Cholera and cemeteries

Over the last few weeks we've been looking at plague, fire, pesthouses and Dead Lane. So today, just for a change, I thought we'd have a look at cholera and cemeteries!

The first national outbreak of cholera in the UK was in 1831 and happened in Sunderland, entering the country by ship, a ship that was carrying infected sailors. From there it spread up to Scotland and down to London and claimed around 52,000 lives. I'm not sure if the disease came to Loughborough, but it certainly came to Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire in 1832. A Nottingham surgeon traced the origins of the disease to Bengal, and from there it came to Britain via Iran, Russia, and the northern European countries. Once in the country, he suggested that the disease was carried by boatmen along the Trent to Nottingham.

The people of Loughborough were very aware of the proximity of cholera, and in 1831 created a Board of Health to try and prevent the introduction of the disease to the town, and in the event it did take hold, to limit its spreading.

The Chair of the Board was C.G.Mundy, Esq., and other members were:

C.M. Phillipps, Esq. M.P., The Rev. Mr Holme, Dr Peach, Wm. Middleton, Esq., Wm. Paget, Esq.

and Messers: S.Hunt, J.H.Eddowes, Swann (Surgeon); Brewin, Fry, H.Toone, Thomas Craddock, Brock, Mowbray, G.Fowler, W.Dean, W.Henshaw, W.Gamble, John Palmer, and Lee.

The members agreed to report to the Chairman, the state of health of the town and villages that they visited in their professional capacity, if the infectious disease should appear.

A further outbreak of cholera occurred in 1848-9 and the Loughborough Board of Guardians (of the Poor Law) created a committee which comprised a chairman and vice-chairman, and the Guardians for Loughborough and Knightthorpe. This committee was expected to work with the surveyors of the highways to help improve the sanitary conditions of the area. The committee of the Loughborough Dispensary held a special meeting to see what might be done to limit the spread of cholera, leading to subscribers to the Dispensary being able to recommend for treatment anyone affected with a bowel complaint. 

On this occasion cholera did reach Loughborough. In 1841 the population of Loughborough was 24,669 and in 1848, 3 people died from the disease. The figures for deaths in 1849 are as follows: 6 (males) 1 (female) died of cholera; 11 (males) 3 (females) died from diarrhoea, making a total of 21 deaths.

The churchyard at the parish church was becoming full, and there was a general concern for hygiene and sanitary conditions in the crowded and overfilled churchyard. Such conditions were particularly a concern for the Rector at the time, Henry Fearon, who campaigned for a fresh water supply for the town, a feat finally accomplished in 1870. 

The government also introduced some new Acts, which resulted in Loughborough creating a Burial Board, who oversaw the building of a new cemetery on the outskirts of the town. This Board comprised some familiar names: Edward Chatterton Middleton (son of William mentioned above); Edward Warner; Beauvoir Brock; Henry Toone, Thomas Bennett, Benjamin Gray; George Wragg; Benjamin Baldwin and Robert Lander.

It's been a while since I've had the chance to wander through the cemetery and absorb the names on the memorials, but last week, I managed to do this. Earlier in September, on their health and safety walkthrough, the council had identified a number of memorials deemed to be unsafe and liable to topple, so there were quite a number of these now lying flat. There'd also been a bit of plant clearance too, which meant some graves were more accessible, and others almost hidden by plant debris.

I wasn't looking for anything in particular, but did spot some familiar names - familiar now because of the research I've been doing into the town. 

Interestingly, the weekend before I'd been up at St Paul's church in Woodhouse Eaves, looking at the churchyard and the cemetery opposite. IN the latter I spotted some absolutely wonderful plot number markers, and thought it was a lovely idea, and helpful to folk looking for a specific plot.

Plot marker left of memorial

Close up of plot marker

Many plotmarkers

As far as I know there was nothing similar at Loughborough cemetery, although there is a map of the plots at one of the entrances. 

Map of plots at Loughborough cemetery

So, imagine my surprise when wandering around I came across some absolutely fantastic plot markers, which I certainly don't remember seeing before!! They were fabulous! Made of cast iron, I think (someone correct me, if I'm wrong please), and one of these I found right next to the grave of John Jones, possibly the iron founder, although I haven't had time to check the dates, so don't quote me on that one!

John Jones memorial

Gravestone and plotmarker

Plotmarker

Hmm, I think that's enough about graves and cemeteries for now! It's almost 31st of October ...

You are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follow:

Dyer, Lynne (2017). Cholera and cemeteries. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2017/10/cholera-and-cemeteries.html [Accessed 29 October 2017]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

Thank you for reading this blog. 

Lynne  

Plague and Dead Lane

Last week we had a quick look at disasters and plague houses in and around Loughborough. Today, a quick word on the plague house and some comments upon Dead Lane.

Following the death of Clemente Parsons and his son, Richard Harryman was paid eleven shillings to build the Pesthouse in The Rushes. Hewgh Foster provided either the foundation for the building, or the doorway and Nicholas Smith was paid five shillings for nails, and eighteen pennies for carrying stone to the house.

Of course, you know what I'm going to say next ... Nicholas Smith also died of the plague in May 1610.

Percy Davenport, author of that 1935 article on the plague, goes on to say that the Accounts of the Bridgemasters include an entry which indicates that they paid five shillings to have the Pesthouse taken down. Initially this sounds odd, but Percy establishes that this probably refers to a building that was already standing that was to be replaced by this new one that was currently being built. A later entry in the accounts shows that the building (whether this means the old one or the new one isn't quite clear) was sold to a John Marshall of Cossington for the sum of fifty shillings. Where exactly the Pesthouse was on The Rushes is not clear.

Next we learn that people buried at this time weren't given their own coffin, so one coffin was re-used time and time again. This particular coffin was made by Robert Joyner who was paid two shillings to make it.

As well as casting huge bells for churches and cathedrals, Taylors the bellfounders on Freehold Street, also make handbells, but I don't think they were responsible for making the handbell used during times of plague in Loughborough, as Nicholas Smithe was paid four shillings and sixpence for it. Besides, Taylors were not in Loughborough at the time.

And so to the topic of Dead Lane, or le Dede Lane, or le Dedlane, or Dedelane, as it has variously been known.

Percy suggests that the story of the origin of the street name, handed down from generation to generation of Loughborough folk, and even told by a respected school teacher to pupils of the Churchgate school in the 1890s, is an unlikely tale.

Percy thinks it's also unlikely that plague pits were dug along Dead Lane in the 17th century, and has not found any evidence that the ground had been consecrated. The street name goes back much further than this, and Percy goes on to quote five instances of mention of the name Dead Lane in old documents:

the oldest comes from a deed probably in the reign of Edward II, so between 1307 and 1327, in which it is recorded that Adam, the son of Ellias de Shathewelle, was granted land in Dede Lane.

in 1460 William Staunton rented a piece of land near Dede Lane from the Lord of the Manor, which land was adjacent to several tenements on Dede Lane itself

unscoured ditches on Dede Lane in 1486 led to a number of people being fined

in 1488 someone appears to be illegally living on le Dedlane

rentals paid to the Lord of the Manor in 1490 refer to le Dede Lane

So, there were people living on Dead Lane from times much earlier than the plague of 1609-1610, and even before the earliest mention of the plague in Loughborough, in 1515.

Percy's final comments are, well, either ironic, or poignant:

"I strongly hope that the suggestion which has recently been mooted, for changing the name of this old lane, will not be listened to by the Corporation."

Today, Dead Lane, which if I remember rightly, ran alongside the Shakespeare Street School, is no longer there, being covered by the ground level car parking area of The Rushes shopping centre.

The school at the top of Shakespeare Street 

The new build at the end of Shakespeare Street along which Dead Lane used to run

Dead Lane used to be on the left of what is now a ground level car park in The Rushes

Post Script
I've made this post into a video. Here's the link: https://youtu.be/nBPzHBD8QlA

Dyer, Lynne (2017). Disasters in Loughborough! Available from:  https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2017/10/plague-and-dead-lane.html  [Accessed 22 October 2017]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

Thank you for reading this blog. 

Lynne 

Disasters and plague houses

Last week we had a look at some of the fires and disease that have affected Loughborough over the years. 

A quick flick through some of the literature and I came across a chap called Percy Davenport, who had written an article about the plague, in the Loughborough Echo. A bit more of a delve revealed that Percy was an "old boy" from the Grammar School, who, whilst working at the Ministry of Health, used to copy out old documents he found, in his leisure time. Some of these are the Manor Accounts and Wills of Loughborough.

So, if Percy read what he was copying in any detail, his voice holds a lot of weight. In his 1935 article in the newspaper he wrote about "When the plague came to Loughborough", saying:

In the years 1609 and 1610 Loughborough was a place to avoid, for it was then in the grip of the deadly plague. The story told by the Parish Registers is indeed a grim one. Under the month of August, 1609, the writer sets down the simple words "A plague began on the 24th day," and for the period of the next 18 months or more, long lists of victims who succumbed are entered, each name prefixed by the letter "p". 

He also mentions the possibility of there being a "plague house" somewhere, which was associated with Thomas Rawlins who founded a school in Woodhouse in 1691. This school lasted until the late eighteenth century, after which it closed until it relocated to Quorn village hall where it re-opened in 1892, firstly, as a boys' grammar (Thomas Rawlins Grammar School), before becoming a co-ed school of the same name, and based in the building occupied today by the Rawlins Academy. Thomas Rawlins is reputed to have escaped the 1665 Plague of London and settled in Pest Cottage in Old Woodhouse. This cottage is still standing today, and is named Pestilence Cottage. 

Percy has this to say about Pest Cottage:

Whatever may be the historical facts behind the "Plague House" of Thomas Rawlins, allusions to which have appeared in recent numbers of the "Echo", we are on solid and indisputable ground when we speak of a "Plague House" in Loughborough.    

The Accounts of the Bridgemasters, (who gathered funds to maintain the bridges, and the Free Grammar School and for many other local needs) were responsible to the Feoffes of the Loughborough Town Lands, and these accounts show that the feoffes took responsibility for building a Pesthouse in The Rushes, in a vain attempt to stop the spread of the plague in 1609. 

Percy quotes from the accounts:

Payed to Richard Harryman on Thomas Wingkfeild hosse [house], in earnest for the newe house in The Rushes vjd [6 old pennies]." 

This is a formal transaction, and the builder is bound to enact the contract and build the house, which is outlined below:

Payed to Clemente Parsons for Carriadg of wood into the Rushes xjs [11 old shillings]

Ironically, both Clemente Parsons and his son died from the plague in October 1610, only a few months after this contract was agreed.

Sadly, I've run out of time to carry on with this post, so pop back next week for a final installment on the plague in Loughborough, and some comments about the infamous Dead Lane!

You are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follow:

Dyer, Lynne (2017). Disasters in Loughborough! Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2017/10/disasters-and-dead-lane.html [Accessed 15 October 2017]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

Thank you for reading this blog. 

Lynne 

Disasters in Loughborough

Hunting around looking for something to write about, I happened upon lots of information about certain disasters that befell our lovely town, many years ago. Trouble is, there really is too much to read and digest at the moment, so here's a few tantalising mentions of plague and fire.

The Plague

*The earliest mention of the plague was in the will of Geffery Salesbury in 1515.

*In 1551 sweating sickness, which appeared to be more virulent among the higher classes, was mentioned in the Parish Records.

*Over a period of 18 months 1558-9, over 295 people died from the plague.

*In 1564 the Great Plague struck London, and reached Leicester. Because of this the Leicester Assizes met at Loughborough for a while.

*Over 452 people died of the plague in Loughborough in the outbreak of 1609-10.

*In 1631 the plague was initially concentrated around three houses, and 11 people died, but it soon took a firm hold, and eventually 1304 people died of the disease in this outbreak.

Fire

While illness might (or indeed, might not) be attributed to sanitary conditions, it is likely that fires start as a result of the industries in the town, and spread because of the wooden buildings with thatched roofs. 

*The fire in town that took place in June 1622 is mentioned in the Parish Registers.

*In 1666 (or it may have been 1668) a fire on 5th October destroyed nearly 200 houses, when a spark from a malt kiln in Wood Gate was blown so easily along the thatched roofs of the buildings. Only a week later, there was a fire in what is now Ashby Square.

*A fire in The Rushes in 1761, destroyed 13 hours in less than one hour.

*The Old Rectory, at the junction of what is now Rectory Place and Steeple Row, was re-built after it was almost completely destroyed by a fire.

*The factory of Paget and White suffered serious fire damage when a fire took hold in 1860.

*A serious attempt to make fighting fires easier came in 1866 when a fire station was built on Ashby Road, and in 1887 when the town got its very first steam-powered fire engine, this after the Nottingham Manufacturing Company was seriously damaged after a fire at the factory. 

*Taylors Bellfoundry suffered a fire in 1892.

*In 1902 there were two fires in schools, one at the Grammar School, the other at Cobden Street.

*A new fire station was built on Bridge Street in 1936.

You are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follow:

Dyer, Lynne (2017). Disasters in Loughborough! Available from: lhttps://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2017/10/disasters-in-loughborough.html [Accessed 8 October 2017]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

Thank you for reading this blog. 

Lynne  

  

What a milestone!

Well, if you've landed here because you are interested in milestones in project management, I'm afraid you'll be disappointed, because this blog post is about milestones or mile posts, or way markers, that are usually to be found at the side of the road!! There's such a lot of interest in these wonderful objects, that there's even a society specifically devoted to them, and plenty of books and leaflets around.

Anyway, if it's roadside markers you're interested in, then do please read on - and even if you're not, do please read on!

Apologies for the silence over the last couple of weeks: I've been putting a concerted effort into my #100days #100wordsaboutloughborough initiative, and pleased to say that this has now successfully concluded. I've also been on holiday (yes, again!) so not easily able to post to this blog.

So, whilst I was away in sunny South West Wales, I spotted loads of milestones on the sides of several major roads, and most of them looked spectacular! This is because they have relatively recently (about 2003) been dug out and restored (see the article on page 16). Well most of them! I don't have any photographs of the lovely restored ones, but here's a picture of one that needs a bit of a paint (blurred because it was taken through the car window as we were travelling) and one that seems a little worse for wear:

Then there were a couple of other interesting types, one in Fishguard which was an iron milestone embedded into the wall which surrounded a church, and the maker's name - Maychurch of Haverford West - is very clear on the front of the milestone. As if this weren't enough, it was painted a lovely shade of green:

The other interesting one was made of slate, and is now the material for new milestones along the Pembrokeshire coastal path. Here's the one at Manorbier:

On the way back from Wales we stopped off to visit relatives near Hereford, and spotted this lovely milestone at Hampton Bishop:

Well, that's the rest of the country dealt with, but what of Loughborough??

We do have some really impressive milestones, both in Loughborough itself, and very close by. Here's the one on Leicester Road, just outside the cemetery:

And, here's another well-kept one on the A6 at Dishley:

The one on the A512 just the other side of Shepshed looks a little bit worse for wear, and could do with a bit of tlc. Again, the maker's mark is clearly visible in the middle - Wootton Bros, Coalville:

If you know of any other milestones close by, do please drop me a line - I'd love to know about more!

One of the other things I've spotted around Loughborough are parish boundary markers. The nearest one to Loughborough itself is the one in Woodthorpe village, outside Renals Farm:

And there are another two, very close together, on Brand Lane, Woodhouse Eaves, outside Longdale Cottage. Here's a picture of the two of them, and a picture of the Lane for a bit of context:

So, that's it! What? No? You mean I've forgotten the best one of all? No, of course, not! Here it is!!! This milepost has been moved! It is believed to have come from Shardlow, and appeared mysteriously one night whilst Harry Sheffield was the landlord of the Old Pack Horse, so that would have been sometime between 1912 and 1938! If you're looking for the distance to Derby, you'll find this has been buried beneath the tarmac!!! And a picture of the Old Pack Horse, where the milestone can be seen just underneath the "ly"!!!

You are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follow:

Dyer, Lynne (2017). What a milestone! Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2017/10/what-milestone.html [Accessed 1 October 2017]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

Thank you for reading this blog. 

Lynne