Whanau & Whenua May 2011

Honorary Cumbrian - In Memoriam 14th October 1943

TOWN WELCOME DAUGHTER OF KELL’S WAR-CRASH AIRMAN

[by Margaret Crosby, Whitehaven News, Friday, 05 January 2007]

THERE was a civic welcome to Whitehaven, this week, for the daughter of a young wartime airman whose plane had crashed into Kells Brows more than 60 years ago.

It was an emotional trip back in time to an October day in 1943, when Whitehaven townspeople going about their daily business were shocked to see a bomber crash-land in their midst.

Susan Hollinshead, was just six years old, when news came through of a tragedy that was to deprive her, and her unborn brother, of their father, Cyril Johnson.

He was one of five young airmen killed on the training flight from RAF Millom, that ended in wreckage strewn over the Brows, at Kells.

On Monday, Susan, who will be 70 next month, and her husband, John, travelled to Whitehaven from their home in Kelsall, Cheshire, to study local records and documentation of the wartime event and pay an emotional visit to the crash site itself.

They were given a civic welcome by the Mayor of Copeland Willis Metherell and the chairman of Cumbria County Council, Alan Caine.

It was on October 14 that the Avro Anson R9780 aircraft was on a routine flight from the unit at RAF Millom, when tragedy struck.

The five crewmen who died were a mixed bunch. There was Susan’s father Sgt Cyril Johnson, who had been a teacher in Nantwich, before joining the RAF, Sgt T Inman, wireless operator, Flying officer H J O’Hare of Glasgow, Canadian navigator, Sgt R H Murphy and American pilot Sgt V J Dunnigan, a baseball player of note, from Buffalo, New York.

Susan’s visit to Whitehaven had been prompted by the interest of her brother, Dr Keith Johnson, who now lives in Wellington, New Zealand. He had never known his father. His mother, Mabel Johnson, was pregnant with him when Cyril died. Sadly Cyril, 33, did not even know his wife was expecting.

Said Susan: “My father had previously been in South Africa with the RAF and he and my mother had stolen a couple of weeks together before he had to go off to the Millom base. My brother was the result but my father never knew.’’

Susan’s decision to revisit the wartime events of 63 years ago had been prompted by her brother’s interest. Keith had contacted Cumbria County Council to help him research the circumstances of his father’s death.

The siblings had understood their father, Cyril, was a navigator but Glynn Griffith of Millom RAF Museum provided old inquiry records that showed he was being trained as a bomb-aimer.

He told Susan: “Because of wartime demands the training role was often undertaken by aircraft that was ‘war-weary’ and it seems this plane suffered a serious structural defect in the wing span.

As a result of this incident all Avro Ansons in use were subsequently checked out and several were found to have cracks.’’

He said the wing had cracked, the plane had begun to disintegrate in mid-air and the pilot lost effective control of the aircraft once the wing was lost. Parachutes had flared but there was insufficient height to enable the men to get out of the aircraft.

Fabric covering from the aircraft was found on Bransty and local children of the time could remember sparks coming from it as it came down and that Border Regiment soldiers had guarded the crash scene.

The Hollinsheads were given copies of Sgt Johnson’s service record from the RAF, the crash inquiry records and research details gathered by the late Gilbert Rothery, who was interested in aviation and had been a boy of 13, waiting for a bus home to St Bees when the crash occurred.

There was also a folio of documents from The Beacon, represented by Averil Dawson, who is appealing to the public for personal memories of the crash on the Brows, which could form part of an oral history collection.

Councillor Metherell said she too had been only 14 at the time but remembered the event being the talk of the area. “It is history we must not forget.’’

Councillor Caine said Sgt Johnson would be made an honorary Cumbrian and the two councils would explore ways in which to create a permanent memorial to him.

Sabine Johnson - the Tudor Merchant's Wife

IN SEARCH OF AN OLD GIRLFRIEND










In August 2006, Jane and the boys and I visited England for a three-week holiday. On arriving at Heathrow, we picked up a hire car and followed the winding itinerary that I had mapped out in my head.

It was designed to overcome the reservations that Jane had developed about England on her Kiwi OE (Overseas Experience) during which time she had worked, for example, in a bookshop in Cambridge - feeling impoverished, marginalized and, dare I say it, different and ‘colonial'.

So we struck off for Cheshire from Heathrow taking the scenic route via Salisbury, Bath and Ludlow. My ploy was to introduce lots of beautiful rolling English countryside, fine old market towns and plenty of ruins, monuments and stately relics.

This plan also had the merit that it largely avoided the motorways, which to me are a never-ending hell somewhere between riding dodgem cars at the fairground and driving go-kart circuits.

My stratagem did not entirely work. As a devotee of Midsomer Murders, she eyed picture book scenes and the numerous English characters, identities and eccentrics that we encountered with apprehension.

For the greater part of the holiday, we stayed in tourist accommodation that had been developed on a farm at Cholmondeley, Cheshire – which was OK except that Jane got lost driving the hire car in the back streets of the nearby market town of Whitchurch, and again in the high-hedged back lanes on the way home on her one solo venture.

As for me, having feasted myself on sagging doorways, low-hanging beams and pork scratchings, I too became a little bit allergic to the closeness of everything and the preoccupation in modern rural England with leaving no nook un-knick-knacked.

However, we took the same approach to travel when we left to return to Heathrow but this time it was via Oundle and Oakham, as I wanted to spend some time with my eldest son Matthew (known locally as Kiwi) who was working on a farm at Draughton in Northamptonshire.

And as our route took us close to the village of Glapthorn (just outside Oundle) I took the time to try to catch up with an old girlfriend.

I can still remember it as yesterday – a rainy day on 25th August 2006. Diplomatically, Jane and the boys stayed in the car while I pushed open the old oak door and surveyed the scene, before kneeling quietly and muttering a prayer for time past and loves lost.

Before you surmise too much dear reader about my insensitivity to my wife, I should explain that the object of my affection died in the 1590s.

But the tiny country church that I had entered – St Leonard’s, Glapthorn – was where this headstrong, whimsical but practical lady had regularly worshipped with her children Charity (b.1542), Rachel (b.1544), Faith (b.1548), Evangelist (b.1550) and Edward (bca 1552) – and more occasionally with her frequently absent husband John Johnson, merchant of the wool staple in Calais, England.

INTRODUCING SABINE JOHNSON

Sabine Saunders (born around 1520) was the daughter of Thomas Saunders of Sibbertoft, Leicestershire and Margaret Cave. In 1541, she married John Johnson (c.1514-1590), who had been apprenticed to her uncle, Anthony Cave. John Johnson was a draper and a stapler whose business was centred in Calais. He also traded in a wide range of other items apart from wool, including wine, herring, grain, cloth, and canvas.

Sabine’s letters from 1542-1552 have been preserved along with those of her husband – and it is from these that we catch sight of a lively and loving lady. John, Sabine’s husband, was bankrupted in 1553, and following the conclusion of the legal proceedings, his letters were stored in the Tower of London until they were transferred to the Public Record Office in London some 300 years later.

The story of the Johnsons is told engagingly if in a somewhat episodic manner in Barbara Winchester’s "Tudor Family Portrait" (1955). This provides excerpts from some of the most interesting letters.

For example, in 1551, John Johnson wrote that he wished: ‘it had pleased God so to have provided for me that I might with less embracing of business have passed my times in the world. But God having appointed me to be a merchant (and such one as cannot live only to myself or for myself) I am compelled to enter into much business, and to take money and much things in hand’.

In 1544, John had been asked by Sir Thomas Brudenell of Deene, one of the wealthiest local aristocratic landowners, whether he would like to take up the tenancy of the Old Manor House (known locally as Browns’ Manor) in the small village of Glapthorn, Northamptonshire. This he did and Sabine set up and ran an extensive household there while John pursued his business interests in Calais.

From the letters, we know that there was a good deal of banter between John and Sabine, with some of it being of a slightly salacious nature.

In December 1545, John wrote from Calais:

‘If but one man in the whole world should be kept from death, it might be I, if it pleased God. Then the women of this town would keep me perforce from you. By Saint Mary! I should have much ado to please so many women! God save me from being troubled by many women, for I have much ado to please you alone, as ye know!

To which Sabine replied from Glapthorn:

‘Husband do not write there be many fair widows in Calais that would be glad of you. The truth is that I had rather they had everyone of them two husbands than you should be troubled with them!

Your promise made to me I will not say but you kept, and so have I, and will do the uttermost, without any bond or allegation. And, when it please God to send you home, I put no doubts that we shall agree very well these cold nights.’

We also know that she had a particular yen for red wine when she was pregnant and that she loved riding ‘her little black mare’ (which was much more tractable than one of the horses that her husband had unwisely purchased for himself which was ‘a pretty horse but fair unrid in the head’).

THE MERCHANT, THE PRIEST AND THE VILLAGERS

When I dodged the rain to look around the tiny white-washed church of St Leonard’s at Glapthorn, I picked up a small pamphlet there that had been produced about its architecture and history – leaving a couple of pounds in return in the gift box (or what we in New Zealand would call the ‘koha’ box). Apparently, the church was originally a Chapel of Ease of nearby Cotterstock.

The pamphlet points out that one of the moulded archway capitals is dated to 1160 and that despite the small size of the church, building and refurbishment can be detected from the succeeding 200 years.

‘Also note the exterior east window is decorated with a stone sow and her piglets – a reminder of when Glapthorn was known as ‘pig village’ and everyone kept a pig in their yard’.

As for the history of the village, there is a terse note that in 1512, ‘Robert Brudenell acquired the Manor of Glapthorn, beginning a long family association with the village. In 1815, the fields were enclosed but field names like Casteepings, Hanging Baulk, Stemborough, Hens and Chickens and Milking Stool remind us of agricultural life from Saxon times to the present day’.

There is no mention of Glapthorn’s most famous residents the Johnsons, though there is mention that the tenor bell weighing five and a half hundredweights was cast by a London foundry in the 15th century – which opens the possibility that it was donated by John and Sabine.

It is interesting then to pick up Glapthorn and its church as it was some 450 years ago.

Browns’ Manor was a relatively small property of around 250 acres which consisted of a hundred acres of arable and pasture ‘lying scattered in all the fields of Glapthorn and Cotterstock’ (i.e. strips of land pre-enclosure), besides which were a number of large and valuable enclosures in Glapthorn itself – Willow Row Close, Bodger’s Close, the Great Close amounting to 30 arable acres and Caies Stybbing, the forty acre meadow where the horses were put out to graze.

Clearly, Caies Stybbing is what the villagers now call Casteepings.

Initially, John seems to have seen the estate as a rural, gentlemanly retreat. However, it wasn’t long before he started to use his growing local knowledge to further his interests as a wool trader. The vicissitudes of this business are illustrated by the inflation in wool prices that followed the succession of rainy springs and autumns in the 1540s which decimated lambings and led to ‘murrain’ and foot-rot.

In April 1545, John refused to pay 12s (shillings) per tod (28 lbs) for the wool of his neighbour Mr Belcher but by autumn he was thankful to have it for 13s. By 1546, wool was only to be bought for 14s per tod in Rutland and 16s per tod in Northampton. And so prices continued to rise, with Lady Brudenell getting 24s per tod for her wool in 1550.

Not surprisingly, as a wool merchant John soon went into wool production, clearing and enclosing as much of his land as he could. In 1550, he spent nearly forty pounds on buying in sheep from Essex and he soon owned 1,000 sheep. However, the local price of wool hit a high of 30s per tod in 1551 and fell thereafter, putting John’s venture at risk.

Not only that, his entry into local trading set him at odds with the regional wool staple (i.e. trading guild) based in Norwich which then also threatened his legitimate registration with the more powerful London Staple.

The Johnsons then, although an apparently happy and cheerful couple, were not exactly popular in Northamptonshire – what with encroaching on the arable land of the cottagers and offending local merchants and traders.

Moreover, they soon fell foul of the local clergy as John through his connections with Lord Cromwell and Sir Thomas Brudenell helped in 1548 to clean up the remaining chantry and church property that had been plundered after Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries.

And the lease that Sir Thomas had given John had effectively privatized the tithes payable on lands associated with St Leonard’s. Parson Saxby of Glapthorn was unsurprisingly miffed about this and a long and costly law suit ensued.

This led Sabine to write to John in Calais ‘desiring him with all her heart to make speed to come home considering how I am troubled with a Sir Priest and have great need of help’. In one letter she confided to John that ‘our priest is a very K, as our last was’ (no one seems sure exactly what that meant, but in all probability it wasn’t polite).

Sabine also much resented Saxby’s lawyer Nicholas Walker, dubbing him ‘the crafty child Nicol Walk-a-Knave’.

The villagers sided with the clergy and in 1548 there was ‘a kind of seditious uproar’ at mass at St Leonard’s. This coincided with the introduction of the new Book of Prayer and the switch of rites from the Catholic to an evangelical form.

So a change of faith was accompanied by some profit realization by those who gained in power and influence, with it being noted that John Broughton, John Desborough and Richard Trusse had been the ringleaders of a ‘great disturbance and disorder in Glapthorn’ and the suggestion being made that ‘the offenders should be committed to prison for a season, until they be taught to study and apply to quietness and godliness’.

I’ll leave it there for the time being. I had intended to review the economic and political milieu of the Johnsons’ lives – and its parallels to some of the problems that we face today but it is quite a big draught to distill and one that must wait for another day.

But it has been a delight to write about Sabine – even though her husband may have had more than an eye for the main chance (and quite possibly the odd Calais widow).

POSTCRIPT

Incidentally, while I was searching in the period 2002-2008 for my own non-existent Johnson ancestors, I developed all kinds of lines of inquiry and interests in Johnson genealogies and family histories. The Tudor Johnsons of Calais and Glapthorn are by far the most interesting, at least as far as England is concerned

As I have already mentioned. The Johnsons’ business went into bankruptcy in 1553, and in 1555 John Johnson was committed to the Fleet Prison for debt. He was not released until 1557. Sabine was allowed to remain at Glapthorn with their children but after his release there was little money to support the family in the manner to which they had become accustomed.

With the help of William Cecil, Johnson obtained a post as a secretary to Lord Paget. This lasted until 1561 and during that time the family shared a house in Lombard Street with John’s widowed sister-in-law, Maria.

During this period, John became a consultant and lobbyist for the relocation of the English Wool Staple from the Continent, following the loss of Calais by Queen Mary I. He wrote a consulting report at this time with the catchy and for that era very short title of ‘Antwerp in England’.

In 1562, John and Sabine moved into the parsonage at West Wickham, Kent, renting it and the accompanying farm for £8 a year. Later they moved back to London. Sabine seems to have survived her husband who died around 1590.

It struck me on my visit that there might still be Johnsons in the Oundle area that were descended from John and Sabine and I asked about this, inter alia, at the town’s best butcher’s shop ‘Johnsons’ (it does fantastic Melton Mowbray type pork pies).

Nobody it seems had heard of the tenants of the Old Manor House and no one claimed descent.

But when I told Mr Johnson that I was from New Zealand and that I had an interest in family history, he jumped at the chance of employing even the most distant relative. Sadly, I had to admit that I had no skills whatsoever in boning and butchering and that for better or for worse I had to stick to my trade as an economist.

Brothers Reunited

Well finally, we can reunite the two sides of a family that was divided in the period 1903-1905, with the descendants of the elder brother using the Johnson surname while those of the younger brother retain the old family name of Shorrocks.

The photographs above show my grandfather's brother Robert Mallinson Shorrocks (centre), flanked by own father 'Jay' Johnson (top), and Robert's elder brother Harry Shorrocks / Johnson (pictured below with Harry's youngest son - and Jay's brother, Eric Johnson).

The photographs are roughly contemporary (1934 to 1940).

The link-up has resulted from around 8 years of research that involved cross-matching male-line ydna data with census, birth, marriage and death records.

My Distant Cousin Norma Crossley (nee Norma Shorrocks) writes:

'Your original email helped explain a mystery in my research as I had found reference to granddad having an older brother Harry from the census records but it was complete news to my Dad.

We had a fun day though when we when to see Mum & Dad earlier this month with all your information & Dad has amended his family tree to include Harry, so the evidence must be enough to convince a solicitor!

As we talked Dad said he has some vague recollection in conversations between his mother & aunts of references to a relative who was 'a bad lot' who disappeared to London - but as he put it “it's over 40 years ago”.

We will probably ever know why Harry left but I have some sympathy with changing his name, Crossley is a vast improvement. I certainly found Shorrocks a difficult name when I lived in South East England for a spell'.

I had written to Norma as follows, after our initial contact:

Thanks so much for replying - it so good to be in touch (if only 105 years or so down the track!)

I was hoping that your family would be able to help explain Harry's disappearance but I am not altogether surprised that there is largely a blank. Whatever happened, it seems the rupture was pretty final'.

Robert it seems was a steady family man who looked after his mother when his father Robert Edwin Shorrocks died, and who then helped to look after a sister who was widowed in WWI.

Harry is seems was a bit of a gambler, a bit of a ladies' man, and a finally a heavy drinker - though I am sure he was good company in any hostelry.

Ironically, both sets of descendants identify with North West England (living not so far from the place of origin of the Shorrocks surname in Central Lancashire) and some members of the contemporary Shorrocks family live within 20 miles of some of their formerly lost 'Johnson' relatives in Cheshire.

Indomitable Presence: The Slim Mother of Twins in the Red Dress

MEMOIRS OF ALICE ELLEN COTTINGHAM (continued)

HAVING A FAMILY DURING THE WAR (in her own words)

I began to feel a lot healthier when I was around eighteen. On holiday in Jersey at that time, I was willing to enter into everything in the holiday camp, and was voted most popular girl.

I went to a dance, a local hop, in a church hall. I was with three girlfriends. I did not see Eric in the hall but when we were walking down the road, four girls all arm in arm, this young man runs down the road after us and comes between the lot of us. I was the one who lived farthest, so he walked me home. [Eric was her future husband Eric Harry Johnson]

I went on holidays then with Eric. We went to Cornwall, Devon and North Wales. We did lots of walking – I was then about 22 years old. We used to go dancing or go up to Town on Saturday nights with all our friends and family. We would walk around the West End of London, have a couple of drinks, thoroughly enjoy ourselves and come home.

We decided to get married in 1938. At that time, Eric was into the long distance walking and I used to walk with him when he trained. When he walked the London-Brighton Road Walk, I got the train and took his change of clothes so that when he got there he could change and we could go out and have a meal and go to the pictures – and then take the train home from Brighton. We had a very good courtship.

When the War did not come as expected in 1938, we decided to get married on the 24th June 1939. But in August, Eric was gone – drafted into the Territorial Army. So that wasn’t it! He was sent to Thames Haven and I used to go around the different camps to see him. We rented as house at 240 Clockhouse Road in Elmers End, near Beckenham. Once I got home to find water pouring down the stairs – the upstairs tank had burst.

I was a fully qualified milliner by then who made hats from scratch on the wooden head blocks. I had been working on the tables doing piece work for a couple of years when the fur lady said ‘I am picking three of you ladies out to make me hats that are fashionable’. We were given the material and left to make up a design.

When I made my four hats, three of them went into the show room and they received huge orders on them. So I became a hat designer with the head designer and stayed there for six years. I used to go to the show room and model the hats for the buyers. I don’t know why he chose me as I don’t know if I were good looking or not, with my broken nose that I got from the car accident in my earlier years – but I had to have my hair done every other day!

When I got married, we lived on four pounds a week. Our rent was 27s 6d per week and we lived well on the remainder for a couple of months. When my husband was called up for the Army, we got more money but the price of everything went up because of the shortages.

During the War, I went to a farm to get out of London. I was four months pregnant and my husband was stationed at Wittering on a gun site. When I visited him, I stayed on a farm with Mrs Naylor and her husband. They had a little boy and Mrs Naylor was also pregnant. Mrs Naylor had her little baby girl while I was there and I looked after the farm and the farm hands for about four months. Eventually, I could not stand the sight of potatoes, as when the farm boys and girls came in from the fields, there would be a huge dish of mashed potatoes in the middle of the table.

At the farm, if you wanted a bath, you had to pump the water and it was two hundred pumps to get enough water. I left home for Christmas in 1940. My husband, father, grandfather and brother Lionel were at home. My mother had gone up north because she was afraid of the bombs. We had a good Christmas although it was very noisy with the sirens going all the time. My husband left and became an officer in the Army. In the following April, I gave birth to my twin daughters.

When I had twin daughters in 1941, I did not go back to work as the War was on. I did however go for another job and they gave me material to make a trial hat. The hat was to have taken tree days but it only took me one. On the day that I was to start work a bomb fell on the factory – as also happened to my old work place – and so that was the end of the job. So I stayed at home and started dressmaking. My husband Eric was away for nearly five and a half years.

I had not been to a doctor during my pregnancy as I had been away in the country, and so no one told me I was getting too big. When I got too heavy, I went to the Nursing Home and was admitted for three days to try to start the baby coming – but with no luck. I left and went to stay with a friend, Gladys Bell, who live near the Nursing Home, as I lived alone and could not get there in time without an ambulance.

I was so big I could not walk properly and I was getting really uncomfortable – so I went back to the Nursing Home and told them I would throw myself under a train if they did not do something for me as they had no idea what I was going through. The matron gave me a prescription to start the baby and I returned to Gladys’. I took the prescription at 7.30 pm and my waters broke at nine o’clock.

Gladys and her husband Mont took me to the Nursing Home and left quickly as there was an air-raid going on. There were two guns situated by the Home and when they fired, all the beds would move across the floor. They put me in a room at 9.45 pm and nobody came near me until 6.15 am the next day. I was in shocking pain but the nurses were looking after the babies because of the bombing.

Then they took me to the delivery room and I had one baby – but the nurse said ‘don’t relax yet, you are having another baby’. I was so surprised, and when they weighed the babies, one was 7lb 4oz and the other 6lb 10oz. They were beautiful babies and the biggest on the ward. I was in the Nursing Home for 17 days as I was not fit enough to come out.

The twins were born on 8th April. Someone sent their father a telegram but he could not get there for a week. The Matron took him to the nursery and asked him if he could pick out his twin daughters – and he did from the whole nursery as he said that they were the best looking ones.

I lost a lot of blood for weeks but I have never had a blood transfusion in my life. I had to drink three pints of water and three pints of milk every day. I had to pay a guinea a day for my stay while everyone else was charged 4 shillings per day.

Mr Johnson, the paternal grandfather (Keith’s grandfather Harry), used to walk around the Nursing Home like a lord – he was so proud of his granddaughters.

The Matron did not like me, as after I had had the babies at 7.30 am, the doctor did not come until 1.00 pm to stitch me up. He had no chloroform and when I was being stitched up, I screamed the place down – and the Matron said I was a spoilt brat.

When I left, I thought I would show up the Matron and I asked my mother to buy me a new girdle and bring me my red dress that fitted me like a glove so that I could wear the dress when I left the Nursing Home. I walked down the corridor and two doctors were walking towards me with a nurse who told them I was the mother of the beautiful twins. The doctors were amazed to see such a slim woman in a red dress walking towards them. When I got home, I could not wait to get off the red dress and the girdle.

I used to take my twin daughters out in a double perambulator in the summer months all dressed in white laying on white pretty pillowcases. People used to come up and peer into the pram and I used to ask them not to breathe on the babies. Every shop I went into, I had to ask the people not to pick up the babies as everyone wanted to hold them.

I had to beg the milkman to give me more milk as we were rationed for one pint a day. I used to wait until the milkman had finished his round and then buy what he had left over for extra money. I never had enough meat because of the rationing. The twins did not like potatoes but really liked minced meat. I used my meat ration as they were not old enough for a meat ration.

I never had any trouble with the twins but myself, I was in a bad way. All my insides were pulled out and I had to see a gynaecologist and wear something inside for about a year. When I felt better, I used to push them in the pram all the way from Elmers End to Courthill Road in Lewisham. Sometimes my parents would meet me in Catford and take me for a small drink at the Rising Sun. My father would go out to the pram and give the twins a sip.

My twin daughters were about 20 months old when their father was posted overseas on active service. They were going to school when he came back. I used to take them all over the place in the double pushchair, on the buses and taxis. When the war was over - so were the taxi days. I used to take the twins to see the ballet at the Lewisham Hippodrome – this has now been pulled down. We went on the Tune and had days in Town. We got around, even before my husband came home.

When the twins were about two years old, I took them down to Westcott in Surrey to visit the other grandfather (Harry Johnson) who used to take them to the pubs and sit them in the pub gardens and buy them shandies (beer with lemonade). Everywhere I went, people used to make a fuss of them. I used to make all their clothes and always bought them expensive shoes so they looked good.

Initially we lived in Clockhouse Road but moved to 65 Conisborough Crescent, Catford when they were about nine years old. During the War, after the twins had been put to bed, I used to get on the sewing machine and do a lot of dressmaking. I used to cut up blankets and make all sorts of things. Then I started making clothes for other people and that’s how I started my dressmaking business. My next door neighbours used to get very annoyed as they could hear the trundle of the sewing machine through the walls at night.

As the twins grew up, I made all their clothes. I used to make wedding dresses, an awful lot of wedding dresses – I can’t believe I made that many. I also made wedding dresses for both my daughters.

Alice Ellen Cottingham: Early Life 1909 - 1927 (in her own words)

MEMORIES OF ALICE ELLEN COTTINGHAM (Keith's Aunty 'Phyl')

I am Alice Johnson, 85 years old, and this is April 25, 1995. I was born in 1909 in the City of London, within the sound of Bow Bells in Shoreditch. My father and mother were James Cottingham and Alice Packham. My father was born in Hull and my mother in Peckham. I had two brothers James and Lionel, and a sister Beatrice.

When I was a little girl, we moved to a flat in Lewisham. It was a downstairs flat with no bathroom and an outside toilet. We had two bedrooms, a large sitting room and a large kitchen diner. In the diner was a range, a coal fire that we did all our cooking on. When we wanted a bath we had to fill the copper up with water, get the hot water on the range and fill the tin bath.

The coal man used to deliver the coal at the door at a hundredweight per week. He delivered by horse and cart. We had many delivery people with horse and cart but some delivery mean used to pull a barrow with their merchandise. They sold oil for lamps, nuts and toffee apples, dried meat for cats, milk, muffins, winkles and shrimps etc. The meat man used to put the meat on a skewer and drop it through the letter box for the cat and pick up his payment next time.

Down the road from us lived a couple who had ten children who had only one pair of shoes between them. If they had to go to the hospital or to see the doctor, they had to wear the communal shoes. For the little ones, the shoes were far too big. For the older, they were far too small. They used to play out in the road without shoes. They were a strong and healthy family. Their flat had shelves set up the walls as bunks. The father was a printer who earned good money but there were too many children.

My brother Jim used to play with the boy next door in the street. One day Ginger had Jim on his shoulders and fell. Jim smashed his face on the ground and that is why his teeth are crooked.

We did have it tough in our younger years but mother was very good and we were mainly happy.

For dinners we always had a good homemade soup with everything in it. Afterwards we always had a pudding - apple pudding, raisin pudding or rice pudding. On a Sunday, my mother always cooked a roast dinner. We were well fed as my mother, during the First World War, worked in the Arsenal in the kitchens. When they were finished in the kitchen, the food was brought home for us. In the evening, we would amuse ourselves by reading, playing board games and sitting around the kitchen table and talking. The boys had plenty of homework.

Life is so different today. We used to go to church three times on a Sunday dressed in our Sunday-best that we did not wear all week. As we were not allowed out very much, we did not mind going out to church. When my mother wanted some fresh mint leaves for cooking, we go on a Sunday, all dressed up to see the lady, who would pull up some fresh mint.This lady always made a great fuss of us children and gave us sweets. We could eat so many sweets that we would not want any dinner.

The school that I went to was Loampit Vale. It was a nice little school. We only had one teacher to take all the classes. I used to play Netball when I could. I could not stand up long or I fainted. The class used to leave the classroom for prayers but I used to stay behind and do some sewing for the teacher. When I was fourteen I had a sewing machine – that is what I have done all my life.

We used to play hopscotch, hide and seek, hoop and stick that we played along the road. My parents would not allow us to play in the road. All the other children in the road used to go out to play.

My father was in the Marines. As a young man, he joined up and he was a Marine in the First World War in 1914, when I was 5 years old. He got rheumatic fever in the First World War and had to leave the Marines – and was too old for the Second World War that came in 1939. My father travelled everywhere and he was fond of Japan – he had Geisha Ladies tattooed on his arms.

When I was about 8 years old, I was run over by an automobile. It was during the First World War and my father came home on leave and sent me out to buy some cigarettes. He said to me here is a shilling, buy a packet of 20 cigarettes for 11 pence halfpenny – and they used to put the halfpenny change from the shilling in the packet.

In those days there were not many cars on the road. I was standing behind the Baker’s horse and cart when I stepped in the road and a car came around the corner and knocked me right over the top and under the car, which dragged me to the Clock Tower in Lewisham (about ¾ mile).

The couple in the car had just got married – he was a Naval Officer and they were off on their honeymoon.

When they got me from under the car, the people got the bride out and told the man to drive me to Miller Hospital in Greenwich, which is now pulled down. I spent about three years going back and forwards to that place. I had my head split open, I was nearly scalped and the scar still shows. I had a broken nose and all sorts of things wrong with me. I lost a lot of blood.

It took me years and years before I made up the loss of blood, till I was 18 years old. I had to drink a lot of milk and used to take it to school in a tin can that had a lid – it was horrible. I was also sent down to Lee Green where there was a butcher’s slaughter house to drink a cup of ox blood twice a week from the freshly slaughtered ox. I also had to eat raw liver. I did everything to make my blood up. They did not have blood transfusions in those days.

I began to feel better when I was 18 and then I met a couple of lads who used to cycle. One of them asked me to tandem with him and we went all over the place – around the Cotswolds and everywhere. That was the making of me with the fresh air and exercise. It was marvellous.

We had moved from Lewisham to Bellingham when I was in my teens. There, I started an apprenticeship as a milliner and eventually ended up in town designing hats in a factory. The first year of my apprenticeship I did not earn any money. The second I was paid enough to buy my pins and the third was very little. When I was an ‘improver’, I earned 7s 6d per week. That was a lot of money in those days. When I left work at 29 years old, I was earning four pounds a week – that was more than my husband earned!

The factory was in City Road, which runs through North London, and it was situated next to some buildings called Peabody Buildings. They were built for old people. The rats used to come up from the water, climb the walls and, if the old people hung a leg of lamb out of a window on string to keep it fresh, the rats would bite the string – and the string and the lamb and the rat would fall after it and then the rats would feast.

In the factory, they had a lot of straw to make the hats. If the hats were left in a cupboard overnight the rats would eat the hats. The rat man in the basement, who used to do the blocking, would come a couple of evenings a week with a shot gun and shoot the rats as they moved around the beams in the workroom.

Xmas Greetings from across the Ditch (i.e. The Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand)

My niece Diane writes in her Xmas Letter from her home in Brisbane of her daughter Imogen and husband Michael:

'Imogen turns 14years old on 27th December and I think I can truly say that she is a teenager in many ways now. She’s had a good year at school and has enjoyed being in the choir and doing her elected subjects, especially drama and business. She has continued jazz dancing and soccer.

Michael was the soccer team manager again and his most glorious moment was getting his medal at the grand final. Unfortunately, they just missed out but the lead up to that last game was very exciting. She has made some great friends through soccer and a group of them have made a futsal team in order to keep their fitness going during the summer.

With respect to the Blog, she comments:

It was great to hear from you and I checked out your blog. I have to say it made me cry, (but I'm a very sentimental old Hector!).

I loved seeing the photos (Beeston Castle - that set me off - Meg meant a lot to me. Ross, the boys, Horace etc.)

All very interesting to read though. Keep in touch. It was nice to see some up to date photos of the boys. Hope you have a great Christmas. Lots of love Di

Cast of the Family History: Johnson (Shorrocks) - Lubbock

Tracking down the Family History of the 'Johnsons' (or should that be the Shorrocks')?

From Islington Street, Salford to South Cheshire, via South London, three generations, and a change of name









THIS IS WHAT I STARTED WITH:

"My grandfather Harold [‘Harry’] Johnson migrated from Salford, Lancashire to London at the turn of the 19th century. Harry must have been born around 1885. Although he spent most of his life in London, he continued to speak with a pronounced northern accent. Harry’s father was a publican who kept a pub in Salford – his name was probably Robert.

More information on the family could possibly be obtained by consulting UK Census material for the occupants of the address of the pub (comparatively easily located, as presumably, there were a limited number of Johnson families who had this occupation - and publicans always lived on the premises). Another alternative would be to research the licensing records for Salford pubs. [This information may be wrong and is under review]

We know almost nothing else about the family in the North, though there are many Johnson farming families in Cheshire (and it was very common for the younger sons of farmers to operate small businesses like pubs). One example of a local Johnson family is provided by Bunbury Church – a special place for the family as my mother worshipped there regularly and we often took Midnight Christmas Communion there as a family – this contains a rather grand 18th century memorial to a Mrs. Johnson[1]. It is not totally implausible that we are related to her, or rather to her husband.

AFTER 7 YEARS TRYING TO TIE THINGS DOWN:

Introduction

In the early part of my life, I was brought up in an entirely female household consisting of my mother Mabel Kenyon Johnson, my sister Susan Davina Johnson (who is over seven years older than I am), and my grandmother Gladys Clarke. We lived in a semi-detached suburban house named ‘Linwood’ on the Crewe Road in Willaston, Cheshire (between the old country town of Nantwich and the industrial and rail centre of Crewe).

It was not until I was five years old when Meg (i.e. Mabel) remarried and we moved to a farm at Wettenhall near Winsford, Cheshire that men really came into my life – in the form of my step-father Horace Darlington and the workers on the farm that Horace managed.

When, over the years I found myself the father of four boys, I decided that our Family History should provide a balanced treatment of both the men and women in the family – and that it should start in proper patriarchal style with our male forbears. The problem with that decision was that meant starting from the point at which information was in shortest supply.

My father had died in October 1943 in an air accident flying with the Royal Airforce – I was born some 7-8 months later in June 1944. As for my grandfather Harry Johnson, he died in 1945 – and by the time I came to start researching the family, both of my father’s brothers Robert Lubbock Johnson and Eric Harry Johnson were also dead.

So what started as a simple challenge became a serious hobby that in turn yielded a significant set of engaging problems – one of which, identifying the origins of my grandfather Harry Johnson became a longstanding challenge (2002-2009) to both my research abilities and patience. This then starts our story.

SEARCHING FOR MY 'JOHNSON FAMILY'

For starters, Johnson is a very common name – it is the second most common name in the USA (with 2.2 million holders) and the tenth most common name in England. It also has alternative spellings (principally Johnston and Johnstone but also rarer name variants like Joynson). And Harry is not a highly distinctive name as it can stand by itself - and act as a nickname form of Henry, Harold and even Hereward.

The scraps of oral information that I could remember were meager. My mother had told me that the Johnsons originated in Salford, Lancashire and that there was a tradition of giving the eldest sons the name of Robert. There was also mention of a family pub (as yet to be validated or identified). Subsequent contact with my three Johnson cousins (Janice, Robert’s daughter) and Judy and Gillian (the daughters of Eric Johnson) added nothing substantial that could be used in pinning down the family’s origins.

Surprisingly, Robert (or Uncle Bob as he was always known to me) referred to his father as ‘Harold’ Johnson when he submitted details to the War office for the commemoration of my father’s death. In contrast, my father recorded his father as ‘Henry’ Johnson when provided details for his own marriage certificate.

However, when I was able to obtain Harry’s own marriage certificates (recording his marriage to my grandmother Constance Maud Mary Lubbock in 1907 and his re-marriage as a widower to Florence Wood in 1944) he clearly recorded himself as ‘Harry’ Johnson.

It started to seem that the facts about Harry Johnson were not entirely straightforward – not the least of which was the conundrum that two of his sons differed markedly in their interpretations of his name. Of course, people who wish to gain anonymity may be cautious in their disclosure of facts - and indeed adopt more common names that allow them to dissolve into the general populace.

One ‘fact’ did emerge from the early rounds of research. In both of Harry’s marriage certificates he refers to his father (my great grandfather) as ‘Robert Edwin Johnson’ and cites his occupation as ‘Brushmanufacturer’.

This then became the focus of the research – to identify a Brushmanufacturer / Brushmaker with the name of Robert or Robert Edwin Johnson, who had a son with a name that could be related to ‘Harry’ and who was born in or around 1879 (the various certificates supported a birthday in the early part of 1879).

As the research evolved, the internet information sources became steadily more diverse and complete between 2002 and 2009. Initially, the search began with the 1881 Census which was the first to be computerized (FamilySearch.com) and which has a useful search engine that allows search links between an individual (e.g. Harry Johnson) and the head of household containing the individual (e.g. Robert Edwin Johnson).

The obvious starting point was Salford, Lancashire. The search did not yield any plausible results. The search was then widened to the whole of England and Wales without result – except for the discovery of a Brushmanufacturer named Robert Johnson who was born, lived and worked in West Ham, London in the right era.

Subsequently, it has become possible to access all of the decennial censuses for England from 1841 to 1911. Combing them became a very long-term and necessarily tedious task. None of them provides any link to a Brushmanufacturer named Robert / Robert Edwin Johnson who had a son who could reasonably have been called ‘Harry’. In my disenchantment with the available data though, I more or less adopted the West Ham family and conducted a good deal of interesting but superfluous research on its family members (see box below).

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MY FALSE START UP TO JANUARY 2009

Actually, almost everything that I have written above may be wrong. It has taken a good deal of effort and persistence to try to track down my Johnson ancestors, partly due to the commonness of the name, partly due to the fact that links were lost with the Johnson side of the family, and not least because the little oral history that I had was erroneous. I am not sure where the Salford reference arose - it is clearly wrong. However, it would have allowed a reprise of D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers, with my grandfather leaving t' Grim North for work in an office in London, like Paul Morel's older brother - and my father Cyril coming back north to rural Cheshire to claim his birthright.

Anyhow, the ‘truth’ is interesting and challenging enough. Let us then start again.

My current ‘best assessment’ is as follows:

My great grandfather Robert Edwin Johnson was born at Plaistow, West Ham, London c1853. Hs wife Elizabeth was born in Gravesend, Kent c1854. According to the 1901 Census, Robert and Elizabeth were then living at 141 Queen's Road, Plaistow with younger children Amy V. (16); Daisy G., (14); Anne L. (12); Alice (10); and William H. (5). All of the younger children had been born in Plaistow. Robert's occupation is given as Brush Manufacturer and he was living 'at own account'. This suggests that he was running a small factory making brushes (probably fancy brushes for personal grooming).

It seems that my great grandmother was born Elizabeth Bossley in Gravesend and that she married Robert Edwin Johnson in the June Quarter of 1876. It has also proved possible to pick up the family in the 1881 Census, with the family consisting of Robert Johnson (28) Brush Maker (b Plaistow), with 27 year old wife Elizabeth (b Gravesend) and oldest son Robert J. Johnson aged 2 (b West Ham) and daughters Elizabeth C. aged 4, born Poplar, Middlesex, and Caroline aged 9 m, born Plaistow, Essex. The family was then living at 4 Chapman Road, West Ham, Essex. It is possible that my infant grandfather Harry was in the charge of a nurse Rose Ann Seager at 68 Cromer Street, Middlesex, presumably due to a postnatal illness.

Having obtained a copy of Robert [Edwin?] Johnson's Marriage Certificate, I can now confirm that he married Elizabeth Bossley on 4th July 1876 at the Parish Church of Bromley St Leonard, Middlesex. My great grandfather Robert Johnson is described as a Brushmaker and both he and Elizabeth were living in Bromley. Their ages are simply stated as 'full'. The Certificate also gives the names and occupations of the fathers of the bride and groom. My great great grandfather Robert William Lilystone Johnson is decribed as a Basketmaker. Elizabeth's father's name is given as John Bossley, Sawyer. The witnesses were Thomas William Bossley and Ann Elizabeth Bossley (presumably siblings). The Bossleys hail from Gravesend, where according to one of our relatives George Bennett, who has an impish sense of humour, 'they were the town drunks'[2].

I have been able to pick up R.W.L. Johnson (the elder Robert) in the 1881 Census and it seems that he was born in Plaistow in 1820, suggesting that the family has a very long history in that area. Again, the fact that the family had stayed in the same area for a long period, while Plaistow was enveloped by London, may help explain the lack of definition in the family history.

If families move substantial distances, they invariably carry a memory of that shift (e.g. most New Zealand families have a clear picture of when their ancestors arrived here).

In 1881, the elder Robert was living with wife Catherine (60), born Catherine Bowen in North Weald, Essex, at East Street, Barking, Essex, with son Alfred (25), harness maker born West Ham; son George (23) Basket Maker born West Ham, and daughter Caroline (19) born West Ham, no occupation given. The Lilystone component of his name is interesting and presumably this was his mother's maiden surname. It is an old Suffolk / Norfolk name suggesting or rather confirming our Johnson origins in eastern England.

We cannot be sure of the whereabouts of my grandfather Harry Johnson (22) in 1901. Most likely, he was the Harry Johnson who was boarding with Ms Rose Ann Prior at 8 Caledonian Road, Islington, having been born in St Pancras, Holborn. If so, he was working for a Manufacturing Chemist at that time. Given the apparent confirmation from my great grandfather's name that Robert was indeed a preferred Christian name for the elder boy, it is interesting that Harry did indeed have an elder brother of that name.

It is possible that he is the Robert Johnson recorded in the 1901 Census, aged 23, who had been born in West Ham and is recorded as a Gas Fitter. However, we currently have little chance of picking up links to him and his descendants. There may also be Johnson descendants from William H. Johnson but the fact that he was 5 years old in 1901, and therefore 18 years old in 1914, would have probably exposed him directly to World War I.

I have been able to trace my great grandfather ‘Robert Edwin Johnson’ (Edwin assumed) from Harry Johnson's marriage certificate. Harry married Constance Maud Mary Lubbock on 11th May 1907 at the Lambeth Registry Office. He gave his own occupation as Estate Agent's Clerk and his father's occupation as Brush Manufacturer.

At that time, Harry was living at 120 Stockwell Park, Clapham / Lambeth, SW London. Constance was living at 25 Lugard Road, Peckham, SE London. Her father Charles Daniel Lubbock is recorded as a Solicitor's Clerk and the marriage was witnessed by her brother Charles V.W. Lubbock and her mother Helen Rebecca Lubbock. In 1917, at the time of the death of Constance’s brother William in WW1, the Lubbocks were living at 26 Whorlton Road, Peckham Rye, London.

There is however an outstanding problem with the Johnsons in that I cannot find a direct association between Harry Johnson and the Robert Johnson of the 1881 and 1901 Censuses. I thought that when I was able to obtain electronic access to the 1891 Census I would find Harry there among his siblings.

In fact Robert Johnson the Brush maker is recorded as living at 29 St Mary's Road, West Ham. He was 38, his wife Elizabeth was 37 (born Gravesend) and the following children were living with them: Elizabeth C. (14) b Poplar; Robert J. (12); Caroline (10); Matilda J. (8); Amy J. (6); Daisy M. (4); Anne L. (1); and Alice (baby) - all the children from Robert down to Alice having been born in West Ham.

However, there are no other Robert Johnson Brush Makers / Manufacturers recorded anywhere else in England in the 1901 Census. Looking for Harry again separately, we probably (i.e. mistakenly) find him recorded as the adopted son (12) of Alfred Pryor, Printer, (53) and Rose Anne Pryor (53) of 40 Bidborough Street, St Pancras. It seems plausible then that Harry's former nurse Rose Ann(e) Seager asked to adopt Harry when she married Mr Prior/ Pryor as a woman well into her 40s. If so, this may also help explain why the family history is a bit hazy.

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PICKING UP THE PIECES FOR A THIRD TIME

The story then takes another turn here as a result of the re-establishment of links with the family of Harry’s wife (she was born Constance Maud Mary Lubbock). In particular, my father’s cousin ‘Bill’ Lubbock wrote to me providing a good deal of interesting family history relating mainly to his side of the family. However, in referring briefly to my grandfather Harry, he was unequivocal that Harry was ‘a Northerner’. So that was the end of any possible links to the West Ham Johnson family.

It is also worth noting that the history of brushmanufacturing / brushmaking (and its participating families) is remarkably well represented on the internet. There is a Society of Brushmakers’ Descendants – and there is no reference there to a northern Robert Johnson. Nor did any links surface on the numerous family history ‘blogs’ (including the excellent site GenesReunited).

At some point in 2004, I decided to take a complementary approach and commission a male line ydna test to identify relatives through their internal genetic ‘signature’. I joined the FamilyTreeDNA company’s Johnson – Johnston – Johnstone ‘One-Name’ ydna study which records and collates the results of tests on males who bear the name Johnson and its variants.

While the study focuses on US families (with special reference to the colonial settlements in Virginia), it is reasonable to assume that links could be established with originating families like mine that remained in the United Kingdom. Currently, there are over 500 test results on the site. There are no results that are at all close to mine (and this also holds true for the results posted on a much smaller UK-only website).

As an after-thought in the light of my growing interest in genetic signatures and pre-history, I posted my ydna results on the general research site ‘Ysearch’ (our signature code is y2hkm). The outcome was disappointing. Although my ydna belongs to the most common Western European type R1b1, its detailed sequence is quite unusual (the wider Oppenheimer Test characterizes it as R1b-13, with one ‘hot spot’ focused on the English Pennines and Cumbria).

For at least 18 months, there were no matches closer than 10:12. Then, a single 12:12 match appeared with a Canadian named Ken Grist. However, Ken made it clear that his grandfather had changed his name from Shorrock to Grist when his mother had remarried. The match was therefore with the name Shorrocks and its variants (Ken’s family hails originally from Blackburn-Darwen, Lancashire).

Some weeks later, in an idle moment, I punched the name Harry Shorrock into the 1891 Census search engine. The hair of the back of my neck rose when I read the results – there was a Harry Shorrocks born 1879 of Salford, Lancashire, whose father had the name Robert Edwin Shorrocks and whose occupation was that of a Foreman Brushmaker! It subsequently transpired that Robert, his father Walter and his grandfather James were the successive heads of a long-standing brushmanufacturing business in Salford.

I then agreed with Ken Grist that we would upgrade our ydna tests to 25 markers. The results came back 24:25. This equates roughly to an 80 percent probability that we shared a common male ancestor within the last 300 years (provided the surname link is genuine).

But there remained the possibility that Ken and I descended from a common ancestor who existed before surnames became established (say 1300). The upshot though was clear that any originating Johnson family stemmed from Lancashire – and that there was a likely association with the Ribble Valley and the city of Blackburn. (The name Shorrocks derives from the words ‘Scar’ (i.e. bank) or ‘Share’ (i.e. boundary) Oak that helped name a small hamlet called Shorrock Green that has now been enveloped by metropolitan Blackburn). And this neatly fitted the pattern of results for the ydna Oppenheimer Test which suggested that the signature that Ken and I share (R1b-13) focused on the Pennine region of Northern England.

However, I also began to seriously consider the possibility that Harry Johnson and Harry Shorrocks were indeed one and the same. To test this proposition, I commissioned a UK-based professional genealogist Antony Adolph (a contributor to the current BBC series ‘Who Do You Think You Are’) to review the evidence. At first, I made no mention of my ydna results and the link to Ken Grist. He therefore made an extensive independent search across the 1841 – 1901 censuses for likely Robert Edwin Johnsons. Again there were no likely candidates.

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ASIDE: JUST HOW DIFFICULT IS IT NORMALLY TO FIND AND TRACE 'JOHNSONS' NOW THAT THE CENSUSES AND BIRTH, MARRIAGES AND DEATH DATA IS READILY AVAILABLE ON LINE?

The answer to this question is ‘not at all difficult’.

As an example take a Johnson family that does actually enter our Family Tree. Using the Free Birth, Marriages and Death search engine, I became aware (as entries beyond about 1910 give the former surnames of birth mothers) that there were two further Johnson boys (in addition to Bob, Jay and Eric) who had a Lubbock mother.

At first, I suspected that these could have been additional brothers who were adopted out of my family but then I remembered that a distant relative ‘Lofty Grimshaw’ , with whom I had corresponded (son of another sister of my grandmother - Phyllis Grace Lubbock), had told me that another of my grandmother’s sisters Winifred Clara Lubbock had also married a Johnson.

The two boys were Stanley Derrick Johnson born 1913 and Reginald James Johnson born 1915, the sons of James Gilbert Johnson, Clothier’s Clerk and Winifred Clara Johnson (nee Lubbock).

James was my grandfather’s brother-in-law – so how easy was to identify his father (from the same generation as ‘Robert Edwin Johnson’)?

From the 1901 Census we find that James G. Johnson was born in 1889 in Norwood, Surrey. He was 12 in 1901 living with his father James Johnson, carpenter, born 1856 at Exning, Suffolk, his step-mother Mary A. Johnson, born 1853 in Norfolk, and siblings Elsie 11 and Ethel 10 (Mary Ann looks as though she was James’ second wife and that he had been previously widowed – James and Mary Ann appear to have married in 1897 in Camberwell).

It is only another half an hour’s work to go back another generation to find that James Gilbert Johnson’s grandfather was John Johnson, born Helions Bumpstead, Essex in 1810. He married Ellen Webb in 1838 in Newmarket (from FreeBMD) and in the 1861 Census the family consisted of John 51, Ellen his wife 45, Thomas 20, Mary A. 17, Emma 11, John 8, James 6, Charles 3 and Elizabeth 3 (the last two children presumably being twins).

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BACK TO THE SHORROCKS LINK

However, alerted to the possibility of a name switch to Shorrocks, Antony Adolph researched the possibility that the Harry Shorrocks born in 1879 (as recorded in the 1901 census) married at some point beyond 1901. He found no evidence of a marriage or of any subsequent reference to this Harry Shorrocks. He therefore concluded that it was likely that Harry did in fact change his name prior to marrying my grandmother in London.

Insofar as there was a problem that remained, it revolved around the fact that we had no established birthplace for ‘Harry Johnson’. However, the release of the results of the 1911 census in December 2008 – January 2009 provided the final lynchpin for the case when Harry stated that he had been born in 1879 in Salford, Lancashire.

Searching the 1901 and 1911 censuses we therefore find:

1901 Harry Shorrocks aged 22 born Salford, Lancashire
Harry Johnson aged 22 born Salford, Lancashire? No result

1911 Harry Shorrocks aged 32 born Salford, Lancashire? No result
Harry Johnson aged 32 born Salford, Lancashire

So the upshot is simply that Harry Johnson was most probably born Harry Shorrocks and that our family history on the male side beyond 1901 is of Shorrocks and not Johnsons. We are never likely to find out why Harry changed his name and it may well be better not to know[3].

But his male descendants may be forgiven for some irritation over the rather casual manner in which the link was broken with our ancestors[4]. As for me, the time spent wasted on searching for Johnsons has been finally recompensed by finally discovering something that was elusive and intriguing.

THE SHORROCKS FAMILY ANCESTORS

Let us start then by picking up on our Shorrocks ancestors in Salford. The entries for the 1881 Census are given below, showing grandfather Harry Shorrocks (i.e. Johnson) aged 2, living with his father, mother and baby sister Louisa (and with a girl helper named Ann Borrowdale supporting my great grandmother Fanny Elizabeth in looking after the new baby).

Salford, Lancashire, England: Extract: 1881 British Census

KEITH’S GREAT GRANDFATHER

Dwelling: 309 Eccles New Rd
Census Place: Pendlebury, Lancashire, England
Household:

Robert. E. SHORROCKS
Marr Age Sex Birthplace
M 27 Male Salford, Lancashire, England
Rel: Head Occupation: Warehouseman

Fanny E. SHORROCKS
M 25 Female Salford, Lancashire, England
Rel: Wife

Harry SHORROCKS
2 Male Salford, Lancashire, England
Rel: Son

Louisa SHORROCKS
5 m Female Salford, Lancashire, England
Rel: Daughter

My. Ann BORROWDALE
U 16 Female Newcastle On Tyne, Northumberland, England
Rel: Servant Occupation: General Domestic Servant

KEITH’S GREAT GREAT GRANDFATHER

Dwelling: 23 Islington St

Walter SHORROCKS
Marr Age Sex Birthplace
M 57 Male Salford
Rel: Head Occupation: Brush Manufacturer

Ann SHORROCKS
M 57 Female Salford
Rel: Wife

William W. SHORROCKS
U 22 Male Salford
Rel: Son Occupation: Brush Maker

Louisa SHORROCKS
U 19 Female Salford
Rel: Daughter

Florence SHORROCKS
U 14 Female Salford
Rel: Daughter

Presumably, Robert Edwin was the Warehouseman for the Brushmanufacturing firm run by his father Walter who still had three children living at home – William, Louisa and Florence.

As for my great great grandfather Walter, we can actually catch a glance of where he lived (Islington Street) from the contemporary photograph. Clearly, 19th Century Salford was no paradise.

In 1861 Walter was living at 23 Islington Street. He was recorded as being 37 years old as was his wife Ann. Both were born in Salford. Their children were recorded as James Henry (13), Walter (11), Robert Edwin (7), Annie (5), Emily (4) and Clara (7 months old who appears to have died in infancy). Walter was recorded as employing 3 men and 1 boy in his brushmanufacturing workshop.

END NOTE

As previously suggested, taking a sentimental view, the emerging story would allow for a reprise of D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers, with my grandfather leaving t' Grim North for work in an office in London, like Paul Morel's older brother - and my father Cyril coming back north to rural Cheshire to claim his birthright. However, the truth seems to be more complex.

Harry left Salford (the original ‘Dirty Old Town’), changed his name and appears not to have looked back. It is quite possible then that when my father was pursuing research for his PhD in History at the Rylands Library, Manchester University, he was not in contact with his Shorrocks relatives across the River Irwell[5].

So what do we actually know that is more personal about my grandfather Harry? By all accounts he was a talented and ambitious young man who was able to obtain employment at the London Stock Exchange (Jay’s cousin ‘Lofty’ Grimshaw comments in a letter that ‘Harry had a very good job on the Stock Exchange’). Apparently, if someone rattled off a series of numbers / stock quotes he could add them together in his head.

He was also a well-known cricket umpire and loved his ale. Further, we know that he was substantially overweight towards the end of his life and unable to tie his own shoe laces – the result no doubt of his drinking. However, I have no doubt that he was very good company – an accomplished raconteur and someone who loved a good tale (so, no doubt, he would have very much amused at us discovering and retelling his story).

FAMILY TREE INFORMATION

SHORROCKS / JOHNSON ANCESTORS

Ancestors of Fanny Eliza Mallinson (wife of Robert Edwin Shorrocks)

Generation No. 1

1. JOSEPH1 MALLINSON (must have been born c1780) married BETTY (surname not known).

Occupation: Manufacturer

Child of JOSEPH MALLINSON and BETTY:

2. i. DANIEL2 MALLINSON, born 25 Nov 1806, Rastrick, West Yorkshire; died 29 Apr 1861, 34 John Street, Pendleton, Salford.

Generation No. 2

2. DANIEL2 MALLINSON married (1) ELIZABETH WHEELHOUSE 19 Jun 1828 in St. Bartholomew's, Colne. He later married (2) MARGARET (LATE NEWTON) RIGG 18 Nov 1855 in St. Mary's, Eccles.

Notes for DANIEL MALLINSON:
1841 543/5 13 Bank Street, Pendleton, Eccles
1861 2902 76 34 John Street, Pendleton
Baptism: 04 Jan 1807, St. Matthew's, Rastrick
Occupation: Book Keeper

Children of DANIEL MALLINSON and ELIZABETH WHEELHOUSE are:

i. ELIZABETH ANN3 MALLINSON, born 15 Nov 1829, Brighouse.

More About ELIZABETH ANN MALLINSON:
Baptism: 27 Dec 1829, St. Matthew's, Rastrick

3. ii. WILLIAM WHEELHOUSE MALLINSON, born 1831, Rastrick; died 12 Jun 1864, 2 Cross Lane, Salford.

ii. JOHN WHEELHOUSE MALLINSON, born 20 Dec 1838, Bank Street, Pendleton; died 27 Feb 1839, Bank Street, Pendleton.

iv. MARY MALLINSON, born 1842, Pendleton.

Generation No. 3

3. WILLIAM WHEELHOUSE3 MALLINSON (DANIEL2, JOSEPH1) was born 1831 in Rastrick, and died 12 Jun 1864 in 2 Cross Lane, Salford. He married ELIZA JACKSON 06 Sep 1854 in St. Mary's, Eccles. She was born 1832 in Pendleton (Eliza’s father was William Francis Jackson, Stationer).

Occupation: Book Keeper

Child of WILLIAM MALLINSON and ELIZA JACKSON:

i. FANNY ELIZA4 MALLINSON, born 1856, Salford.

------------------------------------------------------------------

Ancestors of Robert Edwin Shorrocks (father of Harry Shorrocks / Johnson)

Possible Prior Generations

THOMAS SHORROCKS born 1738, Salford [A marriage was celebrated on 14 June 1763 between Thomas Shorrocks 25, Malster of Salford (i.e. born 1738) and Agnes Taylor 26 – record in Archdeaconry of Richmond Marriage Bonds] - possibly the Thomas Shorrocks who served one year as the Borough Reeve (i.e. Mayor) of Salford in the 1780s

JAMES SHORROCKS (must have been born c1770) married Elizabeth Ackerley, 2 July 1792, Manchester Cathedral (James’ sister Susanna christened 25 March 1765, father Thomas, mother Agnes)

Generation No. 1

JAMES SHORROCKS born c1795 Lancashire (possible son of Thomas Shorrocks above)

Pigot & Slater's Directory 1841:James SHORROCKS & Co., brush makers, 30 New Bailey Street, Salford

Marriage 3 Feb 1815 Collegiate Church, Manchester- James Shorrocks (X) Brushmaker, Batchelor of this Parish and Town of Manchester- Elizabeth Butterworth (X) Spinster of this Parish and Town AforesaidWitnesses: Benj Ball, William Hadley

The baptisms at Manchester Collegiate Church/Cathedral for James & Elizabeth's younger children are on the IGI:
James 9 Dec 1821
Hannah 15 July 1827Rebecca 12 Mar 1829
George 13 Dec 1830
Edwin's baptism on IGI on 21 Feb 1836 at St Stephen's, Salford

1841 Census: New Bailey St HO107/586/257

James Shorrocks 45 Brushmaker Born in county (Lancashire)
Elizabeth " 45
"Walter " 15
"Elizabeth " 15
"Hannah " 14
"Rebeccca " 12
"George " 10
"Edwin " 5 "(Ages in 1841 rounded to nearest 5 years)

Generation No. 2

WALTER SHORROCKS born 1824 Salford, Lancashire
Death of Walter SHORROCKS aged 82yrs MAR qtr 1906 Salford

Slater's Directory 1853:Walter SHORROCKS, brush maker, 7 Bexley Street, SalfordSlater's 1876 and Slater's 1879 DirectoriesWalter SHORROCKS, brush manufacturer, 23 Islington Street, Salford

Marriage 2nd April 1847 Manchester Cathedral:
- Walter Shorrocks
- Ann Collinge (father James Collinge, ‘Traveller’ i.e. salesman)

Children born to parents Walter SHORROCKS & Ann and all baptised at Manchester Cathedral:

James Henry SHORROCKS baptised 6th Jan 1850 (FreeBMD birth reg Chorlton SEPqtr 1847)Walter SHORROCKS baptised 6th Jan 1850 ( FreeBMD birth reg Salford JUNqtr 1849)Alfred SHORROCKS baptised 18th Aug 1851 (FreeBMD birth Salford DEC qtr 1850 miss-spelling of SHORROKS)
Robert Edwin SHORROCKS baptised 4th Sept 1853 (FreeBMD birth Salford SEP qtr 1853)
Emily Jane SHORROCKS baptised 31st Jan 1858 (FreeBMD birth Salford MAR 1857)
William Whittle SHORROCKS baptised 26th Dec 1858 (FreeBMD birth Salford DECqtr 1858 -note, there was also a similarly named child reg in Chorlton 1858 )
Louisa SHORROCKS baptised 19th Feb 1862 (FreeBMD birth reg Salford DECqtr 1861)Elizabeth Ada SHORROCKS baptised 9th Sep 1863 (FreeBMD birth reg Salford SEP qtr 1863)

Possible marriages of Robert Edwin’s siblings:
James Henry SHORROCKS & Lucy A. HOOD JUN qtr 1871 at St Mary’s Eccles
Walter SHORROCKS & Mary Ann BUCKLEY DEC qtr 1870 M/c Cathedral
Emily Jane to Thomas GREGSON JUN qtr 1879 Salford St Philip’s
Louisa to Walter NEIL MAR qtr 1904 Salford St Ignatius

Two possible deaths of siblings:
Alfred SHORROCKS 1851 Salford
Elizabeth Ada SHORROCKS 1863 Salford

CENSUS DETAILS:

1851 is on the unfilmed census ie was damaged due to water logging –
7 Bexley St, ref: 3c/88/6
Walter Sharrocks
"Ann
"James
"Walter
"Alfred "1851 also on unfilmed ref 3A/123/11 at 6 Broughton St
Eliza Sharrocks
Rebecca
"George "Edwin "

1861 21 Islington St RG9/2920/20/2
Walter Sharrocks 37 Brush Manufacturer employing 2 Salford
Ann " 37
"James Henry " 13 Office Boy Manchester
"Walter " 11 Scholar Salford
"Robert E " 7
" "Annie L
" 5 "Emily J
" 4 "William Whittle
" 2 "Clara A " 7 mo "

1871 23 Islington St RG10/4021/127/8
Walter Shorrocks 47 Brush Manufacturer Salford
Ann " 47
"James H " Chemist Hulme
Robert E " 23 Warehouseman Salford
Ann Laura " 15 At home
"Emily Jane " 13 Scholar
"William W " 12 "
"Louisa " 9
"Florence " 4 "

1881 23 Islington St, Salford
Walter Shorrocks 57 Brush Manufacturer
Ann 57
William W. 22 Brush Maker
Louisa 19
Florence 14

1891 4 Crescent RG12/3220/34/1
Walter Shorrocks 67 Brush Manufacturer Salford
Ann " 67
"Walter " 42 Clerk CC (probably 'County Court')
"William W " 32 Brush maker
"Louisa " 24 "

Generation No. 3.

ROBERT EDWIN SHORROCKS
Baptised 4th Sept 1853
Died aged 54yrs Salford September qtr 1907

Marriage: Robert Edwin SHORROCKS marriage to Fanny Eliza MALLINSON at Salford St Philip's 1878

CHILDREN

Harry (took Johnson as his surname) 1879 (married Constance Maud Mary Lubbock)
Louisa 1880 (married Walter Neil)
Puuline 1884
Robert Mallinson 1886 (married Lily Mather and Florence E. Pearce)
Fanny 1890 (married George Davis)
Annie 1900

CENSUS DETAILS:

1881 309 Eccles New Rd, Salford (all born Salford)
Robert. Edwin. Shorrocks “27” Warehouseman
Fanny Eliza. “ 25”
Harry “2”
Louisa “5 m”
Ann BORROWDALE “16 “ born Newcastle On Tyne, Northumberland, England
General Domestic Servant

1891 42 West Wynford St, Salford
Robert Edwin. Shorrocks 37 Warehouseman & Clerk
Fanny Eliza. " 35
"Harry “12
"Louisa “10”
Pauline “6”
Robert Mallinson " 4”
Fanny “2 months” "

1901 28 Nadine St, Salford
Robert E. Shorrocks 47 Foreman Brush-maker
Fanny E. " 44
"Harry “22 " House Decorator’s Clerk
Louisa “20” Brush-maker
Pauline “16”
Robert M " 14” Book seller’s clerk
Fanny “10”
"Annie “5 months”

References to Robert Edwin’s siblings:

Reference to James H. SHORROCKS involved with the Liberal assoc of Stretford 1890s and also someone of that name advertising weekly for the Norbreck Hall Hotel in Blackpool.

Generation No. 4

6. HARRY SHORROCKS / HARRY JOHNSON born 28 March 1879 at 26 Zachariah St, Salford
CENSUS DETAILS

1911 32 Brailsford Rd, Tulse Hill, London, SE.
Harry Johnson 32 Stockbroker’s Clerk
Constance Maud Mary 27
Robert Lubbock 3
Cyril 1&1quarter

CHILDREN:

Robert Lubbock JOHNSON (born 29th May 1908, Fulham)
Cyril 'Jay' JOHNSON (born 24 December 1909, Peckham, Camberwell, London
Eric Harry JOHNSON (born 8 February 1912 Tulse Hill, Lambeth)

REFERENCES TO HARRY’S YOUNGER BROTHER ROBERT MALLINSON SHORROCKS

Robert Mallinson SHORROCKS marriage to Lily MATHER 1909 Salford
Birth of Amy ShORROCKS (mother MATHER), 1910
Birth of Edward SHORROCKS (mother MATHER) 1920 MAR qtr Salford
Death of Lily SHORROCKS (born MATHER) aged 37yrs JUNqtr 1922 Salford

Re-marriage SEP qtr 1923 Salford for Robert M. SHORROCKS to Florence E. PEARCE

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The Church also hosts a very interesting alabaster sarcophagus dating from the mid-12th century containing the remains of Sir Hugh de Calveley. He was as famous Crusader hero who campaigned with Richard the Lionheart in Palestine. The fine full-length recumbent alabaster statue of the knight has lost some of one leg – reputedly, as a result of local farmers grinding off the alabaster to use it in potions to cure sick cattle.

[3]To be fair, there may have been some ‘good' reasons why Harry changed his name like giving his mother the slip and leaving home to join the Army to fight in the Boer War. Or maybe, he just didn’t like the surname which does not appeal widely to those who do not identify it as ‘an old Lancashire name’ and who may regard it as ‘a classical albatross of a name’ (Australian comment on the Internet).

[4] Why Harry ‘Johnson’? Possibly because Harry Johnston was a famous African explorer and Empire Builder who was the first European to climb Mt Kilimanjaro in 1884 – when grandfather Harry was 5 years old – who knows, if he was a bit of a wanderer as a kid, he may even have been nicknamed ‘Harry Johnson’?

[5] Given the relative rareness of the name Shorrocks, it is quite easy to trace the links back further. It appears that my great, great, great grandfather James Shorrocks was also a Brushmanufacturer in Salford and that he may well have been the son / grandson of a Thomas Shorrocks who was the Borough Reeve (i.e. mayor) of Salford around 1776. The women in the family were Fanny Eliza Mallinson (wife of Robert Edwin Shorrocks), Ann Collinge (wife of Walter Shorrocks) and (in all probability) Elizabeth Butterworth (wife of James Shorrocks).

Posted by Keith Johnson at 10:41 PM
Labels: Keith Johnson or Joe Shorrocks

COMMENT

Yvonne Johnson at yvejohn30 said...

Hi again 2nd cousin .Just by chance found you .My name is Yvonne Johnson ,I along with my 3 brothers and 2 sisters are children of Reginald James Johnson ,whose mother was Winifred Clara Lubbock ! Will wait to hear from you ,as not sure how to use this blog !!

October 15, 2009 4:08 PM

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