Tippity Green – Page 2 – rowleyregislosthamlets.co.uk

Pubs in the Lost Hamlets – The Portway Tavern

Taverns, inns, beerhouses and pubs have been in – indeed central to – our towns and villages for many centuries. The start of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, dating from 1387, begins with the pilgrims gathered at the Tabard Inn in Southwark, prior to their setting out on their pilgrimage, and doubtless there would have been many other such houses on busy routes such as existed then.

In smaller settlements some pubs were little more than drinking clubs in an ordinary house, rather than specially built institutions. Many families brewed their own ale for home consumption and many pubs did the same. (Brewed ale was safer than water often because it had been heated in the brewing process.) These successful brewers probably expanded to supply other houses and pubs, especially if it was known as a particularly good brew, big breweries did not exist until relatively recently. Some inns will have started as lodgings for monasteries and religious houses which probably moved seamlessly to independent provision after the Dissolution of the Monasteries and many hostelries, in cities, towns and on major routes will have acted as lodging places for travellers. Others will have developed as places for workmen to get a much needed drink on their way home from dry, dusty or dirty work. The Portway Tavern certainly is on record as having fulfilled this function for the quarry workers from the nearby quarry and some of the other functions from time to time, such as being the venue for inquests.

But formal countrywide legislation to regulate the operation of such places did not reach the statute book until 1753 when the Licensing Act inaugurated the recording of full registers of victuallers, to be kept by the Clerk of the Peace at Quarter Sessions.

In 1830 a Beer Act was passed whereby, upon payment of 2 guineas to the Excise, people could sell Beer, Ale, Porter, Cider and Perry without a formal license from the Licensing Justices and many of the smaller beer houses in the Rowley area fell under this category and were not permitted to sell stronger liquors.

The Licensing Act of 1872 remains in force today and it is illegal to be drunk in charge of a horse, cow or a steam engine. Other modes of transport have been included in later legislation! The Pub History Society tells us that “Under the Act some drinkers became infamous “bona fide travellers”, who could be served outside of normal trading hours. Travelling in good faith meant that you should not be “travelling for the purpose of taking refreshment”, but you could be “one who goes into an inn for refreshment in the course of a journey, whether of business or pleasure”. While people posing as travellers were regularly charged and prosecuted, it was difficult to prosecute licensees who had a handy escape clause in the law. To find the publican guilty, the prosecution had to prove that the licensee did not “honestly believe” that his customer was a bona fide traveller when serving outside of normal opening hours.” ^[i]

The Portway Tavern

The Tavern was, I am told, situated at the foot of Turner’s Hill, facing the road that went up and over the hill and the entrance to the Hailstone Quarry. As can be seen from this photograph, the proximity to the quarrying operations continued to the end. There were several houses around and behind the Tavern, in addition to a Brewhouse and other outbuildings. Some census entries call it the Portway Inn. Some do not even record the name at all.

This map from 1918 shows a ‘P.H.’ at Perry’s Lake, which was obviously the Portway Tavern but I am still not quite sure which building it was in those clusters of cottages. Probably one of the two corner buildings, I suspect and I am inclined to think that it was the building to the right of the new road leading down to Portway. That has several outbuildings and access to a yard which would fit with both the description at the time of the sale and the site described in the prosecution. But someone may put me right on that. It also shows the Rowley Brewery in Tippity Green and how close they were to each other.

Hitchmough records that the Portway Tavern was licensed from some point before 1849, his first names licensee was James Adshead Levett Snr, in whose family occupation it remained until it was sold after Mrs Sarah Perry who was the daughter of James Adshead Levett Junior, gave up the licence in about 1901.

But situated as it was, directly on the route which later became the toll road from Halesowen to Dudley, it seems very likely to me that a beerhouse or hostelry which later became known as the Portway Tavern existed there in some form well before licensing came into force.

The Licensing system was operated by the local magistrates and there was a Licensing Session annually when licences were renewed or not, sometimes, if the applicant had offended against the licensing laws in the meantime in which case he might lose his licence, a serious consideration. There are numerous reports in the contemporary newspapers of these sessions and in each case any offences which had been committed by the Licencee were listed, whether for exceeding licensing hours, permitting drunkenness or gambling or other instances the police reported on. There are also reports in most years that I have seen these reports of the landlords of ‘beer houses’ wanting to upgrade their licence to a full licence so that they could sell wines and spirits in addition to beer but these seemed mostly to be refused and this was obviously carefully controlled.

The Black Country Bugle, in 2003, published an article by Peter Goddard on ‘Tippetty Green and the Tromans Family and Rowley Quarries’, saying:

“Quarrymen were hard workers and hard drinkers. The Portway Tavern was the first port of call after a long shift, due to its closer proximity to the quarries. It had a small bar with a low ceiling, and a little used, long room adjacent.”

And in my blog post entitled ‘Tales of Old Portway’ I noted an article in the Dudley Chronicle in 1926 which said that:-

“The Portway Tavern is described as “the rendezvous of generations of quarrymen”, referring to recent renovations which had done much to modernise the exterior but it was noted that “the interior is pervaded with an old-world atmosphere. On a rack in the smoke room are twenty-two churchwarden pipes, numbered and tobacco stained, the blackest belonging to the oldest and most regular attendant at the pipe club which meets in the tavern on winter evenings.”

The Levett family and the Portway Tavern

In the 1841 Census James Adshead Levett the Elder is living in Perry’s Lake and listed as a Publican, although the pub is not named as such but this was undoubtedly the Portway Tavern. He had, according to the baptismal register at the time of the baptism of his son Richard in 1836, been living at Cock Green as a farmer but by the time of the baptism of his son John in December 1840, the family was living in Perry’s Lake although he was still described as a farmer then, a not unusual case of more than one occupation. In the 1851 Census he was shown as a Colliery Clerk and it was not until the 1861 Census that the Tavern was named and his occupation was shown as a Victualler. As early as 1842, James Adshead Levett Snr was listed in the Poll Books and Electoral Register as eligible to vote because he owned or rented ‘houses at Perry Lake’, so not just one house. Unsurprisingly, in view of this, censuses often show several Levett households living at Perry’s Lake, presumably in these houses, probably around or behind the pub.

Generally when James and Mary Levett were running the Tavern it appears that they kept their house in good order and I can only find one report of an offence in the newspapers. In August 1847 James was charged with permitting gaming with dice in his alehouse. PC Janson told the court that he had found

“two dice on the table and a cup, a man shaking it, and money on the table, for which they were playing. Defendant said there had been a raffle at this house that night, and afterwards the men did play for a few pence, but without his knowledge.”

He was fined 5 shillings and costs. In those days magistrates were local and the courts sat in local towns so people would have been well known to each other. And policemen had local ‘beats’ and would have known their licensees and kept a careful eye on them.

James Levett the Elder died , according to the Probate Record, on 23 Jun 1878, aged 75. His widow Mary retired to Gadd’s Green where two of her granddaughters Ellen (18) and Harriett (9) were staying with her in the 1881 Census. In his Will James had left to his ‘dear wife’ “such part of my household furniture and effects belonging thereto as she shall select for her own use except my clock and bureau which I give and bequeath to my son James”. The remainder of his property was to be sold and the proceeds to be shared equally between his four children. Interestingly, the Will notes that the house in which he lived belonged to his wife as tenant for life. The Will notes that as James the Younger had agreed on his father’s decease “to take it from her as tenant at a rent of twenty-five pounds a year, I direct that in the conversion of my said personal estate into money, my said son James shall be at liberty within a reasonable time after my death or on the happening thereof to exercise the option hereby given to him of taking the stock-in-trade fixtures and effects used by me in my business at my decease at a valuation to be made in the ordinary way in which valuations are made of stock-in-trade fixtures and effects of the like nature.”

It appears that the licence was transferred, perhaps initially to Daisy Levett but later to his son James Adshead Levett the Younger , by then a widower, who was listed as a Licensed Victualler in the 1881 Census at 29 Perry’s Lake, living there with his son William, aged 20, a carpenter, and daughters Daisy aged 23 and listed as a grocer, Kate aged 16 and a Pupil Teacher and Nelly aged 10 and a scholar. It is perhaps not surprising that Daisy should be listed as a grocer as this had been the occupation shown for her father James Adshead Levett Jnr in Perry’s Lake in the two previous censuses, so presumably when he took over the pub, she kept the grocery business going. Looking back at the time of James’s marriage in 1857 he had given his occupation as a grocer on the Tettenhall Road in Wolverhampton and this had been the profession into which he had been apprenticed at the age of 14.

So in addition to the pub, it seems that the Levetts ran a grocer’s shop in Perry’s Lake, very possibly in the same buildings. I have most definitely gained the impression that the Levett family were very flexible about their living and trading arrangements. And it seems the Levetts made sure their children were set up in suitable professions, their son Richard who was a shoemaker (and apparently part-time brewer) also lived in Perry’s Lake, William was a carpenter.

Licencing applications

Oddly, in August 1878, there were various advertisements in the County Express, giving notice of the intention of various people to apply for excise licences to sell various alcoholic beverages in their beerhouses and shops. The advertisement put in by James Adshead Levett was for an excise licence to sell “Sweets by retail, to be drunk and consumed on and off the house and premises thereunto belonging”. This is the only such application I can see, all the others are for licences to sell beer or cider or wine, why would you need an excise licence to sell sweets? Perhaps they were making home brewed soft drinks, as well as beer in their brewery?

I can remember as a child a van that came round selling brewed lemonade, ginger beer and American ice cream soda – strawberry ice cream soda or am I dreaming that? – in large pottery flagons, that was definitely quite fizzy and must have been brewed. I think the drinks were made in Oldbury but certainly very locally. Each week you returned the empty flagons for refilling, it was a rare treat because my father was chronically ill and there wasn’t much money to spare for such luxuries but I remember how delicious they were. And even today Fentimans produce botanically brewed drinks such as lemonade and ginger beer. Or perhaps it was a Printer’s error but I would be interested to hear whether anyone has any other suggestions!

Incidentally in the advertisement Mr Levett states that the house and premises were rated for the relief of the poor and that he was the tenant, the premises being owned by Thomas Auden. So it seems that the Levetts were not the owners after all. Since John Levett had been and appeared to be still bankrupt (See my first article on the Levett family for details) it would perhaps be slightly surprising if his son had the wherewithal to purchase multiple houses at Perry’s Lake in 1841.

Also in the Reports of the County Express of 14 September 1878, there is a report that the Licensing Magistrates approved the transfer of the licence for the Portway Tavern from the executors of the late James Adshead Levett the Elder to Daisy Levett, his granddaughter. But at some point it was obviously transferred again to James Levett the Younger as in the 1881 Census James was was described as the Licensed Victualler and Daisy as a Grocer.

You might think that James would be very careful because he already had a criminal record from an incident much earlier in his life so would not have wanted to be in trouble with the magistrates who obviously ran a tight ship. But alas, James Adshead Levett Jnr found himself in trouble with the police and the licensing authority more than once over the years. In September 1882 it was reported to the Annual Licensing Meeting of the court that he had been convicted of ‘permitting drunkenness on 30^th November’, presumably the previous year, when he had been fined £5 plus costs. However, it seems he did not actually lose his license although it, along with several other similarly blacklisted landlords did have the licence suspended for a period.

There were two reports in the West Bromwich Weekly News about this incident, the first on 25^th November 1881.

“Thomas Summerfield, Rowley Village, was summoned for being drunk and disorderly on the licensed premises of James Levett, Portway Tavern, Perry’s Lake. Prosecutor said the defendant went to his house on Sunday night, there were about 30 or 50 persons in the house, one of the men having paid for 20 quarts of ale, the defendant left but returned and commenced a disturbance, and knocked a woman down.

Superintendant Woolaston asked for the case to be adjourned, he visited the house on Sunday night in company with Sergeant Cooper and two PCs. There were about 70 persons in the house, and the landlord never interfered. A more disgraceful scene never took place. He was of the opinion that the summons was only taken out for a sham. There would be further evidence adduced. The case was adjourned.”

In the same paper in the edition of 3^rd December 1881, this report appears, when James Levett was being charged with permitting drunkenness in his house:-

“PC Birch said at seven o’clock on the night of the 20^th ult. He was sent to the defendant’s house in plain clothes, and remained there until 9.30. There was a large number of men and several women in the house, some of whom were drunk. There was a great disturbance, and the language used by the waiter and company was of the most disgraceful nature. Superintendant Wollaston said on Sunday night the 20^th ult., he sent the last witness into defendant’s house, he remained outside with PS Cooper and PC Styles. About 8.30 he saw several persons stagger out of the house but they re-entered it almost immediately. About nine o’clock he entered the house, the passage and tap room were completely crammed with persons. There was an old woman, quarrelling with a man called Summerfield, who knocked her down and fell on to the top of her. There was great confusion. There were several men under the influence of drink. There were about 70 people in the house, every room being crowded. A more disorderly house he never saw. He spoke to defendant about it who said he was very sorry.

Cross-examined: Defendant had not been summoned before. PC Cooper corroborated.

Mr Shakespeare said the case arose under unfortunate circumstances. Defendant was away from the house some portion of the time and left someone else in charge. A friend of the defendant’s, from Birmingham, came to the house and left 10s to pay for some beer for the men who caused the disturbance complained of.

Mr Bassano [the Presiding Magistrate] said the Bench considered it a bad case and inflicted a fine of £5 and costs, and endorsed the license. Mr Shakespeare [defending solicitor] appealed to the Bench not to endorse the licence as this was defendant’s first offence. Mr Bassano said they could not alter their decision as they considered it a very bad case.”

One can imagine that if this was a regular occurrence, this might not have gone down well with respectable church going neighbours in this very small and presumably quiet community!

On another occasion Levett was prosecuted for brewing offences, which I have already described in detail in another article.

James Adshead Levett the Youngerdied, aged 63 on 26 Aug 1895, according to the Probate Record which was granted to his daughter Sarah Perry. The cause of death shown on his Death Certificate was Pernicious Anaemia and Exhaustion. His Will allowed Sarah Perry to continue the business of inn-keeping for a period of seven years with the option for a further seven if she wished and for her to have the use of the furniture, stock etc at the pub for this purpose. In fact Sarah died almost exactly seven years later but appears to have given up the pub before then, perhaps because of her poor health and other problems.

The licence, according to Hitchmough, passed then to his son William Levett who held it until 1896, when it passed to Mrs Sarah Perry, which does not quite accord with the intentions in the Will but we do not know whether Sarah was already in poor health. William’s sister. Daisy Levett, his eldest sister, had married Abner Payne in 1885 and she also continued to live in Perry’s Lake until her death in 1902.

Sarah remained the licensee until about 1901 when Hitchmough notes that the licence passed to Thomas William Williams whose family ran the Bull’s Head and had at one time been in some rivalry with the Levett family . However, I do note that Thomas William Williams was listed by Hitchmough as the Licensee of the Bull in Tippity Green from 1892-1900 so he had not moved far. He was also the owner of the Rowley Brewery in Tippity Green so had very local licensing interests.

Sarah died in 1902, as did her sister Daisy – only a few days apart and aged only 42 and 44, followed less than two months later by Sarah’s husband George Perry. But on 20 September 1902 the Portway Tavern had been put up for auction, in accordance with the Will of James Levett the Younger who had left it for Sarah to run the pub for seven years with the possibility of a further term if she so wished. It seems likely that, by this time, she was so ill that she could not continue. The children of Sarah and George Perry were taken in by aunts, uncles and others and left Perry’s Lake.

This was the preliminary advertisemment in the advertisement in the County Advertiser and Herald on the 6th September 1902:

In the full advertisement which appeared on the 20^th September 1902 for the sale of the premises this fuller description was given:

“Rowley Regis, Staffs.

Highly Important Sale of a Fully-Licensed Free Public House

Alfred Hill has been favoured with instructions from the Exors. of the late Mr. James A. Levett, to Sell by Auction, on Monday, the 29th day of September, 1902, at the House of Mr. H. B. Darby, the ROYAL OAK INN, Blackheath, at 7-30 in the Evening, sharp.

Lot 1. All that Old-Established Home-Brewing, Fully-Licensed, Freehold, Free, Public House (Corner Property), now in the occupation of Mrs. Sarah Perry, and known as the PORTWAY TAVERN, Perry’s Lake, Rowley Regis, containing Tap Room, Smoke Room, Bar, Club Room, Bedrooms, Pantry, Extensive Cellaring, Brewhouse (with Maltroom over), Stabling (Six-stall), with Loft over, Range of Piggeries, and the usual conveniences, with large Yard and Gateway Entrance, and frontage to two Roads, with Tap Water laid on, and fitted with Gas throughout.

The Auctioneer begs respectfully to call the attention of Investors to these desirable Properties. The Public House offers to Capitalists the rare opportunity of securing a Fully-licensed, entirely Free, Home-brewing House, and an unusually sound Investment”.

Did it sell? I don’t know because I note that in 1911/12 the licensee was George Ward who was the husband of Hannah Levett, the daughter of Richard Levett, the shoemaker, so it seems the Levett family retained an interest in the pub for some time even if it was under another name or perhaps he took it on from Thomas William Williams. George Ward, living at 19 Perrys Lake, had also been one of the Witnesses to James the Younger’s Will.

But altogether three generations of the Levett family had run the Portway Tavern for about seventy years.

Copyright: Eileen Bird who is descended from James AdsheadLevett, shared this family photograph of the Tavern which she says was taken in 1971. I was interested how different it looked when it was painted white.

Over the next sixty or so years, there were nineteen other licensees, according to Hitchmough, most having the pub for only a few years. Because of 100 year privacy rules, it is difficult to find out much about them as individuals, although local people will still have memories of some of the more recent ones and some may even have lived there when their father or other relatives held the licence.

Local memories from Facebook

Below are some of the memories which have been mentioned on the ‘I remember Blackheath and Rowley Regis’ Facebook page over the last few years. Please let me know if you object to your name being mentioned and I will remove your comments but these memories are part of the history of the Lost Hamlets in a way which will never appear in history books!

More people than I can list had their first pints there!

Several people commented that the Tavern was known locally as the ‘blood tub’. David Stokes thought this went back to the early days. His first memories were of living with his great grandfather in the cottages opposite the ‘Tavern’ in the early fifties. He said “What I can remember very well is ‘they’re fighting again’! Hence, ‘the blood tub’…as I understood it? Thankfully, a bygone era!”

Vicki Noott says that she was born in the Tavern in 1955, as her grandfather Albert Harris was the landlord in the 1950s and Maggie Bridgewater said that she also lived there in the 1950s when her parents were the licensees. Two very local surnames there! Peter Wroe’s parents were the landlords from about 1961-1966, he remembered it as a good old fashioned pub. His sister Caroline was also born there.

Joyce Connop remembered that she always used to look at the clock inside through the window to check the time on her way to Doulton Road School, to make sure she wasn’t late for school.

Ann Teague said that she remembered that there was a dirt road down the side of the tavern. The houses there were mostly occupied by Tarmac workers.

Brian Kirkham recalled that there was a row of houses behind the Tavern called Heaven and a bit down from that there was a blacksmiths shoeing horses.

Kenneth Greenhouse remembered all the old penny’s on the ceiling by the darts board.

Marie Devonport – “The road seen in the bottom of the picture was the start of Turners hill, right over the road from the Tarmac entrance. If I remember right my family lived just up the road by the telephone box on the corner.”

William Perry had recently read Wilson Jones’s book on Rowley – “it’s very informative. There is a photo of a manorial windmill that stood on the side of Hawes Hill, also there was a large pool with fish in it somewhere about opposite where the Portway Tavern used to be.”

And indeed Wilson Jones asserts in his book that on a Pre-Inclosure map of Rowley, the main habitations were around Rowley Church from about Rowley Hall to Mincing Lane . But the Manor was at Brickhouse Farm with the Manorial Green at Cock Green and the fishpond on the site of Perry’s Lake. So the original Perrys Lake was a manorial fishpond. He also states that two Manor Mills were also marked on this map, one on the opposite side to Hawes Hill, near Tippity Green and one at Windmill End. The book has a photograph of the Windmill at Tippity Green so it survived for a long time.

Andrew in 2017 said that he lived at the top of Throne Road with his grandparents in the 70’s, he used to be sent to the Portway Tavern with empty Corona bottles to be filled with sherry !

Ant Bromley particularly remembered the really good cider served there.

Marie Smith remembered her brother Eric Oddy having his 21^st birthday party there and her mother getting tired – Marie says she was a lady and she never got drunk!

Arthur McWilliams worked in the garage in the quarry opposite the Tavern and recalls that some days they would go over for a pint at lunchtime. He says he will never know how they managed to work the rest of the day!

The end of the Portway Tavern

The Portway Tavern closed in 1984 and was demolished shortly afterwards. This photograph shows it standing in isolation after most of the houses around it had been demolished. St Giles’s Church can be seen on the hill behind it, and some of the houses in Tippity Green to the right.

David Duckworth shared this rather sad photograph on Facebook of the Tavern prior to demolition, (copyright of this photograph unknown as it appears in several places).

Standing at the foot of Turners Hill Road, the Portway Tavern had been a central part of the community in the area of the hamlets for probably the best part of two hundred years, from the time when it stood alongside the toll road from Halesowen to Dudley and it had served home brewed ale to many generations of quarrymen working in the nearby quarries. Inquests were sometimes held there and some lively parties, too!

And as so often in these days when so many pubs are closing, something was undoubtedly lost from the heart of the community when it was demolished, and it was the same fate which came to the cottages and communities it once served.

[i] https://www.pubhistorysociety.co.uk/index

Families of the Lost Hamlets: The Levett family 2 – James Adshead Levett (1805-1878), and his descendants

My previous article was about John Levett and his connections. James Adshead Levett was the son of John Levett and Elizabeth Adshead. He was baptised at St Giles, Rowley Regis on 6 Jul 1805, followed by his sister Catherine Levett who was baptised at Halesowen Parish Church on 30 Jul 1813. James’s mother Elizabeth had died in 1822 and his father remarried in London in 1823.

I have limited myself in this piece mostly to those descendants who stayed in the immediate area of Rowley. There are many others who lived in surrounding towns and villages as well as much further afield but I have stuck for now with those who continued to be associated with the area of the Lost Hamlets. These lived consistently in Perry’s Lake and Gadd’s Green, Brickfields and Tippity Green.

Incidentally, I was very interested, in looking at various Levett Wills to see that at least some of them regarded Perry’s Lake as a separate place and not part of Rowley Regis, so that they gave their address as Perry’s Lake, near Dudley. All of the Lost Hamlets were, of course, within the parish of Rowley Regis but clearly at least these residents did not see it as simply part of the village.

Catherine Elizabeth Levett and the Thorne family

John and Elizabeth’s only daughter Catherine or Kate Levett married John Brooke Thorne, a widower and a Mercantile Clerk of Bradford Street, Birmingham at St Giles on 4 Oct 1837 and they later lived in Aston in Birmingham. They appear to have had only one child, Ellen Levett Thorne who was born in Aston in July 1838 but died aged 3 years and 8 months in 1842. In 1841 Ellen is not in their household, she appears to be with a Sarah Thorne, who was aged 23, living in Handsworth, along with two Finney children who were possibly related to William Finney who married Hannah Gaunt in 1833, although I have not been able to confirm any connection. Why Ellen was with Sarah Thorne is unclear and I have been unable to confirm any relationship between Sarah Thorne and John Brooke Thorne but it seems a considerable coincidence that the child should be entrusted to Sarah Thorne unless they were related.

At a later stage, on a family tree on Ancestry, there is a photograph of a beautifully bound Family Bible which has embossed on the front of it that it was presented to John Levett (1840-1922) and Sarah Petford (1844-1917) on their wedding day, 18^th March 1867, by ‘their aunt Sarah Thorne’. This John Levett was the son of James Adshead Levett the Elder and his only blood aunt was Catherine Levett who was married to John B Thorne. Was Catherine/Kate known as Sarah – I have not seen this suggested anywhere else although she was frequently referred to as Kate and all official documentation shows her as Catherine or Katherine or Kate. Or was this the unknown Sarah Thorne who was caring for John and Kate Thorne’s daughter in 1841? Sarah Thorne is very elusive in the censuses, does not appear to be in the Midlands over a period of forty years and this remains a mystery – unless there is a member of the Levett family who can tell me? I would love to know!

In later censuses John and Kate Thorne had Catherine’s nephew John Levett (the one who was later presented with that bible)staying with them in Birmingham in 1851, in 1861 a niece Lissie Levett aged 11 and born in Rowley, and in 1871, a niece Janet Pearson aged 10 and said to be born in Penkridge. However, I cannot work out who this child could be, as Catherine had only one brother and he did not have a daughter called Janet. However there is a birth registration in 1860 in Penkridge for an Esther Jane Pearson, and the Mother’s maiden name is shown as Thorne, so presumably Mary was the sister of John Brooke Thorne.

John Brooke Thorne died in 1873 and was buried in Key Hill Cemetery in Birmingham.

By 1881, the widowed Catherine had moved to Sutton Coldfield where in 1881 her unmarried niece Esther Pearson, aged 20 and also born in Penkridge, was living with her, together with a Mary Pearson, aged 46, who was married and a visitor, born in Stafford. Was Esther the Janet who had been staying in 1871? It appears that Esther was indeed Janet or rather Jane, because an Esther Jane Pearson was born in Penkridge in 1860 and her Mother’s Maiden name was Thorne so it appears that this was a niece of Catherine’s husband, rather than Catherine herself. Was Mary her mother? It seems likely. However, tantalising as this rabbit hole is, it is not directly connected with the Lost Hamlets area and I will resist exploring it further! For now, anyway…

Catherine Elizabeth Thorne’s death was registered in the first quarter of 1893 in the Dudley Registration District, although I have been unable to find her burial. Perhaps in her final years she came back to the family with whom she had clearly remained in close contact through the years of her widowhood. From the number of nieces staying with her in various censuses, it would be good to think that for much of her life ‘going to stay with Aunt Kate’ was a pleasing prospect. Catherine’s Death Certificate shows that she died of ‘senectus’ – old age, and that she died at 28 Tump Road, Blackheath (later Beeches Road) and her death was registered by Mrs Ann Barker, who had been present at the death. Who Ann Barker was and why Kate was there, I have no idea but her only brother and her nephew were both dead and several of his children were to die shortly afterwards so may already have been unable to take Kate in. It is possible that Kate was buried at St Paul’s churchyard, the burial records for there have not yet been transcribed for FreeREG. She was not buried at Key Hill Cemetery with her husband, according to their records.

James Adshead Levett the Elder 1805-1878

James was married to Mary Ann Bate on 21 Feb 1832 at Wolverhampton St Peter, the witnesses being H Adshead, possibly Harriet Adhead, his aunt and James Adshead who may have been his grandfather. The Adsheads appear to have been a Wolverhampton family. Perhaps James had been staying with his Adshead relations. The first child of James and Mary Ann- also James Adshead Levett (who I shall refer to as JAL the Younger from hereon) – was baptised at Dudley St Thomas on 27 May 1832, shown in the Baptism Register as James, son of James Adshead and Mary Ann Levett of Rowley. James’s occupation was given as Farmer, perhaps at Brickfield Farm which was still in the ownership of his father. Two more sons Richard in 1836 and John in 1840 followed. A daughter Elizabeth, again probably named for her Adshead great-grandmother, was born in 1849.

The Bate family – publicans and Victuallers in Cock Green

Mary Ann Bate gives her place of birth in later censuses as Rowley Regis and her ages in those censuses consistently compute to give her a birth year of about 1813. But there is no baptism at St Giles for a Mary Ann Bate in that period. There is a baptism in 1814 for a John, son of Richard and Hannah Bate of Cock Green where the father’s occupation is shown as Victualler so in the licensed trade and he was apparently her brother.

However, there was a baptism at Dudley St Thomas on 8^th Aug 1813 for a Mary Ann Bate, daughter of the same couple, Richard and Hannah Bate of Rowley, said to be a labourer so this appears to be the correct Mary Ann, and this was during is the period when extensive repairs were being carried out at St Giles which may account for the Dudley baptism.

Checking out my theory that Mary Ann’s Bate family were in the Licensed trade, I looked without success in the 1851 Census for Richard Bate and then for Hannah Bate and found her, by then a widow, listed at Cock Green, next door to Brickhouse Farm, aged 64 and a Victualler. This later became known as the Cock Inn and it certainly reinforces the idea that John and Mary Ann grew up as neighbours. I was then able to find that Richard Bate of Cock Green was buried at St Giles on 26 March 1832, aged 41, said in the Burial Register to have died of Dropsy.

Hannah Bate had also been at Cock Green in 1841, also a publican then and living apparently in the same household as her son Benjamin Bate, aged 37 and his family, although he had no occupation shown. Perhaps his mother was the licensee but he also worked in the pub.

Hitchmough shows that three members of the Bate family owned the Cock Inn between 1814 and 1873, with John Bate, mentioned above, the last of these. In 1818, a daughter Sarah had been baptised at St Giles to Richard and Hannah Bate of Cock Green but this time Richard’s occupation was given as a farmer, another instance of double occupations for victuallers. Multi-generation pub-keeping seems to have been quite common in Rowley!

There are numerous entries in the St Giles Registers for the Bate family and many of them are in the Cock Green area which was adjacent to Brickhouse so James and this Mary Ann would have known each other from childhood as neighbours. Why they were married in Wolverhampton is another matter, (although there is a marriage of a Richard Bate in Wolverhampton in 1808 so perhaps the Bate family had connections there, like the Adsheads). Or it may simply have been that Mary Ann was at least six months pregnant at the time of the marriage on 21 Feb 1832, as James Adshead the Younger was baptised on 27 May 1832 at Dudley, again, not in the parish so perhaps an attempt to keep a low profile on this. Or simply that James was in busisness there or perhaps that one or other of their families did not approve of the marriage, we cannot tell.

The 1841 Census shows James Adshead Levett and his family in Perry’s Lake where his occupation is shown as ‘Publican’. Richard at that time was 5 years old and John just 8 months old. Little James would have been nine and was not shown in the household, because he was with his grandfather John Levett at Brickhouse Farm. So by that time James had already moved from Brickhouse Farm to Perry’s Lake and become a publican, presumably at The Portway Tavern although it was not named as such in the census. We can narrow the date of that move down even more. At Richard’s baptism on29 May 1836, the abode is given as Cock Green and his father’s occupation as a Farmer but by the time John was baptised on 6 Dec 1840 his father’s address was shown as Perry’s Lake, although he was still shown as a farmer. So James and Mary Ann must have moved from Cock Green, in all likelihood from Brickhouse Farm, although possibly from Mary Ann’s family residence at Cock Green, to Perry’s Lake at some point between 1836 and 1840.

According to Hitchmough’s Guide to Black Country pubs, James Adshead Levett the Elder was the Licensee at the Portway Tavern from at least 1841 until 1887 and his son James Adshead Levett the Younger from 1887-1895, followed by William Levett from 1892-1896, some overlap there. Interestingly, Hitchmough lists the owner of the pub as Thomas B Williams and Lizzie Bate and also states that it was acquired by Ansells on 15^th June 1846 which seems a very early date, especially as Ansells itself was not founded until 1858, so I suspect that Ansells acquired it in 1946, not 1846. The name Bate is also of interest here as Mary Ann, the wife of James was a Bate so perhaps her family bought the pub.

But James appears to have had more interests than the Portway Tavern in Perry’s Lake, he was listed in the Poll Books and Electoral Registers as the ratepayer of Freehold houses there between at least 1841 and 1878, though there may be other Poll Books which have not yet been digitised.

In August 1847, the Worcestershire Chronicle reported that James Levett of Rowley Regis was summonsed before the Magistrates as P.C.Janson had charged him with

“permitting gaming with dice in his house, an ale house on the 7^th August. On the table were two dice and a cup, a man shaking it and money on the table for which they were playing. Defendant said that there had been a raffle at his house that night and afterwards the men did play for a few pence, but without his knowledge. – Fined 5 shillings and costs. “

In the 1851 Census, James and Mary Ann were at Perry’s Lake, though there is still no mention of the Portway Tavern and James’s occupation is shown as Colliery Clerk. It was quite common for publicans to have other jobs and if, as I suspect, Mary Ann was the daughter of a publican, it is quite likely that she would have been very involved in the management of the pub. Their children, shown as Richard aged 15 and Elizabeth aged 1 were at home but John was not.

In the 1861 Census, James is shown for the first time at the Portway Tavern and as a Victualler, along with Mary Ann, and their unmarried son Richard, now 26 and a shoe maker.

In the 1871 Census, James and Mary Ann are again shown at the Portway Tavern, and he is shown as a Licensed Victualler.

Perhaps there was a little rivalry between the Bull’s Head and the Portway Tavern – Hitchmough relates an account that after Thomas Williams had taken over the licence of the Bull’s Head in 1875,

“The pub prospered much to the reported displeasure of the Levett family who were running the PORTWAY TAVERN …… One night the windows of the BULLS HEAD were mysteriously smashed. The following night, Thomas, always called Master by his wife, was seen leaving his pub with a poker up his sleeve, and setting out over Allsops Hill. The following day it was reported that the windows of the PORTWAY TAVERN had been broken during the hours of darkness! The BULLS HEAD suffered no further damage.”

James Adshead Levett the Elder died , according to the Probate Record, on 23 Jun 1878, aged 75. Mary Ann had moved to Gadd’s Green by the time of the 1881 Census, described as a Retired Licensed Victualler, where her granddaughters Ellen Levett, aged 18 and Harriet Levett aged 9 were living with her. Mary Ann died 15 Jan 1890, according to her Probate Record, aged 76, her burial record states that she died in Perry’s Lake, she was buried on 20 Jan 1890 at St Giles.

The children of James and Mary Ann

Of the children of James the Elder and Mary Ann, James Adshead Levett the Younger and Richard stayed in the Perry’s Lake area for the rest of their lives. I shall deal with James in more detail later as he is the one I have most information about but this is what became of the other children of James Adshead Levett the Elder and Mary Ann:

Richard (1838-1907) and his family

Richard, the Boot and Shoe maker, married Mary Merris in 1863 at Dudley St Thomas and they had five daughters – Ellen in 1863, Hannah in 1864, Elizabeth or Lizzie in 1867, Harriet in 1872 and Mary Ann in 1875. Mary Merris died in 1878 and Richard never remarried.

Of these girls, I have been unable to find any trace of Ellen after 1881, no marriage or death.

Hannah married George Ward and they stayed in Rowley Regis, living in Perry’s Lake. They had two children Amy Ward in 1887 and William Ward in 1893. Alas Hannah also died aged 41 in 1906 and she was buried in St Giles on 26 Jun 1906.

Elizabeth (or Lizzie) had gone into service and was in Manningham, Yorkshire for the 1891 Census. I think it was this Lizzie Levett who died in the Sheffield area, possibly in the North Bierlow Workhouse and was buried on 9 Jun 1899 at the City Road Cemetery, Sheffield, Yorkshire, aged 31.

Harriet married John Rudkin and I have already uploaded a whole article on the Rudkin family. Harriet’s children were all born in Rowley, the last in 1909 but she then moved to Cannock in 1911 and later to Meriden and then possibly Nuneaton as that was where she died in 1956.

Mary Ann Levett married Charles Jones in 1897 at Reddall Hill and they lived in Ross in Rowley and later Oldbury. I have been unable to trace the couple after 1921 when they were living in Church Street, Oldbury with their five children and looking for Charles or Mary Jones is a difficult exercise!

So it appears that Hannah was the only one of Richard’s daughters to stay in Rowley and she had died by 1906.

John Levett (1840-1922) and his family

John Levett, the third son, married Sarah Ann Petford at St Giles in 1867 and they moved to live in Harts Hill, Dudley where they had ten children. These were Kate Elizabeth (1867), Fred (1870), Florence Mary (1872), Kezia Beatrice (1873), Daisy (1874), Harry Brooke (1875-1875), Janet (1877), William A (1879), Major (1881) and May (1887). Sarah died in 1917 in Dudley and John died in September 1922 in Halifax, Yorkshire where he was living with his daughter Daisy. So this branch of the Levett family had moved completely out of the Lost Hamlets area.

Elizabeth Levett and her family

Elizabeth Levett married Edward J Stamps in 1871 in Handsworth, Birmingham and they had one daughter Violet Stamps (1873) and three sons Edward Levett Stamps (1875), Thomas Bernard Stamps (1876) and Ernest Cecil Stamps (1877). The family lived in Sutton Coldfield until 1911 but by 1921 the widowed Elizabeth was living with her son Edward in Carshalton, Surrey where Elizabeth died in 1925. Another branch of the Levett family which had moved completely out of the Lost Hamlets area.

James Adshead Levett the Younger (1832-1895) and his family

In those days, it was quite common for boys to be apprenticed at about the age of fourteen, which was usually a seven year commitment. And James was apprenticed to Mr Gill of Bilston, a Provision Dealer, at the age of fourteen, which would have been in about 1846. Following my research on the Old Swinford Hospital School, and their apprenticing practices, it does occur to me that James may have attended the school but I have not been able to check their records, so the apprenticeship may simply have been arranged by his family. He apparently left before his apprenticeship was completed, with Mr Gill’s concurrence and went into the employ of Mess’rs Hallam and Spikes who may have been in Birmingham. Mr Gill had apparently always found James to be ‘a faithful, honest and industrious servant’ whilst in his employ. His new employers also found him steady and faithful until in 1850 he seems to have had a momentary aberration.

A spell ‘inside’!

In October 1850 James Adshead Levett the Younger was convicted at Birmingham of stealing five shillings and sixpence from his employer and sentenced to 12 months in Birmingham Boro’ Gaol, or possibly the Moor Street lock-up. (A new Gaol had been built in 1849 so if this was where James was held it was very new. Or he may have been held in the Birmingham Lock up in Moor Street, it is not clear.) James was now 19 but his former employers, both Mr Gill and Mess’rs Hallam and Spikes evidently did not think of him as an habitual criminal as Mr Gill expressed willingness to take him back into his employ. Mess’rs Hallam and Spikes were said to regard the taking of the money as ‘an act of peculation’, rather than a determined theft.’ and bore witness to his general honesty. Peculation is the act of illegally taking or using money, especially public money, that you are responsible for managing.

How do I know all this? Because in The National Archives is a letter to the Home Secretary [i] Sir George Grey, dated 10 December 1850, from the Mayor of Dudley Thomas Fereday, urging that James’s sentence should be commuted. This letter emphasised the good standing of James’s family in the local community, that the signatories had known them for many years and that they had always ‘maintained the highest character for honesty and integrity’.

The letter goes on that James’s mother had been ‘greatly depressed in spirits ever since his committal and her health which has been gradually declining, is now in a precarious state’.

The letter therefore asked the Home Secretary to consider remitting or commuting James’s sentence. The number and identity of signatories to this letter is impressive. The signatories were:- Thomas Fereday, Mayor of Dudley; William Crump, Incumbent of Rowley Regis; Samuel Nicklin, Churchwarden of Rowley Regis; Thomas Sidaway, Churchwarden of St Luke’s Church at Reddal Hill; William F Peart, Curate of Rowley Regis; Samuel Gill, Provision Dealer of Bilston, the former Master of J A Levett; Francis Northall of Rowley Regis; Charles Hallam, Tea Dealer, Birmingham.

Also appended to this request was a statement that “We the undersigned are desirous of certifying that the parents and family of James Adshead Levett whom we have known many years, have always borne a high character for honesty and integrity.” This statement had been signed by Isaac Budge, and Councillor Cartwright, both Magistrates for the County of Worcester and Stafford.

What an impressive list of supporters for the family had put together this letter. Did it work? It seems unlikely. There is a note on the outside of the paper that James would have immediate employment if he was released and that an answer was sent on the 4^th January 1851 but a scribbled note appears to say Nil and certainly James was still in prison at the time of the census in 1851. What a terrible time this must have been for the family. I found it touching that so many people of position and standing in the community tried to intervene to get James’s sentence reduced. And, it seems, James’s mother Mary Ann survived and lived on until 1890.

James Adshead Levett the Younger obviously served his time and rebuilt his life over the next few years. He married Elizabeth Smith by Banns on 26 Nov 1857 at St Mark’s Wolverhampton (Wolverhampton keeps cropping up, doesn’t it?) at which time he was a grocer in Tettenhall Road and their daughter Daisy, the first of ten children, was born in Rowley in 1858, with their abode given in the baptismal register at St Giles as Perry’s Lake and James’s occupation shown as Grocer, the trade he had been apprenticed to originally. A son William followed in 1860, twins Sarah and Mary in in 1863, Kate in 1865, Harriet in 1867, Nellie in 1870, Alice in 1872, Fred in 1873 and Amy in 1875.

In 1861 James Adshead Levett the Younger and Elizabeth, with William, are in Perry’s Lake, in a grocer’s shop, although Daisy is with her maternal grandparents William and Sarah Smith on Freebodies Farm on Turner’s Hill.

Another Bankruptcy? But in the Birmingham Journal of 12 May 1866 there was a Notice that there had been a First Meeting in re Bankruptcy for James Adshead Levett the Younger of Deritend, which is in Birmingham, a labourer, formerly of Rowley Regis, with debts of £204 6s and assets of £202. 5s 2½d, when an assignee was appointed. How strange that Bankruptcy should have been involved for a difference of a couple of pounds.

Did he move to Birmingham for a time in between the two censuses? Did his grocery shop run into trouble? Twins Sarah and Mary were baptised at St Giles on 9 November 1862, Kate Elizabeth on 30 Apr 1865, and James’s occupation in all of these was given as grocer. So if there was a bankruptcy, it appears to have been resolved very quickly because I have not been able to find any other formal Notices which are usually involved in the process. Other bankruptcies I have seen in this research have generated numerous advertisements and meetings but this one does not appear to have had this happen. Had it not been for the reference to the full name and James being formerly of Rowley Regis I would have thought that this was a case of mistaken identity. Or perhaps family realised what was happening and helped James out of his difficulty.

In 1871, the family are still in Perry’s Lake although James is now described as a Labourer. Elizabeth Levett, nee Smith, died in 1876, aged only 45 and was buried at St Giles.

Taking over the Portway Tavern

After his father’s death in Jun 1878, James Adshead Levett the Younger applied early in September 1878 for a new Licence for the premises in Perry’s Lake, apparently successfully. I cannot think this would have happened if James was still bankrupt.

In 1881, James was listed as a Licensed Victualler in Perry’s Lake, and his daughter Daisy, by then 23, was a grocer. Other children William, aged 21, a carpenter, Kate, aged 16 a pupil teacher and Nellie, aged 10, a scholar were also living with him. Twins Sarah and Mary, aged 18, were also listed in Perry’s Lake though not apparently in the same house but their occupations were described as ‘Licensed Victualler’s daughters with a note on the census ‘see note on Portway Tavern. Sadly the note is not visible but it appears that the flexible living arrangements of the Levett family in Perry’s Lake was well established. The twins were each married soon after that census.

In 1891, James was still at the Portway Tavern with his son William, and his niece Harriet. But in August 1895 he died and was buried at St Giles on the 30^th August.

What happened to James and Elizabeth’s children?

Daisy Levett was married in 1885 to Abner Payne but they do not appear to have had any children before her early death on 24 Oct 1902 at the age of 44. Daisy was buried on 31 Oct 1902 at St Giles.

William Levett stayed in the area and died on 5^th June 1904, his abode at the time of his burial on 8^th Jun 1904 was shown in the Burial Register entry as Gadds Green. He did not marry, so far as I have been able to discover and in his Will, his married sisters Catherine and Elizabeth were his executors. He was also 44 at the time of his death.

Mary Adshead Levett was married to Joseph Foley on 6 Sep 1881 at Halesowen and lived in Powke Lane and later Garratts Lane, before moving to West Bromwich, never returning to live in Rowley village. Though Mary and her daughter Sarah both later ran sweet shops in West Bromwich and Oldbury so they carried on the trading traditions of the Levett family. Mary and Joseph had five children of whom two died in infancy. The eldest son John James Adshead Foley died in 1902, aged only 19. 1902 , indeed the first decade of the 1900s, were terrible years for the Levett family. Mary’s remaining son Albert Edward married in 1915 but did not have had any children, so far as I can find and appears to have been divorced as his wife re-married in 1931. In the 1939 Register Alfred was living with his sister Sarah in Station Road, Oldbury, and was described as a retired Motor Engineer (incapacitated), whereas she was still described as a shopkeeper (Sweets and Tobacco). I have not been able to identify a death or burial for Arthur.

Mary Foley, nee Levett was living with her daughter Sarah in High Street, West Bromwich in the 1921 Census, both were widows and Mary died in West Bromwich in 1922, aged 59. I suspect that she and Joseph may have separated before 1901, and there is no evidence of them being together after 1891. Evidence suggests that Joseph ‘married’ his barmaid Amy Read, twenty years his junior, in 1901 (according to the number of years married shown in the 1911 Census) although I have not found any evidence of such a marriage or of a divorce. It is not impossible that a divorce did happen, although Mary Foley was still describing herself as married in the 1911 Census!

Sarah Adshead Levett, Mary’s twin, was married in 1882 at Netherton to George Perry, (whose brothers Samuel and Daniel kept the Why Not Inn in Reddall Hill, another pub-keeping family) and Sarah and George lived at Gadds Green and subsequently took over the Portway Tavern, although George seems also to have kept up his other occupation as an iron or scrap dealer. Sarah and George had five children, Ada, born 1888, Mabel born 1891, James, born 1892, Alfred born 1894 and Miriam born 1896.

Sadly Sarah Adshead Perry, nee Levett died on 28^th October 1902, aged 40, only four days after her oldest sister Daisy who was 44 when she died. Their funerals were held three days apart. And only weeks later on 31 December 1902 Sarah’s husband George Perry also died, aged 47, so that their children were orphaned.

Alcoholism seems to be an occupational hazard for publicans and all three adults who died in late 1902 died of alcoholism and related causes. There is also some evidence of epilepsy in the family, as epilepsy was given as one of the causes of death for Daisy and some years earlier, during the trial of James Levett for brewing offences, it was mentioned in evidence that one of Sarah’s children had suffered a fit on the evening of the alleged offence.

Of Sarah and George Perry’s children, the two older girls of the Perry family were living with their aunt Mary in Smethwick in 1911, both working as shop assistants in a draper’s shop. Ada went to New York, USA in 1912, marrying there and dying in Pennsylvania in 1964. I have been unable to trace her sister Mabel in this country after the 1911 Census but note with interest that a Mabel Perry of the correct age travelled to New York in 1914 and I wonder whether she went to join her sister there.

The two boys went to their father’s brothers at the Why Not Inn in Reddall Hill. James Perry became a mechanic and subsequently emigrated to Canada where he married and had two children, dying in Ontario in 1965. Alfred stayed in Reddall Hill, where he married and had one son, he had taken over the management of the Why Not Inn by 1921, that common family trade but died – yet another premature Levett death, at the age of 38 in 1933.

Little Miriam, the youngest at only five when her mother died, appears to have been adopted by the Pearson family who kept the Haden Cross Inn at Haden Hill. I believe that she married George Yarranton in 1927 and had two sons, dying in the Sandwell area in 1980.

Nellie Levett, the youngest of the children of James Adshead Levett the Younger married James Kirby in 1890 and they had ten children. They continued to live in the area, in Gadds Green and in Perry’s Lake. In 1921 the family were living at 7 Tippity Green, with nine of the children and two grandchildren.

The Kirby children were William James (1891-1941), Elizabeth (b.1892), Frederick (b.1894), Mary known as Polly) b.1895, Sarah Helen (1897-1906), John (b.1898), Miriam (b.1900), Mabel (b.1902), Samuel (b.1904), Ada (b.906), Lily (b.1908), Nellie (b.1911) and Beatrice May (b.1913). In 1939, for the Register commissioned for identification and rationing purposes, many of these brothers and sisters were living at 6 Windsor Road, with the oldest William as Head of the Household, their mother Nellie having died in 1925 and father James Kirby in 1937. At the time of James Kirby’s burial the abode is given as Hailstone House, Tippity Green so this part of the family had stayed in the immediate area. Nellie gave her children so many Levett Christian names there, familiar from her siblings and her wider family! Many of the Levett girls gave their children the names Levett and Adshead as second names, which can help a lot with tracing them in the records.

Born, as most of Nellie’s children were, on the cusp of the 20^th century, it is not always possible to trace their whereabouts properly, as records tend to be closed for privacy reasons for 100 years but it appears from those who I have been able to track, that many or most of this family stayed in or close to Rowley, often in the immediate area of Perrys Lake, Gadds Green and Tippity Green, true Lost Hamlets people.

The descendants of John Levett in the Lost Hamlets

So there we have the Levett family – from the arrival in Rowley of John Levett, from Stepney, London, grandson of the Nock family, in about 1800, through his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren – they lived in the Lost Hamlets area for almost exactly a century, although their Nock ancestors had been there much longer – also spreading around the wider area and further afield. They ran pubs, shops and businesses, brewed ale, suffered bankruptcies, prosecutions and even prison and conducted bitter disputes with the Curate in that time. They married members of other families in the licensed trade numerous times. And the other familiar names of the Lost Hamlets families appear frequently on their family tree.

But by 1911 the last of this branch of the Levett name in the village had died, many of them after relatively short lives, and the family had suffered some grievous losses. At the end of that time, although there were descendants from the female line still living in the village, there were no Levetts who could trace their descent directly from the original John Levett.

Or were there?

Where did Levett’s Butchers , who I remember from Blackheath and mentioned right at the start of the first article, fit into this? I had not found any connection between this family and those Levetts. And when I double checked for Levetts in the village in the 1911 Census, I was surprised to see that there was still a John Levett with his family in Springfield in 1911 and his son Fred in the village, John keeping a shop in Springfield and Fred a butchers shop in Rowley village.

But that’s another story… and a third instalment to come about the Levetts!

[i] The National Archives Reference HO 18/294

Families of the Lost Hamlets – The Rudkin family

Rudkin is not a common name in Rowley Regis and I only came across it while I was researching the Levett family. Yes, another rabbit hole for me to explore!

Harriet Levett (1872-1956) was the third of the four daughters of Richard Levett, he the second son of James Adshead Levett the Elder and brother to James Adshead Levett the Younger. Richard, born in 1836, was married to Mary Merris and they lived in Perry’s Lake, where Richard was a Boot and Shoe Maker and he also helped his brother out with brewing, as mentioned in my recent article about a court case.

Harriet’s mother died when Harriet was only six and subsequently she was staying with her grandmother Mary Levett in Gadd’s Green at the time of the 1881 Census, while her father and other sisters were living in Hawes Lane, and in 1891 she was in Perry’s Lake with her uncle James Adshead Levett and his son William, (also mentioned in the court case), although her father was by then immediately next door with his youngest daughter Mary Ann, aged 16 and a visitor Ann M Parkes, also 16, a dressmaker, so perhaps a friend of Mary Ann.

On 13 May 1894 Harriet Levett married John Rudkin at Holy Trinity, Old Hill, when he was 26 and she was 22.

John Rudkin, born in 1868, was not a Rowley native, but he was living at 17 Tippity Green in 1881 and at 24 Perry’s Lake in 1891, lodging with Edward Payne, along with his brother William so he had been living very close to Harriet for most of their lives, the boy next door, as it were. I say that John was not a Rowley native but his younger brother William was, born in Rowley Regis in 1875. They were two of the sons of William Rudkin. So I looked for John in the 1871 Census and found him living with his family William and Jane Rudkin in Cainham, near Ludlow in Shropshire. Now, where have we come across Cainham before? Ah, yes, when I was looking at migration patterns among the quarry workers in an earlier article when I found that quite a few sett makers had moved from Mountsorrel in Leicestershire to Rowley Regis to work, had married in Rowley and then moved on to Cainham in Shropshire. And sure enough, when I looked at this family, the pattern fitted again.

Copyright unknown, this photograph of the Clee Hills quarries in Shropshire shows that the quarrying area is not dissimilar to Rowley but without the surrounding heavy industry!

William Rudkin the Elder, John Rudkin’s father, was born in 1835 in Groby, Leicestershire. In 1851 he was living in Mountsorrel, Leicestershire where his father (also William) was a Quarry man and William himself was a Frame Work Knitter, another repeating detail as a Leicestershire occupation.In 1861, William was in Rowley Regis. The ten years between the two censuses were eventful for the Rudkin family.

The 1871 Census shows John Rudkin, with his father William, a Stone Cutter, who was living in Cainham with his wife Mary Jane (nee Parkes, I would later find). Jane, aged 25, had been born in Rowley Regis and their oldest child Sarah J, aged 14 was also born in Rowley Regis , while son Thomas aged 5 was born in Cainham, John aged 3 apparently born in Ludlow, and Elizabeth A, aged 1 also born in Cainham. And living with them were Thomas Parkes, his brother-in-law, aged 15, a labourer and his widowed mother-in-law Mary Parkes, both of them born in Rowley Regis. A classic Mountsorrel/Rowley/Cainham pattern!

And because I always try to find the birth registration in the GRO registers for my records, I was able to confirm that the mother’s maiden name of all the younger children was indeed Parkes. So that all tied together nicely. Except…

Looking at the family in 1871, I noticed that the oldest child Sarah J was 14, born in 1857, but Jane Rudkin was only 25. It seemed very unlikely that she had had a baby at 11. Technically possible perhaps but unlikely. Sarah J must have been born to someone else. So I looked for Sarah’s birth registration – and there was no birth registration for a Sarah Jane Rudkin in the right period. There was, however, a registration of a Sarah Jane Parkes in the first quarter of 1856, with no Mother’s Maiden Name recorded which is usually an indication of illegitimacy. And then I found a baptism on 27 July 1856 at St Giles, Rowley Regis for Sarah Jane Parkes, the illegitimate daughter of Ann Parkes. Not Mary Jane, who was only eleven at this time. So, another puzzle – who was Ann Parkes?

Some more digging around showed that Ann Parkes was born in 1833 in Rowley Regis, the daughter of Joseph Parkes of Tippity Green. Ann Parkes and William Rudkin had been married on 26 Oct 1857 at Dudley St. Thomas, and their son Charles (1858-1861) was born in the last quarter of 1858, followed by Mary (1861-1862) and twins Ann and Maria in 1863, all in Rowley Regis. Now I was able to find William, Ann and Charles in Tippity Green in the 1861 Census. It appears that William accepted Sarah Jane into his household as she was shown as Rudkin in all subsequent censuses. Alas, Ann died, in childbirth or soon after the twins were born, as she was buried on 21 Jul 1863 at St Giles, Rowley Regis, aged 28 and of Perry’s Lake, shortly after the birth of the twins. Baby Ann died in October and was buried on 25 Oct 1863, followed a few months later by her twin Maria who was buried on 20 Jan 1864.

So poor William Rudkin had lost his wife and all four of his children in the space of six years. It is possible that Sarah Jane was also his child but equally possible that she was not as William and Ann did not marry until Sarah Jane was at least fifteen months old.

William, a working quarryman, must have had a lot of help for those new-born twins to survive even a few months. He was living close to his in-laws and no doubt they and other neighbours would have helped to look after the children. So perhaps it is not surprising that on 19 Oct 1863, (just three month’s after Ann’s death) William Rudkin married again, at Dudley Saint Thomas, this time to Mary Jane, usually known as Jane, Parkes. Who appears to have been Ann’s sister!

Perhaps William felt Rowley was not a good place for him or perhaps better money was on offer as they must have moved to Shropshire soon afterwards. William and Jane went on to have four children in Cainham – Edward Thomas (1866-1923), John (1868-1949) who married Harriet Levett and Edith Ann, (1870-1942). As the dates show, these three children all survived into adulthood unlike most of their earlier half siblings. Another son George Henry was baptised on 13 Oct 1872 at Knowbury. But by the time of the 1881 census, everything had changed again.

By 1881, Mary Parkes, now 68, was back in Tippity Green, living with her daughter Elizabeth Parkes, aged 28, the three Rudkin grandchildren, a granddaughter Annie Parkes, aged 6 and another Rudkin grandson named William who was aged 5 and born in Rowley. (Also a lodger William Foley, a miner aged 43). When you think how small the cottages in that area were, it must have been quite crowded.

Where were William Rudkin and Jane? William had died in Shropshire in 1872, just a couple of months after the baptism of their new son George Henry and William was buried on 10 Dec 1872 at St Paul’s church, Knowbury. I do not know what he died of and can find no other records about him but he was only 37 so possibly an industrial accident or perhaps a disease. And Jane? She had obviously moved back to Rowley with her mother and the children by 1874 because George Henry died and was buried at St Giles on 15 Feb 1874, aged 1. And she had had another child William in Rowley Regis in 1875. There is no way of knowing who was little William’s father but it could not have been William Rudkin, her late husband since he had died in 1872.

Jane herself was not in that 1881 Census entry because she, too, had died and had been buried at St Giles on 21 Apr 1878, aged 31.

So poor Mary Parkes, herself elderly, was now responsible for her four Rudkin grandchildren, although by 1881 both Thomas and John were working at the quarry.

What became of the Rudkin children?

I have not been able to trace Sarah Jane Parkes or Rudkin after the 1871 census, there are no definite sightings of her under the name Rudkin and there are so many Sarah Parkes that it is not possible to be sure which if any of them is her. She could have married, gone into service, died under either name – it remains a mystery.

Edward Thomas Rudkin joined the army at some point shortly after this, and when he married Kate Cook in Buriton, Southampton in 1887 he was a Corporal. Presumably travelling with the army, they had two daughters in India, one of whom died there. When they returned to England, they lived in Army Cottages in Kempsey, Worcestershire, presumably based at the Barracks there and later moved to Saltley in Birmingham where Edward was working as a Commissionaire at the Motor Works in 1911. By 1923, they had returned to the Portsmouth area where Edward died in 1923 and Kate in 1936. Their surviving daughter Edith married George Henry Day in Portsmouth in 1915 and she was still living there until she died on 27 May 1941, listed among civilian war deaths there so possibly killed in bombing raids on Portsmouth. She and George Day appear to have had three sons, the first born in Leicester. I wonder whether she had gone back to her Rudkin family there? Pure speculation, of course!

Edith Ann Rudkin went into service and in 1891 she was living at 6 Siviters Lane, Rowley as a domestic servant to Dr Beasley. In 1901 she was still described as a domestic servant but was visiting a friend in Dudley. In 1908 she married a widower Charles Upton in Aston, Birmingham and in the 1911 Census they were living in Hednesford, Cannock with his two daughters from a previous marriage and Edith May, their own daughter born in 1910. Sadly little Edith May died in 1915. Edith Ann was a widow according to the 1921 Census and she died in Cannock in 1942, aged 72.

John Rudkin, my starting point for this family mini-study, had married Harriett Levett in 1894 at Holy Trinity, Old Hill and they had four children. In 1901 they were still living in Perry’s Lake with their son Lawrence (1895-1951) who was six. John was working as a hewer in a coal mine.

By 1911, they had left Rowley and were living in Rugeley Road, Hednesford, Cannock – yes, the same place as John’s sister Edith, nineteen miles from Rowley, according to Google maps. Whether Edith moved to be near John or vice versa, I don’t know but they were living less than a mile apart. By this time John and Harriett also had Edith (1904-1979), Mary (1907-1927) and William Thomas (1909 – ?). John was still working as a miner or Stallman at the pit face and now his son Lawrence, aged 16, was also working in the pit as a driver (underground).

In 1921, John and Harriett had moved again and were living in Kingsbury, near Meriden, the other side of Birmingham. All their children were still at home and again both John and Lawrence were working as miners at the Kingsbury Colliery.

Most of the children stayed in the Meriden area from then on, although it is possible that the youngest William Thomas settled elsewhere as he joined the Navy in 1927 and his service details note him as having been traced for his pension in 1949, though I cannot find any other definite information for him.

John and Harriet appear only to have had two grandchildren, one of them Betty, (the illegitimate daughter of Lawrence) who was born in Tamworth in 1926 and emigrated to the USA with her American husband in 1947, perhaps a War Bride. The only photograph I have been able to find of the Rudkin family in this country is of a young Lawrence in what looks like WWI army uniform, which was uploaded to Ancestry and was marked on the back as ‘Betty’s father’. Her application for naturalisation in the USA gives Rudkin as another name so it appears that this was an acknowledged connection. So the Rudkin genes stretch over the Atlantic, it seems.

Lawrence Rudkin as a young soldier, possibly in WW1. Copyright unknown.

John’s daughter – another Edith – had married William C Monk in Sutton Coldfield in 1941 and had one son Peter in 1942 so he was their only grandson.

The Rudkins in Rowley

So none of the Rudkin family stayed in Rowley Regis, mostly they and their descendants ended up in Warwickshire or further afield and the name will be unknown to most Rowley folk.

So why have I written in such detail about a family who had such a brief encounter with the village?

I have recently been reading some books by Gillian Tindall who is known, according to reviews, as a superb ‘micro-historian’. She is someone who writes about small communities, individual people, a village, a single house – in great detail. Her writing is fascinating and I learn from her writing constantly. The first book of hers which I read was ‘The house by the Thames’ and it is all about a single very old house which survives even now, between the Globe theatre and the Tate Modern on the Embankment in London. It is most interesting and I have learned much about the history of the area and the people who lived there. (I now have three other books by Gillian Tindall waiting to be read!) But it was in the first pages of this book that I read about the philosophy which drives her research and this sang to my heart. She wrote in the first chapter:

“the vast majority of men and women in every time do not leave behind them either renown or testimony. These people walked our streets, prayed in our churches, drank in our inns or in those that bear the same names, built and lived in the houses where we have our being today, opened our front doors, looked out of our windows, called to each other down our staircases. They were moved by essentially the same passions and griefs that we are, the same bedrock hopes and fears, they saw the sun set over Westminster as we do. Yet almost all of them have passed away from human memory and are still passing away, generation after generation –.”

“Witness to the living, busy complex beings that many of these vanished ones were tends to be limited to fleeting references on pages of reference books that are seldom opened. At the most, there may be a handwritten note or a bill, perhaps a Will, a decorative trade-card, a few lines in a local newspaper or a report from a long obsolete committee, possibly an inscription on a tomb. There may perhaps be a relevant page or two in an account of something quite other, or a general social description which seems to fit the specific case.

Scant evidence, you may say, of lives as vivid and as important to the bearers as our own are to us today. But by putting these scraps together, sometimes, with luck, something more coherent is achieved. Pieces of lost lives are genuinely recovered. Extinct causes clamour for attention. Forgotten social groups coalesce again. Here and there a few individual figures detach themselves from the dark and silence to which time has consigned them. They walk slowly towards us. Eventually we may even see their faces.”[i]

‘Neither renown nor testimony’

In Rowley Regis today, of course, there are very few old buildings and our ancestors did not live in our particular houses, look out of our windows or call down our stairs. But the landscape they gazed on has not changed so much and indeed with much of the polluting heavy industry gone or cleaned up, the local scene is perhaps now closer in appearance to the pre-industrial landscape our earlier ancestors would have known. They, too would have gazed across the valley to the Clent hills and been able to spot distant church steeples and the ruins of Dudley Castle, still visible today.

While I was researching Harriet Levett and her marriage to John Rudkin, I had realised that John had grown up in Tippity Green and Perry’s Lake, in the heart of the Lost Hamlets, and that his father had been married to not one but two Rowley girls, the older of whom had borne him four children in Rowley. The children had all died as infants, buried, like Ann herself, in Rowley Regis at St Giles and only one of her children Sarah J had grown to adulthood. Sadly this would not have been an unusual situation with babies in those days. Then I realised that, looking at other Rudkin family trees on Ancestry, that they only listed William Rudkin’s marriage to the second Parkes daughter Mary Jane. Poor Ann Parkes and her infant children had been lost in the mists of time.

I hope that my One Place Study is helping to make the history of the lost hamlets, with the complex web I keep finding of family relationships and intermarriages, more coherent , as Gillian Tindall suggests is possible. And I hope, in particular, that this piece has helped to preserve the memory of this family, and especially of Ann Parkes, (1835-1863), daughter of Joseph and Mary Parkes of Tippity Green. This ordinary and short-lived Rowley girl, has previously been lost in that ‘dark and silence’ to which Gillian Tindall refers, and, although we may not see Ann’s face, I hope that she has at least ‘walked slowly a little way towards us’.

[i] Copyright Gillian Tindall – The House on the Thames, published by Pimlico 2007. ISBN: 9781844130948

The Poorhouse in Rowley

Recently I came across an article in Ariss’s Birmingham Gazette dated 11 April 1825.

Coroner’s Inquest: Rowley Regis

A long examination took place on Saturday at Rowley Regis before Mr H Smith, Coroner, on the body of Jonathan Taylor, a pauper, upwards of 85 years of age. The deceased, who possessed excellent bodily health but whose mental faculties had for some time failed him, was an inmate of the poorhouse, and frequently became so unmanageable that he was obliged to be put under restraint. It was on an occasion of this kind that on Monday afternoon he was confined in a room called the dungeon where there was clean straw for him to lie on, and his victuals were regularly taken to him, and he made a hearty dinner on Tuesday with beef, bread and potatoes; but towards evening he stripped himself naked, and refused to eat his supper.

At five o’clock on Wednesday morning he was heard to cough, and about seven he was found dead, lying on his side with his shirt under his head. Several of the paupers deposed to the kind and humane treatment which the deceased had always received, in common with themselves, from the Governor and Governess of the Workhouse, and it appears that the dungeon was dry and wholesome and had a boarded floor. The Rev. George Barrs, Minister of the parish, stated that he had often made enquiries from the poor as to their treatment and they always expressed themselves perfectly satisfied with it. Mr Kenrick, the surgeon, who opened and examined the body of the deceased, said there were no marks of injury whatever upon it, and that he had never before seen so healthy a subject, considering his extreme age, and that he had no doubt he died a natural death. The jury therefore returned a verdict to that effect.

So what we would now recognise as dementia and mental health problems were a similar problem almost exactly two hundred years ago, and although treatment has mostly moved on a little, even now, in the 21^st century, there are periodoc cases one hears of where the treatment of such people has not improved a great deal since then.

I cannot find a baptism locally for a Jonathan Taylor at any time around 1740 or any other record of him but he must have had some local connection to be in the Poorhouse.

The Poorhouse in Rowley was at the Springfield end of the village, just above Tippity Green and the Bull’s Head, on the same side of the road. It is apparently shown on this map which is a copy of the map drawn up in about 1800 in connection with the Enclosure process, above the Bull’s Head, with two buildings and marked ‘Poor’ and ’27’. but considerably before Brickhouse Green. The second building may have been a nailshop which Chitham says was used by the inmates to earn their keep.

Later there seems to have been some alms provision in Tippity Green itself.

Edward Chitham (in his 1972 book The Black Country) says
“The Rowley Poorhouse was situated at Tipperty Green where nowadays the Christadelphian church stands. It was a stone building, limewashed white and contained separate accommodation for men and women. In addition to stone breaking both sexes worked in the adjoining nailshop, which was closed in 1829 to provide space for a small sickbay. In the sickbay the floor was to be laid with bricks and the window looking out on to the garden stopped up, being replaced by another looking onto what is now the Dudley Road. This was to be “above the height of persons” who might look in and see the paupers.”

Perhaps the provision of a sickbay in 1829 was as a result of the death of Jonathan Taylor in 1825.

How were Poorhouses run?

Under legislation arising from the Poor Relief Act of 1601, by the Parish, who appointed Overseers of the Poor (along with Churchwardens and other Parish Officers) from among their number. But those Overseers clearly delegated some of the practical work of running the Poorhouse.

On 3^rd March 1818 this advertisement appeared in Ariss’s Birmingham Gazette:

Yes, it does say ‘the farming’ of the Poor, a curious term. So it appears that this work was let on an Annual Basis.

What life in the Poorhouse was really like

It is possible that life in the Rowley Poorhouse was not quite as rosy as the picture painted at the inquest above.

These are entries from the Parish Records at about that period:

Rowley Regis Poorhouse 3 January 1820

Resolved that Sarah Challenger be set to break stones at the Poor House under the inspection of J Evans and that she be kept to do that work every day and always do a reasonable quantity of it before every meal is given to her, and that the same course be taken with all other paupers who are capable of work, and that the stones to be broken by the women be first broken into pieces or brought to the place in pieces not exceeding ten or fifteen pounds and be broken by a hammer not exceeding two pounds into pieces not exceeding 3 or 4 ounces.

Rowley Regis Poorhouse 7 May 1820

Ordered that those of the Poor House that are capable of using a hammer with both hands be so put to work, and others with a hammer to be used with one hand only, and that they be not suffered to eat till the appointed quantity be broken by each of them, the stones to be broken down to the size of a hen’s egg.

Bearing in mind that the stone referred to was probably the local notoriously hard Rowley Rag, they certainly earned their keep. And all the local Guardians had supplies of ragstone delivered to their Work and Poorhouses and presumably received an income from the broken stone when it was sold on.

Poor House Rowley Regis 6 July 1821

John Haden was employed to maintain all paupers in the Poor House and he was paid the sum of two shillings and sixpence for each person each week.

One can see why entering the Poorhouse was very much something people dreaded and did their best to avoid. Even for those who needed financial support but could remain outside of the Poorhouse, the authorities would not give any financial assistance, for example, if the applicant owned a dog and they would require the dog to be destroyed before making any payments.

Government Enquiries

The Government was also taking an interest at this time in how these institutions were being managed. A Poor Rates Order was passed in the House of Commons on 20^th June 1821,

“That the Churchwardens and Overseers of the Poor of every Parish, Township or other place, in England and Wales, do prepare an Account showing the total amount of the Money levied in the year ending on the 25^th March 1821,upon such Parish, Township or other place, maintaining its own Poor; and also, the total amount of Money expended in that year; distinguishing in the said Account the amount of Money paid for any other purpose than the relief of the Poor; and that such Churchwardens and Overseers do, as soon as may be, transmit such Account to the Clerk of the House of Commons, stating, in addition thereto, the number of persons (if any) maintained in any Workhouse or other Poor-house, distinguishing in such Statement the number of children under 14years of age; and also stating whether any Select Vestry has been formed or an Assistant Overseer appointed by Virtue of the Act 59 Geo 3 C.12 and any other observations which may be thought necessary.”

The Report was to be brought back to the House of Commons in six months’ time. At this time, although the first national censuses had been held, the information from them was very limited and not detailed at all so probably this was the only way for the Government to gather this information.

Perhaps as a result of these researches, it appears that the Government was not satisfied that individual parishes were coping well or consistently with their responsibilities for the poor and the wealthier classes considered that they were paying for the poor to be idle. In 1834 ‘An Act for the Amendment and better Administration of the Laws relating to the Poor in England’, known widely as the New Poor Law was passed in Parliament which attempted to impose a system which would be the same all over the country.

Provision was made for Unions of parishes to be set up where several parishes would make provision jointly. Except in special circumstances, poor people could now only get help if they were prepared to leave their homes and go into a workhouse.

Conditions inside the workhouses were deliberately harsh, so that only those who desperately needed help would ask for it. Families were split up and housed in different parts of the workhouse. The poor were made to wear a uniform and the diet was monotonous. There were also strict rules and regulations to follow. Inmates, male and female, young and old were made to work hard, often doing unpleasant jobs such as making nails (although most Rowley folk would have been well used to this) or breaking stones. Children could also find themselves hired out to work in factories or mines.

The National Archives says that “Shortly after the new Poor Law was introduced, a number of scandals hit the headlines. The most famous was Andover Workhouse, where it was reported that half-starved inmates were found eating the rotting flesh from bones. In response to these scandals the government introduced stricter rules for those who ran the workhouses and they also set up a system of regular inspections. However, inmates were still at the mercy of unscrupulous masters and matrons who treated the poor with contempt and abused the rules.”

In 1836 the Parish of Rowley joined the Dudley Union of the Board of Guardians and later a new Workhouse was built at Sedgley where conditions were supposedly very much improved. From that point all of the residents of the Poorhouse in Rowley should have transferred there and certainly there were burials after that date of Rowley people who had died in the Sedgley Workhouse, as this is recorded in the Burials Register in some cases, although some were buried at Sedgley.

The New Workhouse for the Dudley Union

The provision of a new Workhouse for the Union had met with considerable opposition in Rowley, from those who were liable to pay the Poor Rate. In 1849 Mr F W G Barrs attended a meeting of the Guardians of the Dudley Union, (at which he was one of those who represented Rowley) and presented a Memorandum against the erection of a New Workhouse, which he said bore the signatures of ‘a great majority of the resident proprietors, rate-payers, and influential iron and coal masters’. According to the report in the Birmingham Gazette the presentation of this document “gave rise to some derisive observations from Mr Thomas Darby, one of the Rowley Guardians, and which drew from the Chairman the remark that a memorial of such a nature was deserving of the utmost attention and respect, instead of being met with a sneer and made a subject of ridicule.” After some discussions about the potential excessive cost of running a new Workhouse and evidence adduced by the Chairman who had consulted various ‘eminent medical men’ who had given it as their opinion that “in all the Kingdom cannot be found more healthy poor-houses than those now used in the Dudley Union” [which seems quite a remarkable claim] but he left it to the Guardians to act ‘according to the dictates of humanity and their own consciences’.

A proposal was made to the meeting to build a new Workhouse, an amendment was proposed by Mr Barrs “that under the existing depression of every kind of trade, and particularly of the iron trade which is the staple trade of the [Dudley] Union, it is the opinion of this meeting that this is not the time to impose any additional burthen on the already heavily burthened rate-payers.” Eventually, this proposed amendment was withdrawn and the proposal to build a new Workhouse was put to a simple vote. There were seven votes in favour and sixteen against.

This clearly did not put a stop to the proposal entirely as a new Workhouse was built in Sedgley in 1855-56.

The Rowley Poorhouse Building

There is some evidence, however, that the original Poorhouse building in Rowley was no longer in use before the new Workhouse was opened because in August 1849 there was an article in the Birmingham Gazette which related that:

‘At the weekly meeting of the Dudley Board of Guardians on Friday last, it was proposed, and, notwithstanding the strenuous remonstrances of Mr Barrs, one of the Rowley Guardians, ultimately resolved “that the Poorhouse at Rowley Regis be forthwith put in repair and used as a place for the reception of cholera patients for the whole of the Dudley Union.” This Union includes the densely populated parishes of Sedgley, Tipton, Dudley and Rowley.’

Mr Barrs was one of the sons of the late Rev. George Barrs and it seems that he may have inherited the combative style which had made his father so unpopular with his parishioners as the reports of his contributions to meetings of the Dudley Union Board seem to have him vigorously protesting against various proposals. It might be considered that it appears that in doing so he was usually representing the financial interests of rate payers and local businessmen, rather than the welfare of the poorer people who needed poor relief.

However, on this particular topic, one can imagine that the residents of the village around the former poorhouse would not have welcomed the use of the old buildings as a cholera hospital for the whole of this large area, especially as it was recognised to be so contagious so on this occasion Mr Barrs probably was speaking for most local residents. There was a cholera outbreak in the area in 1849 and there were 13 cases in the Rowley Parish, mostly in Old Hill in October and November. It is not known whether this plan was ever carried out or whether alternative arrangements were made. The former Poorhouse would not have appeared to have been very big so it is not clear how many people it would have accommodated nor who would have nursed the patients.

Up until this time, it appears that Overseers had been generally appointed from among local people and were probably not paid, it being perceived as a public service to the community. However, times were changing. By the middle of the 1800s the job of the Overseer or even the Assistants to the Overseer were not confined to the supervision of the Poorhouse or Workhouse itself, it seems. There was an advertisement in July 1849 for the neighbouring Union of Walsall for an Assistant Overseer which read:

Assistant Overseer wanted

The Guardians will, on the 10^th August next, appoint some Person to perform the duties of ASSISTANT OVERSEER for the several Parishes in this Union.

Candidates, between the ages of 25 and 55 years, must be thoroughly competent to undertake settlement cases and parish appeals, and value all rateable property to the poor-rate. Salary £50 a year.

So the appointees would have had considerable administrative duties and would have required knowledge of the law to interpret whether people had a right of settlement and so were entitled to poor relief, a responsibility parishes were always keen to repudiate if that responsibility could be passed on to another parish where someone had lived or worked previously.

In the same paper an advertisement by the Parish of Birmingham was seeking to appoint ‘a properly qualified, active and experienced married couple to undertake the offices of Master and Matron of the Workhouse. Joint Salary £150 per annum with Board and Rations.’ They would be required to devote the whole of their time to the duties of their respective offices, and to enforce the observance of the Rules and Regulations of the Poor Law Board, and of the Board of Guardians, with the strictest care. The Master was required to be fully competent to keep the Books required under the Order of Accounts and to give a security of £200 for the faithful performance of his office. So this post did not appear to include the same responsibility for investigating rights of settlement as the Rowley job but it would have been a much larger operation. The report about Jonathan Taylor shows, though that in 1825 there were a Governor and Governess running the Poorhouse on a day to day basis.

The social care profession was slowly being made more professional, although compassion still did not appear to enter into the picture very much.

The Right of Settlement

Priot to the New Poor Law, the Right of Settlement meant that the place where you had this right had to assume responsibility for keeping you if you became poor or ill and unable to support yourself. My 4xg-grandfather Thomas Beet had been born in Nuneaton in 1764 and married there in 1802, having four sons of whom two survived, his wife dying in 1819. My fourth cousin Margaret who is also a descendant of Thomas kindly shared with me her discovery of a Removal Order in Nuneaton in 1820 relating to Thomas and his two sons who were deemed to have no Right of Settlement in Nuneaton and were removed to Rowley Regis. The reason for this is unclear but it is probable that in previous years he had worked in Rowley for some time, possibly for his cousin John Beet at Rowley Hall and this residence overtook his right to be maintained in Nuneaton.

Thomas appears in the 1841 Census in Tippity Green, along with two other elderly residents in the household of Elizabeth Thomson who is said to be of Independent Means. There is no mention of the Poorhouse. In the 1851 Census he was still in Tippity Green, aged 88 and Blind, as was Elizabeth Thompson, now shown as a Widow, and they are both described as Almspeople. So even several years after Rowley had joined the Dudley Union, there were still people described as Almspeople living in Tippity Green (and I have seen a suggestion that there was a Poorhouse in Tippity Green though I cannot find it on any map from the period. ) When Thomas Beet died in 1852 and was buried at St Giles, his abode was still given as The Poorhouse. Almshouses and Poorhouses are not the same thing but it is not clear who gave alms to support local people such as Thomas. I have not heard of any Almshouses as such in Rowley but I am aware that John Beet, the wealthy squire of Rowley Hall, had left the following legacy in his Will which was proved in 1844

“I give and bequeath unto the clergyman of Rowley Church and the occupier of Rowley Hall for the time being the sum of three hundred pounds. And it is my wish and I direct them to nominate and appoint under their hands in writing six proper persons to be trustees jointly with them for the purposes hereinafter mentioned, that is to say: Upon trust to invest the said sum of three hundred pounds upon freehold or governmental security and to crave the interest and proceeds thereof and give and divide the same unto and between such poor persons residing in the parish of Rowley as they or the major part of them shall consider fit and proper objects for relief, part in clothes and part in money.”

So the Vicar and the resident in Rowley Hall (at this time the widow of the late John Beet) appear to have had a sum of money for the assistance of the poor at their disposal and I wonder whether this was how Thomas came to be supported within the village, as an Almsperson. I will do some more research to see whether I can find out what happened to any such Trusts in later years. There is no apparent record of such a charity at the Charity Commission now but it is possible that it may have been consolidated in with other small charities at some point. A record may also have appeared on Charity Boards inside the church. If so, these may well have been destroyed in the church fire. If anyone has any information about this, I would be most interested to hear about it.

There is an interesting article on the workhouses.org website from the Dudley Guardian with a ‘pen and ink sketch’ which waxes lyrical about conditions in the new workhouse in 1866 which makes it sound almost like a delightful rest home. There is also a history and a plan of the new Workhouse on the website.

So this was the Poorhouse and Alms provision which served Rowley village and the Lost Hamlets two hundred or so years ago and illustrates how local people who could no longer support themselves were cared for. At least we know rom that inquest report that the Vicar took an interest in the Poorhouse and that, when someone – even someone who was 85 – died unexpectedly in the Poorhouse there was an inquest held locally and reported on and a real attempt was made to discover whether he had been ill-treated. It also gives us a glimpse of life as a pauper then, for our poor, old or infirm ancestors who could not be cared for by their families.

https://www.workhouses.org.uk/Dudley/

Pubs in the Lost Hamlets 1 – The Bull’s Head

There was no shortage of places for folk to have a drink in days gone by, in Rowley and around. Hitchmough’s work on Black Country pubs is an amazing and most interesting read, packed with information and stories. (Hitchmough’s Guide to Black Country pubs – an invaluable source for local historians is at longpull.co.uk ) He lists 29 pubs in and around Rowley, 7 with a Whiteheath address in addition to the ones in the Lost Hamlets. Not all of them will have been operating at the same time and most of them have long since disappeared but in their time, there were a lot of them!

For the purposes of this study, I shall look at the main pubs in the Lost Hamlets in separate posts, as there is too much information for each of them to fit them into one piece

I am starting with the BULLS HEAD which was at 1, Dudley Road, Springfield, (Tippity Green), Rowley Regis. This is the view that most people now would recognise, from Anthony Page’s Second book of Rowley Regis images.

According to Hitchmough, who is the fount of all knowledge on such issues, the owners of the Bull’s Head were Ferdinando Dudley Lea-Smith, Thomas Benjamin Williams and Lizzie Bate of Rowley Regis, Ansells Ltd. (acquired in 1946) and later Sue Whittall and Mark Franks [1997].

It is entirely probable that there was a public house or hostelry of some sort on the site before formal licensing was introduced but the LICENSEES were as follows:

Joseph Bowater [1834] – [1854]

Mrs. Eliza Bowater [1860]

Elizabeth Bowater [1861] – [1865]

William Henry Hingley [1868] – [1870]

William James Hingley [1867] – [1874]

William Williams [1875]

Thomas Benjamin Williams [1875] – [1891]

Thomas William Williams [1892] – [1900]

Howard Woodhouse [ ] – 1909);

Simeon Dunn (1909 – [1912]

Thomas Benjamin Williams [1911]

Gertrude Fletcher (1913 – [ ]

John Hughes [1916] – 1932

Hitchmough has later licensees listed but I have stopped at about 1920 as my study is really looking at this earlier period.

This map is dated about 1803, copyright Bob Adams. It shows a substantial building on the site of the Bull’s Head which was probably a hostelry even then. There is not much other development, the buildings above it are marked Poor and are presumably the Poorhouse which fits with later census routes. The windmill is just visible in the middle at the bottom, the tiny building with sails, in the ownership of J Alsop, according to this map. There is no development to the North side of Tippety Green but the building opposite the Bull’s Head may be the Mill Farm. I suspect that the tiny square there is the Tippity Green Toll House but that is just a guess! Perrys Lake is already quite a substantial area with several buildings shown.

This hand-drawn map looks to date to about the same period and was shown on Facebook by Roger Slater. It too shows the same buildings but possibly also shows the ‘green’ area. Presumably the bar shown across the road to Perry’s Lake is the Toll Gate.

Joseph Bowater, the first licensee listed by Hitchmough, was also a butcher and it was quite common in those days for licensees to have other full time occupations in addition to the pub, including butchers, farmers and boilermakers in this area. In the 1841 Census, Joseph Bowater was listed as living in Tippity Green and his occupation was shown as a butcher. His age was shown as 50 and with him was Elizabeth Bowater, also 50 with no occupation shown, and also William Cooper, a Male Servant, aged 20, and Catherine Hargrove a female servant aged 25. The two men were both born in Staffordshire, the two women were not.

Also living there were three other men, all labourers. Since Joseph had already been the licensee for several years, it appears that he was combining his butchery business with the pub which was probably why the pub was called the Bull’s Head. (In similar vein, the Levett family apparently sold or let land near their butchery business in Birmingham Road, Blackheath for the erection of a pub (first licenced in 1857) and specified that the pub should be called the Shoulder of Mutton which is, as far as I know, still there and still a pub.)

So it appears that as early as 1841 Joseph Bowater was operating also as a lodging house keeper at the pub. A Joseph Johnson Bowater was baptised at St Giles on 13 Jul 1788, the illegitimate son of Ann Bowater, one wonders, as ever whether his middle name is a clue to his father’s identity. And I was very interested to note from the parish register that sixteen years later in 1804, a child Elenor was baptised, the ‘base-born’ daughter of Daniel Johnson and Elizabeth Bowater , unusual in this register for the father of an illegitimate child to be named – perhaps the Bowaters and the Johnsons were near neighbours!

There were other Bowater families in the area at the time, the first Bowater mentioned in the Parish Registers of St Giles is in 1740.

In 1851 the census gives clearer picture – Joseph Bowater, 64 still showing as living in the first entry in Tippity Green, is a Vittler (a corruption of Victualler – someone who supplies Victuals – food and drink) and Butcher who was born in Rowley and his wife Elizabeth, 66 who was born in Birmingham. Joseph is also employing a butcher Luke Lashford aged 21 who was also born in Birmingham (also referred to in my post about the Redfern family), two female general servants, born in Halesowen and Tipton respectively , a fourteen year old lad from Dudley described as an Inn Servant and a visitor William Bowater 40, born in Rowley.

Whereas Tippity Green came in time to be used as the name of the street running from Dudley Road to Perrys Lake, it seems that at this time the names of various small hamlets referred to a group of dwellings and small businesses grouped together, often round an open space or Green rather than a linear row of houses, as shown on the early maps above, hence Tippity Green, Cock Green, Brickhouse Green although quite where one stopped and the next started is not so easy to work out. One thing I have learned is not to get too hung up on precise addresses at this time.

Bowater was clearly keeping the Bulls Head Inn , licensed premises even though the Census does not mention it by name and this is borne out by that little word in the description of one of his employees – Inn servant! And when I looked at the Enumerator’s Route which Ancestry provides at the beginning of each census piece, the enumerator actually mentions the Bulls Head Inn although he doesn’t identify it on the Census sheet itself, how contrary and unhelpful for us later local historians centuries later!

Incidentally, the next entry in the census is for two people described as Almspeople so that gives us a clue that the almshouse was somewhere very close to the Bulls Head. One of those was Thomas Beet, my 4xg-grandfather, then aged 88 and blind.

There is remarkably little information about Joseph Bowater that I can find. There is one baptism in St Giles in 1829 for James, son of Joseph and Mary Bowater of Cock Green, a labourer which is roughly in the same area as the Bull but there were a lot of Bowaters around and there is no real evidence that this is the same Joseph. By 1841 our Joseph was married to an Elizabeth but no children of that marriage are listed anywhere that I can find. Joseph appears to have died in 1857 and was buried on 23 Jan 1857 at St Giles, aged 70, his abode given as Tippity Green and his cause of death shown in the Burial Register as old age.

Elizabeth or Eliza Bowater then appears to have taken over the licence as she is shown by Hitchmough as the licensee until at least 1865. In the 1861 Census, she is still in Tippity Green, aged 71 and a publican, living with one Elizabeth Bowater, 71, publican and one house servant and one boarder, a stone dresser so the butchery business appears to have ceased or at least not to have a butcher there. There was a grocery shop listed next door in that census, occupied by Benjamin Rock so perhaps he was using part of the premises which had previously been used by the butcher.

Inquests were often held in local pubs and the Bull’s Head was no exception. A report in the Stourbridge Observer on January 1 1865 told of

“An adjourned inquest was held at the BULLS HEAD, Perry’s Lake, on Wednesday last, before E. Hooper, Esq, Coroner, touching the death of Henry Parkes, a collier, 44 years of age, who met with his death through falling down a coal pit on the 21st ultimo. On that day, the deceased and several others who all worked for Mr. Mills of Gornal went to the office to receive their wages. Deceased left the office first, and walked towards the pit to pay his club money. One of the men heard a sound, and immediately missing deceased, some tackle was procured, and a miner named Edwards and another man descended and brought deceased from the bottom of the shaft. He was quite dead. The pit according to witness’s statement, was fenced all round, and was not at work. A man and a boy have both lost their lives previously, by falling down the same pit. After the first inquest, the Coroner and Jury went to view the pit.

At the adjourned inquest, on Wednesday, Mr. Baker, Government Inspector of Mines, was present, and also Mr. Homfray, solicitor, with Mr. Mills, on behalf of the proprietors of the colliery.

Some further evidence was taken of the state of the fencing round the pit, and William Morgan, the banksman of the pit, was called by Mr. Homfray. He stated that the pit was in the same state when the Jury saw it as at the time of the accident.

Mr. Mills was also sworn, and deposed to the same circumstances, and promised that new iron railing should be placed round it.

The Coroner summed up, impressing upon the Jury the fact that there was no evidence as to how the deceased got into the pit. If they were of opinion that the pit was properly fenced of course, would be accidental; but if they thought that the pit was not properly fenced, they would leave the matter in the hands of the Government Inspector.

The Jury retired for ten minutes, and then returned a verdict of Accidental Death, accompanied with the opinion that the pit was not properly fenced at the time.”

Poor Henry Parkes and his family and just before Christmas, too. After publishing this piece I was contacted via Facebook by Luke Adams who was able to give me more information. His wife was related to the Mr Mills referred to above and Luke thinks that the reporter misheard the name of the place, which he gave as Gornal but which Luke thinks was probably Gawne Hill which was the site of a mine and very close to the Bull’s Head. This makes a lot of sense to me, as I had found the Gornal reference odd. Thanks, Luke!

The Bull’s Head also acted as a community venue and several meetings of striking miners and pottery workers were held there at various times, as reported in the local press.

William Hingley took over the licence from at least 1868 so I looked for a death or burial for Elizabeth Bowater at or around that date. But there was no such burial at St Giles anywhere near that date. However, there was a death registered in the Dudley Registration District in the September qtr of 1866 for an Elizabeth Bywater of about the right age. And FreeREG shows that an Elizabeth Bywater was buried in Upper Gornal on August 1866, aged 70 which is exactly the right age for Elizabeth Bowater. Upper Gornal? The abode recorded in the Burial Register is the clue here, she had been in the Union Workhouse there, just along the road from Upper Gornal and if, as I surmise, she had had no children to look to her welfare, this might well be where she ended up if she became infirm.

I had noticed when looking at the Bowaters in censuses that they rarely employed anyone from the village, always from the surrounding area, perhaps they did not endear themselves to local people.

There is an article on the workhouses.org.uk site from the Dudley Guardian here on the Dudley Workhouse, including an article dated April 1866 so particularly timely for this Elizabeth which gives a ‘pen and ink sketch’ of the new workhouse, well worth reading and fairly positive, considering the general reputation of workhouses at that time.

https://workhouses.org.uk/Dudley/#Post-1834

The Licence for the Bull’s Head was now taken over by William Henry Hingley [1868] – [1870] and then William James Hingley [1867] – [1874]. I do wonder whether these two were actually the same man. Certainly a newspaper report in the Stourbridge Observer on 28 September 1867 has William James.

In the 1871 Census William J Hingley is recorded as being 32 and a licensed victualler, born Rowley Regis. He had married Ann Maria Barnsley in 1862 at Netherton and children Caroline M, born 1864, William H, born 1867 and Mary born 1869 were listed in the census, all born in Rowley Regis. His father Titus Hingley was also a publican, running the Heath Tavern in Cradley Heath – the licensed trade is another that often ran in families.

Did he keep a good house? I suspect it depended who you asked…

A report in the Stourbridge Observer on 28 September 1867 says:

“At the Petty Sessions, on Wednesday last, before H. G. Firmstone, E. Moore, and F. W. G. Barrs, Esqrs, William James Hingley, landlord of the BULLS HEAD, Tippitty Green, was charged by Superintendent Mills with unlawfully and knowingly permitting drunkenness in his house on the 9th instant.

Police-sergeant Powner said that he visited the defendant’s house after eleven o’clock. He found about forty men in the house, several of whom were quite drunk. Two of the men were playing at dominoes, and four others at cards. About one o’clock in the morning he heard great screaming at the defendant’s house, and some person shouting ‘Murder’. He visited the house again just before two o’clock, and there was fighting going on, the defendant taking no notice.

Defendant admitted that there were a number of persons ‘fresh’, but he did what he could to get them out. Fined 5s and costs.”

So it sounds as though he was popular with some people!

The Police were obviously keeping an eye on the Bull’s Head. A report in the Stourbridge Observer on 21 February 1874 relates:

“William James Hingley, landlord of the BULLS HEAD INN, Rowley, was charged with a similar offence [being open during prohibited hours] on the 8th inst.

Police-constable Cooper said he visited defendant’s house on the above date at 5.40pm and found a man and a woman there. The landlady was warming some ale. The man gave the name of Joseph Whitehouse of Dudley. Defendant’s wife said the two people said they were travellers, and she was getting them something to eat and drink, when the officer came in. Joseph Whitehouse also gave evidence. The case was dismissed.”

So he was let off here. Certainly convictions on licensing matters for a licensee were not a trivial matter. At the Annual Licensing Meeting of the Rowley Regis Petty Sessional division, held at Cooksey’s Hotel, Old Hill on 27 August 1870, the County Express reported that the landlord of the Boat Inn, Tividale who had two convictions recorded in the previous year, had his licence taken away altogether, two more had their licenses suspended, and five landlords, including William’s father Tobias in Cradley Heath were ‘cautioned in reference to the future conduct of their houses’. Numerous beer house keepers around the area applied for wine and spirit licences which were all refused except one. Nine men applied for a licence to keep a beerhouse and all but one of these were refused, too. So frequent offences might well lead directly to a loss of livelihood.

But an advertisement in the Dudley Herald on the 7 March 1874 seems to show the whole brewing apparatus being sold off.

“Unreserved sale ….. at the BULLS HEAD, Tippetty Green near Rowley Regis ….. the whole of the

excellent brewing plant, well seasoned hogshead and half hogshead ale casks, 350 gallon store cask,

2 and a half pockets fine Farnham and Worcester hops, malt, whiskey, stock of old and fresh ale,

crossleg and oblong tables, rail back benches and forms, quantity of chairs, 4-pull beer machine, tap

tables, malt crusher, iron boilers, vats, coolers, fowls, stock of hay etc. together with the neat and

clean household furniture…..”

Whether this sale went ahead we do not know because certainly William James Hingley was still landlord of the Bull’s Head in June of that year when the following report appeared in the Stourbridge Observer

“William James Hingley, landlord of the BULLS HEAD, Tippetty Green, Rowley, was charged by Police-sergeant Walters with selling ale during prohibited hours on the night of the 13th inst, to wit, at 20 minutes to twelve.

Defendant’s wife pleaded not guilty.

Police-constable Jackson said that he visited the defendant’s house at twenty minutes to twelve o’clock. When he heard some persons laughing and talking. Witness pushed the door, but it was fastened. He got over the wall and found several men sitting in the bar, and some women. Cole had a glass of liquors, as also had a man named Joseph Baker. A woman named Priest had a stone bottle full of ale. He went to the front door, and met the woman coming out. Witness told Mrs. Hingley of it. She said the ale was filled before eleven o’clock. Witness saw the bottle filled.

Defendant said it was club night, and there was a dispute over a bondsman, and could not help it.

Sergeant Mills said defendant had been previously convicted; although it had been some time since.

The Bench considered it a bad case, and fined defendant 20s and costs.”

Whether or not these issues led to the Hingleys giving up is not known but Thomas Benjamin Williams took over the licence at latest in 1875 which is very close to that date and the sale.

Thomas Benjamin Williams was born on 6th August 1844, at Glasbury on Wye, Radnorshire. He married Alice Susannah Darby on 8th September 1874 at Rowley Church. He died in 1908.

The Baptisms Register at St. Giles’, Rowley records the baptism on 15th August 1875 of Ella Mary, daughter of Thomas Benjamin, publican of Tippetty (sic) Green and Alice Susannah Williams,

(Thirty-five years later on 29th July 1911 Thomas Raymond (b. 9/7/1911), son of Thomas Benjamin and Jessie Williams, brewer, The Croft, Rowley Regis was also recorded, the next generation!)

So the 1881 Census for the Bull’s Head has Thomas Benjamin Williams (36), licenced victualler, born Glasbury; Alice S. Williams (39), wife, their children Ella M. Williams (5), Florence Williams (2), daughter and Lizzie Williams (7 months), daughter, all born in Rowley Regis plus Louisa Plant (14) and Hannah Horton (14), both general servants and born Rowley Regis. The Williams family employed people from the village in contrast with the Bowaters.

Sadly Florence died in December 1883 and was buried at St Giles on 10 December, aged 5 and Ella Mary Williams died in December 1888, aged 13 and was buried at St Giles on the 20^th December. So in the 1891 Census there were Thomas Williams (46), licensed victualler, born Glasbury, Radnorshire, Alice S. Williams (39), wife, Lizzie Williams (10), daughter, scholar, Thomas B. Williams (8), son, scholar, all born Rowley Regis and Ellen Hill (22), a general servant, born Rowley Regis.

Anthony Page had this photograph in his Second Book of Rowley Regis photographs and he dated this to the late 19th Century. The buildings to the right of the house are the brewery. Perhaps the people standing outside are the Williams family.

An article in the Black Country Bugle in January 2003 had the following tale to tell:

‘Tippetty Green – The Tromans Family – And The Rowley Quarries’ by Peter Goddard

“The BULLS HEAD was a little more upmarket thanks largely to the efforts of Thomas Benjamin Williams and his wife ….. Thomas had left the quarries to take the tenancy of the BULLS HEAD and it was here that their children were born – Lizzie and Thomas Benjamin Jnr. The pub prospered much to the reported displeasure of the Levett family who were running the PORTWAY TAVERN …… One night the windows of the BULLS HEAD were mysteriously smashed. The following night, Thomas, always called Master by his wife, was seen leaving his pub with a poker up his sleeve, and setting out over Allsops Hill. The following day it was reported that the windows of the PORTWAY TAVERN had been broken during the hours of darkness! The BULLS HEAD suffered no further damage.

Having worked in the quarries Thomas knew the hardships the local families suffered and during very severe periods he would send a cart to Old Hill Bakery for a load of bread which he distributed free of charge to his customers.

…..The pub continued to improve its trade and Thomas eventually purchased the freehold and began to brew his own beer. The business made rapid progress and Thomas purchased other pubs in the area, including the WHEATSHEAF at Turners Hill and the GRANGE in Rowley Village. They had 14 pubs in all and to meet the demand they built a bigger brewery on land to the rear of “The Turnpike” immediately opposite the BULLS HEAD. Williams’ [This is a useful clue to the whereabouts of the Turnlike!] Fine Rowley Ales continued at the Rowley Brewery until 1st November 1927 when they began to purchase beers from the Holt Brewery of Birmingham. Thomas (Jnr) had taken over the business when his father died in 1908. Ansells Brewery bought out the Holt Brewery and being keen to expand further, made a bid for young Thomas’ business. After protracted negotiations an ‘attractive’ offer was finally made and accepted and the enterprising business of T. W. Williams and their Fine Rowley Ales finally came to an end…..”

https://maps.nls.uk/index.html

This map, the OS 25” to the mile, was surveyed in 1881 and revised in 1914 and it shows the site of the brewery in Tippity Green. It ceased brewing on 1st November 1927.

So although the list of licensees shows other people at different periods between 1900 and 1911, the pub was still in the ownership of the Williams family.

So in the 1901 Census, Thomas and Alice Williams were still at The Bulls Head, Thomas now listed as a brewer rather than just a publican with their children Lizzie, now 20 and Thomas Junior, 18 and one general domestic servant Maria Parsons, aged 19. Next door on Dudley Road was still a grocer’s shop where Hannah Povey (or possibly Dovey) was noted as the shopkeeper. Living with her and her husband Charles Povey (or Dovey), who was a self-employed haulier, were her daughter Isabella, Isabella’s husband Simeon Dunn who was also listed as a brewer and their five children. Simeon Dunn was listed as the licensee from 1909, the year after Thomas Williams’s death, until 1912 when the licence went back to Thomas Junior for a couple of years. So these were obviously closely connected with the family and reinforces my feeling that the grocery shop was part of or intrinsically connected with the Bull’s Head.

The Parish Register notes on 15th September 1909 the baptism of Wilfred, son of Simeon and Isabella Dunn, brewer, of 1, Dudley Road, the usual address of the Bull’s Head and the 1911 Census has Simeon Dunn (45), brewer, Isabella Dunn (43), wife, married 23 years, James Dunn (22), son, coal haulier, (perhaps with his grandfather/step-grandfather Charles Povey/Dovey?), William Dunn (19), son, a bricklayer’s apprentice, Amy Dunn (18), daughter, Arthur Dunn (15), son, blacksmith’s striker, Lily Dunn (12), daughter, Florence Dunn (9), daughter, Hilda Dunn (6), daughter, Wilfred Dunn (1), son, all born Rowley Regis. Simeon and Isabella’s descendents are still very much around today.

Norma Postin also confirmed in a comment on this piece about the descendents of Simeon and Isabella Dunn – “I am one of them as they were my gt grandparents . My grandfather was James Dunn. Isabella was the daughter of Hannah and her first husband Samuel Wittall. Isabella later married Charles Dovey. Simeon and Isabella’s daughter Florence married John Noott in 1927 , and lived at Rowley Hall .” Thanks, Norma, the web of connections around the Hamlets is always interesting!

Luke Adams also added some more information on Facebook about Gertrude Fletcher, the landlady in 1913 and who was Luke’s wife’s great-grandmother. She was apparently pretty formidable and well known as the sole proprietor of a series of pubs and cider houses such as The Plough in Halesowen, which was quite unusual for a woman in that time. Coincidentally, she was also the granddaughter of Mr Mills, mentioned in connection with the death of Henry Parkes. And he even supplied a picture of her!

Gertrude Fletcher, Copyright Luke Adams.

The invaluable ‘I remember Blackheath and Rowley Regis’ Facebook page and community can add some interest to the picture, too. In 2021 Simon Hancox showed a picture of a Williams Fine Rowley Ales blue and white Pint tot, owned by his mother and which was thought to come from the Bull’s Head. Simon’s mother lived at Rowley Hall which he says was owned by the William’s family so their property holdings in Rowley were obviously substantial. A rare and possibly now unique piece of Rowley history, I show it here, if Simon has any objection to this, I will of course remove it.

As I said in the original piece, I had no doubt that there are many local residents who have memories of this pub, so much a part of the lcoal community over such a long period which has been confirmed on the Facebook page ‘I remember Blackheath and Rowley Regis! Many people had lived there or had friends who lived there or had held family celebrations of various sorts there, many happy memories.

I had asked whether the pub is still open or whether it has suffered the fate of so many pubs now and had closed down. Immediately this piece was published, several people reported on the Facebook page that the Bull’s Head is currently closed and looking sad and run down, there seem to be various rumours about potential future uses though no mention of it reopening as a pub to the regret of many people. Another community asset lost and the long usage of the site as a pub apparently at an end. Many thanks to everyone who added information and answered my question.

The Tippity Green Toll Road – an update

Further reading on this subject has brought me to a paragraph in J Wilson Jones’s book, published in 1950. He talks about the early road system around Rowley and says

“Let us consider the early roads from the early enclosure and pre-enclosure maps, knowing that a Manor of Rowley would be connected by the earliest of roads, being the all-important demesne. Then locate the toll gate houses, not the turnpike of the busy roads, but houses where toll or tax was paid, often situated near the Lord’s Mill [which was at Tippity Green]. We have the Rowley-Dudley Road through Knowle and Powke Lane as the only marked roads, both converging upon ‘Ye Brickhouse Estate’ [which Jones thought was located at Cock Green which was between Tippity Green and Knowle] . The Toll houses are again on Powke Lane at Yewtree Gate and near Tippity Green as Tippity Green Gate. The only other land marks on the 1821 map being Freeberry’s, Hailston Hill, Perry’s Lake and Hawes Hill.”

So my surmise in the last article that the Toll related to the new road from Perry’s Lake to Portway seems to be wrong. If Jones is correct, the Toll Road ran from an area known as Yew Tree on Powke Lane to Tippity Green, up what was then called Dog Lane, subsequently known as Doulton Road, (though I have been told that the canal bridge there is still called the Dog Lane Bridge on canal maps).

I have not been able to identify the map dated 1821 to which Jones refers. What is now called Yew Tree Lane and the public house called the Yew Tree is much higher up Powke Lane than the road Jones describes, but Yew Tree is clearly marked at the bottom of the lane on the map below . This extract from the first edition OS map, surveyed in the 1830s, shows the road which Jones says was a Toll Road and which I have marked in red.

The road to Portway may well have been built later by the quarry operators to facilitate the movement of their stone, and they did, after all, have plenty of material to build it with.

Always learning…

Reference: A History of the Black Country by J Wilson Jones, published c.1950.