Lineholme stalwarts here, with a dash of Liverpudlian for good measure. Thomas Sutcliffe was born in 1846, the first child of his parents Joseph and Grace (Rigg) of Lineholme, Lydgate today, on the Burnley side of Todmorden. Joseph was a labourer who soon became a grocer and who spent the rest of his life supplying …
Read more “38.17 – Thomas, Harriet, Willie, Joseph and Eva Sutcliffe”
A story that encompasses the church, the school, and the graveyard itself; what more could we want? This grave story is only a half-told one though, because the latter two inhabitants died lately enough that there will be memories out there of them beyond the public record – and we want to hear them! So …
Read more “38.35 – John Thomas, Bertha, Alice and Arthur Cryer”
This grave holds a father and son, and moreover, a father who was part of this church and graveyard’s history – unlike other clerical graves, it might escape your notice entirely if you were idly walking through, as on the face of it it’s just another flat lancet. Even when it was upright only the …
If you have a fondness for St. Peter’s in Walsden, then this one of the men to thank. George was born in either 1803 or 1807 – depends which source you trust – in Stansfield. His father was supposedly James Crabtree, he would say later at both his marriages, but there are no baptism records …
Sometimes we wonder how many tradesmen in Todmorden weren’t tailors; sometimes we wonder if any of them were native to Todmorden, or if they really were all from “north of the north”. This story will not vary from those seemingly universal conditions! James Tyson Postlethwaite was born in Kirkby Ireleth in 1808, although he would …
Read more “41.4 – William, Sarah, James and Ellen Postlethwaite”
From a tiny village in North Yorkshire to bustling busy Todmorden, this family’s journey was really something. Hammond Geldard Metcalfe was born in 1777 in Carlton, a little ways southwest of Leyburn. The current population is estimated at about 232 people and is also the largest village in Coverdale, so you can only imagine how …
Read more “41.8 – Jane and Hammond Geldard Metcalfe, and James and Alice Stansfield”
These stones, one in the public area and one in the private, contain most of what was once one of Todmorden’s more well off families; mill owners, teachers, railwaymen, and housebuilders (and that’s just to start). Once upon a time, 1787 to be exact, there was a building at the bottom of Ferney Lee Road …
Two adults and two little ones. Even the adults weren’t that old though… Liverpool is our first port of call on this story. John Johnson Jr. (the Jr. is important, it’s on his gravestone after all) was born there in 1846, in Kirkdale parish. He was the second of five children, all boys, born to …
Read more “41.57 – John, Ruth and Mary Elizabeth Johnson, and Ruth Varley”
The Denhams were an unlucky lot, all with early deaths – even by the standards of the day. They’re possibly the most unlucky family in this graveyard, even those who aren’t buried here. The fact that their stone was roughly laid flat by shattering the base only underlines the point. Olive Webster was a year …
Read more “41.58 – John, Olive, Sam, Tom, Sarah and Annie Denham”
These Congregationalists are just a small fragment of a large, blended, and ultimately rather mysteriously tragic family. The tragedy of this family is a fairly standard one for its time, if an exaggerated version of it. Medicine wasn’t all people wanted it to be back then. But even so… To start at the beginning we …