It’s been two years and three months since we began Friends of Christ Church Todmorden…began cutting back the brambles and saplings, began researching the people buried here, began FOCCing things up for people who would have preferred this place rotted away…and we have never, never, been able to locate this single stone, which was present in 2006 when the Todmorden Antiquarian Society did their MI transcript of the yard. The last time we know it was here was in 2009 thanks to Google Street View…so here’s the brief story of these two sisters, to ensure that they aren’t doubly lost.
The mystery is further deepened by the fact that their parents, Willie and Olive (Webster) Marshall, are buried at V7.12 with William and Ann (Fielden) Oldroyd, who seem to be of no relation to either the Marshalls or Websters at all. Was this small headstone displaced before and moved back later to sit with the big granite Oldroyd/Marshall cross? It wasn’t, because we tidied that cross up and refreshed the weed barrier and stones inside; there was nothing hidden there.
Willie and Olive married at Christ Church on October 16th 1897, just under a month after Ada Marshall was born. This technically makes her Ada Webster, but she wasn’t baptised for a few more months and lack of marriage meant her illegitimate status was never revealed. She was named after Willie’s sister Ada, clearly one of his favourite people. She was followed by Walter, then Kathleen, then William, then Jack, and then finally Harold. The Marshalls all had to work as soon as they could, which is why on the 1911 Census Ada, aged thirteen, is already at work as a sewing machinist at a tailoring company. Kathleen would follow suit by 1921. The Marshall boys were all too young for WW1 – lucky them! – but by 1938 at the latest (and almost certainly long before) the family was too grown to stay at the back-to-backs on Ridge Street and Pleasant View that they had lived in up to now. They moved to the slightly more spacious housing on Barker Street on Harley Bank, and they would reside at number 10 for the rest of their lives…well, Willie and Olive and the girls. The sons all got to marry and move out. By 1939 only Harold was left, and he married and moved out in 1940.
Ada and Kathleen are hard to track in any extracurricular activities because their names are too common to nail down. If they were involved in events or activities we can only guess at what they were. In Ada’s case, the St. John Ambulance Brigade, because the neighbours on Barker Street made a contribution in her memory after her death. Kathleen we have nothing on, although her in memoriam leads us to think that her health wasn’t always the best and may have hampered her having much of a life outside of work.
Kathleen died in 1956, two years after Willie and two years before Olive. Her cause of death was bronchopneumonia and myocardial degeneration, which is degeneration of the central wall of the heart. No wonder she was suffering. Presumably she isn’t buried with Willie because that space was intended for Olive, but most of the vault graves are dug out for 6-8 people so it’s a surprise to see her in another space in that area. Likewise, Olive didn’t join her daughter, but her husband.
Ada followed in March 1968 and joined her sister here. No clues as to her health in the paper, and her death registration is unavailable, but she was clearly fondly remembered given the donation given by her neighbours, and her family were keen to thank all who had supported her at the end.
Interestingly, this is not the only Marshall family grave to experience dislocation. This small ledger is gone entirely, but brother William who died in 1867 is also displaced. His cross should be at 8.8 along with his wife’s grandmother Mary Butterworth, but when we first entered the yard was found propped against the Clegg-Nuttall grave at 8.2. We’ve left it there as there is no base stone at 8.8 to cement it into, and 8.8 itself is part of the informal path now which has been worn into the fabric of the yard by generations of schoolchildren seeking a spooky shortcut. Now to have it where it belongs would be a trip hazard.
Anyway, this leaves Ada and Kathleen with the dubious honour of being one of only two known missing stones in the wider graveyard, outside of the fourteen missing from underneath the school extension. If any readers know anything about them (or their brother William) and can help solve the mystery then please get in touch.