BYGONES WANT THE LATEST NEWS WHERE
PHILIP BROUGH
1800
The churchyard of St Edward’s church is extended on the north side by 868 sq. yd.
Nearly 3 acres of Leek moor on Ashbourne Road are inclosed as a garden for the workhouse.
Charles Ball is a Leek Methodist and the Sunday school has 200 pupils.
A Coventry man, Thomas Horton, introduces the weaving of figured ribbons in Leek. There are references to other silk weavers.
Twisting continued longer than weaving as a domestic industry or one carried out in shades and not part of the mills.
Thomas Ball, working in a shade behind St Edward’s church, introduces the twisting of sewing silk by means of a ‘gate.’ After the silk has been wound and doubled by women and children, it goes to a twister working gate. Here the threads are twisted, attached to a gate and wound onto bobbins. Each twister employs a boy, known as a helper or trotter. His job is to take the rod carrying the bobbins and run some 25 yards to other end of shade. There he passes the thread around the ‘cross’ and runs back to gate. He then repeats the operation until thread has reached the required thickness.
William Challinor dies and the practice carried on by his partner George Ridgway Killmister.
1801
The sexton is paid 5s. for ringing the curfew.
Charles Ball, a Leek Methodist, now has a Sunday school of 300 pupils, of whom 22 are being taught to write. The school moves successively to Mount Pleasant Methodist chapel, to the grammar school and to the Assembly Room at the Swan Inn.
The population of Leek and Lowe is 3,489.
The Trent & Mersey Canal Co. open a branch canal running from the Caldon canal, east of Endon, to a basin and wharf on Newcastle road in Leek and crossing the River Churnet by an aqueduct.
A tollhouse is built near the canal wharf.
1802
An Act of Parliament seeks to protect the Health and Morals of Apprentices, and regulates factories.
The Countess of Stamford leaves Westwood to her son Booth Grey who also dies this year and is succeeded by his son, also named Booth.
A new association for the prosecution of felons is formed covering the townships of Leek & Lowe, Leekfrith and Tittesworth.
William Travis starts on his own account as a clockmaker in Market Place.
1803
French prisoners of war arrive in Leek which is a designated Parole Town.
Eleven friendly societies exist in Leek, with a membership of 485. Most of them are associated with inns.
One charity received a further £25 from land at Oulton, in Rushton Spencer, partly as interest on money from sale of timber and partly from further occasional sales of timber and underwood.
Pickfords’ wagons between London and Manchester are coming through Leek.
A two-day race meeting on Leek Moor is advertised for the Monday & Tuesday after the third Sunday in October.
A. J. Worthington & Co. originate as James Goostrey & Co.
Joseph Badnall dies and the dyeworks are taken over by his son William and his brother James.
1804
Jean Baptiste Francoise Mien arrives in Leek as a French POW.
General Jean Baptiste Brunet arrives as POW.
On June 12, the Staffordshire Regiment of Gentlemen & Yeomanry are supplemented by a troop of infantry – The Leek meeting of the Quakers commends Henry Bowman and his family to a Quaker meeting at Oswego in New York state.
The farmhouse called Westwood is offered for sale with 212 acres as ‘a pleasant and convenient country residence.’
1805
A ‘cucking stool’ stood by the River Churnet off Abbey Green Road near Broad’s bridge and has apparently been on this site since the 1560s. A chair, which may have been part of the cucking stool was kept in St Edward’s church until it was stolen
There is a well on the south side of Ashbourne Road. Well Street, running north from Ashbourne Road, may derive its name from this well.
Leek Inclosure Act is passed confirming the Earl of Macclesfield’s ownership of the waterworks as the Lord of the manor.
A new fire engine, called the ‘Lord of the Manor,’ is given by the Earl of Macclesfield.
The town and the places adjoining it are supplied with water piped from two reservoirs on Leek moor, at what are now the north end of Mount Road and the east end of Fountain Street.
The income from Ann Jolliffe’s charity (see 1732) produces £38 10s.
The charity English school ceased to function.
1806
The Market Cross is moved from the south end of the Market Square to Cornhill on the Cheddleton Road.
The Old Town Hall is built on the site. This Hall is designed and built by Robert Emerson, a joiner, and John Radford, a stonemason.
The building consists of a basement with two lockups. The ground floor was originally kept open for use by market people who found it dark and inconvenient and eventually abandoned it.
The lock-up in the town is pulled down when the town hall in the market place is built containing two cells.
Thomas Mills sold his interest in the law firm to Mr Cruso.
FB Fynney dies. He built Compton House on the Cheddleton Road.
William Badnall, a Leek silk dyer, dies. He leaves interest on £1,000 to be distributed in blankets, quilts, clothing and other necessities such as coal – but not food or drink, on November 5, to twenty poor widows aged 60 or over; half of the widows to be residents in Leek town and half in Lowe. On his death the partnership is formed between James Badnall, his brother Richard Badnall and his son Joseph Badnall.
1807
Cruso & Jones, solicitors, take on Sinckler (St Clair?) Porter of Lichfield as a partner
George Ridgway Killmister goes into partnership with William Challinor’s eldest son, also William – a gallery over south aisle in St Edward’s Church is mentioned.
The English school has definitely ceased because the annuity expires (See 1786).
A friendly society is established at the Swan (one of many such schemes in town).
1808
Houses are built to the north of St Edward’s church. They became known as Petty France. They are built by James Fernyhough. Petty France may derive from the area where (some?) of the POWS resided or from the proximity of that part of the churchyard where several of them are buried.
Richard Cutting, a silk manufacturer, and a Sergeant in the Leek Loyal Volunteers, is appointed as the Superintendent of the Methodist Sunday School (held position until his death in 1856).
John Cruso is the Cornet officer who carries the colours of the Leek Yeomanry.
1809
Holdens Directory lists 9 manufacturers and 2 dyers in town.
Hannah West, the Quakers’ resident female minister, dies.
Thomas Ball is still in business dyeing silk in Mill Street.
1810
The Governor of the Workhouse is paid a salary of £42 per year and the matron one of £10.
A wake is held on the third Sunday in October, possibly in association with feast of Translation of Edward Confessor (13 October) who is then regarded as the patron saint of the parish church.
Louis Gerard, an emigré priest at Cobridge in Burslem, says mass at Leek for the French prisoners of war and the Irish workers. The usual place is a room in Pickwood Road.
John Condlyffe, a solicitor, confined as a lunatic, dies.
1811
Leek Moor enclosed. The vicar is assigned 8½ acres in respect of his glebe and in lieu of the tithe corn and rents from 20 acres.
The population of Leek & Lowe is 3,703.
There are 178 Methodists. A new chapel is built at Mount Pleasant with a graveyard attached. The old chapel is converted into houses.
The French POW, Jean Bapstiste Nillot, dies, aged 43, at 6 Petty France.
John Brough is in business in the silk trade.
1812
Charles Luneaud, of Petty France, shoots and kills Captain Decourbed in a duel.
Large-scale popular education in Leek comes with the Sunday schools. Leek is one of the small industrial towns where Sunday schools proved to be popular with workers and provided most of the formal education in the town.
The small porch to St Edward’s church is erected on the south side of chancel.
The last of the French
POWS arrive in Leek. They are a changing population and at any one time there are about 140 in the town. Two companies of militia and a squadron of yeomanry are assigned to guard the prisoners. They enjoy considerable freedom, on parole to stay within a radius of one mile from the Market Place. They are welcomed into local society.
1813
James Badnall dies- Robert Hobson has opened a day and boarding school for boys on Clerk Bank.
In St Edward’s Church there is a gallery over the north aisle.
The younger Booth sells the Birchall estate to John Davenport, a potter and glassmaker of Longport and native of Leek.
The Methodists establish a non-denominational Sunday school, controlled by the Wesleyan Methodists.
The Anglicans set up their own Sunday school on the Madras system (A system whereby the older children are taught and they in turn teach the younger ones.) One hundred children joined it from the non-denominational Sunday school. It is held in the grammar school and supported by subscriptions plus collections at St Edward’s church.
1814
Cornelius Brumby still keeps a school. He publishes locally his own system of shorthand.
The capital of the Thomas Birtles charity is used to buy stock
1815
West Street School opens as a Wesleyan Sunday School.
Stocks for the punishment of offenders stand near the Town Hall until their removal to a site beneath Overton Bank. As a replacement, steel stocks are set up in the Market Place opposite the Red Lion.
There is a post office in the Market Place.
Quarrying is taking place at Kniveden.
There are more than 100 weavers in town.
Eight pinnacles are placed on the tower of St Edward’s church.
A total of over 3,400 French POWS have been in Leek, but most have now left with the coming of peace. Some have married locally and stayed.
1816
In St Edward’s Church, the gallery over the north aisle is altered. The vestry in St Edward’s church has fallen down and been rebuilt.
1817
The ground floor of the Town Hall in Market Place is converted into a newsroom.
Four hundred workers from Manchester arrive at Leek on their way to London to present their grievances to the Government. They are known as the ‘Blanketeers’ from the blankets which they carry with them.
1818
The inn at the south of the Market Square is still known as the Blackamoor’s Head.
Two brothers, Samuel and William Phillips, are silk manufacturers at Barngates. They live in the house known as The Field.
There are two gardeners and seedsmen in town.
There is in existence the Volunteer Watch, a group of armed men who are paid to patrol the streets to see that the peace is kept.
There is only one factory, which has only a few looms, in Mill Street. It is run by Richard Badnall and William Laugharn.
1820
What is later to be known as the California Mills is built.
Monthly cheese fairs are being held.
Albion Street and King Street are being built.
1821
Population of Leek and Lowe is 4,855.
1822
Several charities for the poor, which have been managed by the churchwardens of Leek, are merged as the Town Dole.
Land at Oulton, in Rushton Spencer, is left for charitable purposes and let at £25 year.
1823
Six dwellings in what later became Wood Street are built by William Thompson, a broad-silk weaver.
1824
The scold’s bridle is last used.
William Hammersley opens the silk-dyeing works at Bridge End. The Hammersley firm is to remain in business in Mill Street and Bridge End until the early 20th century.
The first known building society in Leek, Leek Building Society, is formed.
1825
A body of 34 Improvement Commissioners is established by an Act of Parliament to light, watch, cleanse, and improve the town.