A Piece of Lowton History

One of the Lowton Websites Productions

CAN YOU HELP ?

Here we publish e-mails from our readers who seek information.

If you can help please e-mail us and we will put you in contact

Icanhelp@lowtonwebsites.co.uk

Our Telephone numbers are: 01942 - 418851 / 01942 - 418863 (24 hour Answerphone)
 
 
You can also use this e-mail address to send us any items that may be considered for inclusion on the website such as old photograph. We are looking for pjotohraphs of the Paramount ballroom, the "Chapel School" behind the Independent Methodist Church (now Kane Court) and George Ashton's cottage on Church Lane (Where the Rainbow House now stands).

 

This was received on 22.06.08

Dear Sir/Madam,

Having just come across your website, I wondered whether any of your visitors might have heard of the Worsley family, a branch of my dad's side of the family tree. I have gathered quite a bit of information about my Worsley ancestors and wondered if anyone else had been able to link to them.

The furthest back I have got is James Worsley (1811-1883) who was a cotton spinner with 52 employees in 1851 and 160 in 1861. He married Sarah Tinker of Salford and they lived first at Mill Bank, then at Lowton Grove and afterwards at Back Lane.  Sarah had been born in 1820 and died in 1866. They had eight children (all except one living to adulthood) and employed three domestic servants in 1851.

Their eldest, James Edwardson Worsley (1843-1899), was a solicitor and coroner who moved to Winwick with his wife and six children - they employed three servants so I think they were reasonably well-off. John (1850-1903) was my great-great grandfather - he worked as a marine engineer and married Ada Willday in 1890, having one child, Alice Ada May, in 1893. Alice's daughter, my late gran, was told that John died in Canada but I have learnt that he actually seems to have spent his last years in Lancaster lunatic asylum. His death certificate states that he had had an aneurysm.

Ralph Leigh Worsley (1853-1925), the third brother, spent a lot of time travelling to and from America and Canada in his capacity as a cotton merchant. He married Susan Darwell and moved to Birkdale, and later to Aughton near Ormskirk, had five children (some of whom also travelled to or settled in Canada) and was also able to employ three domestic servants.

As well as the sons, James and Sarah had four daughters. Ann seems to have died at a few months old, but Sarah Ann (1846-1883), Alice (b. 1848, died after 1891), Ellen (b. 1849, d. after 1871) and Elizabeth (b. 1852) lived to adulthood. Sarah and Alice don't seem to have married but were described as "annuitant" on the census. Ellen married a paper manufacturer Ferguson Mason from Limerick in Ireland, but I cannot find out much about her after his death in 1874 - she is mentioned in her father's will in 1883). Elizabeth married a solicitor named George Wilson Rigg in 1887 and had one son, James Wilson Rigg. The Riggs moved to Golborne, living at Highfield House on Park Road in the late 1800s.

I have managed to find out that some of Ralph's descendents are still in Canada but am not sure whether any other members of the family remained in the Lowton area. I would be very interested to know if any of the addresses or family names are familiar to any of your site's visitors.

Yours sincerely
Kate Hurst

 

This was received on 5.2.08

Sirs,
 
I am researching the ancestry of my family and my 3rd great grandparents were a William and Ann Bailey who, in the 1841 Census, are identified as living in Mathew Lane, Lowton, with their family of six daughters, all of whom were employed as Silk Weavers.  William and Ann were both aged 50 at the time of the Census and their daughters ranged in age between 9 and 20 years,
 
Although not numbered in the Census the house in Mathew Lane lay next door to Lowton Hall in one direction and four houses away from Sycamore House.  Most of the immediate neighbours had at least one family member employed in the silk weaving industry.
 
I can find no record of William and Ann in the 1851 Census but their daughter, Alice, was living at that time at the end of Mathew lane in the house next to the local Toll Collector.  I assume that the toll gate was located across the adjacent Warrington Road.
 
I am particularly interested in learning anything I can about the Hand-loom Silk Weavers of Lowton and about the previous history of the Baileys.
 
I also would appreciate any information about the location of the old Marriage Registers, particularly for the Independent and Methodist Chapels.
 
Any references which I could look up on the internet, or in person, would be greatly appreciated.
 
I will be most welcome of any help, however little, which you may be able to offer me.
 
Good luck with your Lowton site - it is a great service to the local community and to others, like myself, who would like to learn more about the Town and it's history.
 
Neville Bailey 

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