“Being swallowed by a tree” is how we mark this stone as special on our transcript, and we’re lucky to be able to know as much as we do about the names on this stone. Thank you to the previous transcription efforts for helping us out here!

Isaac Button was a brickmaker whose journey from his home to Todmorden was standard for talented craftsmen who were able to contribute to industry. He was born in Colston Basset in Nottinghamshire in 1823 to Francis and Hannah Button. He was their eldest son and Francis was also a bricklayer, and one good enough to have junior brickies lodging with his family and presumably either apprenticed or indentured to him. Isaac was a quick learner and competent workman, but the family’s working class trade meant they had to go where the work was. By 1841 this meant the Buttons had moved from Colston Basset to Worsborough. Barnsley, Sheffield, and the surrounding area was coal mining country but Francis and Isaac remained aboveground.

In 1848 Isaac married for the first time, to Hannah Maria Broadhead. Her father was a tailor but he wouldn’t have objected too much to this match – by 1851, and maybe earlier, Isaac was described on the census as a master bricklayer employing four men and three boys. The couple had three children that we know of over the next 12 years, all girls; Polly, Anne, and Eliza. We won’t dwell on these girls much for this story, but one thing is worth noting before we move on: all three died within four years of each other in Vancouver, Canada, having all married in the UK and then emigrated with their husbands in the 1880s to the far side of North America. Polly’s story is told in a little more detail at another grave.

By 1861 the Buttons had moved to Wortley near Sheffield and Isaac had been taken on as a constable, although we only found one mention of this and it seems to have not been something he took on in earnest. In August 1863, though, disaster struck the family, when Hannah Maria died. Their youngest child was only three years old.
Just over a year later Isaac married for the second time, to Mary Jane Hirst. Mary Jane was from farming stock and she was 36, old (in those days) for a first marriage. Two years later they had a son, John Rhodes, and two years after that a daughter, Emily Mary. Soon the Buttons would move up to Seaham in Durham and spend a few years working there, and afterwards would finally make the move down to Todmorden. Why Tod? Well, Isaac’s sister Mary had married Joseph Charlton, a coachman at Dobroyd Castle, and was settled here with her own family when suddenly both she and Joseph died within a month of each other and in apparently quite a lot of debt. Their son in law William Heyworth and Isaac were left to sort out the mess. If Isaac hadn’t already moved to Todmorden with his family then it must have been a big mess to bring them from Seaham down here.

Once in Todmorden Isaac seems to have found his feet socially, playing cricket games as part of a Warehousemen’s team (one of the many local cricket teams made up from particular workplaces or industries) and being elected onto the Educational Committee for the Bridge End Co-operative Society. It’s interesting to see that once he came to Todmorden Isaac gave up bricklaying and had gone to work as a warehouseman at a cotton mill. Did he receive an injury somewhere or was the work too much for him in some other way? The Buttons seemed happy enough anyway settled at Oak Street in Shade and getting on with their lives here. But in 1884 Isaac died, and in 1886 John Rhodes died – the latter must have been a shock, but his death registration gives phthsis as the cause of death, and readers of these stories knows that it laid everyone low whether they were young or old…

The older three Buttons girls were, as we said, gone by now to Canada. Mary Jane was left with daughter Emily, far from her hometown, and alone. John had been working as a weaver but after his death Mary Jane had to go back to work. She found a position as a cleaner at a school (we don’t know which one sadly) and Emily worked as a cotton weaver. They stayed in Todmorden until 1903 when Emily married Henry Eyre, a horse carter from Leeds, and she and Mary Jane moved there as a result. Mary Jane died in 1907 and is buried in Leeds, and Emily died in 1929 and is buried in Adel. Just Isaac and John Rhodes are here…being swallowed by a tree.
I am the grandson of Henry Eyre and Emily Mary Button, so Isaac was my great-grandfather.
Thank you for your detailed account of his life and that of his family.
You describe Isaac as a bricklayer, buy actually he was a brick-maker, as was his father. A directory of 1867 for Wortley states that Isaac Button was ” manager of Wharncliffe Brick and Tile Works”.
You are correct is saying that Isaac and Hannah Maria had 3 girls, but in fact they also had 3 sons all of whom died as children. A gravestone in Thurgoland churchyard marks the grave of Hannah Maria and 2 of their young sons.
As you said , the 3 girls emigrated to Canada. Eliza was unmarried when she went, but married a railway employee she met on the train in Canada. Their son visited the UK several times and I was able to meet him.
Hi Peter – thank you so much for your comment, and for correcting me – I must have been in a rush when I typed bricklayer! The additional detail about Isaac being the manager of the brick and tile works is really interesting, as is the information about the lost sons.
I’m glad you’re happy with the writeup overall and any additional information you might have would be welcome…particularly about Isaac’s sister Maria who married Joseph Charlton, as we have a volunteer who’s been working on their story for some time but hasn’t fully written the story up yet.
Hi – Thanks for replying to my comment and for inviting me to offer any further information on this family.
I was surprised by your reference to Isaac Button’s marriage to Margaret Edson and wondered if this was correct. It is very easy to get confused when several people in a family have the same name. Actually, Francis and Hannah Button, Isaac and Mary’s parents, were married in 1807 and had many other children. One of these, born in 1813, was called Francis and he also was a brick-maker. He went to live in Hawksworth, a small village near Leeds. He had several children and one born in 1840 was called Isaac, and he also became a brick-maker. It is this Isaac that married Margaret Edson. On the marriage record he is a bachelor aged 23. As you mention, Margaret died in 1864. In 1865, Isaac married Sarah Fielding. This time he is stated to be a widower.
I will comment on the Charltons another time .
I’ve just looked at the marriage certificate and I don’t know how on earth I missed the enormous age discrepancy there…I meant it when I said I’m glad when people comment who can point out errors, it gives us a chance to fix it (and scratch our heads in genuine confusion over how we got it wrong in the first place!)
I’ve amended the post now but these comments might be useful for others so will leave them in place. Thank you so much again for commenting and yes, let us know about the Charltons when you’ve got the time. 🙂 Sarah
Hi Sarah, here is an account of the Charltons (got mostly from Ancestry website)
Joseph Charlton married Mary Button at Worsborough on 2nd Feb 1846. He was aged 25, son of Henry Charlton and from Shelley near Nottingham. She was 21, daughter of Francis Button. She had been born in Colston Bassett, a village east of Nottingham. In 1846 she was living in Worsborough where her father now lived as a brick-maker.
Initially, Joseph and Mary lived near Nottingham and their first 4 children were born there. In around 1860 they all moved to Todmorden because Joseph got a job as a coachman at Dobroyd Castle. Their 5th child was born here. The 5 children were: Maria, Henry, Julia Hannah, Mary Elizabeth and Ruth.
Maria married William Thomas Heyworth in 1873; their story is told in connection with another grave.
Henry married Annie Hartford-Pollard in Liverpool in 1878. In the 1891 Census he is the Innkeeper of the Swan Inn at Rhyl in North Wales. In 1911 Census he is a bus driver in Rhyl; his wife stated that she had had 9 children, 6 still living. Henry died in 1916 and is buried in Barnsley.
Julia married John Thomas Law in 1872. Both were aged 20. He was a gardener, his father was a butcher in Gauxholme. She was a weaver. In Census 1881, they are living in Nottingham with a daughter, Mary Ann, aged 6. A few years later they emigrated to Canada. They are buried in Winnipeg, John in 1913, Julia in 1920.
Mary Elizabeth died aged 21, a few months after her parents, all in 1877, and all buried in this grave.
Ruth Charlton, in 1881 was working as a scullery maid at Dobroyd Castle. Also working there as a groom was Charles Spencer; he had been born in Bicester: his father Thomas was also a groom. Ruth and Charles were married in 1885 at Kirkby Wharfe, a village near Tadcaster, he is now a coachman at the nearby Grimston Hall. In 1901 they are at Shevington Hall, near Wigan; he a coachman, she a cook. Ruth Spencer died in 1908 at Bacup in Lancashire but is buried in this grave. In 1911, Charles is in Todmorden Workhouse, and died there in 1916. He is buried at Cross Stones.
Hi Sarah, Here’s abit more about Charles Spencer.
He was the nephew of Joseph Spencer – see Joseph’s story in connection with grave V8.5.
Both were born in Bicester in Oxfordshire. In 1881 they were both grooms/coachmen at Dobroyd Castle. In 1891 both Charles and Joseph were at Grimston Hall which was owned by John Fielden. John Fielden died at Dobroyd Castle in 1893 but was buried at Kirkby Wharfe Church near Grimston Hall. Perhaps both Charles and Joseph were involved in the cortege.