Thomas Goodman
was born around 1836 to parents James and Mary, and his birth registered in
Ashby de la Zouch. By 1841 the family were living on Leicester Road,
Loughborough, where father, James, was occupied as a coach builder. James and Mary
were both aged 25, Thomas was now 6, and he had two younger siblings, Kate,
aged 4, and James aged 2. Coachbuilding was still a very necessary operation,
and there were at least two other coach builders in Loughborough, around 1846 - Thomas
Matthews, who was based on Church Gate, and Alice Warren on High Street. The Warren
family had brought coachbuilding to Loughborough from Ashby in around 1820, and
the company would pass down through family members, until it was bought out by
the Dickens firm in the 1920s.
James continues
as a coach builder through 1849, and on the 1851 census, the family is still
listed as living on Leicester Road, where James (although listed as Thomas on
the 1851 census) and Mary, with siblings Catherine 14, James 12, John 8, Sarah
6, and William 3 months. Living on Leicester Road, where Thomas (i.e. James) is
a coach maker, and son Thomas is an apprentice coach maker.
According to an
1854 trade directory, James is still coachbuilding but has moved to Pinfold
Gate. I have been unable to trace the family on the 1861 census return, but a trade
directory for that year lists and Edward Goodman as a coachbuilder on Pinfold
Gate. At this time, Thomas and John Warren are still listed as coachbuilders on
High Street. A directory from 1863 lists James Goodman as a coachbuilder on
Pinfold Gate.
In 1864, Thomas’s
first son, John F. Goodman was born, but I have been unable to trace a marriage
for Thomas, until 1869 in Loughborough when Thomas, the apprentice coach maker
in 1851, marries Annie Orgill, who was born in 1837, in Charley Hall to parents
Francis and Sarah. In 1851, Annie aged 14, was living on Derby Road,
Loughborough, with her parents Francis and Sarah, and siblings – Francis 19,
Sarah 18, Martha 11, and William 11 – and with grandfather, Thomas aged 63. Annie’s
father, Francis, was listed as a coal merchant.
In 1871, the Goodman
family are living in Leicester, on what looks to be High Cross Street, where
Annie is a housewife, son John is a scholar, but everyone else in the property
is a carriage builder! This includes, Thomas, and Thomas’s brother,
William aged 22 (although listed as his son) and boarders, John Wilson aged 40,
William Clarke, aged 22, John Bloxham, aged 18, William Dummdon(?) aged 16, and
Thomas Swift, also 16.
The following year, Thomas and Annie’s second son, William T.
Goodman was born, followed by the birth of their daughter, Martha Annie
Goodman. By 1876, Thomas has returned to Loughborough, and is listed in a directory
as a coach builder on Devonshire Square. Son James A. Goodman is born the
following year, and the birth of Florence Mary Goodman comes in 1879. In 1881
the family – parents Thomas and Annie, John aged 17, William aged 9, Martha
aged 7, James aged 4, and Florence aged 2, are living in Fishpool Head, where
Thomas and John are carriage builders.
In 1891, Thomas and Annie are living at 17 Cattle Market,
with three of their children – William, James, and Florence. Thomas is a coach
builder, but William is listed in the census as a coach builder and a photographer.
In 1901 the same members of the family are still living in the property on
Cattle Market, but have been rejoined by Martha, and all the male family members
are now carriage builders, with Thomas, the father, listed as an employer. A
trade directory for 1901-2 lists J. Goodman as a carriage builder in Cattle
Market.
In December 1905, Annie Goodman, aged 69, dies, and her death
is followed in 1910 by that of Thomas Goodman, at the age of 75.
In 1911, Martha Annie aged 37, was a governess at
Southgate House, Sittingbourne Road, in Maidstone, with the Chapman family – Captain
Harry Ernest, father, Catherine Harriette Jessie, mother, and children Kathleen
Violet aged 7, and Doreen Mary aged 5. Meanwhile, Florence and brother James
were still living at 17 Cattle Market, where James was a coach builder, employing
workers. The census enumerator seems a little confused as the pair are first
listed as son and daughter of the head of the household (presumably they still
considered themselves to be children of Thomas, who had only recently died),
but then scribbles out the marital status which had been correctly listed for
each of them as ‘single’, to Head and Wife.
A trade directory of 1912 has two entries for Goodman coach
builders: one is Goodman and Savage, carriage builders on 22 Leicester Road,
the other is William Goodman, coach builder at 17 Cattle Market.
In 1920, John Goodman died aged 55, and at some point, some
of the family move to 12 York Road. In June 1933, it is reported that Florence suffered
a breakdown, and died on 26 April 1934. Martha aged 64, and brother James aged
62 are listed in the 1939 register as living at 12 York Road, and James’s occupation
is coach painter.
James died on 11 September 1951, in Loughborough General
Hospital at the age of 73. He was living at 12 York Road, and probate was
granted on 11 October to Martha, the effects being £110. James’s death was
followed by that of William in 1959 at the age of 88, and Martha in 1961 at the
age of 86.
So, three of Thomas and Annie Goodman’s offspring lived well
into their old age, but two, John and Florence died in their mid-50s. What
happened to John, I do not know, but Florence’s death in 1934 was reported in
the local newspapers. Here’s the report from the ‘Nottingham Journal’ of
Friday 27 April 1934:
“LEFT HOME IN NIGHT ATTIRE. TRAGIC LOUGHBOROUGH INQUEST
STORY. SISTER’S ORDEAL BY SICK BED.
The tragic story of how a Loughborough spinster went from her
home in the middle of the night, clad only in her night attire, to a brook over
a mile away, and drowned herself in twelve inches of water, was related at an
inquest at the Loughborough hospidal yesterday. The Coroner for North
Leicestershire, (Mr. H.J. Deane) recorded a verdict of “suicide by drowning while
of an unsound state of mind” on Miss Florence Mary Goodman (54), 12 York Road,
Loughborough, whose body was found in a shallow brook in Burton Walks, one of
Loughborough’s beauty spots, early yesterday.
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| The Grammar School Brook 2022 |
A sister of the dead woman, Miss Martha Anne Goodman, said
she and her sister attended a brother who was lying ill in bed at their home.
He required constant attention, and witness and her sister took it in turns to
look after him. On Wednesday night at about midnight, witness was in her brother’s
room when deceased came in and said in a perfectly normal and calm voice: “Thank
you for the flowers, the hot water bottle and a comfortable bed. I am going to
put myself under a train, or drown myself.”
Miss Martha then heard her go out and the front door close. “I
did not realise what she was doing,” witness continued, “I was dazed and she
had nothing on but her night attire. I jumped up and put on my dressing gown
and ran to the gate and called to a neighbour [Mr Grundy]. It was impossible
for me to leave my brother.”
Witness said her sister had a breakdown last June. She was
attended by a doctor and recovered, but after going away for a period she became
worse again. It had been a very big strain to look after her brother and they got very little sleep.
P.C. Allen said he found Miss Goodman lying on her back in a
brook, the water of which was about twelve inches deep and just flowed over her
face.
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| The Grammar School Brook |
The coroner characterised the case as an extraordinarily sad
one of a woman of nervous disposition and temperament who had to take her share
in nursing a sick brother.
“Her sister was faced with a very difficult situation of
having to decide between a brother lying in bed and a sister who was apparently
going to end her own life,” Mr Deane added.
“I sympathise with Miss Goodman in the position she was
placed, and I am glad to know that she did the right thing by calling up a
neighbour.” ”
I have made enquiries, but have been unable to identify a brook
called the Burton Walks Brook, in Loughborough, but given the lcoation of Burton
Walks, and its proximity to what is known as the Grammar School Brook, I have
concluded that this sad event occurred in the Grammar School Brook.
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| Location of the Grammar School Brook |
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