John’s search brings a “eureka moment”

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John Dallison, from Derby Local Studies Library, reveals the story of his own “eureka moment” during a search through his family history.

I BEGAN family history reluctantly, feeling that the pursuit was both eccentric and morbid. Also, there was very little help or advice for novices in those days. In the mid 1970s “ancestor hunting” was a minority sport!

Luckily, though, a neighbour told me about Derby Local Studies Library. Local Studies was housed in the Central Library at that time. There weren’t such things as CD-ROMs or the internet in those days, of course.

The place had very few machines for viewing microfilms or microfiches. But the knowledgeable members of staff were friendly and there was an impressive collection of red boxes containing the “name index”.

I was amazed to find that the index held more than a few entries for my own surname. According to one entry, “Mrs Dallison – a widow” had been buried in St Peter’s Churchyard in 1669.

That seemed to be the earliest reference to the family in Derby. I then read index-slip after slip recording infant deaths in the 18th century and I felt overwhelmed by the harshness of the past – by the thought of so many brief, shadowy lives lived out in the grim old town.

I was on the verge of abandoning the whole family history project when I found an entry for a Mary Dallison, which stated that she had been the mother of William Billingsley.

The past suddenly came excitingly alive, for Billingsley was one of the most gifted china painters England has produced and I had long admired the splendid examples of his work in Derby Museum. But I knew nothing about his life and ancestry.

According to the painter’s biographers, Mary married William Billingsley snr in St Werburgh’s Church, Derby, in 1757.

He had worked as a china painter at the Chelsea factory in London.

William jnr, the eldest of their six children, was born the following year.

William snr was among the first painters employed by William Duesbury at his new china factory in Nottingham Road, Derby.

As well as his job at the china works, William snr appears to have been a bit of a wheeler-dealer.

He owned the Sir John Falstaff Inn on Bridge Gate and ran an enamel-button warehouse.

Sadly, however, he died in 1770 when his eldest son was only 12 years old. Poor Mary had to take on the running of the inn and the raising of her family.

The widowed mother apprenticed young William to Duesbury in September 1774 at the Nottingham Road factory which was conveniently close to their home.

The highly skilled artists, along with modellers, were among the workforce’s elite, being comparatively well paid.

But they had to work long hours under considerable pressure and they often found the novel factory system’s regimentation hard to accept.

They were also surrounded by toxic pigments and other industrial dangers. In their precious leisure time, many of the apprentices fished by the River Derwent or played football.

Some of the young men became heavy drinkers, however, for china factory work was hot and dusty.

William’s early painting was highly accomplished and he possessed undoubted talent, but he had not yet become a true master of his art.

He married Sarah Rigley in 1780. Then, in 1783, Zachariah Boreman arrived in Derby. He had worked at Chelsea, was 20 years older than William and was an artist of the first rank.

Boreman became William’s friend and mentor. He showed William the “wiping out” process of painting flowers on china and taught him the art of landscape painting. The two men also experimented in the production of porcelain.

William became the factory’s chief flower-painter. His finest work at Derby was produced between 1790 and 1796.

He was ambitious and creative but was not a good businessman. With the backing of John Coke, he set up a factory at Pinxton. Unhappily, it failed financially.

He got into debt and had to seek work at various china factories in England and Wales.

His prolonged wanderings, while his wife remained in Derby, and the fact that he changed his name more than once have led some biographers to suggest that he was a rogue and, possibly, a bigamist.

Undoubtedly, William was a troubled man; a man whose great talent could not save him from ultimate poverty.

He died at Coalport in 1828 and was buried in a pauper’s grave. Happily, though, his sublime works are his memorial.

So much for the gifted son; what about the mother who raised him? During the 30 years that sped by since I came across that index-slip and had my “eureka moment”, I never managed to prove Mary’s connection with my own silk-working Dallison ancestors.

Yet, I shall always remain grateful that Mary and her eldest son made family history, and Derby’s history, come alive for me.

Nowadays, so very much is available for family historians. There is a super-abundance of websites and there are entertaining mainstream television programmes such as Who Do You Think You Are?

Yet, isn’t there a danger that such convenient things will lead some novice family historians to expect to uncover their whole ancestry in an instant, without effort?

Let us hope the danger is averted, that new researchers learn to take things slowly and that they are able to enjoy their own “eureka moments”.

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This article is from the Derby Evening Telegraph and is reproduced online here.