150 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (28th JUNE - 4th JULY 1871)
This week's stories include the wife deserter with a conscience, the St Helens man who'd been drunk and riotous in Ormskirk, the most disgraceful and abominable assault on a wife, the harsh treatment of miners at Ashton and the tramp who bedded himself in a pig sty after turning out the pigs.
We begin with this advert on the 28th in the Manchester Guardian (as The Guardian was then known): "WANTED, by the Corporation of St. Helens, an experienced man, to assist the Borough Surveyor chiefly in making and repairing the roads within the borough." As there was a lack of decent roads in the town, this was important work. And how much would the assistant surveyor be paid? £100 per year – so less than £2 a week. Still the pay wasn't too bad, as £1 a week was a reasonable wage for a labourer.
Also on the 28th a tramp named James Boyce was charged in the St Helens Petty Session with vagrancy. The Liverpool Daily Post wrote: "He had driven the pigs out of [a] farmer's stye, and lain down in their place. The presiding magistrate commended his taste, and ordered him to have a clean bed in Kirkdale [gaol] for 14 days."
At St Helens Petty Sessions on the 28th, William Eccleston was charged with threatening to take his wife's life. The Wigan Observer wrote: "It was apparent from his manner that his mind is affected. He was ordered to find sureties."
On the following day the Ormskirk Advertiser told of a St Helens man who had faced a charge in Ormskirk Police Court of being drunk and riotous and assaulting a policeman. John Patten had been working in Southport but had returned home for the day on the Sunday. However with no direct train service for the return journey from St Helens to Southport, he'd had to change trains at Ormskirk and decided during the interval to have a quick drink in a pub. One beer became two and before long Patten found that he had missed his connection. So then he appears to have had one or two drinks more…
Sgt. Sanderson of Ormskirk police told the court that at half-past midnight he'd found the man making a great noise in the street and he had threatened to lock him up if he did not desist. To that the officer claimed Patten seized him by the collar and tried to throw him down, although the sergeant said he had been able to overpower him. John Patten stated that he was simply asking the officer to find him lodgings! However it was shown that he had asked Inspector Bolton some time earlier about somewhere to stay and had had a place pointed out to him. He was fined 10 shillings and costs.
It was a serious crime for a St Helens man to desert his family and leave them chargeable to the Prescot Union. The people who ran Whiston Workhouse and supported destitute folk in the community did not like having to help out the wives and children of able-bodied men. The Poor Law Unions' own weekly paper called 'The Gazette' had the sole purpose of publishing details of sought after men who had deserted their families. On its front page it said: "Every person running away and leaving his wife, or his or her child or children chargeable to any parish, shall be deemed a rogue and vagabond." But I think The Gazette would have long since stopped searching for the unnamed man whose letter was read out at a meeting on the 29th.
The Guardians of the Prescot Union were told that the letter had come from a "very respectable gentleman" in America who had deserted his wife in the St Helens area some twenty years earlier. For a time the woman had been left chargeable to the Prescot Union but he had since "grown well-to-do" in the States and was asking the Guardians if they would accept £10 as compensation. The offer was reported as having been gratefully accepted. However whether the well-to-do man had since done right by his family back in Britain, as well as as the authorities, was not revealed.
Also on the 29th Patrick Mannion was sent to prison for a week after being caught begging at Windle Smithies.
The St Helens Newspaper reported on the 1st how battered wife Caroline Thompson had summoned her husband to St Helens Petty Sessions for assaulting her. Caroline told the Bench that he had knocked her down and kicked her, threatening that he would be "the death of her". Then on the following day he did the same. She said she was afraid of her life and, crucially, she had witnesses. A John Smith said he had seen the man give his wife "some brutal usage" and a neighbour, described as "respectable-looking", provided further corroboration of what the Newspaper called "harrowing details".
Thomas Thompson pleaded aggravation, claiming – as many wife beaters did – that his wife had been drunk, although John Smith said she appeared sober to him. Thompson told the Bench that his wife had also been "fearfully abusive" to him and he would not have touched her if she had behaved herself. The Chairman said it was a "most disgraceful and abominable assault", and Thompson was given two months hard labour. Such domestic assaults in St Helens were commonplace but normally carried out in private. The mistake made by Thomas Thompson was to undertake his attacks in front of "respectable" witnesses.
At the St Helens Petty Sessions on the 1st, Thomas Mark was sent to prison for fourteen days after been found sleeping inside a colliery "without leave". Also on that day the Warrington Examiner reported that a very small egg – smaller in size than a linnet's egg – had been found in Rainhill inside an ordinary hen's egg that had been boiled.
The paper also published this piece: "It will be seen on reference to our report of Daresbury Sessions held last Tuesday, that a young man named Wardle was heavily fined, for exposing himself on board a flat [small boat], whilst suffering from smallpox. Yesterday an unmarried woman, who is the mother of four children, was committed to prison for a month, for neglecting to get her child, which was since dead, vaccinated. These steps are instituted by the Board of Guardians, in order to eradicate the disease – a course which must meet with the approval of every inhabitant of the borough."
Until well in the 20th century, miners were expected to provide their own tools and pay for materials. In 1934 a St Helens miner's wife interviewed on BBC Radio said her husband had to pay to use the pithead baths, store his bike at the mine, have his picks sharpened and pay for the lamp oil that he used – among a whole host of other charges. In the 1870s matters were even worse – with harsh penalties imposed on miners if they did not sufficiently fill a coal tub.
A fortnight ago I wrote that Thomas Tunstall from Stubshaw Cross in Ashton had appeared in court charged with committing wilful damage at the Garswood Hall Collieries. After being sacked from the mine, Tunstall had apparently returned and driven a number of three-inch nails into the colliery's headgear as an act of revenge. However that wasn't quite what had happened. The miners were paid for the coal they produced and if they sent to the surface boxes of coal that were under the prescribed weight, they were paid nothing – as Mr Tunstall explained in this letter published in the Wigan Observer on the 1st:
"Myself, in common with number of my fellow-workmen at Garswood Hall Colliery, had a number of boxes [of coal] taken from us by the over ground authorities for short measure, &c., which implies that if a 7 cwt. box is ¾ cwt. short of weight or measure, the other 6¼ cwt. of coals must be counted NIL, although they are at once discharged into the waggons for sale.
"In order to show how many boxes had been taken from me I pinned the same number of my tallies to the headgear with some nails, not for the purpose of injuring the headgear, but for the purpose of showing how many boxes had been taken from me. This I acknowledge was illegal and improper, and done under momentary excitement but not very damaging." It had been for that act – for which the company sought a penny damages in court – that Thomas Tunstall had been sacked.
This week's "and finally" item is a report of a tragedy at sea near Hong Kong that had occurred nearly two months ago but the news had only recently come through. Despite last week's declaration by the New York Tribune that the electric telegraph had almost encircled the globe, communication could still be dreadfully slow. The article was published in the St Helens Newspaper under the headline: "Five Hundred Coolies Burned To Death":
"The details of the total destruction by fire of the Peruvian ship Don Juan, at sea, by which 500 coolies perished, have been received. The Don Juan left Macau on May 4th, with a cargo of 650 coolies, for Peru, and on the 6th was burned to the water's edge, not more than 50 miles from Hong Kong. The coolies who have arrived in Hong Kong all avers that their treatment was humane, and they had nothing whatever to complain of either as to the allowance of food or the quality or quantity, and the whole affair was simply accidental. The other view in the question, namely, that the vessel was set on fire by designing men among the Chinese, is not impossible.
"One of the men distinctly avers that he heard an explosion of gunpowder aft, and also smelt a strong smell of it. Others again say they did not hear any report; and they were nearly overpowered by the sickening smell of the ship's material burning aft. It is to be regretted that the European who had the humanity to open the hatches did not succeed in saving his own life, as he was overtaken by the coolies, who made a rush at the boat waiting for him, and a general scramble occurred to get to it, the Europeans using arms to prevent the coolies getting into it.
"In this scramble several Chinese were drowned. The boat, however, ultimately succeeded in getting clear of the ship, but had not gone far when it upset in sight of but not within reach of the coolies. During this time the materials of the ship were rapidly burning, and a large number perished in the hold, some of whom no doubt were suffocated, but the cries from the others were piteous. Many, however, jumped into the water, and escaped by drowning the more horrible death by fire."
Next week's stories will include a sad suicide in St Helens Canal, the decision is taken to build a new Town Hall for St Helens, an alarming railway accident takes place at Rainford and the man given 7 years in prison for stealing a meat pie.
We begin with this advert on the 28th in the Manchester Guardian (as The Guardian was then known): "WANTED, by the Corporation of St. Helens, an experienced man, to assist the Borough Surveyor chiefly in making and repairing the roads within the borough." As there was a lack of decent roads in the town, this was important work. And how much would the assistant surveyor be paid? £100 per year – so less than £2 a week. Still the pay wasn't too bad, as £1 a week was a reasonable wage for a labourer.
Also on the 28th a tramp named James Boyce was charged in the St Helens Petty Session with vagrancy. The Liverpool Daily Post wrote: "He had driven the pigs out of [a] farmer's stye, and lain down in their place. The presiding magistrate commended his taste, and ordered him to have a clean bed in Kirkdale [gaol] for 14 days."
At St Helens Petty Sessions on the 28th, William Eccleston was charged with threatening to take his wife's life. The Wigan Observer wrote: "It was apparent from his manner that his mind is affected. He was ordered to find sureties."
On the following day the Ormskirk Advertiser told of a St Helens man who had faced a charge in Ormskirk Police Court of being drunk and riotous and assaulting a policeman. John Patten had been working in Southport but had returned home for the day on the Sunday. However with no direct train service for the return journey from St Helens to Southport, he'd had to change trains at Ormskirk and decided during the interval to have a quick drink in a pub. One beer became two and before long Patten found that he had missed his connection. So then he appears to have had one or two drinks more…
Sgt. Sanderson of Ormskirk police told the court that at half-past midnight he'd found the man making a great noise in the street and he had threatened to lock him up if he did not desist. To that the officer claimed Patten seized him by the collar and tried to throw him down, although the sergeant said he had been able to overpower him. John Patten stated that he was simply asking the officer to find him lodgings! However it was shown that he had asked Inspector Bolton some time earlier about somewhere to stay and had had a place pointed out to him. He was fined 10 shillings and costs.
The Guardians of the Prescot Union were told that the letter had come from a "very respectable gentleman" in America who had deserted his wife in the St Helens area some twenty years earlier. For a time the woman had been left chargeable to the Prescot Union but he had since "grown well-to-do" in the States and was asking the Guardians if they would accept £10 as compensation. The offer was reported as having been gratefully accepted. However whether the well-to-do man had since done right by his family back in Britain, as well as as the authorities, was not revealed.
Also on the 29th Patrick Mannion was sent to prison for a week after being caught begging at Windle Smithies.
The St Helens Newspaper reported on the 1st how battered wife Caroline Thompson had summoned her husband to St Helens Petty Sessions for assaulting her. Caroline told the Bench that he had knocked her down and kicked her, threatening that he would be "the death of her". Then on the following day he did the same. She said she was afraid of her life and, crucially, she had witnesses. A John Smith said he had seen the man give his wife "some brutal usage" and a neighbour, described as "respectable-looking", provided further corroboration of what the Newspaper called "harrowing details".
Thomas Thompson pleaded aggravation, claiming – as many wife beaters did – that his wife had been drunk, although John Smith said she appeared sober to him. Thompson told the Bench that his wife had also been "fearfully abusive" to him and he would not have touched her if she had behaved herself. The Chairman said it was a "most disgraceful and abominable assault", and Thompson was given two months hard labour. Such domestic assaults in St Helens were commonplace but normally carried out in private. The mistake made by Thomas Thompson was to undertake his attacks in front of "respectable" witnesses.
At the St Helens Petty Sessions on the 1st, Thomas Mark was sent to prison for fourteen days after been found sleeping inside a colliery "without leave". Also on that day the Warrington Examiner reported that a very small egg – smaller in size than a linnet's egg – had been found in Rainhill inside an ordinary hen's egg that had been boiled.
The paper also published this piece: "It will be seen on reference to our report of Daresbury Sessions held last Tuesday, that a young man named Wardle was heavily fined, for exposing himself on board a flat [small boat], whilst suffering from smallpox. Yesterday an unmarried woman, who is the mother of four children, was committed to prison for a month, for neglecting to get her child, which was since dead, vaccinated. These steps are instituted by the Board of Guardians, in order to eradicate the disease – a course which must meet with the approval of every inhabitant of the borough."
Until well in the 20th century, miners were expected to provide their own tools and pay for materials. In 1934 a St Helens miner's wife interviewed on BBC Radio said her husband had to pay to use the pithead baths, store his bike at the mine, have his picks sharpened and pay for the lamp oil that he used – among a whole host of other charges. In the 1870s matters were even worse – with harsh penalties imposed on miners if they did not sufficiently fill a coal tub.
A fortnight ago I wrote that Thomas Tunstall from Stubshaw Cross in Ashton had appeared in court charged with committing wilful damage at the Garswood Hall Collieries. After being sacked from the mine, Tunstall had apparently returned and driven a number of three-inch nails into the colliery's headgear as an act of revenge. However that wasn't quite what had happened. The miners were paid for the coal they produced and if they sent to the surface boxes of coal that were under the prescribed weight, they were paid nothing – as Mr Tunstall explained in this letter published in the Wigan Observer on the 1st:
"Myself, in common with number of my fellow-workmen at Garswood Hall Colliery, had a number of boxes [of coal] taken from us by the over ground authorities for short measure, &c., which implies that if a 7 cwt. box is ¾ cwt. short of weight or measure, the other 6¼ cwt. of coals must be counted NIL, although they are at once discharged into the waggons for sale.
"In order to show how many boxes had been taken from me I pinned the same number of my tallies to the headgear with some nails, not for the purpose of injuring the headgear, but for the purpose of showing how many boxes had been taken from me. This I acknowledge was illegal and improper, and done under momentary excitement but not very damaging." It had been for that act – for which the company sought a penny damages in court – that Thomas Tunstall had been sacked.
This week's "and finally" item is a report of a tragedy at sea near Hong Kong that had occurred nearly two months ago but the news had only recently come through. Despite last week's declaration by the New York Tribune that the electric telegraph had almost encircled the globe, communication could still be dreadfully slow. The article was published in the St Helens Newspaper under the headline: "Five Hundred Coolies Burned To Death":
"The details of the total destruction by fire of the Peruvian ship Don Juan, at sea, by which 500 coolies perished, have been received. The Don Juan left Macau on May 4th, with a cargo of 650 coolies, for Peru, and on the 6th was burned to the water's edge, not more than 50 miles from Hong Kong. The coolies who have arrived in Hong Kong all avers that their treatment was humane, and they had nothing whatever to complain of either as to the allowance of food or the quality or quantity, and the whole affair was simply accidental. The other view in the question, namely, that the vessel was set on fire by designing men among the Chinese, is not impossible.
"One of the men distinctly avers that he heard an explosion of gunpowder aft, and also smelt a strong smell of it. Others again say they did not hear any report; and they were nearly overpowered by the sickening smell of the ship's material burning aft. It is to be regretted that the European who had the humanity to open the hatches did not succeed in saving his own life, as he was overtaken by the coolies, who made a rush at the boat waiting for him, and a general scramble occurred to get to it, the Europeans using arms to prevent the coolies getting into it.
"In this scramble several Chinese were drowned. The boat, however, ultimately succeeded in getting clear of the ship, but had not gone far when it upset in sight of but not within reach of the coolies. During this time the materials of the ship were rapidly burning, and a large number perished in the hold, some of whom no doubt were suffocated, but the cries from the others were piteous. Many, however, jumped into the water, and escaped by drowning the more horrible death by fire."
Next week's stories will include a sad suicide in St Helens Canal, the decision is taken to build a new Town Hall for St Helens, an alarming railway accident takes place at Rainford and the man given 7 years in prison for stealing a meat pie.
This week's stories include the wife deserter with a conscience, the St Helens man who'd been drunk and riotous in Ormskirk, the most disgraceful and abominable assault on a wife, the harsh treatment of miners at Ashton and the tramp who bedded himself in a pig sty after turning out the pigs.
We begin with this advert on the 28th in the Manchester Guardian (as The Guardian was then known):
"WANTED, by the Corporation of St. Helens, an experienced man, to assist the Borough Surveyor chiefly in making and repairing the roads within the borough."
As there was a lack of decent roads in the town, this was important work. And how much would the assistant surveyor be paid? £100 per year – so less than £2 a week.
Still the pay wasn't too bad, as £1 a week was a reasonable wage for a labourer.
Also on the 28th a tramp named James Boyce was charged in the St Helens Petty Session with vagrancy. The Liverpool Daily Post wrote:
"He had driven the pigs out of [a] farmer's stye, and lain down in their place. The presiding magistrate commended his taste, and ordered him to have a clean bed in Kirkdale [gaol] for 14 days."
At St Helens Petty Sessions on the 28th, William Eccleston was charged with threatening to take his wife's life.
The Wigan Observer wrote: "It was apparent from his manner that his mind is affected. He was ordered to find sureties."
On the following day the Ormskirk Advertiser told of a St Helens man who had faced a charge in Ormskirk Police Court of being drunk and riotous and assaulting a policeman.
John Patten had been working in Southport but had returned home for the day on the Sunday.
However with no direct train service for the return journey from St Helens to Southport, he'd had to change trains at Ormskirk and decided during the interval to have a quick drink in a pub.
One beer became two and before long Patten found that he had missed his connection. So then he appears to have had one or two drinks more…
Sgt. Sanderson of Ormskirk police told the court that at half-past midnight he'd found the man making a great noise in the street and he had threatened to lock him up if he did not desist.
To that the officer claimed Patten seized him by the collar and tried to throw him down, although the sergeant said he had been able to overpower him.
John Patten stated that he was simply asking the officer to find him lodgings!
However it was shown that he had asked Inspector Bolton some time earlier about somewhere to stay and had had a place pointed out to him. He was fined 10 shillings and costs.
It was a serious crime for a St Helens man to desert his family and leave them chargeable to the Prescot Union.
The people who ran Whiston Workhouse and supported destitute folk in the community did not like having to help out the wives and children of able-bodied men.
The Poor Law Unions' own weekly paper called 'The Gazette' had the sole purpose of publishing details of sought after men who had deserted their families.
On its front page it said: "Every person running away and leaving his wife, or his or her child or children chargeable to any parish, shall be deemed a rogue and vagabond."
But I think The Gazette would have long since stopped searching for the unnamed man whose letter was read out at a meeting on the 29th.
The Guardians of the Prescot Union were told that the letter had come from a "very respectable gentleman" in America who had deserted his wife in the St Helens area some twenty years earlier.
For a time the woman had been left chargeable to the Prescot Union but he had since "grown well-to-do" in the States and was asking the Guardians if they would accept £10 as compensation.
The offer was reported as having been gratefully accepted. However whether the well-to-do man had since done right by his family back in Britain, as well as as the authorities, was not revealed.
Also on the 29th Patrick Mannion was sent to prison for a week after being caught begging at Windle Smithies.
The St Helens Newspaper reported on the 1st how battered wife Caroline Thompson had summoned her husband to St Helens Petty Sessions for assaulting her.
Caroline told the Bench that he had knocked her down and kicked her, threatening that he would be "the death of her". Then on the following day he did the same.
She said she was afraid of her life and, crucially, she had witnesses.
A John Smith said he had seen the man give his wife "some brutal usage" and a neighbour, described as "respectable-looking", provided further corroboration of what the Newspaper called "harrowing details".
Thomas Thompson pleaded aggravation, claiming – as many wife beaters did – that his wife had been drunk, although John Smith said she appeared sober to him.
Thompson told the Bench that his wife had also been "fearfully abusive" to him and he would not have touched her if she had behaved herself.
The Chairman said it was a "most disgraceful and abominable assault", and Thompson was given two months hard labour.
Such domestic assaults in St Helens were commonplace but normally carried out in private. The mistake made by Thomas Thompson was to undertake his attacks in front of "respectable" witnesses.
At the St Helens Petty Sessions on the 1st, Thomas Mark was sent to prison for fourteen days after been found sleeping inside a colliery "without leave".
Also on that day the Warrington Examiner reported that a very small egg – smaller in size than a linnet's egg – had been found in Rainhill inside an ordinary hen's egg that had been boiled.
The paper also published this piece: "It will be seen on reference to our report of Daresbury Sessions held last Tuesday, that a young man named Wardle was heavily fined, for exposing himself on board a flat [small boat], whilst suffering from smallpox.
"Yesterday an unmarried woman, who is the mother of four children, was committed to prison for a month, for neglecting to get her child, which was since dead, vaccinated.
"These steps are instituted by the Board of Guardians, in order to eradicate the disease – a course which must meet with the approval of every inhabitant of the borough."
Until well in the 20th century, miners were expected to provide their own tools and pay for materials.
In 1934 a St Helens miner's wife interviewed on BBC Radio said her husband had to pay to use the pithead baths, store his bike at the mine, have his picks sharpened and pay for the lamp oil that he used – among a whole host of other charges.
In the 1870s matters were even worse – with harsh penalties imposed on miners if they did not sufficiently fill a coal tub.
A fortnight ago I wrote that Thomas Tunstall from Stubshaw Cross in Ashton had appeared in court charged with committing wilful damage at the Garswood Hall Collieries.
After being sacked from the mine, Tunstall had apparently returned and driven a number of three-inch nails into the colliery's headgear as an act of revenge.
However that wasn't quite what had happened. The miners were paid for the coal they produced and if they sent to the surface boxes of coal that were under the prescribed weight, they were paid nothing – as Mr Tunstall explained in this letter published in the Wigan Observer on the 1st:
"Myself, in common with number of my fellow-workmen at Garswood Hall Colliery, had a number of boxes [of coal] taken from us by the over ground authorities for short measure, &c., which implies that if a 7 cwt. box is ¾ cwt. short of weight or measure, the other 6¼ cwt. of coals must be counted NIL, although they are at once discharged into the waggons for sale.
"In order to show how many boxes had been taken from me I pinned the same number of my tallies to the headgear with some nails, not for the purpose of injuring the headgear, but for the purpose of showing how many boxes had been taken from me.
"This I acknowledge was illegal and improper, and done under momentary excitement but not very damaging."
It had been for that act – for which the company sought a penny damages in court – that Thomas Tunstall had been sacked.
This week's "and finally" item is a report of a tragedy at sea near Hong Kong that had occurred nearly two months ago but the news had only recently come through.
Despite last week's declaration by the New York Tribune that the electric telegraph had almost encircled the globe, communication could still be dreadfully slow.
The article was published in the St Helens Newspaper under the headline: "Five Hundred Coolies Burned To Death":
"The details of the total destruction by fire of the Peruvian ship Don Juan, at sea, by which 500 coolies perished, have been received.
"The Don Juan left Macau on May 4th, with a cargo of 650 coolies, for Peru, and on the 6th was burned to the water's edge, not more than 50 miles from Hong Kong.
"The coolies who have arrived in Hong Kong all avers that their treatment was humane, and they had nothing whatever to complain of either as to the allowance of food or the quality or quantity, and the whole affair was simply accidental.
"The other view in the question, namely, that the vessel was set on fire by designing men among the Chinese, is not impossible.
"One of the men distinctly avers that he heard an explosion of gunpowder aft, and also smelt a strong smell of it.
"Others again say they did not hear any report; and they were nearly overpowered by the sickening smell of the ship's material burning aft.
"It is to be regretted that the European who had the humanity to open the hatches did not succeed in saving his own life, as he was overtaken by the coolies, who made a rush at the boat waiting for him, and a general scramble occurred to get to it, the Europeans using arms to prevent the coolies getting into it.
"In this scramble several Chinese were drowned. The boat, however, ultimately succeeded in getting clear of the ship, but had not gone far when it upset in sight of but not within reach of the coolies.
"During this time the materials of the ship were rapidly burning, and a large number perished in the hold, some of whom no doubt were suffocated, but the cries from the others were piteous. Many, however, jumped into the water, and escaped by drowning the more horrible death by fire."
Next week's stories will include a sad suicide in St Helens Canal, the decision is taken to build a new Town Hall for St Helens, an alarming railway accident takes place at Rainford and the man given 7 years for stealing a meat pie.
We begin with this advert on the 28th in the Manchester Guardian (as The Guardian was then known):
"WANTED, by the Corporation of St. Helens, an experienced man, to assist the Borough Surveyor chiefly in making and repairing the roads within the borough."
As there was a lack of decent roads in the town, this was important work. And how much would the assistant surveyor be paid? £100 per year – so less than £2 a week.
Still the pay wasn't too bad, as £1 a week was a reasonable wage for a labourer.
Also on the 28th a tramp named James Boyce was charged in the St Helens Petty Session with vagrancy. The Liverpool Daily Post wrote:
"He had driven the pigs out of [a] farmer's stye, and lain down in their place. The presiding magistrate commended his taste, and ordered him to have a clean bed in Kirkdale [gaol] for 14 days."
At St Helens Petty Sessions on the 28th, William Eccleston was charged with threatening to take his wife's life.
The Wigan Observer wrote: "It was apparent from his manner that his mind is affected. He was ordered to find sureties."
On the following day the Ormskirk Advertiser told of a St Helens man who had faced a charge in Ormskirk Police Court of being drunk and riotous and assaulting a policeman.
John Patten had been working in Southport but had returned home for the day on the Sunday.
However with no direct train service for the return journey from St Helens to Southport, he'd had to change trains at Ormskirk and decided during the interval to have a quick drink in a pub.
One beer became two and before long Patten found that he had missed his connection. So then he appears to have had one or two drinks more…
Sgt. Sanderson of Ormskirk police told the court that at half-past midnight he'd found the man making a great noise in the street and he had threatened to lock him up if he did not desist.
To that the officer claimed Patten seized him by the collar and tried to throw him down, although the sergeant said he had been able to overpower him.
John Patten stated that he was simply asking the officer to find him lodgings!
However it was shown that he had asked Inspector Bolton some time earlier about somewhere to stay and had had a place pointed out to him. He was fined 10 shillings and costs.
The people who ran Whiston Workhouse and supported destitute folk in the community did not like having to help out the wives and children of able-bodied men.
The Poor Law Unions' own weekly paper called 'The Gazette' had the sole purpose of publishing details of sought after men who had deserted their families.
On its front page it said: "Every person running away and leaving his wife, or his or her child or children chargeable to any parish, shall be deemed a rogue and vagabond."
But I think The Gazette would have long since stopped searching for the unnamed man whose letter was read out at a meeting on the 29th.
The Guardians of the Prescot Union were told that the letter had come from a "very respectable gentleman" in America who had deserted his wife in the St Helens area some twenty years earlier.
For a time the woman had been left chargeable to the Prescot Union but he had since "grown well-to-do" in the States and was asking the Guardians if they would accept £10 as compensation.
The offer was reported as having been gratefully accepted. However whether the well-to-do man had since done right by his family back in Britain, as well as as the authorities, was not revealed.
Also on the 29th Patrick Mannion was sent to prison for a week after being caught begging at Windle Smithies.
The St Helens Newspaper reported on the 1st how battered wife Caroline Thompson had summoned her husband to St Helens Petty Sessions for assaulting her.
Caroline told the Bench that he had knocked her down and kicked her, threatening that he would be "the death of her". Then on the following day he did the same.
She said she was afraid of her life and, crucially, she had witnesses.
A John Smith said he had seen the man give his wife "some brutal usage" and a neighbour, described as "respectable-looking", provided further corroboration of what the Newspaper called "harrowing details".
Thomas Thompson pleaded aggravation, claiming – as many wife beaters did – that his wife had been drunk, although John Smith said she appeared sober to him.
Thompson told the Bench that his wife had also been "fearfully abusive" to him and he would not have touched her if she had behaved herself.
The Chairman said it was a "most disgraceful and abominable assault", and Thompson was given two months hard labour.
Such domestic assaults in St Helens were commonplace but normally carried out in private. The mistake made by Thomas Thompson was to undertake his attacks in front of "respectable" witnesses.
At the St Helens Petty Sessions on the 1st, Thomas Mark was sent to prison for fourteen days after been found sleeping inside a colliery "without leave".
Also on that day the Warrington Examiner reported that a very small egg – smaller in size than a linnet's egg – had been found in Rainhill inside an ordinary hen's egg that had been boiled.
The paper also published this piece: "It will be seen on reference to our report of Daresbury Sessions held last Tuesday, that a young man named Wardle was heavily fined, for exposing himself on board a flat [small boat], whilst suffering from smallpox.
"Yesterday an unmarried woman, who is the mother of four children, was committed to prison for a month, for neglecting to get her child, which was since dead, vaccinated.
"These steps are instituted by the Board of Guardians, in order to eradicate the disease – a course which must meet with the approval of every inhabitant of the borough."
Until well in the 20th century, miners were expected to provide their own tools and pay for materials.
In 1934 a St Helens miner's wife interviewed on BBC Radio said her husband had to pay to use the pithead baths, store his bike at the mine, have his picks sharpened and pay for the lamp oil that he used – among a whole host of other charges.
In the 1870s matters were even worse – with harsh penalties imposed on miners if they did not sufficiently fill a coal tub.
A fortnight ago I wrote that Thomas Tunstall from Stubshaw Cross in Ashton had appeared in court charged with committing wilful damage at the Garswood Hall Collieries.
After being sacked from the mine, Tunstall had apparently returned and driven a number of three-inch nails into the colliery's headgear as an act of revenge.
However that wasn't quite what had happened. The miners were paid for the coal they produced and if they sent to the surface boxes of coal that were under the prescribed weight, they were paid nothing – as Mr Tunstall explained in this letter published in the Wigan Observer on the 1st:
"Myself, in common with number of my fellow-workmen at Garswood Hall Colliery, had a number of boxes [of coal] taken from us by the over ground authorities for short measure, &c., which implies that if a 7 cwt. box is ¾ cwt. short of weight or measure, the other 6¼ cwt. of coals must be counted NIL, although they are at once discharged into the waggons for sale.
"In order to show how many boxes had been taken from me I pinned the same number of my tallies to the headgear with some nails, not for the purpose of injuring the headgear, but for the purpose of showing how many boxes had been taken from me.
"This I acknowledge was illegal and improper, and done under momentary excitement but not very damaging."
It had been for that act – for which the company sought a penny damages in court – that Thomas Tunstall had been sacked.
This week's "and finally" item is a report of a tragedy at sea near Hong Kong that had occurred nearly two months ago but the news had only recently come through.
Despite last week's declaration by the New York Tribune that the electric telegraph had almost encircled the globe, communication could still be dreadfully slow.
The article was published in the St Helens Newspaper under the headline: "Five Hundred Coolies Burned To Death":
"The details of the total destruction by fire of the Peruvian ship Don Juan, at sea, by which 500 coolies perished, have been received.
"The Don Juan left Macau on May 4th, with a cargo of 650 coolies, for Peru, and on the 6th was burned to the water's edge, not more than 50 miles from Hong Kong.
"The coolies who have arrived in Hong Kong all avers that their treatment was humane, and they had nothing whatever to complain of either as to the allowance of food or the quality or quantity, and the whole affair was simply accidental.
"The other view in the question, namely, that the vessel was set on fire by designing men among the Chinese, is not impossible.
"One of the men distinctly avers that he heard an explosion of gunpowder aft, and also smelt a strong smell of it.
"Others again say they did not hear any report; and they were nearly overpowered by the sickening smell of the ship's material burning aft.
"It is to be regretted that the European who had the humanity to open the hatches did not succeed in saving his own life, as he was overtaken by the coolies, who made a rush at the boat waiting for him, and a general scramble occurred to get to it, the Europeans using arms to prevent the coolies getting into it.
"In this scramble several Chinese were drowned. The boat, however, ultimately succeeded in getting clear of the ship, but had not gone far when it upset in sight of but not within reach of the coolies.
"During this time the materials of the ship were rapidly burning, and a large number perished in the hold, some of whom no doubt were suffocated, but the cries from the others were piteous. Many, however, jumped into the water, and escaped by drowning the more horrible death by fire."
Next week's stories will include a sad suicide in St Helens Canal, the decision is taken to build a new Town Hall for St Helens, an alarming railway accident takes place at Rainford and the man given 7 years for stealing a meat pie.