The Closes were an interesting family – active, clever, and helpful people, even despite all their losses.
Henry Close was born in 1824, the last of John and Susannah Close’s children to be born, which is no surprise since Susannah was 46 years old at his birth. They forgot to baptise him though which rather sets the scene for his own experience of being a parent. John was a currier, or leatherworker, but Henry became a weaver when he was old enough to work like most of his other siblings. John’s death in 1834 meant all hands on deck – essential given Susannah’s age. 1841 found the Closes at George Street, and was also the year when 17 year old Henry finally took matters into his own hands and got himself baptised at Christ Church.
Ann Barker was born in the same year, to weavers Thomas and Betty of Blind Lane. A more religious sort, maybe, than the Closes, Ann was baptised soon after birth and would remain active in the Church of England for her entire life. She wasn’t the youngest of her siblings, but she shared Henry’s experience of losing her father while relatively young and of becoming a power loom weaver to support the family. Come 1841 and the Barkers were at Meadow Bottom, with Betty’s occupation being “taking care of the home” and the four children remaining at home all working as weavers.
In September 1847 Henry and Ann were married at Heptonstall, and just under nine months later their daughter Maria was born. Next came Sarah in 1851 and John in 1852. Next came bereavement – Maria died in December 1852, and John in 1854. Then came Thomas in 1855, Emma in 1857, and Richard who was born and died in 1862 and who is one of the “and of two infants” mentioned on this stone. Betty in 1864 and Susannah in 1866 finished off the family. Funnily enough, neither Emma nor Betty had their births registered officially. They were baptised, but never made “official” in the eyes of the government. We wondered if they might have been adopted but no reference to this is ever made anywhere, so flippantly we have to conclude that the couple were either too poor or too busy to remember.
The Closes lived at Queen Street, then Peel Street, and finally Ridge Street above Cobden. They would have at least three more postal addresses before the end of this story. They were hard workers but not wealthy. Henry and Ann both had a shared interest beyond simply working though: health. Not necessarily because of their children and the large number of fatalities they had suffered, but also in a general sense. Neither could read or write but they had eyes and hearts. When manufacturers and weaving unions began to express concern that China clay, used to help stiffen and protect yarn prior to weaving, was causing lung complaints and consumption amongst weavers, Henry proposed and became an important part of the Todmorden Anti-China Clay Association.
Ann, meanwhile, worked behind the scenes. During various smallpox and typhoid outbreaks she volunteered as a nurse, looking after people in their homes and somehow managing to not get sick herself. Was she an early recipient of the smallpox vaccine or was she just very careful and very lucky? Good question. But she stepped up again and again and, on her death in 1876, would be remembered for it.
In the meantime though there was one last child loss for Henry and Ann to experience. It would be Emma, who in 1874 developed erysipelas. Erysipelas is a rash that in her case covered her head and neck and which, like so many other illnesses in the yard, can be traced back to Strep A. In Emma’s case she developed edema in her throat and the combination was too much for her. She joined her siblings here, and two years later Ann joined her after dying suddenly while in bed next to Henry.
Henry initially remained at the family home at 11 Barker Street and in 1881 was living with widowed daughter Sarah, unmarried children Thomas, Betty and Susannah, and his older sister Elizabeth. He eventually moved down to Rose Street after Betty married Joseph Naylor and set up home with him there. In 1886 he died – no obituary to remind us of his work trying to improve the working conditions of his fellow weavers – and was buried here as the last Close to enter this grave.