotted a particular area of the district to collect more donations.
The St Helens Newspaper gave an unusually long account of the inquest on Elizabeth Leadley, which took place this week at the Talbot Hotel in Duke Street.
The 18-year-old had drowned herself in St Helens Canal but the exact reason was unknown.
Lizzy – as her family and friends knew her – had been in service at the Salisbury Hotel in Salisbury Street and had had what appeared to be only a minor tiff with her boyfriend.
Elizabeth had subsequently made clear her intention to drown herself and PC Daniel Callister told the inquest that he had spent three days dragging the canal to locate the girl's body.
He eventually found her in water near Pocket Nook at the rear of Latham's timber yard, fully dressed but wearing "neither bonnet nor shawl".
She was, however, carrying a photograph – or "likeness" as it was described in the newspaper account – of her young man inside her purse.
There was another crime this week that falls into my "brainless" category in which a thief steals from his or her lodging house and then decamps.
In doing so it took little detection work to figure out that they were the thief.
Such persons rarely went far and were soon in police custody after pawning the stolen goods – often after taking them to a pawnshop in the same street.
And as stealing was taken very seriously in the 19th century, the individual could expect a prison sentence.
Whether she thought that would remove her from suspicion, I don't know. But she took the shawls to a pawnshop in Liverpool Road and once the lodging house keeper's wife discovered they were missing, the police were informed.
They went straight to the pawnshop and found one of the shawls and in searching Ann Johnson's room discovered the other.
In St Helens Petty Sessions this week Ann Johnson pleaded guilty to the charge of theft and she was sentenced to one month's imprisonment with hard labour.
John Murray and James Smith were also in court charged with stealing two ducks.
The fowl belonged to George Swift who ran a beerhouse in Ashcroft Street.
His wife Ann told the court that on the previous Sunday morning about 7 o’clock she had observed the two men in her backyard but upon them seeing her they both went away.
On going outside she found that a padlock had been wrenched off and that a duck and a drake were missing.
Shortly afterwards Murray and Smith returned to the house and cheekily asked for some beer.
Alcohol was not legally allowed to be served on a Sunday morning and so Ann said she had refused them.
But she also asked them whether they had taken the ducks, which they denied.
However, she followed the pair to the house where they lived and found a bucket in the back kitchen with blood in it. There were also feathers lying about and the wing of a duck.
Despite Murray's wife admitting that the ducks had been killed, cooked and partly eaten, the pair denied the offence but were found guilty and sent to prison with hard labour for a month.
Pokers were the main weapon of choice for many people, especially women, and were often used to bash their foe over the head.
I always think it's miraculous that more people did not die from such poker blows.
This week Margaret Coleman appeared in court charged with using a poker to assault Mary Collins in Gerards Bridge.
The two women had rowed after Mary had gone to a neighbour's house to return a clothes prop that she had borrowed.
Margaret seized a poker and struck Mary on her head, inflicting what was described as a severe wound that bled profusely.
It was claimed that Margaret was about to attack Mary again but a neighbour had restrained her.
The 1870s was an era when those engaged in the stealing of shawls and ducks were treated harshly – but not those who used violence unless it was deemed excessive.
What Margaret Coleman had done with a poker did not pass the threshold for severity and so she was only fined 10 shillings and costs.
The St Helens Newspaper was published on the 4th and featured an advert for a St Patrick's Day celebration in the Volunteer Hall that was offering:
"Grand musical entertainment and pantomimic tableaux entitled The Triumph over St. Patrick over Satan, brilliantly illuminated with coloured fire."
On the 6th in the Petty Sessions, Henry Cowell was charged with a shocking act of animal cruelty.
The man was employed at Pilkington's St Helens Colliery and he had struck a pit pony in the eye with a pick shaft. The eye burst and the animal was blinded.
The cruel Cowell was fined £3 and costs, or two months imprisonment if in default.
Including court costs, the amount he had to pay would likely have been the equivalent of three weeks' wages and so it's likely that the brutal man would have ended up in prison where he clearly belonged.
Kirkdale Gaol was also the temporary abode of Hannah Glynn after she had wounded Mary Brown by striking her in the face with a glass bottle.
A wound that extended from one cheek to the other was created and the St Helens magistrates committed the 35-year-old charwoman with no prior convictions for trial at the next assizes hearing in Liverpool.
In April a judge deemed that the threshold for severity had been passed and Hannah Glynn received a sentence of six months imprisonment with hard labour.
St Helens Newspaper courtesy St Helens Archive Service at Eccleston Library
Next Week's stories will include the pigeon shooting on Croppers Hill, the spelling bee that was held in Waterloo Street, the clog kicking of constables in Parr and the stealing from the till of the Swan Inn in Cotham Street.