WW1 Death Penny BACK CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO SEE IN FULL William Henry Dawtry - World War One Death Penny William Henry Dawtry was born and lived his childhood at 24 St. Leonard’s Street before leaving school and joining the Army. As a regular soldier and in barracks on the Isle of Wight in the summer of 1914 he was a member of the British Expeditionary Force that sailed for France and moved north towards Mons in August 1914. As a member of the Royal Army Medical Corp attached to a Cavalry Regiment, he was very close to the front line when he was killed in action from shrapnel wounds on September 29th 1914. William has no known grave and his name is recorded close to where he fell at Seine-et-Marne LA FETTE-SOUS JOUARRE Memorial. He was buried in a field near Villers En Prayeres close to a sugar factory on the River Aisne. In the words of Rupert Brooke If I should die, think only this of me: That there’s some corner of a foreign field: That is for ever England … William is remembered on the War Memorial in St George’s Church and the Town’s War Memorial in Broad Street. DOWLOAD PDF Previous Next

investigating Stamford deaths < Back Death By Misadventure: Coroners' Inquests 1700-1850 - Part 1 John Hartley 1978 This is a slightly modified version of the original article, which appeared in Vol 2 of the Stamford Historian, published in 1978. In addition to the appendix below, published with the original article, further examples of the contents of Coroners’ Files will be added elsewhere on this website. DEATH BY MISADVENTURE: CORONERS’ INQUESTS 1700-1850 - PART 1 BACKGROUND Among sources often neglected by the local historian are the papers of Coroners’ Inquests. Studies of the work of the medieval coroner have been made [1] and collections of documents published [2] , but very little use has been made of inquest papers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It may well be that they have been neglected because few have survived and their usefulness has not therefore been brought to general notice. It must be confessed at the outset that the papers often make depressing reading. Few can find much pleasure in detailed accounts of the deaths of suicides or of young children killed by negligence. However, the papers of an inquest provide information which cannot easily be found elsewhere. While other sources, particularly newspapers, may provide some information, it is rare that they contain the richness of detail to be found in evidence given by witnesses at inquests. Moreover,the evidence of witnesses often gives the modern historian an insight into the lives of the poor, rather different from that which is given by other sources. Something of this is apparent from the examples cited from the surviving inquests relating to the borough of Stamford. Stamford has a collection of over three hundred inquisitions dated between 1705 and 1850. More than half these official reports of the findings of the coroners’ juries have the evidence of witnesses preserved with them. These three hundred are the surviving ones; many more must have been lost, and it is not therefore possible to attempt more than a general survey of their findings. The Coroner The office of Coroner was well established by the early years of Edward I’s reign, and his duties were clearly defined soon after this. In Stamford, until 1835, the office of Coroner was held by each retiring mayor in turn [3] . Along with his other duties (including inquests for treasure trove and similar investigations) the Coroner was ordered to hold an inquest whenever an unexpected or unnatural death occurred within his jurisdiction. It was an offence to fail to inform him of a death which came into this category, as it was to bury the body before the inquest had been held. The Parish Constable was ordered to provide a jury of at least twelve men (no upper limit was set) who had to appear unless they had a ‘reasonable excuse to the contrary’. The jury had to take the inquest ‘upon view of the body’, and no inquest could be held unless the body had been seen by the jury in the presence of the Coroner. The notorious inquest at Oldham, Lancashire, in 1819 on John Lees who died from injuries received at Peterloo, was never completed for this reason. It was the duty of the jury to find out what had happened, and to present a verdict to the Coroner, rather than to hear a case presented by a prosecution. The many questions which the jury had to ask were established by law. Detailed descriptions of wounds had to be made and these feature in almost all records of inquests [4] . The Verdict The decision reached by the jury about the cause of death was normally very clearly indicated on the inquisition, the signed and sealed report of the jury. Murder, manslaughter, accident and natural causes (‘the visitation of God’) are usually stated quite plainly, but one finds less uniformity in cases of suicide. The jury may give an explanation why a person took his own life; for instance, some physical defect may have brought somebody to the brink of insanity; but often no explanation is given. The distinction between temporary and permanent insanity is not always made. Thus, when William Venters of Stamford threw himself from the town bridge in November 1827, the verdict returned was suicide through lunacy, in spite of the evidence that he had been drinking quietly, though in a depressed state, at the Queen’s Head Inn. About ten o’clock in the evening his wife, ‘a woman not bearing a very good character’, entered the Inn and started ‘soliciting his return home’; one is probably safe in assuming that it was her nagging that drove him to his death [5] . Other qualifications to the verdict of ‘suicide’ were sometimes returned, and open verdicts were given in a number of cases of drowning and infant mortality. The Records of Coroners’ Inquests The records of inquests of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries usually contain three sets of papers. The first is the ‘Inquisition Indented’, so-called from the opening words of the official report. This has the general details of the finding of the jury, and may give a brief account of the events leading up to death when these can be ascertained. Secondly, many collections have statements of evidence, sworn before the Coroner, on which the jury based its decision. Some witnesses’ evidence was slight and it may be reported verbatim in the Inquisition; but in other cases, particularly the later ones, the evidence is much more substantial. In drownings and similar tragedies short recent biographies of the deceased may be given so that the jury could establish whether the death was an accident or suicide. Doctors’ evidence appears in most instances, whether to establish the cause of a natural death, often a hit-or-miss affair, or to report on the care of a person between accident and death. Workmates say what they know of an accident; travellers report on the state of health of a fellow passenger or the competence of a coach driver. From such evidence, much may be discovered. What may have been irrelevant to the Jury then, and therefore not mentioned in the Inquisition, may provide a valuable insight for the historian now. In addition to the Inquisition and the evidence of the witnesses, other papers may well survive among Coroners’ records. Lists of the jury were drafted before they were summoned to appear; the costs of witnesses were recorded; orders were made to hold persons who might have to face criminal charges when manslaughter or murder had been found to be the cause of death. If an inquest were held on somebody who had died in gaol, very thorough investigations were made, and these papers may be preserved with the other records. Included in one set of papers are the notes of a Stamford Coroner about suicide and how it should be regarded, while in another set is the original suicide note from a woman to her brother [6] . Other Sources It is often possible to gather further information about a case by recourse to other sources. Quarter Sessions Rolls may contain relevant material; Assize Courts dealt with murder cases and their records may complete the story of an inquest; parish registers may mention the burial of someone who died accidentally, with a note to indicate this. In the later eighteenth century, and for the whole of the nineteenth century, the local newspaper is a source which should be consulted in order to fill out the picture, though often it may add little, especially when the evidence of the witnesses is detailed or when, as increasingly became the case, the newspaper reported the inquest itself rather than relating the story independently. If the victim had been of importance in the local community a short obituary may have appeared. THE STAMFORD INQUESTS Few places possess a substantial collection of original Coroners’ Inquisitions with their subsidiary papers, and those that have survived at Stamford are most interesting. Their value is enhanced by the fact that for most of the eighteenth century we have the Stamford Mercury , while during the early nineteenth century as many as four local newspapers were published, copies of which survive. Murder and Manslaughter Only a few inquisitions at Stamford found murder to have been the cause of death. This is partly because all official papers had to be forwarded to the Assizes and it was not customary for copies to be kept locally. Of the five murders whose records survive among the Stamford Inquisitions, only one deserves a mention. In 1782 a quarrel between two victuallers in the town led to the death of Robert Osborne, master of the Black Swan. William Fawkner was held in gaol to answer for the offence. It appears that Osborne had been obstinate and had refused to give up a quarrel, in spite of pleas from his friends. The Mercury (28 Feb. 1782) reported that “the heartfelt grief of Mr. Osborne’s antagonist cannot be expressed, tho’ the nearest of his friends do not blame the person he fought with for this misfortune”. Manslaughter also seems to have been relatively rare, though this may again be due to gaps in the records. We know most about a case involving Richard Facon who made a visit to a ‘female acquaintance’ at Tolethorpe, about two miles from Stamford, in 1774. She was not at home so he went to the house of a friend of his, the miller Mr. Goodwin, thinking she might be there. He peered through a window but could not see her. However one of Mr. Goodwin’s servants saw the face looking in and told his master. Goodwin, who had been robbed a few months earlier, went after Facon, shot first and then asked questions. Facon’s hand was ‘shattered in a most miserable manner’ ( Mercury , 22 Dec. 1774) and Goodwin did not realise that he had hit an ‘intimate acquaintance and very good friend’ until after he had further injured him with the butt of his gun. Facon was taken back to Stamford where he died some days later. Though the accident took place outside the Stamford Coroner’s jurisdiction, it was usual for the Coroner of the place where the death eventually occurred to hear the inquest. Suicide Suicides seem to have been fairly frequent. Stress and strain are not modern phenomena, as the evidence in many cases makes clear. Methods varied greatly and they are often described in detail. Two cases of suicide by shooting occur; some cut their throats, but no records survive to show cutting of wrists as the cause of death. Hanging and drowning were most common of all. Juries had to be satisfied that a drowned person had intended to take his own life, and so the detail of the witnesses’ evidence is often considerable. ‘Gibraltar Pitt’ in the town meadows seems to have been a most dangerous place, since swimmers drowned there, as well as its having been the site of at least one suicide. An inmate of Browne’s Hospital, a medieval almshouse, Francis Allen aged eighty-two, put his head in a butt of water while troubled by a painful hernia, and a verdict of ‘delerium and despondency’ leading to suicide was returned. Others chose poisons: mercury, opium and even a ‘sublimate’ for treating venereal disease, but laudanum seems to have been especially favoured. Natural Causes Many deaths were, of course, attributed to natural causes, and one can often see in the medical evidence at these inquests an attempt by the doctors to get to grips with pathology. Many deaths are recorded as ‘from apoplexy’ and left at that. Some cases were however clear for all to see. Jane, the wife of John Chamberlain White, met her end according to the jury through too much ‘drinking of ardent spirits’, and there is the evidence of various witnesses to show that she had been in the habit of ‘drinking large quantities of spirits of lavender, spirits of wine, and other stimulants’ ( Mercury , 11 Mar 1831). Equally simple for the doctors to decide was the case of William Fletcher who died in the winter of 1800 through the ‘natural causes’ of starvation, illness and infirmity. The medical profession, and the Coroners’ juries, faced their stiffest test when confronted with the body of a very young child. It was often impossible to get any other evidence than the mother’s and this might be suspect. Thus ‘open’ verdicts may be returned in cases of this kind. But a jury in 1840 found that a new born female child of Frances Palmer, a widow, had died from ‘natural causes accelerated by improper treatment’. Perhaps the most perplexing case of all, both to the jury then and the reader today, was that of a ‘male infant child’ found dead in 1827. On the Inquisition its age is given as five days, yet at the inquest the jury returned the verdict of ‘stillborn’. With the Inquisition is a thick sheaf of papers containing evidence and the supposed mother, Elizabeth Cunnlngton, was held in custody by the Magistrates for inquiries to be made. Accidents at Home Not surprisingly poisons were also a common source of accidents in the home. In several cases laudanum, used by parents as an opiate to keep their children quiet, was accidentally administered. Edward Alexander, aged fourteen weeks, was given laudanum instead of children’s cordial in 1834, while James Addleshaw, a victualler, was given the same by mistake instead of tincture of Rhubarb. Samuel Spencer’s mother also intended to give her son tincture of Rhubarb but instead gave the three week old baby oil of vitriol (sulphuric acid). She realised her mistake immediately, but the doctors could do nothing to help the child. Other accidents in the home were quite common, especially to the very young or old. There are a number of cases of clothes catching fire, while dangerous cellar steps at Truesdale’s Hospital led to one death. Accidents at Work Work was always accompanied by hazards. On the last day of December 1795 the Coroner’s jury ‘sat on the body’ of Thomas Wing, aged eleven, who had fallen into the Welland the previous day and drowned. He had been fetching water for a forge nearby owned by his master, Thomas Harper. The Mercury (1 Jan. 1796) carried a report of the accident and criticised his parents: ‘his tender (sic) parents were soon apprised of the circumstance (singular we hope it.) His body was left to cool in the river till the next morning.’ Even a simple task like washing out a cart could be dangerous. Edward Jackson was drowned in a patch of deep water in the Welland when his cart went out of control. Not surprisingly the accidents at work were very varied. Richard Sandall fell from a ladder when a rung broke; Richard Scholes fell from a haystack he was making onto the upturned prongs of a pitchfork. At W. B. Edwards’ brewery at least one of two accidents was caused by intoxication. While Francis Cole was emptying hops into the boiling copper he fell in and was scalded very severely, but he survived long enough to make the uncomfortable journey in a jolting cart the half mile from the brewery to his home where he died eight hours later. Six years after this, in 1832, John Andrews did not take proper precautions, according to his workmate Ambrose Ripping, before going into a vat to clear out the dregs of the stale ale and he was suffocated by the gases that remained. It took several attempts by the foreman, Joseph Wilson, before he could stay long enough to attach a rope to Andrews’ leg ( Mercury , 5 Jan 1832). Abraham Ryley was knocked from the staging of Mr. Brown’s bark mill in 1813. It seems likely that a gust of wind started the mill sails unexpectedly. The force of the sails was such that he was thrown over some buildings, across a road and into a paddock. He left a widow and seven children, five of them under eleven, for whom the Mayor and the owner of the Mercury started a subscription ( Mercury , Aug. 1813). A similar accident had happened to Alice Wilson in 1745. At Hudd’s Mill in 1814 Job Topley, ‘an industrious man in the employ of Mr. Smith, miller’ ( Mercury , 28 Jan.) was standing on the water wheel clearing ice when it suddenly started, crushing him and nearly killing Stephen White, his helper, who gave detailed evidence at the Inquest. Although the range and variety of accidents is very great, certain trades were rather more dangerous than others. In spite of the incompleteness of the inquest papers it is possible to suggest that the most dangerous occupations were those connected with building and transport. The Building Trades seem to have had many accidents, involving most of the separate occupations within the trade. Unsurprisingly, stone quarrying was very dangerous and there are several inquests on people like Christopher Wilson and William Peasgood, both killed in 1818 when there was a rock fall in a stone pit. Once the stone had been won, other risks arose. Ladders and scaffolding caused accidents - Robert Pilkington, a member of a well-known Stamford family of builders, fell from a ladder in 1825 while the Gas Works was being made. Though the collapse of St. Michael’s Church in 1832 was not attended by any fatalities, repairs on churches were always dangerous. In 1788 Robert Shaw was working on the steeple of St. Mary’s Church when the rope of a basket used for lifting stone caught on one of the crockets of the spire and this fell on him; a ‘Charitable Card Assembly’ (the eighteenth century equivalent of a whist drive) was held for the benefit of his widow and her six children, and over £26 was raised ( Mercury , 29 Aug., 5 Sept. 1788). Surprisingly, only one death of a slater is recorded, perhaps because the job was obviously dangerous and more precautions were taken. In 1811 Thomas Jorden was working on the house of the Rev. John Butt and though others were at work there, nobody saw him fall. It was reported that he was subject to fits and it is possible that this was the cause of his mishap. Another member of the same family, Joseph Jorden, had been killed in 1786 while making alterations to a house when an arch collapsed on him. Finally, there was the case of Thomas Pierce, an architect who was responsible for work at the Stamford Hotel Cockpit in 1825. He was found dying by his own workmen at the foot of some stairs. If building was a dangerous occupation, transport in one form or another seems to have accounted for the largest number of accidental deaths. Cases were recorded, much as one might find today, of children run over - Charles Hudson was playing with a ball when he was hit by a cart; in 1793 Thomas Jackson, aged four, was run over; most tragic of all was the death of Mary Ann North, also aged four, who was run over by the cart her father was driving. Innocent pedestrians might suffer as well as careless children. Thomas Thompson, aged about eighty, called to a carter to beware of some holes at the side of Red Lion Square, a section of the Great North road. Whether the carter heard or not, the wheels of the waggon fell into the holes and the cart shed its load of elm tree trunks over the pavement and over Thompson. A stationary wagon was not necessarily safe either - William Olphin, nine, was playing with his friends near a cart, when its load of pipeclay fell over him. Whether he or one of his friends caused the cart to tip up was not proved satisfactorily, though the owner of the cart assured the jury that it was the fault of the children rather than negligence on his part that caused the accident. According to the Mercury (10 Jan. 1823) Olphin was in the act of removing the support of the cart when the load fell on him. Richard Pitt’s death in 1776 reminds us of the dangers for the pedestrian in winter journeys. He died, accidentally, so we are told, while travelling from Oakham to Stamford in cold, snowy weather. During the period between 1770 and 1840 several travellers along the Great North Road gave evidence to inquests that they had found a cart or wagon stationary beside the road without any driver. Further along the road they had found the driver dead, more often than not run over by the wheels ofhis own wagon. In some cases medical reasons were adduced for the prior death of the driver, but more frequently the evidence was that the driver had fallen from his bench, perhaps while drunk. It would appear that many carters tended to take advantage of the facilities which main streets in Stamford offered to the thirsty. Occasionally a coach, chaise or cart overturned, or the horses bolted, with fatal results to drivers or riders. In 1839 John Clarke tried to climb onto the Wonder coach as it left up the long hill from Duddington, about five miles from Stamford, to get a free ride into town, but he fell and his legs became entangled with a wheel. He was taken to the Stamford Infirmary but his injuries were too severe for him to survive. Even the arched entry to a yard could be dangerous; in 1729 Thomas Blain tried to drive a coach into Henry Dove’s yard but the archway was too low and he was crushed to death. Those looking after horses were also at risk - kicks from horses while they were being groomed proved fatal in a number of cases. In another instance a lad aged thirteen, George Waterfield, had, without permission, taken a horse out of a stable to graze. He lay down and slept, having first fastened his arm round the halter of the horse in such a way as to prevent its escaping from him. Something made the horse bolt, and Waterfield was dragged through the town. ‘When the body was disengaged’, the Mercury reported (18 July 1811), ‘It was in a state too shocking to describe’; nevertheless the account did continue: - ‘the upper part of the head had been literally beaten off against a stone’. The river seems to have been a much safer place for those earning their living. Only one person was reported as having drowned in a fall from a boat, though another was drowned while helping to build the town bridge in 1848. While some inquest papers must have been lost it would seem significant that none refer to people being killed while following a waterborne trade, in spite of the fact that many boats came up the Welland and the Stamford Canal during the period under review. By contrast the building of the railway between Stamford and Collyweston in 1847 led to four deaths in seven months with two more the following year. One man died during blasting operations when rocks fell on his head; two more were killed by falls of soil while undermining for cuttings; the other three were run over by horse drawn railway waggons removing spoil from cuttings to places where embankments were being made. In Stamford in January 1847, only a fortnight after direct railway communication with London had been established, James Bowley died as a result of an accident in the engine shed. Bowley was employed lighting fires and preparing engines for the early morning trains, a job which entailed arrival at work at about four o’clock in the morning every day. Unfortunately, the train due in from London at 10.30 p.m. on 21st January had arrived about five hours late and though its engine, No. 122, had been raked out there was still steam left in the boiler. By all accounts given to the inquest, Bowley went between the buffers of this engine and another, No. 17, to uncouple them, and thus broke the rule of his Company (as the Superintendent of the coaching department of the Eastern Counties Railway was quick to point out) by not ducking under them. As he went between the engines, No. 122 moved slightly and he was trapped and crushed. However, he did not die until six days later and was able to give his own version of the accident. This has been preserved among the inquest papers. According to Bowley, Charles Mitchell, a sixteen-year-old who was employed to clean the engines, “was on the tender of No. 122 shifting the rods, and I told him to leave off doing so and come off the engine.” Bowley claimed that Mitchell was “a bad boy and always full of mischief. I have frequently told him to leave the Engines alone as he has no business to touch them, he was very impudent to me, and I should have reported him .... but was afraid he might lose his situation.” Mitchell was questioned very closely by the jury, and his evidence tells rather a different story. “He instructed me to get on the Engine 122 and to put her back to the other engine No. 17 . . . I put her in motion but a little bit. . . ." The Mercury report (29 Jan. 1847) which was published during the inquest, since an adjournment was made for a post mortem to be held, was unequivocal - it was Mitchell’s fault, they said. However, the jury found no evidence to suggest manslaughter and decided that since Bowley had broken Company Regulations, his death must be attributed to accident. This case has been dealt with at length to show something of the detail which inquest papers may contain. Other information which emerges from the evidence includes the report that Bowley and Mitchell were the only ones in the shed at the time of the accident, two other workmen having gone to the Exeter Arms, whether for breakfast or for a drink we do not know - and this at 4.30 a.m. In addition, Mitchell’s hours of work and wages are specified; 4 a.m. to 4 p.m. and a quarter of an hour each evening with some occasional extra duties for 10/6 (52½p) a week. Leisure One final group of inquests remains to be mentioned. Many leisure activities also had their dangers. One must interpret the term ‘leisure’ very loosely, since an evening’s drinking must fit this description. On 30 May 1791 Charles Myers spent the day drinking with his cousin, and in the evening he went alone to the Bull Inn. They refused to serve him there and gave him a chair in the kitchen so that he might sleep off the alcohol, but later he awoke and was taken upstairs to a first-floor room. He had a dream, so he told the doctor who attended him after his accident, that his cousin was leaving the Inn by the main gate, and he thought he would climb from the window to stop him, having no memory of being taken upstairs. In his consequent fall he fractured his thigh and died outside the Inn about an hour later. Many other fatalities, including falls from haylofts and down cellar steps of inns, occurred as a result of drunkenness. During winter, skating was always a popular activity and in 1814 William Freeman fell through the ice on a pond at Burghley House. According to the Mercury (4 Mar. 1814) the “weather and the ice afforded a warning of danger” but Freeman took no notice. Only one person saw him fall in, and though he was able to cling on for twenty minutes no help arrived for him in that time. It was said that the witness was unable to convince any of the people standing on Burghley Bridge that he was not hoaxing them. During the summer, when swimming in the Welland was popular, a number of drownings happened, either in the river itself or in the ponds which were then in the meadows. Among the inquests only one records a fatal accident as a result of the annual Bull Running in November, though another death as a result of being tossed by a bull occurred in January 1728. In 1801 Benjamin Overton, a horse keeper aged twenty-six, followed the bull on Bull Running day into the Welland. By all accounts he was very drunk at the time and most thought that the death was caused by the sudden shock of the cold water. Overton’s death is mentioned in the burial register of St. George’s parish with the simple comment ‘drowned on Bull Running day’. One other unclassifiable case deserves a mention. On 31 March 1802 William Reisby (or Reesby) aged fourteen had joined with many others in celebrating the Peace of Amiens. The news of the Treaty had reached Stamford the previous day and the Mercury published a special single page edition to announce that Napoleon’s France had agreed a peace with Britain. Though the Treaty lasted for no more than a year, it was thought at the time that it really would be the end of the war, and thus it was celebrated extravagantly throughout England. The Mercury (2 Apr. 1802) tells us that “the general mirth was unfortunately interrupted during the firing of the military in the Hay Market by the accidental discharge of a small piece of ordnance while loading, by which we are concerned to say a son of Mr. Reesby, baker in Scotgate had his head blown to pieces”. The Coroner’s inquest papers make it clear why the accident was so terrible; at the time the cannon went off the ramrod was still in the barrel, and it was this that hit William Reisby on the side of the head. If Reisby’s death is one of the most bizarre of all those that occurred and whose records have survived for us to read about in detail, it does nevertheless illustrate something of the richness of Coroners’ inquests as a source for the local historian. They can provide useful illustrations and examples for many different studies. APPENDIX This Inquisition with its sworn evidence is fairly typical of those that have survived at Stamford. It has been chosen because it shows a parish officer, the Beadle of St. Martin’s, showing little humanity as he ensures that his parish will not become liable for any costs associated with the traveller by forcibly removing him to the next door parish; in addition it is interesting to find a reference to a sedan chair carrier at work at this late date. Until 1835 St Martin’s parish, south of the river Welland came under the civil and ecclesiastical jurisdiction of Peterborough while north of the river the five parishes owed their allegiance to Lincoln; the town’s magistrates were ultimately responsible for all aspects of local government north of the river. In addition, until 1832, Stamford voted for two members of Parliament while St Martin’s householders voted in Northamptonshire. FORMAL VERDICT OF THE INQUEST The Town or Borough of An Inquisition indented and taken for STAMFORD our Lord the King within the Borough aforesaid, on Saturday the TwentyIn the County of Lincoln. fifth Day of October in the ninth year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord George the Fourth by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, and in the Year of our Lord One Thousand Eight Hundred and twenty eight before Matthew Rooe Esquire, Coroner of our said Lord the King in and for the said Borough, on View of the Body of a person unknown aged about Twenty Years, then and there lying dead, by the Oath of Thomas Peatling, John Abbott, William Chambers, William Cox, Daniel Whitehead, Francis Coy, Joseph Tomlinson, Samuel Lightfoot, Thomas Bainton, William Barton Parker, William Dawson the younger, William Lowson and Elijah Dixon, good and lawful Men of the said Borough, duly chosen, and who, being then and there duly sworn and charged to inquire, for our said Lord the King, when, how, and by what Means the said person unknown came to his Death, Do upon their Oath say, That on Tuesday last between five and six o’clock the deceased who said he was an Irishman was seen in this Borough in an ill state of Health being an entire stranger, that the next morning Wednesday he was found very ill and nearly exhausted, that in consequence he was taken to the Workhouse in the Parish of St. George in the said Borough where he languished for a short space of time and then and there died by the visitation of God in a natural way and so the jurors aforesaid upon their Oath aforesaid do say that the said deceased came to his death in manner aforesaid by the visitation of God in a natural way and not otherwise. In witness whereof as well the said Coroner as the Jurors aforesaid have to this Inquisition set their hands and seals the day and year first above written. (Signature of N. Rooe, Coroner with seal of the Borough of Stamford, and signatures and blank seals of thirteen jurors.) SWORN EVIDENCE TO THE INQUEST The Town or Borough of Informations of Witnesses severally STAMFORD taken upon Oath, within the BoroughIn the County of Lincoln aforesaid, on Behalf of our Lord the King touching the Death of a person unknown aged about Twenty Years, onSaturday the Twenty fifth Day of October in the ninth Year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord George the Fourth by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, and in the Year of our Lord One Thousand Eight Hundred and twenty eight before Matthew Rooe Esquire, Coroner of our said Lord the King in and for the said Borough, on an Inquisition then and there taken on View of the Body of the said person unknown then and there lying dead. John Arden of the said Borough, mason, sworn saith that on Tuesday last between five and six o’clock In the evening he was going into Saint Martin’s over Stamford Bridge and near to the end of the Bridge on the Stamford side he saw the deceased who appeared to be very ill and that William Scuithorpe the Beadle of Saint Martin’s was with him and shoving or forcing, him along over the Bridge into Stamford, that deceased declared himself to be very ill several times and the said Sculthorpe said he was drunk, that the said Sculthorpe shoved the deceased down and he fell upon his face on the Ground when the said Sculthorpe said I have done with you now (meaning the deceased) I have got you clean out of the Parish, that this Deponent being employed in carrying a sedan chair passed on and does not know what further took place at that time. That the next morning this Deponent being near to Mr. Lincoln’s back gate about half past six o’clock saw the deceased walking very slowly with his dress in a disordered state and he then seemed to be very ill. John Arden X his mark William Hudson, Tanner, sworn, saith that about six o’clock on Wednesday morning last on going into the Bark Mill upon Mr. Stevenson’s Premises he found the deceased lying on his back with his head hanging over a Basket and his Hat off, that he seemed to be in an intoxicated state and to have been there all night, that this Deponent removed him from the premises and he walked a little way and wanted to come back again but this Deponent told him he could not be allowed to do so, that he could scarcely speak but mentioned his name which this Deponent has forgotten and he said he was an Irishman - that about eight o’clock this Deponent again saw the Deceased under the Gas Wall and he seemed then to be in a state of exhaustion or intoxication which this Deponent did not know. William Hudson X his mark Leonard Stevenson, Surgeon, sworn Saith that on Wednesday morning last about seven o’clock he saw the deceased walking in a staggering way towards the Gas Wall, that when near it he turned about and stood fumbling with his hands with his Hat over his face and this Deponent thought he was tipsy but did not take further notice of him - That about an hour afterwards he was sent for to attend a person in Saint George’s Workhouse whom he found to be the deceased who had been taken there and put to bed - that on examination this Deponent found the deceased to be nearly exhausted and in a dying state - that he directed some food and cordials to be immediately given to him neither of which he could take and upon the whole this Deponent thinks that the deceased came to his death from ( ‘want and’ crossed out ) exhaustion and from no other cause. Leo. Stevenson Surgeon Taken and sworn before me M. Rooe Coroner. [1] R. F. Hunnisett, The Medieval Coroner , Cambridge 1961, and references cited there. See also Coroners’ Records in England and Wales , J Gibson & C Rogers 3rd Edn., Bury, Lancs; Family History Partnership, 2009 which gives a guide about the availability of records but little about their contents or uses. [2] Notably Thoroton Society, Record Series, XXV for 1966, Calendar of Nottinghamshire Coroners’ Inquests, 1485-1558 , ed. R. F. Hunnisett; also The Earliest Lincoinshire Assize Rolls, 1202 -1209 , ed. D. M. Stenton, Linc. Rec. Soc. XXII. [3] G. Burton, Chronology of Stamford , Stamford 1846, p. 116. [4] Any edition of the eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century handbook for magistrates, The Justice of the Peace and Parish Officer by Richard Burn, will provide information about the method of holding an inquest. It gives the wording of all the forms and the various technical and legal terms which were used in inquests. [5] The Stamford Coroners’ papers are at present (2012) stored in the Town Hall. It is possible to find an individual Inquisition quite quickly from the contemporary endorsement though currently these records are not available for consultation [See note to List of Inquests]. Newspaper references have generally been given when quoted. [6] Coroner’s comments on suicide in papers for inquest on Mary Ann Black, 17 July 1810; suicide letter in papers for inquest on Jane Congreve, 22 June 1842. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

the third manor of Stamford < Back St. Cuthbert's Fee in Stamford Dr E C Till 1982 This paper was written for the Stamford Historian by the late Dr E C Till. For this paper, the author has drawn on much original material in a attempt to remove some of the mysteries surrounding this obscure manorial court. St. Cuthbert’s Fee A manor with full administrative rights within the general area of a large town manor; such was St Cuthbert’s Fee. Peck (1) demonstrates its origins in the extensive grants of lands and tenements made to the cathedral priory of Durham, which maintained a cell at Stamford, later St. Leonard’s Priory. Writing in 1724 (2) he refers to ‘The two parishes of St Maries (by the bridge) within Stamford; all…. in the patronage of the prior and convent of Durham’, He postulates ‘a feast held by the aldermen and bretheren of Corpus Christi gild in their gild hall yet standing in the Monday mercat street’. (3) Stamford Baron Manor, south of the Welland, originally held by Peterborough Abbey but lost at the Reformation, was in Northamptonshire until the Boundary Act of 1832 when the built-up area was brought into Stamford Borough. It was granted to Sir William Cecil by Elizabeth in 1560 and was always tightly held and controlled by the Cecils. Stamford Manor, north of the Welland, from early times was a Royal manor and grants reverted to the Crown. In 1561, Queen Elizabeth granted it to Sir William Cecil. In 1622/3, his grandson, the second Earl of Exeter, secured a grant of the reversion. Being without male issue, he settled Stamford Manor in 1639 (the year before he died) upon the Earl of Stamford, who had married his youngest daughter Anne. More than a hundred years later, in 1747, it was purchased by the 8th Earl of Exeter for £6,950 and so returned to control by the Cecils, albeit in a somewhat tattered and diminished state. The manor of Cuthbert’s Fee, the third manor in Stamford, belonged in 1550 to Robert Hall.(4) By 1557/8 William Cecil was lord of the manor and probably purchased it from the Hall family. It was certainly a possession of the Cecils before Elizabeth’s grant of 1561, and remained with the Cecils after 1640. With the dissolution of the monasteries from 1536, it had been secured by the Crown Commissioners for the use of Henry VIII and was subject to the sales and leases that followed. From the Restoration in 1660, the Cecils and the Greys (Earls of Stamford) were politically opposed and much friction developed over the control of the two manors. This came to a crisis in the 1720’s when the 8th Earl of Exeter, a somewhat prickly nobleman, was prepared to act as plaintiff in a suit before the Court of Common Pleas. A draft of historical and current evidence was prepared (5) and this document is the only firm evidence to date of the extent and tenements of Cuthbert’s Manor. The actual Court rolls have not yet been discovered. The document states that it is ‘a distinct Manor and by the Court Rolls…. it appears to be a Court Leet and Court Baron and always swore a constable and aletaster but the extent of the Manor….nowhere appears, but waifs and strays and felons goods were taken within the said manor for the use of the Lord thereof as appears by the Rolls in 1550 and 1654. Actions for small debts… were … determined there as a Court Baron and a freehold house called the Bull Inn (6) particularly is held of the said manor and paid a Relief upon the death of the owners as appears … in 1557 and on and off a fine of 8 pence ….’ Until 1640, when the Greys inherited Stamford Manor, the Courts of Cuthbert’s Fee were usually kept at 3 – 4 years interval and it was convenient for the tenants of both manors to appear at one court. In 1640, the 3rd Earl of Exeter kept a separate court for Cuthbert’s Manor and thereafter ‘the inhabitants of St Mary’s parish were summoned yearly for a time and then every 3 or 4 years. By 1729, ‘Lord Stamford insists that the whole town is within his Manor and therefore his steward keeps court in St Mary’s parish (and) sets fines … upon the inhabitants there …. which Lord Exeter insists is within his manor of Cuthbert’s fee. Eventually, matters came to such a pass that the steward of Stamford Manor appointed a constable for St. Mary’s parish at the Court Leet and the inhabitants were summoned to perform their suit and service to Lord Stamford. The document states ‘By tradition and by best information we can get of the Antient inhabitants within the manor and elsewhere …. The said manor of Cuthbert’s Fee extends from Dr. Denham’s House at Castle Dyke (7) and takes in all St. Mary’s parish on both sides of Tenter Meadows and takes it in soon (i.e. after the interval imposed by the Blackfriars Estate) by St. Leonard’s to Uffington Mannor on the south side of the Way. Several other freehold houses and lands in different parts of the Town of Stamford belongs to this Mannor as a Court Baron’. To prove the active jurisdiction of Cuthbert’s Fee by the Earl of Exeter, a series of extracts of amerciaments (fines and penalties imposed by the Court) are given for the years 1722, 1724 and 1728/9. A selection of these extracts are given, as they enable the students of Stamford property deeds to locate some of the buildings within the jurisdiction of Cuthbert’s Manor. 1722 Fines varying from 2d – 1s 6d levied on ten persons for ‘laying loads wood on the waste ground in a place called the Tenter Mead’. Included are Simon Walberge ‘Doctor in Physick’ (8) and Boniface Bywater (9) Thomas Dawkins, gent, fined for laying unspread Ramell (rubbish, usually mason’s) in the same place. (10) Felix Feast ‘in the same place creating a Water Cut or Lake of Water adjoining to ye River Welland’, William Miller ‘for a wash pitt or Lyme Pitt on the same meadow near his house and also for a load of Dung in the same place’. (11) Ayscough Kirke for a Dunghill in the same place. (see also under g.) Hannah Curtis, spinster, Mary Curtis, spinster and Francis Peck, clerk, for ‘containing an incroachment in the common street called St. Mary’s Hill with two stone pillars adjoyning to the messuage in tenure of Mr John Rogers …’ (12) Felix Feast, Esq ‘for stopping the common highway with Posts sett up and placed at the messuage in the tenure of Ayscough Kirke in the parish of St. George’. (13) 1728/9 Thomas Doosley for depasturing his horse upon Blackwell’s Leys before the end of harvest. Thomas Sharman depasturing his horse upon grass before May day. Peter Symonds ‘for a wall on St. Mary’s Hill belonging to his messuage called The Bear and Ragged Staff’. (14) Robert Collington (15) ‘for a lake of water containing length 20 yds and in breadth 6 yds adjoining to the River Welland’. Thus the area of Cuthbert’s Fee in 1722, included substantial parts of St. John’s and St. George’s parishes in addition to a major part of St Mary’s parish. What is far from clear, is the extent to which the designated lands and property represent original ownership by Durham up to the Reformation. It seems probable that the Cecils for convenience tacked on sporadic acquisitions either or both before 1561 and after 1640. William Cecil, Lord Burghley, throughout his life dealt extensively in property, both buying and selling. For example, in 1551 he purchased from Sir Ralph Sadleyr and Laurence Wemington a job lot of chantry and ex-monastic property including St. Katherine’s chapel in Saltfleethaven, the site of St. John’s chapel in Louth, the chapel garth etc. in Ashby in Bottesford and the ‘Scholehouse’ in Stamford St. George’s.(16) This is the well recorded Carmelite school that according to Peck, lay ‘full east of the parsonage…’ Again, in another private purchase just before the Queen’s grant of Stamford Manor, William Cecil acquired a parcel of small areas of land in and around Stamford, including ‘Lands and tenements lyeing and being in the circuite …. of the Poche (i.e. parish) sometyme called the Poche of St. Andrew in Stamford…. ‘(17) A further problem lies in the possible existence of other small Stamford manors, merged but not forgotten in 1724, when the marriage settlement of the 8th Earl of Exeter mentions the ‘Manors (or reputed manors or estates) of Cuthbert’s Fee, Wake’s Fee and Barker’s Fee’.(18) The names of 61 tenants of these ‘Fees’ are given and almost all are surnames occurring in contemporary Stamford documents. This, then, is the latter-day history of Cuthbert’s Fee. Possibly the student of the chronology of parish boundaries in Stamford may be able to shed further light on this interesting problem. Notes Peck, Antiquarian Annals of Stamford , 1728. Lib II pp. 7-13 ibid Lib XIV pp. 6 and 7 Exeter MSS 86/5, contains a deed of 1652/3. This cites ‘a cellar under a Tenement called the Guildhall in Stamford … which … Queen Elizabeth … did grant unto Hercules Wytham and Francis Thekeyton of London … in … the two and fortieth year of the said Queens raigne’. The deeds are those of 4 St Mary’s Place and part of the undercoft still persists. Exeter MSS 54/1-5 ibid Lincolnshire Archive Office 1545/6, I, 17; ii, 137. The Bull Inn occupied a site in St. Mary’s Street on part of which the (former) Stamford Hotel now stands. Exeter MSS 85/8, dealing with properties on the south side of Castle Street, locates Dr. Denham’s house at the junction of Castle Street and Castle Dyke. The house was demolished after 1868 when Wright Waterfield lived there. Photographs of this medieval building still exist. In 1727, Mrs Walburge occupied a garden west of the Assembly Rooms. Exeter MSS 88/42. Boniface Bywater, whitesmith (also gunsmith and clock repairer) of 11/12 St. Mary’s Street c.1725 (Peck, A.A.S., Lib XI p.25 and Stukely, Surtees Soc . 76 (1836), p.324. From 1744-52 he lived in a tenement at the north east corner of St. John’s passage, part site of the present 36 St. Mary’s street. Exeter MSS 47/31/12. He owned a house on the site of the present 4 St. Mary’s Place. Exeter MSS 86/5 A fellmonger. In 1727 was living in 21 St George’s Sq. Exeter MSS 88/42 13 St Mary’s Hill (property deeds). John Rogers was ‘a doctor in physick’. 19 St. George’s Sq. (Peck A.A.S., 1728 Lib XI p.26). The raised plinth and a flight of stone steps in the NW cellar demonstrate the need for protection of the sunk area in the adjacent street. 13 St. Mary’s Hill (property deeds). Peter Symonds, sadler purchased the property in 1723 A coaldealer (Exeter Day Books). Exeter MSS 201/53 Exeter MSS 90/14 Exeter MSS 45/13 Glossary Manor : An area of land with tenements granted originally by the Crown in return for services rendered. The lord of the manor, in turn had the right to exact certain fees, fines and services from those who occupied his lands and tenements. The administration was expressed through the holding of periodic manorial courts, presided over by the lord or his steward. The court appointed its own officials – constables, aletasters, bailiffs etc. – and was largely independent of magistrate’s, assize and other courts of the English legal system. Court Baron : The assembly of the freehold tenants of a manor. Court Leet : A sort of record held periodically (in Stamford usually once a year) before the lord or his steward and attended by the residents of the manor. Fee : (e.g. St. Cuthbert’s Fee) a heritable estate held in feudal law of the Crown in condition of ‘homage and service’. Fine(s ): Usually, these were not punitive as modern usage suggests, but more in return for a licence to do certain things within the manor and its waste (ground). Thus it appears that Tenter Meadow was a town rubbish tip with its heaps of dung, wood and builders ramell. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

Pick & Company BACK CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO SEE IN FULL Pick Motor Car Company Stamford - Spanner Messrs. Pick & Co started in business repairing cycles in the 1890s. It was only natural that John Henry Pick, Jack to his friends, should move on to making motor cars. By 1900 Stamford had a firm making motor cars. The firm had a site in Gas Lane where Danegeld now stands before moving to High Street, St. Martins. Many of the parts were made locally, including the bodies which were constructed by Hayes and Son at Scotgate. A successful business was being developed but the First World War brought an end to many of Jack Pick’s dreams with the company going into voluntary liquidation in January 1925. DOWLOAD PDF Previous Next

< Back Stamford Town Bridge 1792 Chris Hunt 2024 It is ordered that the Bridge in the Borough of Stamford called Stamford Bridge shall immediately be repaired and kept on good and sufficient Repairs at the Expenses of this Corporation hereafter during the time that Lord Exeter the Owner of the said Bridge shall continue to suspend the Receipt of the Tolls and profits thereof. Source Hall Book 4 November 5th 1792 (2A/1/4 folio 240/241) Previous Next

< Back Anti-Printing Poem by an Unknown Hand, Published in 1820 The Banished Printer to His Trade – A Parody Submitted by Chris Hunt Compositor of printing name! Quit! Oh quit your wooden frame! Working, starving, idling, drinking Oh the gain, the loss of printing! Cease, fond printer, cease your trade, And shun the laws for printers made! Hark! they sentence; - judges say, ‘Libel printer, go away!’ What is this embitters life? Starves my children, kills my wife, Sends me abroad for punishment? Tell me my trade – ‘tis banishment! England recedes; it disappears -- France opens to my eyes! my ears With foreign accents ring: Lend, lend your ships! I sail! I fly! O judge! where is thy victory? O law! where is thy sting? The above poem was attached to a letter to the editor, which stated: I trespass upon your time and patience with an ode, intended to convey a faint idea of the inky breathings of an aspiring letter-press printer, who was fully conversant, and even deeply versed, in the ‘black arts’; and being considered too noxious a weed to remain in the garden of England was transplanted into a more degenerate soil. Leaving it to your candour to determine whether the ‘setting-up’ will warrant its being ‘sent to press’, I remain, sir, with grateful acknowledgements for your encouragement. X. Source Drakard’s Stamford News January 7th 1820 p4/c3 Note We shall never know the author of this poem, although its contents almost certainly mirrored the views of the Editor of the Stamford News, Mr Drakard. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

Find out about events at The Stamford Local History Society where we discover more about the history of our town and the local area. Become a member today. EVENTS In keeping with the aims of the Society, visits to local places of interest are arranged during the summer months. In addition, the Society may at other times of the year arrange commemorative displays in the town. Visits Summer 2026 - Tour of Wittering on 8th July, free event. Prior years have included Guided tours of Longthorpe Tower, Apethorpe Palace & Burghley House Roof. The Stamford Canal Walk and Talk. Castor St. Kyneburgha's Church visit. Displays and Events Spring and Summer 2026 Heritage Open Day Free Events. The Society is supporting a number of Walk and Talks and Research Workshops in Stamford Library. These will include: Stamford Town Walk & Talk May 16th. Bull Running Walk & Talk May 23rd. Stamford in 1913 - an illustrated talk, May 21st. Stamford Courts, Yards & Terraces - an illustrated talk, May 28th Weekly Wednesday sessions in Stamford Library. Prior years have included Commemoration of hundredth anniversary of WWI at the Stamford Arts Centre A Dry Pub Crawl Around St Martin’s Parish. Stamford’s Medieval Walls and Gates. The Town's Early History along Ermine Street and Ryhall Road. Stamford's Northfields Estate.

< Back Blackstone & Co Works Rules 1916 Chris Hunt 2018 WORKS RULES FOR THE EMPLOYEES OF BLACKSTONE & Co., Ltd., RUTLAND ENGINEERING WORKS STAMFORD February 28th 1916 1. Working Hours. The Buzzer will sound ten minutes before and at the times for commencing work, namely 6 a.m., 8.30 a.m. and 2 p.m. It will also sound at the times for leaving off work, namely, 8 a.m., 1 p.m., and 5.30 p.m., and at 12 noon on Saturday. For night shifts the hours to be from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. 2. Meal Times. Day-time 8 to 8.30 a.m., and 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. Night-time 9 p.m. to 10 p.m., with a break of 15 minutes at 2 p.m., during which period the machinery will not be stopped. 3. Overtime. Overtime is to be worked when, and to what extent required. All time lost during the week shall be made up before overtime is reckoned. 4. Orders. Orders and directions issued by the Managers and Foremen must be carried out promptly and efficiency. 5. Losing Time. Special attention must be paid to good time-keeping, in order that the output of the Establishment may be as effective as possible. Illness should be the sole justification for absence from work and such absence should be covered by a Doctor’ Certificate. 6. Piecework. Piece or contract work is to be worked as, when, and where required by the Management. In all cases of piecework the time rates will be guaranteed. 7. Time Recording. All men, when starting work, will be given a number and be provided with a card with the number upon it for use in the time-recording clocks. Upon this each man is expected to enter the time spent on the various jobs upon which he is employed. Great care is to be taken in booking the correct order numbers and quantities on his time card. All time cards must be given in each week to the Foreman on Wednesday night. Time Cards may be stamped in the morning any time from 5.50 to 6.30. Every minute made after6 will count, but after 6.30 no time can be booked until 8.30. Each man must stamp his card as follows: ----- On entering in the morning before breakfast. On commencing work after breakfast. On commencing work after dinner. On finishing for the day. The card must then be left in the proper partition provided in the box. Night hands must stamp on commencement at 6 p.m.: on leaving at 9 p.m.: on entering at 10 p.m.: and when leaving at 6 a.m. Cards must not be stamped more than ten minutes before working hours. Time will be made up and paid to the nearest quarter of an hour. Each man must see that his name, number, and the date are properly filled in. Under no circumstances can anyone stamp another’s card, by so doing he renders himself liable to instant dismissal, as also by defacing the stamping on his card. 8. Payment of Wages. Payment to be made at 12 noon on Saturday, with the exception of the night shift men, who will be paid at 6 p.m. on Fridays. 9. Care of Tools. Small tools are to be obtained from the tool room, and a check filled in by the man who receives such tools will be deposited in their place, which check will be given back when the tools are returned. Upon any man leaving or being discharged his tools must be given up to the Tool Room Foreman. Tools broken or not returned will be charged for at cost price. 10. Cleaning of Machines. No part of any machine or machinery is on any account to be cleaned or wiped down while any part of the machine is in motion. The cleaning or the wiping down of any machine or of any machinery is to be done only by those in charge of the machinery or machine tools, or by such other person as may be appointed by the Foreman or Works Manager. The last half-hour of Saturday morning is allowed for cleaning and is paid for at daywork rate. 11. Accidents. Any accident to persons or machinery is to be reported at once to the Foreman in charge. Workmen are strictly prohibited from putting on driving belts. This work, and the repairing of belts, is to be done only by the belt man or such person as may be appointed. Where belts have to be applied, or in cases where it is necessary to effect repairs to shafts, bearings, &c., the shafts must be at rest. Workmen are specially cautioned against wearing any loose jacket or sleeve or loose garment of any kind when working at, or in close proximity to, machines or machinery in motion, or which is liable to be put in motion. 12. Commencing and remaining at work. Every man will be provided with a copy of the Rules when starting work for the first time, and is expected to read and abide by them. When a man is engaged he must sign the works register and his signature will be his receipt for the book of rules. Every man must be in his place and at work immediately the buzzer has ceased to sound. All workman must enter and leave the works by the workmen’s entrance and make their way to and from their departments by the appointed roads and doors. 13. Absence from Work. Any man absenting himself without informing his foreman as to the cause, and who is absent for a period exceeding two consecutive days, must report himself to his Foreman before recommencing. 14. Fires. Workmen using portable fires are to exercise every precaution to eliminate any possibility of danger to the surroundings or building. No such fires may be lighted without orders. 15. Permit to leave the works during working hours. No one is allowed to pass out of the works during working hours, without a permit duly signed by the Foreman of the Department of the Works Manager. 16. Material. No material will be issued from the Stores without an order signed by the Foreman. 17. Offences. Any employee found guilty of any of the following offences shall be liable to a fine or to dismissal: --- Employing his time in carrying out work other than that for the Company. Loitering in the lavatories or using them for any purpose other than those for which they are intended. Talking, other than connected with the business, and loitering in the works or being away from his department or work without permission. Breaking open any fast lock place or opening or removing tools, &c., from any workman’s drawer or tool chest or from a bench or machine without authority. Smoking within the work gates during ordinary working hours. Bringing intoxicating liquor, or being intoxicated within the works. Bringing any person into the works without permission. Using waste, oil or any articles otherwise than as directed or for the purpose for which same is given out. Taking chips or any articles whatever out of the works without a permit signed by the Works Manager. Refusing to obey any lawful order of the Manager, Foreman or other Superintendent. Committing any act of dishonesty. Taking Time Cards off the rack other than their own. 18. Holidays. The following holidays shall be observed as works holidays. EASTER. The Works will close at 1 o’clock on the Thursday before Good Friday and be reopened on the following Tuesday morning at 8.30 o’clock. WHITSUNTIDE. The Works will close on the Saturday before Whitsun, and be re-opened on the following Tuesday morning at 8.30 o’clock. AUGUST. The Works will close on the Saturday before Bank Holiday at 12 o’clock, and be re-opened on the following Tuesday at 8.30 o’clock. The Annual Holiday will be fixed as nearly as possible for the last week in August. CHRISTMAS. The Works will close on Christmas Eve at 1 o’clock and there will be two days’ holiday in addition to Christmas Day, the Works re-opening on the third day after Christmas Day at 8.30 o’clock. These Holidays are liable to alteration as and when determined by the conditions existing at the period the holiday falls due, and notices regarding same will be posted in due time. Note The original rule book measures three inches by four and a half inches. The eighteen rules are printed in a small type face on nine pages of a twelve page pamphlet in red covers. The date February 28th 1916 is printed on the title page. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back Early History of a Mormon Community in Stamford Submitted by Chris Hunt The Mormons.- This sect (‘Latter-day Saints’ as they call themselves) have taken the room lately occupied by the Wesleyans in Gas Lane, Stamford, for the purpose of giving lectures every Sunday. It was opened on the 20th ult. (October 20th 1850), with a speech by an American elder, and last Sunday two men, one a labourer named Grice, from a village in the neighbourhood, addressed the congregation, consisting of about 20 persons including children. One of them spoke at great length on baptismal regeneration; and from the arguments used, it might be supposed that he had just come from the hands of Bishop Philpot (Strict Baptist – North Street Chapel, Stamford), had he not said that the world had been without successors to the Apostles for several hundred years, until an Angel appeared to Joe Smith, and made a revelation to him, and now the Latter-day Saints had the same power as St Peter, to admit into heaven all who believe and are baptised in their faith. Source Stamford Mercury November 1st 1850 p3/c2 In 1851 the Church of Latter Day Saints’ was recorded in the Census of Religious Worship. GAS LANE LATTER DAY SAINTS’ CHAPEL 1851. Parish of St. George. Erected about the year 1836. Separate and entire building. Used exclusively as a place of worship. Free sittings 14. On 30th March (1851). In afternoon General Congregation 14. In evening General Congregation 17. Signed Henry Wilson, Elder. Larton (Laxton) Court, St Leonard’s Street. Source Lincolnshire Returns of the Census of Religious Worship 1851. Edited by R.W.Ambler, M.A. Published by the Lincoln Record Society Volume 72 (1979) page 4. Note Below Henry Wilson was born in Castle Bytham on May 9th 1809 and died on July12th 1882 and is buried in Salt Lake City Cemetery, Utah, USA. He was a baker and confectioner and was still living in St Leonard’s Street in 1861 with his wife Mary Ann Wilson. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back Fire at the Star Tea Company Shop on the High Street in 1904 On Monday afternoon as an assistant at the Star Tea Company shop in High Street, was clearing the window, preparatory to re-dressing it, when he noticed an escape of gas. Another assistant brought a light to ascertain where the leakage was, and immediately there was an outburst of flame which set fire to the ceiling. Fortunately, this was quickly subdued by means of wet sack, prior to the arrival of the hose cart from the fire station, but damage was done to the extent of about £5. Source Stamford Mercury (Friday) November 18th 1904 p4/c2 Note: - In 1904 The Star Tea Company shop was at No. 12 High Street. Originally a 16 th or early 17 th century building with 18 th century bay windows, the building was split into two shops (No. 11 and No. 12 High Street). The building (No 11 and No. 12) was completely re-built in 1982 for the Halifax Building Society and the presently (June 2025) empty premise would not be included in the RCHM volume. A Print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back My School-Days in Stamford by EDITH NESBIT [The article below was written by Edith Nesbit and is part of her memoirs entitled My School-Days which was serialised between October 1896 and September 1897 in The Girl’s Own Paper . It has been suggested that the period in question was between the autumn of 1866 and the spring/summer of 1867. Nesbit was most famous for her children’s novel, The Railway Children (1906), and the subsequent award-winning film of the same name. This memoir gives us a picture of a dame school in Stamford from the viewpoint of an eight-year-old schoolgirl, albeit written in her late thirties. And, of course, her opinion that she never ‘wished to see Stamford again’. (Chris Hunt).] I spent a year in the select boarding establishment for young ladies and gentlemen at Stamford, and I venture to think that I should have preferred a penal settlement. Miss Fairfield, whose school it was, was tall and pale and dark, and I thought her as good and beautiful as an angel. I don't know now whether she was really beautiful, but I know she was good. And her mother, dear soul, had a sympathy with small folly in disgrace, which has written her name in gold letters on my heart. But there was another person in the house, whose name I will not put down. She came continually between me and my adored Miss Fairfield. She had a sort of influence over me which made it impossible for me ever to do anything well while she was near me. Miss Fairfield's health compelled her to leave much to Miss ----, and I was, in consequence, as gloomy a cynic as any child of my age in Lincolnshire. My chief troubles were three, my hair, my bands, and my arithmetic. My hair was never tidy, I don't know why. Perhaps it runs in the family for my little daughter's head is just as rough as mine used to be. This got me into continual disgrace. I am sure I tried hard enough to keep it tidy. I brushed it for fruitless hours till my little head was so sore that it hurt me to put my hat on. But it never would look smooth and shiny, like Katie Martin's, nor would it curl prettily like the red locks of Cissy Thomas. It was always a rough, impossible brown mop. I got into a terrible scrape for trying to soften it by an invention of my own. As we all know, Burghley House is by Stamford Town, and in Burghley Park we children took our daily constitutional. We played under the big oaks there, and were bored to extinction, not because we disliked the park, but because we went there every day at the same hour. Now Harry Martin, he wore striped stockings and was always losing his handkerchief and suffered from his hair almost as much as I did. So when I unfolded my plan to him one day in the park, he joyfully agreed to help me. We each gathered a pocketful of acorns, and when we went to wash our hands before dinner, we cut up some of the acorns into little bits, and put them into the doll's bath with some cold water and a little scent that Cissy Thomas gave us, out of a bottle she had bought for twopence at the fair at home. "This," I said, "will be acorn oil, scented acorn oil." "Will it?" said Harry doubtfully. "Yes," I replied, adding confidently, "and there is nothing better for the hair." But we never had a chance of even seeing whether acorns and water would turn to oil, a miracle which I entirely believed in. The dinner-bell rang, and I only had time hastily to conceal the doll's bath at the back of the cupboard where Miss ----- kept her dresses. That was Saturday. Next day we found that Miss ----'s best dress (the blue silk with the Bismarck brown gimp) had slipped from its peg and fallen on to the doll's bath. The dress was ruined, and when Harry Martin and I owned up, as in honour bound. Miss Fairfield was away in London and so we were deprived of dinner, and had a long Psalm to learn. I don't know whether punishment affects the hair, but I thought, next morning at prayers, that Harry's tow-crop looked more like hay than ever. My hands were more compromising to me than anyone would have believed who had ever seen their size, for, in the winter especially, they were never clean. I can see now the little willow-patterned basin of hard cold water, and smell the unpleasant little square of mottled soap with which I was expected to wash them. I don't know how the others managed, but for me the result was always the same. Failure; and when I presented myself at breakfast, trying to hide my red and grubby little paws in my pinafore, Miss ---- used to say: "Show your hands, Daisy, yes, as I thought. Not fit to sit down with young ladies and gentlemen. Breakfast in the schoolroom for Miss Daisy." Then little Miss Daisy would shiveringly betake herself to the cold bare schoolroom, where the fire had but just been kindled. I used to sit cowering over the damp sticks with my white mug, mauve spotted it was I remember, and had a brown crack near the handle. Sometimes I used to pull a twig from the fire, harpoon my bread-and-butter with it, and hold it to the fire: the warm, pale, greasy result I called toast. All this happened when Miss Fairfield was laid up with bronchitis. It was at that time, too, that my battle with compound long division began. Now I was not, I think, a very dull child, and always had an indignant sense that I could do sums well enough if any one would tell me what they meant. But no one did, and day after day the long division sums, hopelessly wrong, disfigured my slate, and were washed off with my tears. Day after day I was sent to bed, my dinner was knocked off, or my breakfast, or my tea. I should literally have starved, I do believe, but for dear Mrs. Fairfield. She kept my little Body going with illicit cakes and plums and the like, and fed my starving little heart with surreptitious kisses and kind words. She would lie in wait for me as I passed down the hall, and in a whisper call me into the store closet. It had a mingled and delicious smell of pickles and tea and oranges and jam, and the one taper Mrs. Fairfield carried only lighted dimly the delightful mystery of its well-filled shelves. Mrs. Fairfield used to give me a great lump of cake or a broad slice of bread and jam, and lock me into the dark cupboard till it was eaten. I never taste black-currant jam now without a strong memory of the dark hole of happiness, where I used to wait, my sticky fingers held well away from my pinafore till Mrs. Fairfield's heavy step and jingling keys came to release me. Then she would sponge my hands and face and send me away clean, replete, and with a better heart for the eternal conflict with long division. I fancy that when Miss Fairfield came downstairs again she changed the field of my arithmetical studies; for during the spring I seem to remember a blessed respite from my troubles. It is true that Miss ---- was away, staying with friends. I was very popular at school that term I remember, for I had learned to make dolls bedsteads out of match-boxes during the holidays, and my eldest sister's Christmas present provided me with magnificent hangings for the same. Imagine a vivid green silk sash, with brilliant butterflies embroidered all over it in coloured silk and gold thread. A long sash, too, from which one could well spare a few inches at a time for upholstery. I acquired many marbles, and much gingerbread, and totally eclipsed Cissy Thomas who had enjoyed the fleeting sunshine of popular favour on the insecure basis of paper dolls. Over my memory of this term no long division cast its hateful shade, and the scolding my dear mother gave me when she saw my sashes' fair proportions docked to a waistband and a hard knot, with two brief and irregular ends, was so gentle that I endured it with fortitude, and considered my ten weeks of popularity cheaply bought. I went back to school in high spirits with a new set of sashes and some magnificent pieces of silk and lace from my mother's lavendered wardrobe. But no one wanted dolls' beds any more; and Cissy Thomas had brought back a herbarium: the others all became botanists, and I, after a faint effort to emulate their successes, fell back on my garden. The seeds I had set in the spring had had a rest during the Easter holidays, and were already sprouting greenly, but alas, I never saw them flower. Long division set in again. Again, day after day, I sat lonely in the schoolroom, now like a furnace and ate my dry bread and milk and water in the depths of disgrace, with the faux commencements and those revolting sums staring at me from my tear-blotted slate. Night after night I cried myself to sleep in my bed, whose coarse home-spun sheets were hotter than blankets. All because I could not get the answers right. Even Miss Fairfield, I fancied, began to look coldly on me, and the other children naturally did not care to associate with one so deficient in arithmetic. One evening as I was sitting as usual sucking the smooth, dark slate pencil, and grieving over my troubles with the heart-broken misery of a child, to whom the present grief looks eternal, I heard a carriage drive up to the door. Our schoolroom was at the back, and I was too much interested in a visitor, especially one who came at that hour and in a carriage, to be able to bear the suspense of that silent schoolroom, so I cautiously opened its door and crept on hands and knees across the passage and looked down through the bannisters. They were opening the door. It was a lady, and Mrs. Fairfield came out of the dining-room to meet her. It was a lady in a black moiré (type of textile) antique dress and Paisley shawl of the then mode. It was a lady whose face I could not see, because her back was to the red sunset light; but at that moment she spoke, and the next I was clinging round the moue skirts with my head buried in the Paisley shawl. The world, all upside down, had suddenly righted itself. I, who had faced it alone, now looked out at it from the secure shelter of this screen. For my mother had come to see me. I did not cry myself to sleep that night, because my head lay on her arm. But even then I could not express how wretched I had been. Only when I heard that my mother was going to the South of France with my sisters, I clung about her neck, and with such insistence implored her not to leave me and not to go without me. I think I must have expressed my trouble without uttering it, for when, after three delicious days of drives and walks, in which I had always a loving hand to hold, my mother left Stamford, and she took me, trembling with joy like a prisoner reprieved. And I have never seen, or wished to see Stamford again. EDITH NESBIT A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next