Madelely Family Tree

The Madeley Family Tree

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England News		2003 Spring issue

Shrewsbury
Whitehall - Shrewsbury		Whitehall, on Monkmoor Road, near Shrewsbury town, was where my grandmother lived before she married Robert Madeley from Long Lane at Sleap. I had with me the 1901 census record showing all the people living there at that time. My grandmother was Ida Ellen Key and she was the parlor` maid there. She was born in Inkberrow in Worcestorshire and had moved to Whitehall with the family resident. It was a huge mansion with a walled garden and a gardener's cottage and it has not lost any of its presence in the area. Then, the only other staff there was a cook and a housemaid to do all the work. We looked over the mansion and thought they must have worked very hard for their master and his daughter in their huge home.
For more pictures of Whitehall click here



From Whitehall we went over the River Severn on the English Bridge and through town to my old school, the Lancasterian Secondary Modern. The school is also known as the Dana School. This school was built nearby the Dana and the castle walls in September 1813, and followed the monitorial education system of Joseph Lancaster. Charles Bage designed the original Dana School, and it was enlarged in 1889. He also designed the Flax Mill in Castle Foregate, the world's first iron framed building. My sisters Valerie and Patricia went to this school before grammar school. Valerie went when she was 10. I was a monitor and head boy at the school, and it looked just the same as it was when I was there bringing back many memories from that time.		The Lancasterian School - Shrewsbury Incidentally, it was the school of the Madeley family before the Great War 1914-1918, and my aunt remembered using slates and chalk for lessons instead of paper. Olive Madeley, my mother's sister, was 5 in 1912 when she was there.

Shrewsbury Weir	In Castlefields we turned right at bottom of John Street where the church hall still stands, and where we had to walk in crocodile formation for our dinner each day from the Dana school. By the old vicarage the road sloped down and opened out down to the River Severn. As we approached I felt as though I had been whisked back in time fifty years. It still looked the same as it did all those years ago. Children on the weir, couples walking, fishermen, and beautiful white swans. Then, the Summers always seemed hot and long. It was a special place that local children spent most Summer days. We had tea at 4pm and the sun was still hot.
More pictures of the weir here

This picture is by Swan Island at Castlefields taken looking upstream to the Weir. This is was where to stand to skim a flat stone across the river. I had to have a go just as I had as a boy. I did and I managed twelve bounces in only two goes. After all I was the local champion. Ahem! The willows, a common tree by the Severn banks, set the perfect picture for me on such a perfect sunny scene.		Looking upstream towards the Weir
More pictures of Swan Island here

My Home 1946-1969	After tea at Swan Island we set off to go to Pontesbury. Just up the road from the Weir we passed my old home. The people of No. 33 have kept it lovely. hat made me happy. The coal hole in the front path had been filled in. There was many a day when I was a lad of 7 I had to enter the house down the coal chute because I did not have a key. I had to change and wash off the coal dust before my father came home though. Later a key was left in the outside toilet for me to get in after school.
I remember that we had gas lighting in our house and in the street. The street lighting man came each night and hooked the chain pulls that lit the tall gas lights by using a very long rod, and pulled it out in the morning. The lamppost is still outside converted now to electric. It used to shine into my sisters' bedroom each night. We had an outside toilet, and only one tap in the house. We bathed in a tin bath tub in front of our huge black leaded fireplace. The bath was kept hung in the garden against the house. We had a fireplace in every room, including bedrooms and the kitchen. I remember having mumps in bed next to a cosy fire. Our cellar flooded regularly when the River Severn broke it's bank each year. The water came right up the stairs and completely filled the cellar. The cellar window seems to be covered now, but in those days it let in a lot of welcome light. My father made potent potato wine by the window. Sometimes we would here an explosions as a bottle blew up. In the winter, when the river flooded the nearby fields, they would freeze and become huge skating rinks.

From Castlefields we passed the old flax mill in Castle Foregate, designed by Charles Bage who designed my old school. Also called Ditherington Mill, this mill holds the key to one of the major turning points in history - the Industrial Revolution. It is said to be the first iron framed building in the world. It was built originally in 1796 to spin flax for making linen. In this mill, was untold pain and suffering among the thousands of forgotten men, woman, and children who gave their whole lives to the mill. Ditherington is one of the many textile mills, which has survived from the Industrial Revolution.		Shrewsbury Flax Mill It’s not the oldest, or the biggest, or the most beautiful, but is has been proved that it is the birthplace of the skyscraper.

Shrewsbury Castle	Going into town from Castle Foregate, the Shrewsbury Castle remains dominant since Edward I rebuilt it during his reign 1272-1307. In 1663, Charles II granted the castle to Sir Francis Newport of High Ercall. It remained in private hands until 1924 when the Shropshire Horticultural Society bought it and gave it to the borough. I remember climbing up the outer walls to the top of the tower when I was a lad. Quite a feat just to look into the castle grounds. It is built from local sandstone known as Keele Bed Sandstone. The same stone was used to build the huge walls which surrounded the town. Some town walls still exist, and Whitehall where my grandmother lived, was built from the same stone taken from the old town walls.
As we passed through the town, it was good to see the old familiar places: My old firm, Salopian Designs, when I was an apprentice draughtsman before I joined the Royal navy, The old Tudor buildings, And the old Rowley's Mansion Museum where I spent many a rainy day as a boy. Now it was time to travel to Pontesbury.