Update on Joseph Limb

This week we needed to visit an Ikea store and it seemed like a good idea to go to the Nottingham one which is actually at Giltbrook and very close to Awsworth, Eastwood, and Ilkeston all places my ancestors have lived and worked. Toying with the idea of finding out where my great great grandfather Joseph Limb might be buried (see my previous post) I looked on the website of the Archives at Nottingham. On looking up Awsworth St Peter's I found that their records were also in the libraries at Beeston and Eastwood. As Eastwood is just a few miles from Ikea the decision was made. A quick telephone call was all that was needed to find out that a - they had the burials records from 1900 onwards and b - I could book a microfiche reader.

When we arrived we went straight upstairs to the Local Studies area and found the fiches I wanted to look at. I picked the first fiche and placed it in the machine. Imagine my shock when the first thing I saw was the address where my great great grandfather died - I had found the entry of his burial without even manipulating and searching the fiche - I was certainly meant to find the entry that day!

We left Eastwood and called at Awsworth before setting off for home. Although there isn't a memorial stone with an inscription it was nice to think that at last we had found where Joseph and Alice Limb were buried.

A Return to Awsworth

After a few months of inactivity as far as family history research is concerned, this week, I was galvanised into action by not one but two e-mails from people about ancestors on my mother's side of the family. One of them introduced me to some fascinating on-line information, of which more in another post. The second brought about a chain of events that led to one of those eureka moments you get when researching your family tree.

My great great grandmother Alice Limb (nee Reeve) was born in Awsworth in 1835 - see my post Reeves in Awsworth for more details of her early life. She died in Shirebrook, Derbyshire on 17th April 1903 at the age of 68. According to her death certificate she died from bronchitis and heart failure. After our joint success in finding the final resting place of our great grandmother Celia - see my post Desperately Seeking Celia - my fellow detective and I had not been so lucky in finding out where Alice was buried, for, although she died at Shirebrook, she certainly wasn't buried there.


After receiving an e-mail earlier this week from said fellow detective who had still been gnawing at the bone of Alice's whereabouts I started messing around on line and, for some reason returned to the Rootsweb lists that I had been a member of several years ago but had given up on because the amount of e-mails I was receiving each day got too much to cope with. Anyway, I went to browse the 'Nottsgen' mailing list and saw some e-mails from September this year concerning burials at Awsworth St Peter's Church. One of the e-mails was headed burials at St Peter's, Awsworth 1902/3. I scanned down the list of names and there was the name Alice Limb! Could it be our Alice? I contacted the person who had put the list on the message board and she replied almost immediately - yes, it was Alice Limb of Shirebrook who had died on 17th April 1903. So now we know where she was buried and given the story of Celia Limb I don't know why we hadn't thought of it before. Or perhaps we had but for some reason discounted it, anyway - at last Alice was found. A quick visit to the church by my fellow detective hadn't revealed a headstone for Alice but it did one for her parents so she may be somewhere in the same area of the churchyard.

The next step of the research is to find out if there is a plan of the churchyard so we can find out exactly where in the churchyard Alice's grave is situated and then to find out if our great great grandfather Joseph Limb was taken there to be buried with her. He died in December 1914 in Nottingham and a friend of a friend had already very kindly done a search in the Archives of the Nottingham Cemetery databases for his burial and found nothing. I get the feeling that Joseph will be found with or near Alice at Awsworth St Peter's - so onwards to the next bit of research - I'll let you know what we find.

Where Ancestors Lived

I'm fairly lucky in that my ancestors came mostly from the East Midlands so I am able to visit the places where they used to live. We've driven along the A6007 between Ilkeston and Heanor many times but I hadn't realised that this road was also Hassock Lane and that is where some of my ancestors lived in the mid nineteenth century.

The sign above is just beyond the Shipley Garden centre and almost opposite Pit Lane which presumably led to the colliery where my great great grandfather worked when he lived on Hassock Lane - in later years this area was the site of a theme park called The American Adventure - now closed.

As you can see from the garden centre most of the buildings and houses along this road are fairly modern ones - the earliest dating from 1898 with just one house built in the 1860s which may have been familiar with my ancestors. There is nothing left to give any impression of what the houses in which they lived would have been like but I'm guessing they would have been little terraced cottages of some kind.

As you can see from the copy of the 1861 census for Shipley my great great grandfather Joseph Limb, born in Shipley, Derbyshire in 1837 is at the top of the page. Not long after the census was taken the Limbs moved to Staveley in Derbyshire because my great grandfather William Edward Limb was born there in 1863.

Of further interest on Hassock Lane, and living on her own, close to Joseph Limb is his mother Mary Limb.

Here is a report from the Derbyshire Times of Saturday 8th December 1860 about the use of Safety Lamps at Shipley Colliery. This incident would perhaps have taken place whilst Joseph Limb was working there.

'On Friday last, the 30th. of November, a very large outburst of gas took place in the floor of the Hard Coal seam at Shipley Colliery, which filled a large area of the working with explosive gas, for several hours, notwithstanding that a current of air of several thousand cubic feet was passing per minute. Safety lamps have been used to light this colliery upwards of four years. Had an exposed light been in use, or had there been one defective safety lamp in that part of the mine, a most appalling explosion must have occurred carrying death and destruction before it throughout the mine. When the workmen observed the indications of gas in the lamps, they cautiously withdrew from the mine. On the following day, Saturday, the gas had cleared away. It is gratifying for us to make known the above facts, which add another instance of the inestimable value of safety lamps; when Messrs. Woodhouse and Jeffcock, the mining engineers at the colliery, must feel highly satisfied with having introduced them. We have made the above remarks from having noticed that three explosions have occurred at collieries in South Wales, from an improper use of safety lamps. We repeat what we have often stated, that many valuable lives may be saved by a proper use of safety lamps.'

During the 1850s and 1860s the Shipley Colliery was owned by the Munday family who also owned the estate at Shipley Hall, now the site of Shipley Country Park.

Working Ancestors

Most of my ancestors, like at lot of people's I expect, were either coal miners or they worked on the land. There are some exceptions down the years; my great great grandfather Alexander Young was a tailor. My great great grandfather Edward Matthews was a saddle maker. Another great great grandfather, Robert Hodgetts, worked in a brass foundry and another one, William Stubbs was a farmer of 63 acres. I always find the Census entries about people's employment fascinating as it helps to build up a background, not only of the person themselves, but of the area they lived in.

In the case of my Gough family from Newhall in Derbyshire the area they lived in was noted for both its coal and pottery industries. As you know from previous posts I have a huge 'brick wall' in my 4x great grandfather Thomas Gough. I found from a newspaper article that he came to Newhall in the 18th century, according to one of his great grandsons Jabez Gough, from the Forest of Dean ' a prospecter with a gang of men who went around with him sinking small shafts and working as far as they could go.' He also left to his family a collection of Gresley Hall pottery - see the picture below taken from an article by Joe Woodford in the Burton Mail of April 2nd 1960.

In the article Mr Gough says that his great grandfather was also 'a collector of antiquities and doubtless came across the Gresley Ware in that way.' Now I wonder about this? Thomas Gough came to the area as an 'adventurer' - his job would be to find rich coal seams and interest entrepreneurs in opening them up. The first record of him being in Newhall is his marriage at St Peter's Church, Stapenhill in 1789. About eight years later, when Thomas is settled in Newhall with a young family, Sir Nigel Gresley of Gresley Hall was opening up a small coal mine linked to a pottery kiln where he attempted, unsuccesfully, to make porcelain. Is there a connection here? Did Thomas Gough work for Sir Nigel Gresley opening up the mine and did he receive a gift of china in lieu of or as well as payment? I wonder? I doubt he would have been rich enough to buy it.

Thomas's grandson William Gough was involved in the pottery industry. Most of his brothers, including my great great grandfather were coal miners, one was a blacksmith, another a grocer and rate collector and one became a tea dealer and moved into Lancashire. The only information about William I have is from Parish Records, Census Returns and Trade Directories but these can tell us quite a lot.

William was born about 1828 the son of Benjamin and Hannah Gough of Newhall, Derbyshire. On the 1851 Census he is a coal miner but by the 1861 census he is a potter. What caused this change of direction? He is now married; has this been the cause of his career change? Perhaps his wife, Louisa came from a family of pottery workers? By 1871, still living in Newhall, he has a second wife, the first having died and he is now a Manager of a Potworks. In the household are his three young children and a lodger one John Beacall who is also listed as Manager of a Potworks. I learned from a source at The Magic Attic in Swadlincote that in the 1870s William Gough went into partnership with brothers Josiah and Herbert Till and in the Post Office Directory of Derbyshire 1876 they are listed as:-

'Till and Gough, manufacturers of ironstone cane ware, buff and Rockingham ware, Common Side Pottery.'

I'm guessing that Common Side is the address of the pottery works as there is still a Common Road in Church Gresley near Gresley Common and the factory was apparently opposite what is now the Maurice Lea Memorial Park.

Josiah and Herbert Till were the sons of Herbert and Mary Till who moved from Stoke-on-Trent to Newhall. In 1861 Mary gives her birthplace as Etruria, Staffs. Etruria was the village built by Josiah Wedgwood I for his factory workers, hence her calling one of her sons Josiah, perhaps?

By 1881 William and his wife Elizabeth, sister of Josiah Till's wife Mary, are living at Coppice Side, Church Gresley and William is now a Pot Manufacturer employing 11 men and 10 women. There are entries for Till and Gough in Kelly's directories for the years 1881, 1887 and 1891 and on the Census of 1891 William Gough is still listed as an Earthenware Manufacturer. By the time of the 1895 directory the pottery is no longer listed, this may be because William died in 1894. He was buried on Friday 9th February 1894 at Emmanuel Church, Swadlincote. In 1901 Elizabeth Gough, now a widow, is living in Swadlincote and the Till and Gough factory is no more.

A Simple Spelling Error

I mentioned in my recent post on searching the 1911 census that on one side of my family, great grandparents were missing. Well, now they are found. I knew the family should have been on Maypole Hill, Newhall as they were there in 1901 and my great grandmother died there in 1915 but I didn't have a house number. By searching for Maypole Hill, Newhall I'd found that only odd numbered houses had been transcribed. I e-mailed the help team on the 1911 site to enquire if some houses had been missed in the transcription and I had a response and enquiry number retuned immediately along with a promise that they would look into my query and respond in a couple of days. In the meantime I decided to look again at the 1901 census on ancestry and I'm glad I did because I discovered that there was a house number after all. Number 3. I returned to the 1911 site and brought up the transcription for that household, and there they were as Gaugh instead of Gough. There is a button available on the transcript to report any errors so I gave them my findings. Not long after I received an e-mail saying that the transcription had been sorted and that they were pleased to see I had answered the query for myself. Wonderful - someone had actually, not only sorted my query out but had the gumption to put two and two together and realise both queries related to the same problem. Pretty good service I would say.

Questions, Questions

All Saints Church, Dilhorne, Oct 2004

My great, great grandmother Rosanna Chell was born in 1824, in Newhall, Derbyshire to Mary Chell, a servant. Rosanna was illegitimate and so were her brothers Samuel and Daniel. Mary later married a man called William Street and they had a son Thomas. Rosanna married my great, great grandfather Benjamin Gough in 1841 and died, after giving birth to 6 children over the ensuing years, in 1858 at the very young age of 34. Not so uncommon for that time when childbirth was a lottery and could, quite easily end in death for either the mother or the child and often both.

Rosanna's mother Mary is a mystery. She had 3 illegitimate children. Did these children have the same father or different ones? She was a servant - in a large household perhaps? Did something happen here? Who knows? Would she have been judged harshly in the 1820s for having these three children? I'm sure she would have been.

On the 1871 census, by now a widow, Mary gives her place of birth as Dilhorn, Staffordshire. This village is not far from where I live now and there are Chells buried in the churchyard there. Would Mary have moved to Newhall for work perhaps. Did she go alone or did the whole family move away from Staffordshire? Did she move with the father of her children? It would be interesting to see if there are any Settlement Records for the period. Or if there are any Bastardy Bonds pertaining to one or all of her children. Will there be other parish records regarding claims for parish relief, baby clothing or lying-in requirements? If I want to follow this line of enquiry any further then I have to return to the Derbyshire Records Office at Matlock to do some more searching.

Searching the 1911 Census

The 1911 Census has been released for some parts of England, including the areas I'm interested in so, as I said in my last post that I'd have to wait for the 1911 census to find out more about my great grandmother Celia Limb, I found I didn't have as long to wait as I thought I would.

For the moment I've only been looking at the transcripts rather than the original pages because it is a lot cheaper but there is lots of information to be gleaned from these. As with previous census returns you can find out all people in the household, their ages, marital status, place of birth and occupations. A new addition is the number of years married. For instance on the entry for my great grandparents Thomas and Sarah Ann Edwards it states that they had been married for 36 years. Also, with this census, you get a clearer address for where they lived.

I found the site quick and easy to use. I was already registered on Find My Past (Link on my side panel) and I just had to purchase some credits on-line and the searching began.

Rather disconcertingly one set of my great grandparents is missing. I know they were still alive and that they were buried in Newhall, Derbyshire and had lived there all their lives but they don't appear on any searches I've done so far. I doubt they were missed out or that they had travelled very far from home so I expect that it is a spelling or handwriting issue and that they are hidden somewhere, with the computer unable to find them.

Back to Celia. Her children are living at 30 Warren Terrace, Shirebrook. The eldest is 23 and considered to be head of the household. The youngest is 9 years old. So where was Celia? Yet again she has thrown up a mystery as I eventually found her visiting a family by the name of Edwards - no relation to the Edwards I mentioned earlier as they were on my father's side of the family and Celia is on my mother's side - in Attercliffe, Sheffield. I've found on the list of mourners at my great-grandfather's funeral a Mr Edwards of Sheffield, so I'm guessing this must be the same one and that they were friends of the family rather than relatives. There are also other morners from Woodhouse, Sheffield so there must have been some connection with Sheffield somewhere.

Interestingly, Celia's future second husband is lodging with my grandparents. Also in that household was my Aunt Gladys, aged 4. The photo below shows my grandmother Florence Limb with my Aunt Gladys which looks to have been taken around 1911 or 1912.