| I looked at the facilities, they had copies of the 1841, 1851, 1861, 1871, 1881 and 1891 census returns on microfilm. It occurred to me then that throughout all those years Queen Victoria (1837-1901) had been on the throne, and I remembered all the great achievements made during those times, the flourishing mines and pottery works. All the mines have gone now and but a few pottery factories remain, even Royal Doulton are in trouble. I decided to do a bit of research into the conditions at the time, just to put myself in the mood before I went in search of my ancestors. When you read that in 1842 the Mines Act banned women and children under 10 from working underground you realise just what the conditions were like. That was followed a few years later with Factory Act...Female workers were limited to a 12 hour day and 8-13 year olds to a six and a half hour day! In the early 1800's one in ten people, mostly children, died of Smallpox but in 1840 a free vaccination became available and the disease was virtually wiped out by 1880. I was later to examine the burials at St. Marks Church, Shelton, and to see never ending burials of infants, dozens and dozens buried in the 1860's, I found it very upsetting, but I was beginning to appreciate just what it was like to be alive during the 19th. century. Cholera killed 52,293 people in 1854, and 72,000 in 1848-9, however did they cope? In 1849 the whole area of Hanley and Shelton was described by a doctor to be "an area surrounded by a moat full of decomposing filth"...charming! By the mid 1800's most of the graveyards at the churches were completely full and in 1858 the borough council opened a cemetery on 20 acres of Shelton Hall land. The public baths which used to stand in Lichfield Street were built in 1873. From the early 1770's the whole area began to grow dramatically due to the opening of the Trent and Mersey and Caldon canals, hugely expanding imports and exports. Then with the coming of the Railways in the mid 1800's the canals began to lose trade and after a few comeback bids gradually fell out of favour for commercial purposes.....it's all happening now..we're right in the middle of the Revolution! 1832......Bucknall New Road finished 1842......Stoke to Endon road constructed 1849......First proper Waterworks 1859......Charles Darwin published his book, " On the Origin of Species". 1860......Last bare knuckle boxing match in England....it lasted 42 rounds.. and it was a draw!!! 1860......Hanley Cemetery opened (most churches stopped burying...full up.) 1862......Horse drawn trams introduced in the town. 1864......Bucknall&Northwood Railway opened 1882......Steam trams 1894......first electricity 1897......Hanley Park opened Remember, no proper toilets, houses were built back to back with shared facilities, no bathrooms, just big tin baths in front of the fire! Oil lamps! The further back we go the worse it gets! Let's not forget the horses, they must have been all over the place, the only form of transport, loyal servants, what would we have done without them? I can envisage all kinds of carriages, stagecoaches, the beautiful Shires.... Don't forget also the cobbled streets, the lack of street lighting, the choking smog caused by the numerous bottle ovens. My ancestors would not have given these things a second thought, they grew up with it all. It was their world, they just got on with living their lives, working, raising families........ Water..we take it so much for granted...listen to this...Before 1820 Hanley's water supply, whether fetched in a pitcher or bought from a higgler at 1/2d. a bucket, came from a spring called Woodwall Well near to the present Well Street.. This spring, with a pump added, was still in use in the 1840's, but the "service"....was impaired by robberies made upon it's hidden streams! You don't realise do you, until you read it, how it used to be.....it really was a different world....and don't forget, it's doubful whether you would have understood a word they said..... |
| Setting the scene.... |
| The Cordall Story |