150 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (18th - 24th JANUARY 1871)
This week's stories include the 47th LRV's glittering annual ball in the Volunteer Hall, the drunken tramp in Liverpool Street, the night soil man in Rainford, a shocking train accident at St Helens Junction and the body that had been floating in St Helens Canal for a month.
We begin on the 18th with the annual ploughing match in Rainford, which was scheduled to take place on John Birchall's land near the clay holes. Such competitions were regularly held over the rural parts of St Helens during the 19th century – especially in Bold and Sutton – and still take place in other parts of the country. Not only did they encourage good practice (being a measure of quality rather than speed) but the ploughmen could win as much as £5 prize money – which was more than three weeks' wages. However the bad frost that had been on the ground since Christmas led to the event being postponed until next week.
Later that day the 47th Lancashire Rifle Volunteers (the St Helens' part-time soldiers) held their annual ball in the Volunteer Hall. An "efficient" quadrille band provided the music in which sets of four couples danced in a rectangular formation. It was a late evening "do" with dancing only starting at 9pm. All members of the services who attended were instructed to dress in military uniform, with their horse-drawn carriages arriving by Duke Street and leaving by North Road.
The advertisement for the ball said: "The room will be fragrantly perfumed, by Mr. G. Webster chemist, with Rimmel's Vaporisers". The St Helens Newspaper's review was full of praise for the decoration, writing: "The large room was beautifully decorated, the committee having spared neither trouble nor expense in giving it an air of loveliness and grace appropriate to the occasion. Devices formed of glistening bayonets, swords, and rifles abounded, and relieved the sides and prominent parts of the walls, the whole of which were draped from the floor to the spring of the roof beams in pink and white coloured drapery, which formed a pretty and effective ground work for the various mottoes and devices which abounded."
The dozen or so mottoes – we might call them banners or slogans – included "Defence, Not Defiance", "God Defend The Right" and "None But The Brave Deserve The Fair". The Newspaper described the latter as a "good old maxim from the days of chivalry, conveying a compliment and a hint to the fair sex that gentlemen in uniform ought to stand first in their estimation."
Around ten o’clock that night a man called Holden came to grief in Whiston. He was employed at the Holt Lane stone quarry and had set off for home in Portico after working in the smithy. The severe frost of the last few weeks was still making the ground very slippery and as I've often said, it's hard to imagine how dark the district of St Helens was at night 150 years ago. So it was presumed that Holden in taking a short cut in the dark had fallen into a pond and drowned. The man's body was found soon after the accident with his dog standing by his side.
On the 23rd at the St Helens Petty Sessions, Henry Jones was charged with committing a breach of the peace in Liverpool Street (pictured above). A constable said the man had been drunk and asking for someone to fight him and when told to desist became abusive and refused to leave. Superintendent Ludlam told the Bench that the man was a tramp "and such persons gave the police great trouble". Jones was ordered to find sureties to keep the peace. But he was a tramp and didn’t have that sort of money and so was sent to prison for a month.
Robert Locklyn faced the same charge of breaching the peace but he was not a tramp. In fact the St Helens Newspaper described him as a "respectable looking young man" and so was assured of more favourable treatment from the Bench. Locklyn was described as a barman in what was described as the new vaults in Liverpool Road.
He had thrown an itinerant fiddler out of the house and was accused of using more violence than was deemed necessary. The defendant admitted the charge but claimed mitigation after being spat in the face by the disorderly man. The Bench was sympathetic saying he had "allowed his temper to master him" and the summons against him was subsequently withdrawn.
Farmer William Harrison was accused of dumping night soil in Ormskirk Road in Rainford and leaving it there from December 25th until January 16th. Night soil was the regularly used euphemism for human faeces and was so called because a collector normally removed it at night from the privies, pits and pail closets that people used as toilets. However some people made their own arrangements and Harrison told the court that he had been unwell and not able to get rid of it. He was fined 2s. 6d. and costs.
The St Helens / Sankey Canal used to be so deep and wide that it could take a long time for it to surrender its dead. On the 23rd the body of Peter Kernaghan was found floating in the waters near the Navigation Inn. The copper worker had been missing since Christmas Eve when he was last seen in a drunken state walking near the canal.
His cap was subsequently found on the bank and the presumption was that the man had fallen into the waterway. So the canal was dragged at that spot but without any success. That was far from uncommon and Kernaghan's relatives then had to wait for his body to surface. Last year a jury had called for the fencing of parts of the canal as a "protection to human life". But that would cost brass and doesn't appear to have happened. The man's death was probably a combination of the drink, the dark nights, the unfenced canal and the icy ground.
A pregnant woman was struck by an express train at St Helens Junction on the 23rd and may possibly have survived. This is the St Helens Newspaper's account of the dreadful accident:
"On Monday afternoon, Mrs. Draper was standing at the level crossing at St Helens Junction waiting for a goods train, which was being shunted, to move out of the way, so that she could cross the line. While she was watching the goods train an express train came up at full speed from the opposite direction, and the buffer of the express engine struck her on the side, hurling her a considerable distance, and dashing a child she had in her arms to the ground. Mrs. Draper is far advanced in pregnancy, and lies in a very dangerous state. The child was not injured, and lay upon the ground without uttering a cry. Dr. Ricketts, the company's medical man in this district, was immediately sent for, and he promptly attended, rendering all the assistance possible to the injured woman."
It does seem very unlikely that Mrs Draper would have survived, although I can find no record of her death. James Ricketts was a 30-year-old doctor who lived in Cotham Street. Due to the many accidents on the railway and the lack of any hospital to see to the injured, the railway company contracted Dr. Ricketts to treat the victims of the many accidents within the St Helens area.
I've often talked of the Copper Works in Sutton being sued by farmers for damage done to their crops through the emission of noxious vapours – as the pollution was called. With so many other chimneys in the district belching out toxic fumes, it could be hard to prove that the copper works was solely to blame. So usually the farmers had to settle for a fraction of their claim. Strangely it doesn't appear to have occurred to anyone that if the fumes did terrible things to crops and vegetation, what must they be doing to the lungs of workers and residents? I expect it probably did but it was not an issue that anyone was yet prepared to face.
The scale of the claims against Sutton Copper Works was revealed on the 23rd in a court case in which it was stated that 34 more actions for damages were being brought against the firm. The company wanted a ruling on whether they would have to pay the costs of all these separate claims. However these hearings would not take place until March at the next assizes sessions in Liverpool and a decision would be made before then.
Next week's stories will include the annual dinner for the old folk of Rainford, the spread of smallpox in Sutton, the sale of two old workhouses and the right old barney that took place in Parr.
We begin on the 18th with the annual ploughing match in Rainford, which was scheduled to take place on John Birchall's land near the clay holes. Such competitions were regularly held over the rural parts of St Helens during the 19th century – especially in Bold and Sutton – and still take place in other parts of the country. Not only did they encourage good practice (being a measure of quality rather than speed) but the ploughmen could win as much as £5 prize money – which was more than three weeks' wages. However the bad frost that had been on the ground since Christmas led to the event being postponed until next week.
Later that day the 47th Lancashire Rifle Volunteers (the St Helens' part-time soldiers) held their annual ball in the Volunteer Hall. An "efficient" quadrille band provided the music in which sets of four couples danced in a rectangular formation. It was a late evening "do" with dancing only starting at 9pm. All members of the services who attended were instructed to dress in military uniform, with their horse-drawn carriages arriving by Duke Street and leaving by North Road.
The advertisement for the ball said: "The room will be fragrantly perfumed, by Mr. G. Webster chemist, with Rimmel's Vaporisers". The St Helens Newspaper's review was full of praise for the decoration, writing: "The large room was beautifully decorated, the committee having spared neither trouble nor expense in giving it an air of loveliness and grace appropriate to the occasion. Devices formed of glistening bayonets, swords, and rifles abounded, and relieved the sides and prominent parts of the walls, the whole of which were draped from the floor to the spring of the roof beams in pink and white coloured drapery, which formed a pretty and effective ground work for the various mottoes and devices which abounded."
The dozen or so mottoes – we might call them banners or slogans – included "Defence, Not Defiance", "God Defend The Right" and "None But The Brave Deserve The Fair". The Newspaper described the latter as a "good old maxim from the days of chivalry, conveying a compliment and a hint to the fair sex that gentlemen in uniform ought to stand first in their estimation."
Around ten o’clock that night a man called Holden came to grief in Whiston. He was employed at the Holt Lane stone quarry and had set off for home in Portico after working in the smithy. The severe frost of the last few weeks was still making the ground very slippery and as I've often said, it's hard to imagine how dark the district of St Helens was at night 150 years ago. So it was presumed that Holden in taking a short cut in the dark had fallen into a pond and drowned. The man's body was found soon after the accident with his dog standing by his side.
Robert Locklyn faced the same charge of breaching the peace but he was not a tramp. In fact the St Helens Newspaper described him as a "respectable looking young man" and so was assured of more favourable treatment from the Bench. Locklyn was described as a barman in what was described as the new vaults in Liverpool Road.
He had thrown an itinerant fiddler out of the house and was accused of using more violence than was deemed necessary. The defendant admitted the charge but claimed mitigation after being spat in the face by the disorderly man. The Bench was sympathetic saying he had "allowed his temper to master him" and the summons against him was subsequently withdrawn.
Farmer William Harrison was accused of dumping night soil in Ormskirk Road in Rainford and leaving it there from December 25th until January 16th. Night soil was the regularly used euphemism for human faeces and was so called because a collector normally removed it at night from the privies, pits and pail closets that people used as toilets. However some people made their own arrangements and Harrison told the court that he had been unwell and not able to get rid of it. He was fined 2s. 6d. and costs.
The St Helens / Sankey Canal used to be so deep and wide that it could take a long time for it to surrender its dead. On the 23rd the body of Peter Kernaghan was found floating in the waters near the Navigation Inn. The copper worker had been missing since Christmas Eve when he was last seen in a drunken state walking near the canal.
His cap was subsequently found on the bank and the presumption was that the man had fallen into the waterway. So the canal was dragged at that spot but without any success. That was far from uncommon and Kernaghan's relatives then had to wait for his body to surface. Last year a jury had called for the fencing of parts of the canal as a "protection to human life". But that would cost brass and doesn't appear to have happened. The man's death was probably a combination of the drink, the dark nights, the unfenced canal and the icy ground.
A pregnant woman was struck by an express train at St Helens Junction on the 23rd and may possibly have survived. This is the St Helens Newspaper's account of the dreadful accident:
"On Monday afternoon, Mrs. Draper was standing at the level crossing at St Helens Junction waiting for a goods train, which was being shunted, to move out of the way, so that she could cross the line. While she was watching the goods train an express train came up at full speed from the opposite direction, and the buffer of the express engine struck her on the side, hurling her a considerable distance, and dashing a child she had in her arms to the ground. Mrs. Draper is far advanced in pregnancy, and lies in a very dangerous state. The child was not injured, and lay upon the ground without uttering a cry. Dr. Ricketts, the company's medical man in this district, was immediately sent for, and he promptly attended, rendering all the assistance possible to the injured woman."
It does seem very unlikely that Mrs Draper would have survived, although I can find no record of her death. James Ricketts was a 30-year-old doctor who lived in Cotham Street. Due to the many accidents on the railway and the lack of any hospital to see to the injured, the railway company contracted Dr. Ricketts to treat the victims of the many accidents within the St Helens area.
I've often talked of the Copper Works in Sutton being sued by farmers for damage done to their crops through the emission of noxious vapours – as the pollution was called. With so many other chimneys in the district belching out toxic fumes, it could be hard to prove that the copper works was solely to blame. So usually the farmers had to settle for a fraction of their claim. Strangely it doesn't appear to have occurred to anyone that if the fumes did terrible things to crops and vegetation, what must they be doing to the lungs of workers and residents? I expect it probably did but it was not an issue that anyone was yet prepared to face.
The scale of the claims against Sutton Copper Works was revealed on the 23rd in a court case in which it was stated that 34 more actions for damages were being brought against the firm. The company wanted a ruling on whether they would have to pay the costs of all these separate claims. However these hearings would not take place until March at the next assizes sessions in Liverpool and a decision would be made before then.
Next week's stories will include the annual dinner for the old folk of Rainford, the spread of smallpox in Sutton, the sale of two old workhouses and the right old barney that took place in Parr.
This week's stories include the 47th LRV's glittering annual ball in the Volunteer Hall, the drunken tramp in Liverpool Street, the night soil man in Rainford, a shocking train accident at St Helens Junction and the body that had been floating in St Helens Canal for a month.
We begin on the 18th with the annual ploughing match in Rainford, which was scheduled to take place on John Birchall's land near the clay holes.
Such competitions were regularly held over the rural parts of St Helens during the 19th century – especially in Bold and Sutton – and still take place in other parts of the country.
Not only did they encourage good practice (being a measure of quality rather than speed) but the ploughmen could win as much as £5 prize money – which was more than three weeks' wages.
However the bad frost that had been on the ground since Christmas led to the event being postponed until next week.
Later that day the 47th Lancashire Rifle Volunteers (the St Helens' part-time soldiers) held their annual ball in the Volunteer Hall.
An "efficient" quadrille band provided the music in which sets of four couples danced in a rectangular formation. It was a late evening "do" with dancing only starting at 9pm.
All members of the services who attended were instructed to dress in military uniform, with their horse-drawn carriages arriving by Duke Street and leaving by North Road.
The advertisement for the ball said: "The room will be fragrantly perfumed, by Mr. G. Webster chemist, with Rimmel's Vaporisers". The St Helens Newspaper's review was full of praise for the decoration, writing:
"The large room was beautifully decorated, the committee having spared neither trouble nor expense in giving it an air of loveliness and grace appropriate to the occasion.
"Devices formed of glistening bayonets, swords, and rifles abounded, and relieved the sides and prominent parts of the walls, the whole of which were draped from the floor to the spring of the roof beams in pink and white coloured drapery, which formed a pretty and effective ground work for the various mottoes and devices which abounded."
The dozen or so mottoes – we might call them banners or slogans – included "Defence, Not Defiance", "God Defend The Right" and "None But The Brave Deserve The Fair".
The Newspaper described the latter as a "good old maxim from the days of chivalry, conveying a compliment and a hint to the fair sex that gentlemen in uniform ought to stand first in their estimation."
Around ten o’clock that night a man called Holden came to grief in Whiston. He was employed at the Holt Lane stone quarry and had set off for home in Portico after working in the smithy.
The severe frost of the last few weeks was still making the ground very slippery and as I've often said, it's hard to imagine how dark the district of St Helens was at night 150 years ago.
So it was presumed that Holden in taking a short cut in the dark had fallen into a pond and drowned.
The man's body was found soon after the accident with his dog standing by his side.
On the 23rd at the St Helens Petty Sessions, Henry Jones was charged with committing a breach of the peace in Liverpool Street (pictured above).
A constable said the man had been drunk and asking for someone to fight him and when told to desist became abusive and refused to leave.
Superintendent Ludlam told the Bench that the man was a tramp "and such persons gave the police great trouble".
Jones was ordered to find sureties to keep the peace. But he was a tramp and didn’t have that sort of money and so was sent to prison for a month.
Robert Locklyn faced the same charge of breaching the peace but he was not a tramp.
In fact the St Helens Newspaper described him as a "respectable looking young man" and so was assured of more favourable treatment from the Bench.
Locklyn was described as a barman in what was described as the new vaults in Liverpool Road.
He had thrown an itinerant fiddler out of the house and was accused of using more violence than was deemed necessary.
The defendant admitted the charge but claimed mitigation after being spat in the face by the disorderly man.
The Bench was sympathetic saying he had "allowed his temper to master him" and the summons against him was subsequently withdrawn.
Farmer William Harrison was accused of dumping night soil in Ormskirk Road in Rainford and leaving it there from December 25th until January 16th.
Night soil was the regularly used euphemism for human faeces and was so called because a collector normally removed it at night from the privies, pits and pail closets that people used as toilets.
However some people made their own arrangements and Harrison told the court that he had been unwell and not able to get rid of it. He was fined 2s. 6d. and costs.
The St Helens / Sankey Canal used to be so deep and wide that it could take a long time for it to surrender its dead.
On the 23rd the body of Peter Kernaghan was found floating in the waters near the Navigation Inn.
The copper worker had been missing since Christmas Eve when he was last seen in a drunken state walking near the canal.
His cap was subsequently found on the bank and the presumption was that the man had fallen into the waterway. So the canal was dragged at that spot but without any success.
That was far from uncommon and Kernaghan's relatives then had to wait for his body to surface.
Last year a jury had called for the fencing of parts of the canal as a "protection to human life". But that would cost brass and doesn't appear to have happened.
The man's death was probably a combination of the drink, the dark nights, the unfenced canal and the icy ground.
A pregnant woman was struck by an express train at St Helens Junction on the 23rd and may possibly have survived. This is the St Helens Newspaper's account of the dreadful accident:
"On Monday afternoon, Mrs. Draper was standing at the level crossing at St Helens Junction waiting for a goods train, which was being shunted, to move out of the way, so that she could cross the line.
"While she was watching the goods train an express train came up at full speed from the opposite direction, and the buffer of the express engine struck her on the side, hurling her a considerable distance, and dashing a child she had in her arms to the ground.
"Mrs. Draper is far advanced in pregnancy, and lies in a very dangerous state. The child was not injured, and lay upon the ground without uttering a cry.
"Dr. Ricketts, the company's medical man in this district, was immediately sent for, and he promptly attended, rendering all the assistance possible to the injured woman."
It does seem very unlikely that Mrs Draper would have survived, although I can find no record of her death.
James Ricketts was a 30-year-old doctor who lived in Cotham Street.
Due to the many accidents on the railway and the lack of any hospital to see to the injured, the railway company contracted Dr. Ricketts to treat the victims of the many accidents within the St Helens area.
I've often talked of the Copper Works in Sutton being sued by farmers for damage done to their crops through the emission of noxious vapours – as the pollution was called.
With so many other chimneys in the district belching out toxic fumes, it could be hard to prove that the copper works was solely to blame. So usually the farmers had to settle for a fraction of their claim.
Strangely it doesn't appear to have occurred to anyone that if the fumes did terrible things to crops and vegetation, what must they be doing to the lungs of workers and residents?
I expect it probably did but it was not an issue that anyone was yet prepared to face.
The scale of the claims against Sutton Copper Works was revealed on the 23rd in a court case in which it was stated that 34 more actions for damages were being brought against the firm.
The company wanted a ruling on whether they would have to pay the costs of all these separate claims.
However these hearings would not take place until March at the next assizes sessions in Liverpool and a decision would be made before then.
Next week's stories will include the annual dinner for the old folk of Rainford, the spread of smallpox in Sutton, the sale of two old workhouses and the right old barney that took place in Parr.
We begin on the 18th with the annual ploughing match in Rainford, which was scheduled to take place on John Birchall's land near the clay holes.
Such competitions were regularly held over the rural parts of St Helens during the 19th century – especially in Bold and Sutton – and still take place in other parts of the country.
Not only did they encourage good practice (being a measure of quality rather than speed) but the ploughmen could win as much as £5 prize money – which was more than three weeks' wages.
However the bad frost that had been on the ground since Christmas led to the event being postponed until next week.
Later that day the 47th Lancashire Rifle Volunteers (the St Helens' part-time soldiers) held their annual ball in the Volunteer Hall.
An "efficient" quadrille band provided the music in which sets of four couples danced in a rectangular formation. It was a late evening "do" with dancing only starting at 9pm.
All members of the services who attended were instructed to dress in military uniform, with their horse-drawn carriages arriving by Duke Street and leaving by North Road.
The advertisement for the ball said: "The room will be fragrantly perfumed, by Mr. G. Webster chemist, with Rimmel's Vaporisers". The St Helens Newspaper's review was full of praise for the decoration, writing:
"The large room was beautifully decorated, the committee having spared neither trouble nor expense in giving it an air of loveliness and grace appropriate to the occasion.
"Devices formed of glistening bayonets, swords, and rifles abounded, and relieved the sides and prominent parts of the walls, the whole of which were draped from the floor to the spring of the roof beams in pink and white coloured drapery, which formed a pretty and effective ground work for the various mottoes and devices which abounded."
The dozen or so mottoes – we might call them banners or slogans – included "Defence, Not Defiance", "God Defend The Right" and "None But The Brave Deserve The Fair".
The Newspaper described the latter as a "good old maxim from the days of chivalry, conveying a compliment and a hint to the fair sex that gentlemen in uniform ought to stand first in their estimation."
Around ten o’clock that night a man called Holden came to grief in Whiston. He was employed at the Holt Lane stone quarry and had set off for home in Portico after working in the smithy.
The severe frost of the last few weeks was still making the ground very slippery and as I've often said, it's hard to imagine how dark the district of St Helens was at night 150 years ago.
So it was presumed that Holden in taking a short cut in the dark had fallen into a pond and drowned.
The man's body was found soon after the accident with his dog standing by his side.
A constable said the man had been drunk and asking for someone to fight him and when told to desist became abusive and refused to leave.
Superintendent Ludlam told the Bench that the man was a tramp "and such persons gave the police great trouble".
Jones was ordered to find sureties to keep the peace. But he was a tramp and didn’t have that sort of money and so was sent to prison for a month.
Robert Locklyn faced the same charge of breaching the peace but he was not a tramp.
In fact the St Helens Newspaper described him as a "respectable looking young man" and so was assured of more favourable treatment from the Bench.
Locklyn was described as a barman in what was described as the new vaults in Liverpool Road.
He had thrown an itinerant fiddler out of the house and was accused of using more violence than was deemed necessary.
The defendant admitted the charge but claimed mitigation after being spat in the face by the disorderly man.
The Bench was sympathetic saying he had "allowed his temper to master him" and the summons against him was subsequently withdrawn.
Farmer William Harrison was accused of dumping night soil in Ormskirk Road in Rainford and leaving it there from December 25th until January 16th.
Night soil was the regularly used euphemism for human faeces and was so called because a collector normally removed it at night from the privies, pits and pail closets that people used as toilets.
However some people made their own arrangements and Harrison told the court that he had been unwell and not able to get rid of it. He was fined 2s. 6d. and costs.
The St Helens / Sankey Canal used to be so deep and wide that it could take a long time for it to surrender its dead.
On the 23rd the body of Peter Kernaghan was found floating in the waters near the Navigation Inn.
The copper worker had been missing since Christmas Eve when he was last seen in a drunken state walking near the canal.
His cap was subsequently found on the bank and the presumption was that the man had fallen into the waterway. So the canal was dragged at that spot but without any success.
That was far from uncommon and Kernaghan's relatives then had to wait for his body to surface.
Last year a jury had called for the fencing of parts of the canal as a "protection to human life". But that would cost brass and doesn't appear to have happened.
The man's death was probably a combination of the drink, the dark nights, the unfenced canal and the icy ground.
A pregnant woman was struck by an express train at St Helens Junction on the 23rd and may possibly have survived. This is the St Helens Newspaper's account of the dreadful accident:
"On Monday afternoon, Mrs. Draper was standing at the level crossing at St Helens Junction waiting for a goods train, which was being shunted, to move out of the way, so that she could cross the line.
"While she was watching the goods train an express train came up at full speed from the opposite direction, and the buffer of the express engine struck her on the side, hurling her a considerable distance, and dashing a child she had in her arms to the ground.
"Mrs. Draper is far advanced in pregnancy, and lies in a very dangerous state. The child was not injured, and lay upon the ground without uttering a cry.
"Dr. Ricketts, the company's medical man in this district, was immediately sent for, and he promptly attended, rendering all the assistance possible to the injured woman."
It does seem very unlikely that Mrs Draper would have survived, although I can find no record of her death.
James Ricketts was a 30-year-old doctor who lived in Cotham Street.
Due to the many accidents on the railway and the lack of any hospital to see to the injured, the railway company contracted Dr. Ricketts to treat the victims of the many accidents within the St Helens area.
I've often talked of the Copper Works in Sutton being sued by farmers for damage done to their crops through the emission of noxious vapours – as the pollution was called.
With so many other chimneys in the district belching out toxic fumes, it could be hard to prove that the copper works was solely to blame. So usually the farmers had to settle for a fraction of their claim.
Strangely it doesn't appear to have occurred to anyone that if the fumes did terrible things to crops and vegetation, what must they be doing to the lungs of workers and residents?
I expect it probably did but it was not an issue that anyone was yet prepared to face.
The scale of the claims against Sutton Copper Works was revealed on the 23rd in a court case in which it was stated that 34 more actions for damages were being brought against the firm.
The company wanted a ruling on whether they would have to pay the costs of all these separate claims.
However these hearings would not take place until March at the next assizes sessions in Liverpool and a decision would be made before then.
Next week's stories will include the annual dinner for the old folk of Rainford, the spread of smallpox in Sutton, the sale of two old workhouses and the right old barney that took place in Parr.