This plot marker has two sets of initials, and thanks to them we can be pretty sure of who’s in here. It’s not the usual story of children whose parents moved on.
Henry Smith, a cotton weaver, married Mary Stansfield in Rochdale in 1835. The couple were based at Sandhole in Walsden (later Knowlwood) and were Methodists, although at the time Knowlwood Primitive Methodist Chapel was only a small room capable of very little and managed by a preacher known for being a bit of a madman, and so when their daughter Jane was born the following year they had her baptised at Christ Church. In 1838 a son, Abram, was born. Poor Abraham didn’t have much life and when he died in November 1839 he was buried here, with the plot marker bearing his father Henry’s initials. H. S.
Henry and Mary had a long patch with no children born, and then in 1847 they welcomed Alice and in 1849 welcomed Sarah. By this time Knowlwood Chapel had been expanded a little and the mad preacher had departed and so both girls were baptised there. They now lived at Stoneswood Bottom and Jane worked alongside Henry at whichever mill was employing them – Henry as a carder and Jane as a throstle doffer. Henry and Mary would have no more children now.
In 1859 Jane married Thomas Pearson of Bacup, a mechanic who was a Tod lad himself and also a Methodist, and who had grown up in Bacup with his parents Abraham and Betty, and later his stepfather Samuel Lord. Jane and Thomas were living alone together in 1861 but that’s only because Jane’s little passenger hadn’t yet entered the scene. That year they had their first child, James Henry, and two years later Abraham was born. Sadly in 1864 Abraham died, and then James Henry in 1866. Both boys are buried at Christ Church. And we know they’re buried here because of the second set of initials. T. P. for Thomas Pearson, the other person with grave rights. Henry either sold or gifted the grave to his son in law. This probably explains why when he died in 1880 he was buried up at Cross Stone, and the others after him.
In between James and Abraham’s deaths a son, Samuel, was born, and in the end Thomas and Jane would have another six children who all lived to adulthood. They moved around, from Bacup to Whalley and back again, and eventually Thomas retired from mechanics and became a life insurance agent before making another hard switch and becoming a wholesale and retail confectioner. They were getting older though and in February 1894 Jane died. She was brought back to Todmorden and buried here somewhere…maybe the somewhere is right here! It’s very tempting to think so and is definitely the preferred plot if we were writing fiction. To top off the dramatic suspense, Thomas died in October 1894 (don’t say from a broken heart, although maybe…) and was also brought back to Christ Church for his burial. They’re named on no other stones here, their parents aren’t here, so where else would they go?
The stone was never updated, but when you know how to read this graveyard and work with the stones that are here, then sometimes you can make sets of initials give up their secrets.