43.ii – James, William, Thomas, Hannah and John Hiley

More Hiley/Highley graves which link to one another here in the graveyard; this one features the parents and siblings of Charles Hiley at 43.52.

This branch of Hileys (or Highleys, depending on who wrote the name down at the time) were firmly Lumbutts and Causey Wood stock, but they hadn’t always been this way. John Hiley, who was born in 1795, was the son of John and Judith (King) Hiley of Warley. His future wife was Hannah Bentley, born in 1799. Her place of birth and parentage is unknown but by the time they wed in 1817 she was a resident of the Lancashire side of Todmorden, in Rochdale parish. The couple would settle at Midge Hole in Lumbutts though and go to work for the Fieldens, as you did in those days…

John and Hannah had nine children together during their marriage, from 1819 all the way through 1843 – poor Hannah! Only James, born in 1839, seems to have had an early death. He was buried here in 1842 at the age of three. He would be followed by his brother William in 1848, at the much older age of 28.

John in 1851 was described as a “coppacker” on the census, which means he was in charge of packing tubes or filling bobbins with, in his case, cotton yarn before they would be used on a loom. At that point only children Emma, Martha, David and Charles were left at home. The other five children had either moved out and married or were buried here. That leads us to Thomas, who died “much respected” according to the stone here. Thomas had trained as a cordwainer, or shoemaker, and in 1846 married Jane Shepherd of Ewood, formerly a servant to Rev. Joseph Cowell of Christ Church, at St. Chad’s in Rochdale. At first the marriage was probably seen as an auspicious one, with Jane apparently being respected, but in 1848 she was caught stealing from the house of a cabinet maker who she did charwoman work for – scandal! Other items thought to have been gotten hold of through theft were found in the house and the scandal intensified. The couple then moved to Melling near Liverpool where Thomas, for reasons known only to him and Jane, stopped working as a cordwainer and instead was described as an agricultural labourer on the 1851 Census. He may have been apprenticed to a cordwainer and ended up not wanting to take the profession on – it did happen. Once your indenture finished you were free to do as you pleased, and he pleased to move away and work differently. Which is unsurprising given Jane’s indiscretions.

Sadly it would have been better for him to stay in the safety of the cobbler’s workroom. Thomas found work on the railway at Waterloo Station in Great Crosby as a “waggon greaser”, and on July 17th 1855 he was assisting in moving some carriages from their sidings when either he slipped, or someone bumped into him, or the engine moved the wrong way at the wrong time. The newspapers make it sound as though it was entirely his own “fool-hardy” fault, but who knows – maybe they thought he was Irish. They certainly didn’t know what his actual surname was.

Northern Daily Times, July 30th 1855

He fell under the carriages and according to his death registration suffered “instant death”. We hope that was the case. Jane was apparently left widowed with six children, although given the newspaper couldn’t get Thomas’s last name correct we aren’t certain that this is true either. We couldn’t trace her after this so don’t know where she went next.

Thomas was brought back here to be buried with his brothers, and life went on for the rest of the family. Emma and Charles were still at home, Hannah still kept house, and John still worked as a cotton packer. Their address was now shown as Causey on the census. In 1868 Hannah died, and by 1871 it was just John and Emma still in their house on what the census now called Causway…they keep us on our toes, they do. John was now 75 years old and still working as a “warehouse man”. What must that have been like? This researcher doesn’t like doing manual labour now, let alone at an age that’s about 33 years off in the future. In 1873 Emma married John Fielden, a fishmonger and cotton warehouse man (always good to have a side hustle) from Chorlton. The couple had a daughter, Ada, who died in 1878 at the age of two. After this the Fieldens came back to Todmorden and settled with John at Causey with John presumably finding work alongside him.

When John’s death came in 1882 he was an impressive 87 years old. Not bad for a cotton weaver who was still at work in 1881!

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