1800s: Pubs shops and homes side by side

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Nicola Rippon takes an in-depth look at Derby’s 1841 Census returns and meets the occupants of Queen Street, Sadler Gate, the Wardwick, Victoria Street and Friar Gate.

In 1841, Queen Street was home to several inns, one of particular note being the Bull’s Head, run by Hannah King. Today, there is little trace of this hostelry, since the inn was demolished in 1940 to allow for the expansion of Full Street.

However, the outline of the building is still visible on the side of St Michael’s House, the building that it once adjoined.

The licensee of the nearby Nottingham Castle was Francis King, most probably a relative of Hannah’s, since many Derby families became associated with several different pubs.

Next door, Samuel Morley ran the Devonshire Arms. On land now occupied by the swimming baths stood William Langdon’s Tiger Inn and, at the top of Queen Street, the Acorn Inn invited local drinkers through its doors.

John Flamsteed lived at the Acorn in Queen Street, Derby

Run by publican Thomas Gregory, the Acorn occupied a section of one of Derby’s most historic buildings. Once home to Denby-born Astronomer Royal John Flamsteed and scientist and clockmaker John Whitehurst, it was here, some 70 years earlier, that American statesman Benjamin Franklin had visited his friend Whitehurst.

Artist Joseph Wright later rented the property and it eventually became the home and business of clockmaker John Smith.

Sadler Gate, by contrast, was home to more mundane, yet essential businesses like that run by the Keeling family, who were labourers and silk weavers, and their neighbour, John Halbord, a bell hanger whose services would have been vital to all the parish churches in the town.

In 1841, Sadler Gate would have been a chaotic mix of people making barrels, creating pots and baking breads. Here, too, were charwomen, cork cutters and cordwainers who traditionally fashioned leather and were, by the 19th century, largely upmarket shoemakers.

William Fearn and Hugh Shaw, two chimney sweeps, lived in Sadler Gate, as did John Cope and his nine-year-old son. They were fishmongers and, according to a contemporary directory, Cope senior also ran an oyster room and sold beer.

Some of the properties were very cramped. In one small property, Henry Fearn, a tailor, lived with his wife, Ann, sons Joseph, Henry and William, and daughters Amelia, Eliza, Mary and Catherine.

There were pubs there, too, among them the Bell, the Horse and Jockey, run by John Tunnicliffe, and the Shakespeare, owned by Ralph Smith.

Joseph Thoma ran his clockmaking business from premises there and, just across Sadler Gate Bridge, on Bold Lane, another clockmaker, the splendidly named Digby Shipley, traded.

Around the corner in the Wardwick there were many large houses, several of which had been converted to business premises, like that occupied by Robert Foreman, where he and his son, also named Robert, ran a hop and seed merchants.

Nearby lived Henry Bates, a stone mason, Richard and Mary Stone, who were provision dealers, and Elizabeth Waddams, a grocer.

Several other Wardwick houses, however, had maintained a residential use. The much-respected Rev Roseingrave Macklin, after whom two of Derby’s streets would be named, was the 45-year-old vicar of Christ Church, on Normanton Road.

One of Derby’s newest churches, it had been erected largely to provide pastoral care for the quickly-expanding housing districts in that part of the town. Macklin lived on the Wardwick with his six daughters, Martha, Charlotte, Sophia, Rosina, Jemima and Francis, as well as two servants.

Next door, at the house we now know as the “Jacobean House”, lived Francis Jessop, a 50-year-old attorney, and his family and servants.

Elsewhere in the house lived Michael Keane. Unfortunately, the lack of clarity of the enumerator’s handwriting makes it impossible to establish Keane’s profession.

Elsewhere on the Wardwick lived surgeons George Lamb and George Rowland, with apprentice Mark Bromley; and builder Thomas Gadsby, who lived there with his wife, four sons, one daughter and a servant.

Next door to them lived Enoch Gadsby, a shoemaker, and Joseph Gadsby, a labourer.

Beside this house was Gadsby’s Wood Yard in which lived William White, a 35-year-old “port boy”, and his wife, Eliza, maltster Thomas Barker and wire worker Thomas Torr. Other Torrs, presumably members of his family, worked in the same trade in Bold Lane, producing wire mesh and grills.

Other shops and businesses in the Wardwick included a tailor, a cutler and a dressmaker.

At the end of the Wardwick and the beginning of Victoria Street stood the Sir Walter Scott Inn. Unfortunately, the enumerator seemed to find the boundary between the two streets somewhat fluid.

He lists the hostelry on Victoria Street, while contemporary directories place it on the Wardwick. Either way, the licensee in 1841 was Robert Carson whose son, John, was a painter’s apprentice

On Victoria Street, by which name it had been known for only four years, lived Henry Mozley, junior. A 35-year-old solicitor, he also served as a coroner. John Walker, a 65-year-old printer, and his wife, Sarah, lived in the same house, and may have worked for Mozley’s father who ran a printing business.

Near neighbours Thomas Brearey, an auctioneer, and Francis Eames, a pawnbroker, catered for the differing needs of Derby’s diverse social classes.

Thomas Cooper, described as a “gentleman”, lived with two female servants near William Gregory who, in the census, is described as a “laceman”.

In fact, Gregory ran a warehouse for overseas lace in which baby linens and embroidered Scottish muslin was stored. He had nine young women in his employ.

Another neighbour was George Broadhurst, a “tin man”, or tin plate worker, who had a lodger, William Ewart, a Scottish draper.

Even though the Improvement Commission had largely redeveloped Victoria Street, many small courts remained and here lived yet more weavers and labourers.

One Derby street that was yet to be “improved” by the town’s Victorian fathers was Friar Gate. In 1841, the Great Northern Railway had yet to slice through one of the town’s most elegant streets. Here was a varied mixture of grand houses and artisans’ cottages.

At the St Werburgh’s end of Friar Gate lived Joseph Chadfield and his family. A bookseller, printer, stationer and paper bag merchant, Chadfield also ran a musical repository. Nearby, Samuel Bull ran the register office for servants and Bernard Bretnor and John Swanwick were grocers.

Then, as now, Friar Gate was well known for its pubs. At the Fox and Goose lived publican Mary Cave along with James Cooper, a 70-year-old gardener called John Bennet, his wife, Dorothy, and their daughter, Harriet.

On the opposite side of the road, at No 114, stood the Rising Sun Inn. Rebuilt in the late 19th century and known today as the Bishop Blaise, the inn was then an ancient cruck-framed structure run by 30-year-old William Rowley and his wife, Alice, who lived there with their young children, Ann and William, and Emma Roberts, a servant.

The Rowleys were another of Derby’s well-established publican families. In 1841, William’s mother, Sarah, ran the Stag and Pheasant on Lower Brook Street, where William’s sisters, Elizabeth and Frances, were assistants.

His eldest son, five-year-old George, was listed at the Stag and Pheasant where, presumably, his grandmother or aunts were babysitting him that night.

On the same side of the road, and later to be demolished for the building of Friargate Station, stood the fabled Old White Horse Inn, where the licensee, John Taylor, lived with his wife, Elizabeth, and his three children Agnes, Edwin and William.

An eight-month-old baby in 1841, William would later take over the inn with his wife, Ann. After his death, Ann would marry William Rowley, in 1841 just 11 months old and living at the Rising Sun Inn.

The Old White Horse was surrounded by a number of labourers’ cottages and by several large private residences that were typical of Friar Gate.

Living in houses that had been built on the old Nuns Green area were several wealthy Derbeians including, at No 42 Friar Gate, Mary, Grace and Elizabeth Palmer, three unmarried sisters who ran an academy for young ladies with the help of an assistant, Charlotte Jacob.

Next door lived John Jones, a surgeon, his apprentice, William Tindals, servants Mary Haslam, Elizabeth Dean, and Ann Brown, described as being of independent means.

At 44 Friar Gate, there appears something of an anomaly. Just as large and impressive as the houses that surrounded it, on the night of June 6-7, 1841, it appears to have been home to only one family – that of an Irish hawker, possibly named Figis McParlm.

At No 45, Richard Willoughby, schoolmaster, lived with his children, Somina, Richard junior, Henry and Susanna.

At 46, which until recent years hid the bulk of the local tax office, was William Baker’s silk mill.

The Friar Gate part of Nuns Green was intended only for residential use, so an elegant frontage was built to disguise the mill.

At the Ashbourne Road end of Friar Gate, beside the Greyhound Inn, in a rather grand house, was physician Thomas Bent, who lived with his sisters, Eliza and Maria, his daughter, Emma, and six servants.

Between this house and the Old White Horse stood a few small mansions, many poor quality, but very ancient homes, and several businesses.

A little closer to town, at number 99, lived William Wallis, a coach proprietor, and, at 103, attorney Benjamin Frear.

The Friary, by far Friar Gate’s biggest mansion, was home to printer Henry Mozley, with his wife, Jane, sons John and Charles, daughters Maria, Ann and Fanny, and no less than five servants.

For those less fortunate people who were unable to spend the night of the census in a home of their own, there were certain important, if sometimes unsatisfactory, provisions.

At the Derbyshire Infirmary, master John Rimmington, his wife, Ellen, the hospital matron, and Richard Dix, the house surgeon, did all they could to make the lives of their staff and patients comfortable.

With two porters, five nurses and four female servants, they took care of more than 30 patients, most of whom, it seemed, were textile workers or agricultural labourers from just outside the town.

Perhaps less delicate care was provided at the notorious lunatic asylum on Green Lane. Here Thomas Fisher, surgeon-in-residence, together with two matrons, clergyman William Banks, a nurse, a cook, a laundress and two male servants, took care of the inmates who came from varied backgrounds and classes, from a housewife and a groom to a merchant and a clergyman.

Yet, perhaps the most pitiful Derbeians in 1841 were those resident at the workhouse on Osmaston Road, in premises now occupied by Royal Crown Derby.

As was usual for such an institution, Derby’s new workhouse, established in 1837, had a governor, William Webster, a matron, his wife, Ann, and a considerable staff comprising governess, schoolmaster and cook, all of whom remained resident overnight.

Many people came to the workhouse because they had become too poor, too ill, or too old to provide for themselves, and had no family wealthy enough to take care of them.

They had to apply before a committee for permission to enter the institution and conditions were designed so that it would become a last, rather than a first, resort for those in need.

Each of those resident in the workhouse were desperate cases – no one with another choice would make such a decision.

Some 33 of the residents were over the age of 60 while 11 were under 20. For families forced to enter the workhouse, life was particularly harsh.

After law changes in 1834, inmates were usually divided into categories according to sex, age and ability.

This meant that entire families could be split apart, even though they resided in the same building. Parents were usually permitted a short daily meeting with their children.

There were many infants, several apparently orphaned, like one-year-old Sarah Farnsworth and two-year-old Edward Dawson.

Some children had entered with their mothers, since many unmarried pregnant women, disowned by their families, found the workhouse their only refuge.

Although it was theoretically possible for any inmate to leave the workhouse, most would remain there indefinitely, and we can never know the fate that befell one young baby.

Aged just one, she was apparently abandoned and is listed simply “A Foundling”.

It is often tempting to romanticise bygone eras and, certainly, the mid-19th century offered a comfortable enough life for those fortunate to have been born into wealthy families, or even to have acquired the skills and wherewithal to establish their own, albeit small, businesses.

However, the 1841 Census reveals that life in Derby could, for many of the town’s residents, be difficult, harsh and cruel.

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