HODGKINSON of WARRINGTON and TOXTETH PARK

The earliest Hodgkinson traced in the direct line is John Hodgkinson, who was a husbandman living at Rix[t]on township (Warrington), when he married Elizabeth Mather in 1748.

John was perhaps a son either of Henry Hodgkinson, weaver and his wife Alice (baptised at Warrington in 1723); or of Adam Hodgkinson, carpenter and his wife Ellen (baptised there in 1727).1

John Hodgkinson and his wife Elizabeth Mather were the parents of Thomas Hodgkinson (1770–1837).

Thomas Hodgkinson and his wife Mary were the parents of Thomas Mather Hodgkinson (1805–1878).

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson and his wife Alice Sparkes were the parents of Mary Hodgkinson (1829–1903), who married Joseph Steel.2

Origins

The surname Hodgkinson means ‛son of Roger’, derived from ‘Hodge’ (a pet form of Roger) and its diminutive, ‛Hodgkin’.3

Henry and Alice Hodgkinson and Adam and Ellen Hodgkinson were amongst those of the name living in Warrington in the 1720s. Henry (a weaver) may have married at Wigan in 1711 and Adam (a carpenter) to Ellen Pendlebury at Deane on 1 May 1711.4

Henry’s son John was baptised at Warrington on 23 May 1723 and Adam’s son John on 14 April 1727.

Rixton

John Hodgkinson was living at Rixton at the time of his marriage in 1748 and may therefore have been connected with the Hodgkinson family of Hollins Green, Rixton whose baptisms and burials appear in the incomplete registers of Hollinfare chapel, Rixton from 1705.5 By 1717 Peter Hodgkinson leased from Martha Clare (a Glazebrook widow) for £10 a cottage, ferryboat and toll for the life of his son Thomas, plus 14 years, and tenanted a farm in Glazebrook called The Boat House, let to Thomas Clare. There was also a small farm at Glazebrook leased to John Hodgkinson.6

Peter Hodgkinson, blacksmith of Hollins Green made his will on 16 December 1730, mentioning three sons (Peter, Henry the late William) and four daughters. Henry was to inherit the tenement at Hollins where his father had been living. The executors were to be his friends Thomas Royle of Rixton Hall, yoeman and Hamlett Clarke of Hollins Green, linen webster and the will was proved on 8 January 1732/3.7

Henry Hodgkinson, blacksmith of Hollins Green made his will on 16 May 1668, mentioning his wife Elizabeth, sons William, Charles and Joseph and a daughter Hannah Smith. Henry was buried at Hollinfare on 28 March 1773 and the will was proved on 3 April.8

An Aughton poor rate assessment of 1613 lists Gilbert Butler, paying 4s 3d.9 On 16 February 1619 the inventory of Henry Goore, yeoman of Lydiate listed debts of 1s 6d due to him from William Smith, 19s rent owed by Gilbert Butler and a debt of 3s 4d for ‘one mett barlie’ from Elnor Butler.

There seems no instance of a John Hodgkinson at Hollins Green.

One Thomas Hodgkinson, a Rixton webster married Mary Owen of Rixton by banns at Warrington on 3 February 1730/1. One William Hodgkinson, yeoman of Rixton took out a licence on 24 December 1749 to marry Margaret Johnson, spinster of Newton: the marriage took place at Warrington.

1 Henry Hodgkinson of Rixton was buried at Warrington in 1756, as was William (an ale seller, born c. 1756), who died on 1 April 1790, aged 34.10

Other Hodgkinsons of Bowdon, Cheshire (a parish adjacent to Rixton across the river Mersey) received marriage licences in the 1730s and 1740s (no wills).

John Hodgkinson and Elizabeth Mather

John Hodgkinson, who we have seen was perhaps the son of Henry (born 1723), or of Adam (born 1727) was a husbandman of Rix[t]on (Warrington) on 10 April 1748 when he took out a licence (supported by John Hall of Newton) to marry Elizabeth Mather of ‘Billinge in the parish of Winwick’ (sic, recte Wigan) at Wigan or at Burtonwood chapel (Warrington parish). The marriage took place at Wigan later that day.

Elizabeth was the eldest child of Thomas Mather, yeoman and attorney of Billinge and of his wife Hannah: she was described in her father’s will made in 1744 as ‘sufficiently secured and fully satisfied ... out of Crow Lane Estate in Newton’.11

Newton-in-Makerfield

John and Elizabeth Hodgkinson seem to have lived for at least the first eight years of their marriage at Newton-in-Makerfield (a chapelry of Winwick), where their first five children (all daughters) were baptised. These were Hannah (21 May 1749, born 10 May); Alice (23 September 1750, born 15 September); Betty (16 July 1752, born 2 July); Margaret (8 May 1755, born 21 April); Mary (30 September 1756, born 18 September).12

After Mary’s baptism in 1756 we lose track of the family’s movements for eight years and it may be that John Hodgkinson was working as a travelling weaver.13 A son Henry was born c. 1758. On 20 April 1760 ‘Peggy, daughter of John Hodgkinson’ was baptised at St John’s, Lancaster.14

Warrington

John and Elizabeth Hodgkinson seem to have been living at Warrington from at least 24 January 1762, when Martha (1762–1827), daughter of John Hodgkinson, weaver and Elizabeth his wife was baptised there.

Henry, son of John Hodgkinson, weaver and Elizabeth his wife was buried at Warrington on 6 March 1764, aged six. Peggy, daughter of John Hodgkinson, weaver and Elizabeth his wife was buried at Warrington on 29 April 1764, aged four.

Of John and Elizabeth’s children, at least four survived to adulthood: these were their son Thomas, their unmarried daughter Martha, their daughter Mary Lowe and another daughter, the mother of Ellen Bailey.

Great Sankey

The family then began a strong connection with Great Sankey (a chapelry in ‘Farnworth side’ of Prescot parish, but immediately adjacent to Warrington). The eastern boundary of Great Sankey township was formed by the Sankey Brook as it passed through the settlement of Sankey Bridges. Everything immediately south and east of the Sankey Brook (including Atherton’s Quay and Bank Quay on the Mersey) lay in the hamlet of Little Sankey, which was a division of Warrington township. The Sankey Brook Navigation (later the St Helens Canal), passed through Sankey Bridges on its course to St Helens from Fiddlers Ferry on the Mersey.

John and Elizabeth’s only surviving son Thomas was baptised at Great Sankey on 28 January 177015 and the connection was to last until the burial of Thomas’ only son Thomas Mather Hodgkinson, 108 years later.16

2 John Hodgkinson was buried at Sankey on 7 December 1789 and Betty Hodgkinson (probably John’s widow Elizabeth) on 20 March 1791.17

John and Elizabeth’s daughter Mary married Moses Lowe (by 1780) and another daughter one Bailey.

Children were born to Moses Lowe, husbandman and his wife Mary: John (1781, buried at Warrington 1 March 1784); Thomas 1783, buried 11 June 1784; John (baptised 28 August 1785; Elizabeth (10 May 1789); Hannah (13 March 1791); Martha (1 September 1793, buried 27 April 1794,Moses now a ‛labourer’); Mary (8 October 1797, buried 22 January 1798). Moses Lowe, labourer (44) was buried at Warrington on 27 June 1798. We shall see that Mary Lowe was buried in 1840, aged 83.

THOMAS HODGKINSON (1770–1837)

Thomas Hodgkinson was baptised at Great Sankey on 28 January 1770, a son of John and Elizabeth Hodgkinson, beginning his family’s long connection with Sankey Chapel.

Thomas married Mary (perhaps Mary Turton married to Thomas Hodgkinson by banns at Winwick on 13 September 1790).18

In 1867 (30 years after Thomas’ death) Thomas Mather Hodgkinson, marrying for the second time, described his father as a ‛yeoman’. Marrying for the third and fourth times in 1870 and 1871, Thomas junior called his father a ‛cotton spinner’.

THOMAS MATHER HODGKINSON (1805–1878)

THOMAS MATHER HODGKINSON, probably Thomas and Mary’s only child, was born at Great Sankey (where his family had lived for two generations) and baptised at Sankey Chapel on 27 January 1805.

MARY HODGKINSON, probably Thomas Mather Hodgkinson’s mother, was buried at Sankey on 13 March 1810, when he was 10.

The canal connection

Sankey was a vital junction in the north-west’s great canal and river network, with links up the Irwell to Manchester, down the Mersey to Liverpool and via the Mersey to such canals as the Bridgewater and the Leeds and Liverpool; and to St Helens and its coalfield by the Sankey Navigation (St Helens Canal) in 1759.

The complex canal, river and coastal system of north-west England produced a distinctive kind of barge, sometimes under and sail and sometimes (on the canals) pulled by horses. These barges were known as ‘flats’ and were to be seen throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries on the Mersey and the Weaver and all over the extensive Lancashire and Cheshire canal system, carrying coal, salt and other cargoes. These barges were sailed by ‘flatmen’ with a skilled knowledge of the tides and of the workings of the locks.

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson married a flatman’s daughter and then worked first as a carpenter at Atherton’s Quay on the Mersey and at Worsley on the Bridgewater Canal, before becoming a Liverpool shipwright. It seems most likely therefore that his connections with Warrington and Sankey relate directly to their strategic importance in the river and canal network of the north-west.

The Mersey was naturally navigable from Liverpool to Warrington (formerly its lowest bridging point) and in 1736 the Mersey and Irwell Navigation connected Bank Quay at Warrington via eight locks with Manchester. Atherton’s Quay was installed at Little Sankey just below Warrington, probably about the same year. 19

From 1732 the Weaver Navigation had connected the Cheshire saltworks and their constant need of coal, with the Mersey. From the Mersey, near Fiddlers Ferry there was a mile-long

3 navigable section of the Sankey Brook as far as Sankey Bridges, where by 1756 there were private wharves, a coal-yard and a public house called The Resolution Sloop: a 60-ton sloop was operating to this point.20

In 1757 England’s first modern canal (the Sankey Brook Navigation)21 was cut parallel to the Brook from the Mersey through Sankey Bridges and Winwick Quay to the St Helens coalfields. It was hugely successful and made possible direct shipments of coal from the pits to the Cheshire saltworks on the Weaver. A dry-dock and boat-yard were built at Sankey Bridges by the Clare family, who were coal-merchants and carriers involved in the Anglesey copper ore trade between Amlwlch and St Helens: they began building flats at Sankey Bridges in 1807.22

The network was further improved when the Bridgewater Canal opened to Stockton Heath, half a mile south of the Mersey at Warrington in 1771 and to Runcorn the following year. A packet boat service ran from Stockton Quay to Manchester from 1771 and on the Mersey and Irwell from Warrington from 1807.

Atherton’s Quay

For at least ten years from 1819 the Hodgkinson family were living at Atherton’s Quay, a small settlement on the Mersey between Warrington Bank Quay and Sankey Bridges. Although Atherton’s Quay was in Warrington parish, it was close to the Great Sankey boundary and it is possible that the family had lived at Atherton’s Quay since the beginning of their association with Great Sankey in 1770. There appear already to have been buildings close to Atherton’s Quay by 1786.23

It was already said of Warrington in 1795 that ‘it may be considered a port town, the Mersey admitting by the help of the tide, vessels of 70 or 80 tons … to Bank Quay, a little below the town’.24

It should be remembered that throughout this period the road from Warrington past Atherton’s Quay to Sankey Bridges was the main turnpike route from Liverpool to London, with all the intense commercial and coaching use which this generated. By 1825 traffic on the river (from Liverpool to Bank Quay and then via the Mersey and Irwell Navigation to Manchester) was said to be ‘unremitting’.

One Mary Hodkinson was a householder in Sankey Street, Warrington from 1785 until at least 1804: in 1798 she was paying 1s 5d land tax.25

In May 1819 John and Elizabeth Hodgkinson’s daughter Martha occurs for the first time in the Warrington rate books. Although inhabitants of Atherton’s Quay were not listed separately until 1829, careful comparisons of names in that period make it quite clear that Martha Hodgkinson was indeed living there.26

Martha was assessed for poor rate on a house (described as a cottage in May 1819 only) with a rental value of £2, on which she at first paid 6s poor rate and 4d in church leys. The listing continued from November 1819–May 1823 (and in May 1825). In May 1819 Martha’s house was shown between those of John Atherton, a potmaker27 and William Clare’s house and land; in November 1819 between John Atherton and Mather Bowker’s coal-yard and wharf; in 1821 next to William Beckwith’s house and quay; and by 1823 next to William Albiston.28

The rate book listings can be compared with the ordnance map surveyed in 1849 29 and the census returns of 1841 and 1851 to locate some of the Atherton’s Quay properties more precisely. On the western corner of the lane leading from Liverpool Road down to the river was the Coach and Horses Inn (still on the same site today).30 Also close to Liverpool Road (probably on the eastern corner) was Hollins House, which was probably the home of William Albiston’s boarding academy.31 Half-way down the lane and the only other building on the western side, was Atherton’s Cottage, a building of some size.

None of the other properties are named on the maps. There were four adjacent dwellings on the river bank, one of them much larger than the others. They were particularly mentioned in the borough charter of 1847, which spoke of a boundary in mid-river ‘opposite to a

4 Watercourse emptying itself into the said River at a Creek or Inlet situate c. 45 yards to the south west of the Cottages on the River Bank, known by the name of Atherton’s Quay’. 32 The remaining properties were on the eastern side of the lane, occupying all the frontage from Liverpool Road half-way down to the river: these comprised a £30 house, a £7 coal-yard, nine £2 houses (£4 10s in 1841) and four at £1 10s (£4). It seems likely that the £2 houses were reduced in number when the ‘Manchester, Warrington and Garston Railway’ was cut through them during its construction in 1847–1852 and belonged to the range shown south of the part-completed railway in the survey of 1849. By 1851 the Atherton’s Quay community was to include six water-men, four agricultural labourers, a wire manufacturer, a victualler, a boat- yard labourer, a railway labourer, a sawyer, a machinery driver and a dress-maker.

On 18 January 1825 Martha Hodgkinson made her will, disposing of her expected 1/10th share in the estate of her mother’s cousin William Ainsworth (died ‛November or December 1807’,33 leaving £100 to her brother Thomas (1770--1837) or in default to his son Thomas Mather Hodgkinson (1805--1878); £100 to her sister Mary Lowe (1756-1840); and the remainder to be shared between ‘all my nephews and nieces’. The executors were to be John Clare, coal and timber merchant of Sankey Bridges34 and John Robinson, tailor and draper of Warrington.35

Witnesses to the will and its subsequent codicils were William Beckwith; John Atherton of Atherton’s Quay, pot-maker (died 1828); Thomas Eaton (local manager of the Bridgewater Canal); John Leach; and Mary Albiston of Atherton’s Quay.

Thomas Hodgkinson and his son Thomas Mather Hodgkinson

In 1824 and again from 1826 to May 1828 Martha Hodgkinson’s house (still between John Atherton and William Albiston and the last of nine/ten consecutive properties rated at £2) was listed as occupied by Thomas Hodkinson, doubtless her brother and Thomas Mather Hodgkinson’s father.36 Of Thomas’s nine nearest neighbours and fellow 11s 4d rate-payers in 1827 (William Oakes; Ralph Lightfoot; Ann, Ralph and John Atherton; Peter Swift; John Whitfield; and Edward Kenwright), only Kenwright (a labourer of c. 50) was still to be found there in 1841. The houses were owned in 1841 by ‘Ellen Clare’s executors’. Jonas Joynson, who seems to have succeeded Thomas Hodgkinson in his tenancy, was still there in 1851, a boat- yard labourer.

On 23 July 1826 Thomas Mather Hodgkinson (aged 21) married by banns at St Helens Chapel (Prescot-side, parish of Prescot) ALICE SPARKES, daughter of GEORGE SPARKES, a flatman and glazier of St Helens, and his wife ELIZABETH HUGHES.37

In January 1827 Martha Hodgkinson made a codicil to her will, providing for the repayment of £10 to her cousin Alice Mather.

On 30 March 1827 (eight months after their wedding) a son GEORGE, born to Thomas Mather Hodgkinson and Alice at Warrington, was baptised at Warrington. The child’s father was then a ‘carpenter’ of ‘Atherton’s Quay’.

The Warrington poor rate assesssment for May 1827 shows (for that year only) a second house at Atherton’s Quay (between James Hewett and Thomas Derbyshire, previously that of Thomas Davies) occupied by Thomas Hodkinson, who was probably Thomas [Mather], junior.38 The house was in a group of four, rated at £1 10s (owned by one Broadhurst in 1841). Of the neighbours in this group Hewett was to be there still in 1841 (a labourer, c. 40), while George Higham, who took the house by November 1828 was by 1841 a labourer, c. 45.39

In December 1827 Martha Hodgkinson made a further codicil to her will, speaking of the ‘great trouble I have been’ to her brother Thomas in her long illness and leaving him an extra £50. There was also a legacy for her niece Ellen Bailey ‘on condition she remains with me here until my decease’. Martha died and was buried at Great Sankey on 18 January 1828. Her will was not finally proved until 6 December 1848, after the death of William Ainsworth’s son Thomas.40

5 Martha’s sister Mary Lowe (1756—1840) died at Bank Quay, Warrington on 10 January 1840 (aged 83) and was buried at Warrington on 12 January. It was noted in 1855 that [other than her brother Thomas Mather] she had died ‘without child, grand-child, parent, brother, sister or grandparent’ living.

MONTON GREEN (1827/8–1839/40)

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson, his wife Alice and their infant son George moved from Atherton’s Quay, on the Mersey to Monton Green, near Barton (Eccles) on the Bridgewater Canal between May 1827 and May 1828.41 Monton was connected via the Mersey and Irwell Navigation (now the Manchester Ship Canal) with Sankey and Liverpool. We can be fairly sure that when Thomas was described as a ‘carpenter’, it was barges and canals with which he was concerned. The family were to remain here for some twelve years.

A second child MARY (later the wife of Joseph Steel) was born at Monton Green, but taken back to Sankey for baptism on 12 July 1829: her father was then described as a ‘carpenter, Worsley’.

Four more children were born to Thomas and Alice at Monton Green and baptised at Eccles. 42 JOHN was baptised on 13 May 1832, son of Thomas, ‘ship carpenter, Monton’ and DANIEL on 10 January 1835, son of Thomas, ‘carpenter, Monton’. Daniel died in November 1835, aged 11 months and was buried at Sankey on 27 November (of ‘Worsley’). ELIZABETH was baptised on 6 November 1836; and THOMAS on 6 May 1839.43

Death of Thomas Hodgkinson

Thomas Hodgkinson, senior (labourer) died of ‘fever’ at Monton on 23 November 1837. The death was registered by Thomas, junior of Monton: and the burial of ‘Thomas Hodgkinson, Worsley’ took place at Great Sankey on 26 November.44

CHESHIRE VIEW, 141 NEW MANN STREET, TOXTETH PARK

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson and Alice and their five surviving children George; Mary; John; Elizabeth; and Thomas; moved from Monton to New Mann Street, Toxteth Park, on the south-eastern edge of Liverpool sometime between Thomas’ baptism at Eccles on 6 May 1839 and his death 14 months later on 25 July 1840. They were to live in Liverpool for the next 25 years.

Although Mann Street45 had been laid out southwards as far as Warwick Street by 18.., its development towards Northumberland Street and on towards Park Street only followed the construction of Hartley’s Brunswick Dock in 1832. New/Upper Mann Street was built gradually in a southerly direction, parallel with the river Mersey. For many years building was confined to the east side of the street, with nothing else but timber yards and rope walks on the hillside falling steeply down to Brunswick Dock, its adjacent graving docks and the river. Up-river to the southeast, open country remained, marred only by the smoke and fumes of the huge Mersey Forge and Iron Works, only 200 yards away.46

The newly built Cheshire View47 was a court at 141 Mann Street on its eastern side between Warwick Street and Northumberland Street, looking out westwards over Grafton Street to Brunswick Dock, with its sloping quays designed to facilitate the unloading of timber, and to the Cheshire side of the Mersey.

Cheshire View comprised four dwellings, built behind larger houses in Mann Street. The dwellings numbered 1, 3 and 4 lay back-to-back with dwellings in the Mann Street courts on either side. Number 3, at the far end of the narrow court, must have had windows opening only onto the court.

By 1858 (18 years after the Hodgkinson family had moved on) Upper Mann Street was to be marked as a ‘semi-pauper street’ in the ‘southern pauper area’ and was to be described by 1883 as one of the ‘three worst streets’ in a ‘larger squalid area stretching round it’. 48 Nevertheless a report in 1883/4 on the incidence of fever in Liverpool was to show number 3

6 as a clean house in fair structural condition, although with bad ventilation and no external drainage. It had a ‘D-trap in area’ and a cellar 6 feet 7 inches high, with its ceiling 2 feet 7 inches above the ground.

The infant Thomas Hodgkinson died of convulsions at [3] Cheshire View, Upper Mann Street at 5.00 a.m. on 25 July 1840. Alice Hodgkinson registered the death on 27 July: she marked her signature and described her husband as a ‘shipwright’.

At the 1841 census Thomas Mather Hodgkinson was at 3 Cheshire View (listed after 103 Mann Street) as a ‘shipwright’, with his wife Alice and their four surviving children George (an ‘apprentice’, 14), Mary (12), John (8) and Elizabeth (4). Their immediate neighbours at 2 and 4 were the families of John Hilton (c. 40) and Thomas Edwards (c. 65, the Welsh owner of Cheshire View), both sawyers.49 At number 1 was Laurence Hodson (c. 32), another shipwright, who had had a vote when living there in 1839/40. All these had moved on by 1848.

A second THOMAS was born to Thomas Mather and Alice Hodgkinson at Cheshire View, New Mann Street at 5.30 a.m. on 12 September 1841. Thomas was baptised not at the nearby St Thomas’, Warwick Street but at St Peter’s, Liverpool, on 17 October 1841 as a son of ‘Thomas Mather Hodgkinson, Mann St, Toxteth, shipwright’.50 Alice registered the birth on 18 October, marking and again describing her husband as a ‘shipwright’.51

The family were no doubt at Cheshire View on the night of Liverpool’s great thunderstorm of 23 August 1841, when damage was sustained to the spire of nearby St Michael’s, Toxteth and to that of St Martin-in-the-Fields in the north of the city.52

AUGUSTINE PLACE, BLENHEIM STREET

Sometime between Thomas' baptism in October 1841 and that of their next child William in September 1844, Thomas Mather and Alice Hodgkinson and their children George; Mary; John; Elizabeth; and Thomas moved from Cheshire View just over two miles to Augustine Place, Lower Blenheim Street, off Vauxhall Road, on what was then the far northern edge of the city.

Augustine Place was newly built, back-to-back with the houses at the corner of Augustine Street and the upper part of Blenheim Street, with its entrance in Blenheim Street. Augustine Street itself was newly laid-out along the eastern boundary of the churchyard of St Martin-in- the-Fields, linking Blenheim Street with Great Oxford Street North. Augustine Place was to become one of Liverpool’s infamous courts, although it was probably not completed until after the 1842 regulations, which insisted on sewerage and a fifteen feet open entrance to each court.53 By 1858 Blenheim Street was to be marked as a ‘semi-pauper street’ in the ‘northern pauper district’.54

In 1827 there had been complaints that sulphurous smoke from the nearby soda works were making St Martins-in-the-Fields (then being built) invisible from 100 yards and that its stone had already been darkened by hydrochloric gas. However, following a legal verdict in 1838, gossage towers had been erected to condense the gas.55

The 1841 census listed only three families in Augustine Place: those of Robert Williams (40), John Sutton (30, shipwright)56 and Sarah Morton (25, independent). The 1843 directory shows the Place at 14 New Blenheim Street.

Another son WILLIAM Mather was born to Thomas and Alice at Augustine Place on 16 September 184457 and baptised on 20 October at the nearby St Martin-in-the-Fields: his father was shown as a ‘shipwright’.

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson first appears in the Liverpool electoral registers in 1845–6 (qualifying date 30 November 1845), living in Blenheim Street, but voting in Toxteth Park in respect of a share in freehold houses in Bedford, Park and Upper Mann Streets (‘John Jones & others, tenants’). This qualification was to remain precisely the same until 1855–6.58

7 9 TATLOCK STREET

By November 1846 the family (still with the same freehold interests in Bedford Street, Park Street and Upper Mann Street) had moved one street southwards, to 9 Tatlock Street, where they remained for at least two years: they are shown there in the directories for 1846 and 1847.59 9 Tatlock Street was to remain listed as Thomas’ abode continuously in the electoral registers of 1846–7 to 1855–6.60

HORNBY STREET

Although the electoral registers continued to show their address as Tatlock Street until 1855, it is clear that by 1848 the Hodgkinsons had moved two streets south to 28 Court, 76 Hornby Street: Thomas is shown as a shipwright at that address in the 1848 and 1849 directories (at 76 in 1848 and 51 in 1849).61

On 23 October 1848 there died at Roby (in Huyton parish, near Liverpool) Thomas Ainsworth Ainsworth’s father William had been first cousin to Elizabeth Hodgkinson (née Mather), Thomas Mather Hodgkinson’s grandmother; and a part of the Ainsworth estate had been due to pass to Thomas Mather Hodgkinson’s father and then to Thomas himself under the will of Martha Hodgkinson. Administration of Thomas Ainsworth’s estate was granted to his second cousin Joshua Mather of Billinge and came in two stages: on 9 November 1848 (when it was certified that Thomas had died ‘without wife, child, parent, brother, sister, nephew, niece, uncle or aunt, grandfather, grandmother, great grandfather, great grandmother, great uncle, great aunt, great nephew, great niece, first cousin, great-great uncle, great-great aunt, child of great uncle, child of great aunt, or child of first cousin living’ and his estate valued at ‘under £1000’) and on 7 August 1852 (when the estate was eventually sworn ‘under £6000’).62 Martha Hodgkinson’s will (made in 1828) was proved in November 1848 as a result of Ainsworth’s death: it was sworn at first ‘under £1000’, but later as ‘under £3000’.

PARK STREET

By 1850 the Hodgkinson family had moved back to Toxteth Park, to a house and shop next door to the Sea View spirit vaults towards the newly-built southern end of Park Street and round the corner from Upper Mann Street. Although some renumbering took place, it is clear that the family lived in the same house from 1850–1864.

The first evidence of the move comes in the electoral register for 1850–1. 63 In addition to the old Tatlock Street entry it shows Thomas Mather Hodgkinson at 100 Park Street with another vote in Toxteth Park in respect of 100 Park Street (a freehold house), tenanted by Thomas Smith. The census return of 1851 shows the Hodgkinsons (Thomas, Alice and their six children) sharing 100 Park Street with Smith (a dock labourer) and his family. 64 The 1851 directory shows ‘Thomas Hodgkinson, shipwright’ at ‘148 Park Street’.

Sometime between the census of April 1851 and his marriage on 20 September 1854, Thomas Mather Hodgkinson’s eldest son George sailed to Victoria, Australia. (A ‘Mr Hodgkinson’ arrived in Sydney in steerage aboard the ‘Favourite’ on 6 May 1851, sailing on to Melbourne on 12 May). George Hodgkinson was to speculate in gold mining with huge success. Alluvial mining began around Bendigo in 1851–2, and the first diggings in 1853. The 1853 directory of ‘Diggings’ (around Bendigo) shows ‘Hodgkinsons Stores’ at ‘Long Gully’ ‘near the main road about the middle of the gully’.

On 5 September 1854 the newly-founded Bendigo Advertiser carried the following advertisement: ‘Wanted, two good joiners—apply to George Hodgkinson, Auction Street, Sandhurst’. George was living in Bendigo, when on 20 September 1854 (aged 27) he married at St Peter’s, Melbourne, the Hull-born Jane Isabella Potter, daughter of William Potter, shipwright of Collingwood, Melbourne.

On 20 October 1854 the Bendigo Advertiser announced:

George Hodgkinson, builder, has just received a large assortment of panel doors and windows, which he can sell at considerably low prices. Shop fronts fitted & c. All orders punctually attended to. Also he has to let on lease

8 two frontages of 15 feet each to Pall Mall, with right of way at the side. For terms & c. apply at his shop, Auction Street.

The same advertisement appeared on 18, 22 and 35 November and 6 December and (without reference to leases) on 24 and 31 January 1855.

On 12 January 1855 George made his first purchase of crown land in Sandhurst, paying £112 10s. for a rood, fronting onto Hargreaves Street. On 1 February 1855 he joined three partners in buying two further roods at McCrae Street (Pall Mall).

George and Jane Hodgkinson’s first child William Thomas was born on 5 May 1855, when George was a ‘builder, Pall Mall’: the child’s birth was announced in the Bendigo Advertiser. William died aged 8 months on 16 January 1856. A daughter Elizabeth was born on 18 February 1857, but buried on 19 February; a second daughter Mary Alice was born at 9.30 a.m. on 7 March 1858. The births of Elizabeth and Mary Alice and the death of Elizabeth were all announced in the Bendigo Advertiser. The infants William and Elizabeth were buried at White Hills Cemetery, where a stone records ‘two dear children of George and Jane Hodgkinson, taken to heaven’.

The 1856 electoral register of Sandhurst shows George Hodgkinson as a carpenter, with a freehold property in Pall Mall, Sandhurst. George paid rates from 1856 as occupier and owner at Hargreaves Street and Pall Mall: by 1857 his properties there were valued at £670. In 1857 George was occupying his ‘land and store’ at Hargreaves Street.

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson was listed as a Liverpool shipwright throughout the 1850s. His wife Alice kept the ‘smallware’ shop attached to their Park Street house and was listed independently as a ‘smallware dealer’ at 136 Park Street in the 1853 directory. In 1855 Thomas was shown as 'shipwright and smallware dealer, 140 Park Street'. In 1860 Thomas was a ‘s’ware dealer’ and ‘Elizabeth Hodgkinson’ an ‘earthenware dealer’, both at 3 Park Street.65

On 3 January 1855 Thomas Mather Hodgkinson ‘ship carpenter’ of 100 Park Street claimed administration of the estate of his father Thomas Hodgkinson (18 years after his death) and of his aunt Mary Lowe (15 years after hers). Thomas was cited as his father’s ‘only next of kin’: of his aunt it was recorded that she was ‘without child, grand-child, parent, brother, sister or grandparent’. Thomas was obviously making claim to their portions of the Ainsworth estate. The bondsmen in each case were John William Mellor, gent., and James Riley, book-keeper, both of Warrington. Thomas Hodgkinson’s estate was sworn under £100 and Mary Lowe’s ‘under £200’.66

For some unknown reason, the electoral register for 1856–7 ceases to show Thomas Mather Hodgkinson with a vote anywhere in Liverpool, although he certainly had not moved from Park Street.67

[In 1859 George Hodgkinson and his family were back in England after an absence of between five and eight years: George was a carpenter of Edge Lane, Liverpool when his son Thomas Mather Hodgkinson was baptised at St Peter’s, Liverpool on 20 July].68

On Christmas Day 1860, at St Michael’s, Toxteth, Mary Hodgkinson (1829–1903), second child and eldest daughter of Thomas Mather Hodgkinson married Joseph Steel, a 43-year-old blacksmith and widower.

At the 1861 census Thomas and Alice, with their unmarried sons John, Thomas and William; their daughters Elizabeth and Mary and Mary’s husband Joseph Steel, were still sharing 3 Park Street with Thomas Smith, his wife and four children.69

Thomas and Alice Hodgkinson’s daughter Elizabeth married John Gerrard Shiel of Whitfield Street at St Michael’s, Toxteth after banns on 13 February 1862.70

From 1861 George Hodgkinson had a parliamentary vote in Chester for his house at 10 Crane Street (outside the walls, leading from Watergate to the river). He is found there as a ‘builder’ in the 1861 census.71 A daughter Georgina Ann was born to George and Jane at Crane Street

9 on 28 September 1861. George appears in the Chester burgess rolls from 1863 with a ‘counting house’ in Foregate Street. A son William Arthur was born to George (‘auctioneer’) and Jane at Eastgate Buildings, Eastgate Street in the first days of 1864 and baptised privately from St Oswald’s, Chester on 9 January.72 From 1864–7 the burgess rolls and directories show George with a house in Old Post Office Yard, Chester as an ‘auctioneer, appraisor and general commission agent’. Old Post Office Yard is variously shown as Eastgate and Foregate Street. Daughters Charlotte Beatrice and Laura Jane were born at Eastgate Street in 1865 and 1866 and baptised at St Oswald’s. ‘George Hodgkinson, gentleman’ held property in Bendigo worth £458 in 1864, rising to £1096 in 1872. In 1868 one George Hodgkinson had a hotel at Collingwood, Victoria.

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson appeared in the Liverpool directories for the last time in 1864 (as a shipwright of 3 Park Street, Toxteth Park). Thomas and Alice seem to have moved to Chester c. 1865, when Thomas was 60.

BOUGHTON HEATH

Alice Hodgkinson, ‘wife of Thomas Mather Hodgkinson, landed proprietor’ died of liver cancer aged 62 on 28 May 1866 at Boughton Heath, Chester: Thomas registered the death the same day and Alice was buried at Great Sankey on 1 June.

Thomas Hodgkinson and Hannah Wright

On 15 July, seven weeks after Alice Hodgkinson’s death, their son Thomas (a joiner of 3 Park Street, 35) married Hannah Wright of Hyslop Street (26, daughter of an iron-moulder) at St John the Baptist, Toxteth.73 In 1871 Thomas (a ‛ship joiner’) and Hannah were lodgers at 3 Park Street with Thomas’s sister and brother-in-law Elizabeth and John Shiel and a dock worker and his family. From 1874 to 1881 Thomas is shown in the directories as a joiner at 39 Brenton Street; in 1883 and 1884 he was at 58 High Park Street; and from 1886 to 1890 at 58 Rhiwlas Street. By 1891 Thomas and Hannah were living at 46 Aspen Grove.74

Thomas died between 1891 and 1901 (probably at Liverpool in mid-1893, aged 51) and at the 1901 census his widow Hannah (a retired milliner, aged 60) was living at 13 High Park Street, Sefton Square, with her widowed sister Elizabeth and her younger brother Frederick Wright (54). In 1911 Hannah (now 70) was housekeeper to her brother Frederick at 43 Isaac Street, Toxteth Park. Frederick (an insurance agent) appears there in the 1912 directory, but ‛Mrs Hannah Hodgkinson’ is listed continuously at 43 Isaac Street continuously thereafter. Hannah ‛widow of Thomas Hodgkinson’ died at Isaac Street on 18 July 1929, aged 89 and was buried in the unconsecrated section of Toxteth Park cemetery, Smithdown Road cemetery on 22 July:75 her will was proved (in the sum of £65) on 23 August by her sister Elizabeth Bown, widow.

John Hodgkinson and Anna Audley

By 1871 Thomas’ elder brother John (a shipwright) had married Anna M. Audley: the census returns show the couple (‛38’ and ‛37’) at 19 Clarke Street, Toxteth Park with Anna’s father Thomas (then 74), a gas company labourer:76 John is listed (as a ‛shipwright’) at Clarke Street in the 1872 directory: from 1873 to 1876 he was at 101 Grafton Street. It seems possible that John was ‛John Hodgkinson, gas fitter’, at 51 Sykes Street in 1883 and 1884 (but not after).77

William Mather Hodgkinson

It was probably Thomas and Alice’s youngest son ‛William M. Hodgkinson, 26’ who in 1871 was an unmarried commercial clerk, lodging at 84 Garden Lane in St Oswald’s, Chester. William Mather Hodgkinson was a clerk, living with his sister Elizabeth and brother-in-law John Shiel at 3 Park Street, Toxteth Park when he witnessed John’s will on 1 June 1886.

By 1911 John Shiel had died and William’s sister Elizabeth had gone to live with her daughter and William Mather Hodgkinson ‛clerk’ was a patient at the ‛Turner Memorial Home of Rest for Male Incurables’ in Dingle Lane, Toxteth.78 William died at Toxteth Park in the December quarter of 1915, aged 70.

10 OVERTON

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson was still living at Chester when he married his second wife Mary Pritchard of Overton (the 59-year-old widow of one Grimsditch and daughter of William Booth, a farmer), by licence at Frodsham on 15 August 1867: the witnesses were John and Annie Lewis.79 Thomas moved in with his new wife at ‘Mary’s Cottage’, Overton, a house he owned, with 1.1.23 acres and a rental value of £3.80 After only 19 months Mary Hodgkinson died on 26 March 1869 aged 61: she was buried at Frodsham on 29 March.81

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson (66, now again of ‘Park Street, Toxteth’) married his third wife Fanny M. Grice of Park Street (56, born at Acton, Cheshire, a daughter of John Dutton, miller) at St Michael’s on 16 June 1870: the wedding was after banns and the witnesses were John Gerrard Shiel (Thomas’ son-in-law) and Elizabeth Hutchinson.

Thomas and Fanny are found at Overton in the 1871 census,82 but Fanny Hodgkinson died at 56 in June 1871 and was buried at Frodsham on 9 June.83

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson (now ‘65’, a shipwright of 9 Rock Street, Liverpool) married his fourth wife Marrion Annie Hellen Gertrude Turner (born to John Newton, a Gloucestershire grocer and aged 40) also of Rock Street by certificate at Liverpool Register Office on 16 October 1871, just over four months after Fanny’s death: the witnesses were Martha Lovett and Annie Brown.

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson is found in the 1872 parliamentary electoral registers with an address at Dee View, Boughton, Chester (in respect of a freehold house at Dee View) and another vote in Frodsham lordship for his freehold house at Overton.

He certainly continued to live at Overton and his grandson Thomas Mather Steel had clear recollections of visiting him there. He appears in the Liverpool voters list for 1876 living at Overton, but still owning the ‘house and shop’ at 3 Park Street.

Elizabeth Hodgkinson and John Gerrard Shiel

3 Park Street had in 1871 been shared between Thomas Mather Hodgkinson’s children Elizabeth and Thomas and their families and a dock labourer and his large family. John G. Shiel is shown there variously in the directories from 1865--1899 as an earthenware dealer, joiner (1867), tallow chandler and chandler. In 1881 Elizabeth and John Gerrard Shiel ('joiner, unemployed') were at 3 Park Street with their daughter Elizabeth (8): in 1891 John was a ‛joiner’ and Elizabeth junior (18) a ‛pupil teacher’.84

John was shown in 1901 as a ‛chandler’ living on his ‛own account’ at Park Street with his wife Elizabeth. Elizabeth junior was a ‛government certificate elementary teacher’ lodging with an older teacher in Hale High Street. In December quarter 1903 Elizabeth married Robert Ridland, a Scots piermaster 34 years her senior: their son Robert John was born in September quarter 1904. John Gerrard Shiel died at 3 Park Street on 22 August 1906 and was buried at Toxteth Park cemetery (Smithdown Road):85 his wife Elizabeth inherited the ‛house, shop and yard’.

In 1911 Elizabeth Shiel was living at 109 Avondale Road, Wavertree with her daughter Elizabeth, her Lerwick-born son-in-law Robert Ridland (now 72) and their 6-year-old son Robert John. Elizabeth Shiel died in September quarter later that year. Robert Ridland senior died in Liverpool in September quarter 1923, aged 84: his widow Elizabeth died aged 64 and was buried at Allerton cemetery on 14 February 1937.86

From 1868–71 George Hodgkinson had an office and warehouse in (Upper) Northgate Street, Chester (St Oswald’s) and was owner and occupier of a house in Parkgate Road (Trinity ward, in the north of the city). In mid–1869 a daughter Emma Theodora was born to George and Jane at Parkgate Road. Emma died at 11 weeks on 29 September and was buried at Chester cemetery: George was then still described as an ‘auctioneer’. In 1871 George (‘auctioneer and appraisor’) appears as an agent of the Scottish Union Fire and Life Association, with an office

11 at Abbey Gate in Northgate Street, East (next to Palace Chambers, between Abbey Gateway and St Werburgh’s Street).

The 1871 census shows George (‘commission agent, gentleman’) at Brookfield, Newton-by- Chester, with Jane and five children Mary Alice (13); Thomas Mather (11); Georgina Ann (9); William Arthur (7); Charlotte Beatrice (6); and Laura Jane (5).87 Thomas Hodgkinson (11), almost certainly their eldest son, was also shown as a pupil at a boarding school at 29 Parkgate Road.

In 1871 George began a four-year partnership with his brother-in-law William Hodgson Potter, who was already an established Liverpool shipbuilder. Potter was to build the four- masted barque Wanderer, later made famous by the poet John Masefield.88

From 1872–4 the Liverpool directories show George as a ‘shipbuilder (Potter and Hodgkinson)’ of Brookfield House [Newton-by-] Chester and the firm as ‘Potter and Hodgkinson’, shipbuilders of Vulcan forge, Baffin Street, Queen’s Dock and North works, 9–11 Blackstone Street, Bramley Moore Dock. Potter was living at this time at Frankby Manor, Cheshire.89

On 19 September 1871 George Hodgkinson joined with others in leasing land at Sandhurst, Bendigo to the Central Hustlers Freehold Mining Company. On 8 December (through his attorney) he leased land at Sandhurst for mining purposes to The Hustlers City Freehold Gold Mining Company. There were to be further land deals in Australia. George appears to have signed a conveyance of land at Jika Jika (Melbourne) to one Edward Box on 15 July 1875. He bought land at Laanecoorie, Victoria from William Sherborn on 13 February 1877: the conveyance was witnessed by a Chester solicitor. A seven-year lease of ten stalls/shops in Benson’s Arcade, Hargreaves Street, Sandhurst was made in George’s name on 6 November 1877.

A son George was born to George and Jane c. 1872. From 1872–5 the electoral registers show George at Brook Lane (St Oswald’s) and Flookersbrook, Newton-by-Chester (called ‘Brookfield’ in 1874), with an office at Northgate Street and a warehouse at 16 Upper Northgate Street. The 1872 Chester electoral register shows George at Eastgate, with freehold houses in Upper Northgate Street.

Morris’ Cheshire directory of 1874 shows George as a commission agent at Palace Chambers. Directories from 1876–80 show George as an estate agent at 74/84 Northgate Street, E, but give no residential address. Phillipson and Golden’s directory gives the exact position: the third premises from Little Abbey Gateway, looking from Northgate towards Abbey Gateway.

Joseph Steel died in 1874 and his widow Mary was ‘greatly helped’ in bringing up her five children (the youngest of whom, Thomas Mather, was then nine) by her wealthy brother George.

From 1876–8 George Hodgkinson’s address is shown as ‘Delamere’.

Thomas Mather Hodgkinson made his will on 10 April 1877. He died at Overton 19 November 1878, a yeoman aged 74 and was buried at Great Sankey on 22 November. His grave was one of those removed during later road-widening works in Sankey, so no stone survives. His will was proved on 28 March 1879 by George Hodgkinson of 84 Northgate Street.90

His widow Marrian Ann Helen Gertrude Hodgkinson (of West Derby, 46) married John Marsh, a Derbyshire-born warehouseman and widower from Liverpool at St Nicholas’, Liverpool by licence on 4 January 1880. At the 1881 census John and Marian Marsh were living at 85 Spencer Street, Everton with John’s daughter and father. The directories show them there until 1882. By 1891 John and Marian Marsh and John’s daughter Sarah were living at 35 Rawlins Street, Fairfield.91

John Marsh, cotton warehouseman, died aged 70 at Rawlins Street on 10 July 1899 and was buried at Anfield Cemetery on 14 July. The Liverpool Mercury mentioned that he had been connected with Kearsley and Cunningham (cotton brokers) for 40 years as a warehouseman. 92

12 His will was proved in 1899 and resworn in 1900. Marian Marsh moved immediately from Rawlins Street.93

On 11 March 1880 George Hodgkinson acquired property at 102 Northgate Street, Chester (and land and buildings at the rear of 102—108) from the dean and chapter of Chester. 94 At the 1881 census George Hodgkinson (estate agent) and Jane were at ‘Forest Hey’, Chester Road, Weaverham-cum-Milton, with Mary Alice (23); Georgina (19); Charlotte (16); Laura (14); and George (9).95 The 1881 electoral register shows George at Liverpool Road, Chester (Trinity ward, close to Parkgate Road), with two freehold houses at Back Dee View, Boughton. The 1881 Frodsham register shows him at 84 Northgate Street, with his father’s freehold house at Overton. The 1881 Chester census shows 84 Northgate Street as a ‘lock-up shop and office’.

George’s residential address seems first to have been given as Dee Hills in the 1882 directory (which still shows his office at Northgate). George Hodgkinson, ‘of Chester, gentleman’ made his will on 3 April 1883, appointing his wife Jane as guardian of their under-21 children and making Edward Clarke, corn miller and Lee Hankey, cabinet maker, as his trustees. The solicitor was John Tatlock of Chester.

George had been in failing health for some time and it was later reported that in spring 1883 ‘he took a trip to Melbourne (where he also possessed property), principally for a change of air and scenery’. On 9 September 1883 at Melbourne, George signed a memorial of conveyance to his wife of land at Sandhurst, Bendigo. On 15 January 1884, again at Melbourne, George signed a memorial of mortgage, in respect of land at Jika Jika (Melbourne).

George Hodgkinson’s Liverpool-born son Thomas, by now a 24-year old solicitor, died on 29 April 1884 at his father’s house, Dee Hills, Chester. George returned from Australia in May ‘apparently somewhat benefited’ and on 14 June made a codicil to his will, revoking the trusteeship of Clarke and substituting George Okell, a solicitor. Thomas’ death was announced in the Bendigo Advertiser of 18 June, as ‘eldest son of Mr Geo. Hodgkinson, formerly of Sandhurst’.

George Hodgkinson ‘soon relapsed into his former dilapidated condition’ and died of ‘chronic Bright’s disease’ at Dee Hills on 21 November 1884, aged 57. Described as a ‘gentleman’ and ‘auctioneer’, he was buried at Chester cemetery. The Chester Chronicle wrote: ‘We regret to announce the death of Mr George Hodgkinson ... Deceased, who was a well-known property owner in this city, had been in failing health for a long time’. It went on to describe his 1883 trip to Melbourne. George’s death was announced in The Bendigo Advertiser of 6 January 1885.

A conveyance of land at Pyrie Street and Wellington Street, Melbourne from George Hodgkinson to Terry’s West End Brewery and signed by George, was memorialised on 12 December. At his death George owned property in England ‘not exceeding £4627 3s 4d’ and in Victoria (at Laanecoorie only) real estate not exceeding £500.

On 16 January 1886 George Hodgkinson’s mother-in-law Mary Potter (‘widow of William Potter’) died at Dee Hills, aged 86 and was buried in the Hodgkinson family grave at Chester cemetery.

It was probably William and Mary’s son William H. Potter who was a shipbuilder (Wm H. Potter & Son), living at Beach Side, Burbo Bank Road, Blundellsands in 1881–1885 and at Brimstage Spital, Cheshire in 1889 and 1891.96

On 5 June 1886 Jane Hodgkinson was still living at Dee Hills when her husband’s Northgate Street property was assigned to her. Jane and her family now moved south. At the 1891 census Jane (62) was living at ‘Bolenna’, in Monken Hadley, Hertfordshire with Georgina (29); Laura (24); and George (19).97 In 1893 she sold her property at Northgate Street, Chester.98 Jane was still at Hadley Common on 30 April 1896, when she initiated proceedings to have George’s will ‘sealed’ (validated) in Victoria, in order to sell the Laanecoorie property.

13 In 1901 Jane (‛72, living on own means’) was at 17 Broadwater Down, Tunbridge Wells [Sussex, sic], with her daughters Georgina (39) and Laura (34).99

Jane Isabella Hodgkinson died aged 74 on 4 July 1903 at 17 Broadwater Down, Tunbridge Wells. She was buried at Chester and by her will left an estate of £33,000 (almost £2 million at 2005 values): her will was reported in the Illustrated London News of 5 September 1903.

George’s son William Arthur Hodgkinson, who registered his death in 1884, was living in New Zealand from at least 1898, when he begins to appear in directories and electoral registers as a farmer at Hunterville in the Rangitikei district of the North Island, married to Edith Cawton Canning.

William Arthur made his will on 10 March 1910 as an accountant of Marton, but was living at Porirua on the coast north of Wellington when he died aged 47 on 7 August 1910. William was buried at Hunterville: the Evening Post of Wellington reported sealing of his will on 1 March 1911 (estate £2713) and administration of his £487 effects in England was sealed 0n 8 July 1913. Edith Hodgkinson subsequently married Arthur Perry (died 1925) and died aged 88 on 31 December 1940: they were both buried at Hunterville.

George and Jane Hodgkinson’s daughter Mary Alice married Thomas Wilson Bridgford (a Manchester-born stockbroker) at Barnet in June quarter 1892: they appear to have been childless. In 1901 they were at 20 Lee Terrace, Lee, S. London. 100 At the 1911 census on 2 April Thomas was at their home, 27 Frant Road, Tunbridge Wells, but Mary Alice was a patient at the Beacon Court nursing home in Croft Road, Crowborough, where she died on 9 April. Thomas Bridgford died at Frant Road on 27 June 1913, aged 57. In his will (proved on 12 January 1914) Bridgford left £3000 to ‛each of the sisters of my late wife’ [Laura, Charlotte and Georgina]: the executors were two brothers Sturgeon and David Brewster, a solicitor and a stockbroker and doubtless related to Mary Bridgford’s brother-in-law John Brewster.

George and Jane’s daughter Laura Jane married John Felgate Brewster (1865-1935) at St George’s, Bloomsbury on 1 June 1906.101 They, too, appear to have been childless. John Brewster occurs in Kelly’s directories of Bedfordshire in 1928—1935 at The Briars, Bow Brickhill Road, Woburn Sands, where he died in December quarter 1935. Laura died there as his widow on 7 April 1944: her will was proved on 22 June 1945.

Their daughter Georgina Hodgkinson was at 17 Broadwater Down in 1911:102 she died unmarried at 9 Church Road, Tunbridge Wells on 31 October 1946: her will was proved on 17 June 1947 (estate £8341).

Their daughter Charlotte Beatrice married a Dutch architect Frederik Adolf Bodde (1867— 1949) in South Africa on 23 May 1898: their children Frits George and Anna Beatrice Bodde were born at Pretoria on 27 May 1899 and 14 October 1905. The family returned to The Hague ‛because of the boerenoorlog’ and lived later in Oxford. Frederik returned to Eindhoven, Netherlands in 1925 and his daughter Anna kept a flowershop at 88 Lomanstraat, Amsterdam. Charlotte became a translator of books from Dutch to English.103 Frederik died a manufacturer at Veldhoven on 8 March 1949, aged 82. ‛Charlotte Bodde, widow’ died at Pittville Court, Albert Road, Cheltenham on 14 May1956, aged 91: her will was proved on 30 August by her brother George Hodgkinson.104

George and Jane Hodgkinson’s son George Edmund married Daisy Matthews at St Marylebone in December quarter 1898. In 1901 he was a solicitor of 25 Norfolk Road, St Marylebone105 and a daughter Marjorie Greatorex Hodgkinson (1903—1979) was born in March quarter 1903. In 1911 George was at 5 Cannon Place, Hampstead with Daisy and their daughter Marjorie Greatorex (8). George’s wife Daisy died on 7 July 1915 at Tillingdown House, Caterham Valley (aged 43) and was buried at Godstone: administration of her £557 estate was granted to her husband on 3 April 1916. George subsequently lived at Artillery Mansions, Victoria and married Ingeborg in 1924. In 1956 George Edmund Hodgkinson proved the will of his sister Charlotte Bodde. George died at Bromley Hall, Standon, Hertfordshire on 3 May 1957 (aged 85) as a solicitor of 13 Carlisle Mansions, Westminster and 14 Lincolns Inn Fields: his will was proved in the sum of £81,203.106

14 *************************************************************** © T.M. Steel (revised 7 September 2011)

Appendix: additional material relating to Geo. Hodgkinson’s Australian holdings

GHs Australian property seems to have been at Sandhurst; at Jika Jika (Melbourne); and at Laanecoorie. The holdings around Bendigo & Jika Jika seem the most interesting.

Genealogy section of the State Lib. would have Electoral Registers/Rolls, Melbourne & Bendigo Directories & Births, Deaths & Marriages Index (all on fiche) & Passenger Lists.

The Lib. itself would have histories of the Bendigo goldfield and it would be worth scanning the index in a few of these for GH (and Potter). The Lib. might also have a history of Melbourne street names.

Bendigo Lib. would have lots of 1850s stuff in its local history section, I would think. And as State Lib. for street names. Somewhere there may be records of the Gold Companies Mining.

The Titles Office might unlock more secrets, especially re Pall Mall, Bendigo. Here’s a list of the photocopies I have from there:

Two sheets re ‘Land Purchases’ at Laanecoorie by Sherborn in 1857 (pp 164 & 165, no 38581, 46913 & 4); one sheet headed ‘66 Hodgkinson, George’, with a record of 24 transactions (no dates) at Sndhurst, Jika Jika & Laanecoorie; Two sheets of Waugh’s Cert of Title at Laanecoorie, 1910–1974; and Nine sheets of ‘Memorials’, viz:

1871, Sandhurst, GH et al to Central Hustlers, No 817, Book 214 1871, Sandhurst, GH to Hustlers City Mining, No 883, Book 216 1875, Jika Jika, GH to Edward Box, No 610, Book 250 1877, Laanecoorie, W Sherborn to GH, No 74, Book 268 1878, Sandhurst, GH to Holmes & White, No 698, Book 277 1884, Jika Jika, GH to Howgate, No 888, Book 313 1884, Sandhurst, GH to Jane Hodgkinson, No 877, Book 314 1884, Pyrie & Wellington Sts, GH to T’s Brewy. No 452, Book 320 1886, Jika Jika, Terry’s W End Brewery & Terry,No 761, Book 335 To be seen: memorials of the early 1850s transactions at Sandhurst

15 1 For christenings, marriages & burials [hereafter cmbs] Warrington after 1706: Cheshire Record Office [hereafter C.R.O.], P316/5448/ 2 See T.M. Steel, ‛Steel of Silsden & Merseyside’: http://tsgf.pbworks.com 3 C.W. Bardsley, A Dictionary of English & Welsh Surnames (London, 1901), p. 389; P.H. Reaney, A Dictionary of British Surnames (London, 1976), p. 179 4 For cmbs Wigan after 1625: Wigan Record Office, 1/1–3; at Deane: A. Sparke (ed.), ‘The Registers of the Parish Church of Deane, 1604–1750’, I, part 1, Lancs Parish Register Soc. [hereafter L.P.R.S.], (53), 1916 5 R. Bromley (ed.), ‘The Registers of the Chapel of St Helen, Hollinfare, 1654–1837’, L.P.R.S. (120), 1981 6 R. Sharpe France (ed.), ‘The Registers of Estates of Lancs Papists, 1717’, II, Record Soc. of Lancs & Cheshire [hereafter R.S.L.C.], 108 (1960), pp. 115, 140, 141 7 Henry’s s. Peter) & Wm’s children & wid. Eliz were also mentioned; daus were Esther, w. of Jn Lingart, Ellen, w. of Ralph Wakefield, Ann, w. of Jn Bailey, Jane, w. of Nathan Wadsworth; niece Esther Green (living with him); wits Robt, Lydia & Jn Bromley. For S. Lancs wills, invs & admons (Chester consistory) to 1858: L.R.O., WCW/[name]/[place]/[year] 8 Henry noted his lease under Tempest, dated 20 Aug. 1763; his s. Wm was exec. & wits were Walter Houghton & Jn Wilson 9 Liverpool Record Office, 920 PLU/PT 42* (Aughton leys & assessments) 10 G.C. Normansell (ed.), Warrington parish church memorials (Warrington, 2000) 11 See T.M. Steel, ‛Mather of Billinge’: http://tsgf.pbworks.com 12 Not all these children perhaps survived, but none was bur. Newton; for cbs Newton: K.T. Taylor (ed.), ‘The Registers of St Peter’s, Newton in Makerfield, 1735–1837’, L.P.R.S. (151), 2001 13 They do not occur again in Newton parish registers, nor in those of Winwick parish church [J.R. Bulmer (ed.), ‘The Register of St Oswald’s, Winwick, 1716–1812’, L.P.R.S. (M7, M17, M18), 1985 & 1988]; nor its chapelries of Newchurch (W.J. & E.W.W. Kaye (eds), ‘The Registers of Newchurch, 1599–1812’, L.P.R.S., 22, 1905); Ashton [J. Perkins (ed.) ‘The Registers of Ashton-in-Makerfield, 1746–1809’, L.P.R.S. (M14), 1997]; or Lowton (K.T. Taylor (ed.), ‛ The Registers of St Luke, Lowton, 1733—1837’, L.P.R.S., 173, 2011) 14 L.R.O., PR 3264; among other possible children of Jn & Betty/Eliz. are some bap. Preston (Jn, 20 Oct. 1763; Betty, 12 Oct. 1766; Mgt (1774); Henry was bur. there 1774. L.R.O., PR 1432–1479. In the next generation 9 children b. to Jn Hodgkinson were bap. Ashton: Jn (1780), Thos (1782), Henry (1785), Ann (1787), Daniel (1789), Wm (1791), Betty (1793), Matty (1795) & Peter (1797). A dau. Martha was bur. 1796 15 For cmbs Great Sankey: I. Foster (ed.), ‘The Register of St Mary’s Chapel, Gt Sankey, 1728–1839’, L.P.R.S. (M1), 1984; Abigail, dau. of Jn Hodgkinson of Sankey was bap. Farnworth 1725: Gt Sankey chapel was then under independent control & was returned to the Church of England only 1728, when its surviving registers begin 16 C.R.O., P 286/4216 (mf 328/1). One Sarah Hodgkinson was bur. Sankey 7 Dec. 1766. In 1851 there was still living Cow Lane, Sankey one Betty Hodgkinson, independent wid: she d. at 73 & was bur. there Dec. 1854. Helen, dau. of Jn Hodgkinson, an Ashton trade mechanic & his w. Mgt, was bap. Sankey 24 Oct. 1824 17 We know from Wm Ainsworth’s will that Eliz. Hodgkinson had indeed d. by 1806 18 Thos signed, Mary marked & both were ‛of this parish’: J.R. Bulmer (ed.), ‘The Marriage Register of St Oswald’s, Winwick, 1754–1812’, L.P.R.S. (M17), 1988; 21 Jul. 1805 Thos Hodgkinson m. Martha Young after banns at Warr: he signed 19 C. Hadfield & G. Biddle, The Canals of North-West England, (Newton Abbott, 1970), I, p. 17; J. Corbridge, A Pictorial History of the Mersey & Irwell Navigation (Manchester, 1979), p. 4 20 Hadfield & Biddle, Canals, p. 43 21 Later the Sankey Canal & then the St Helens Canal 22 P.A. Norton, Railways & Waterways to Warrington (Chester, 1985), p. 7 23 W. Yates, Map of Lancs, 1786 (1" to 1 m.) 24 J. Aikin, A Description of the Country from 30—40 miles round Manchester (London, 1795), p. 305 25 Warrington Lib. [hereafter Warr. Lib.], MS 146, et seq. (poor rate assessments, 1771 onwards); T.N.A., IR 23/40 (f. 854v, land tax) 26 House listed variously under Sankey St, Little Sankey, Sankey Bridges & Atherton’s Quay: Warr. Lib., MS 789 27 Atherton was a wit. of Martha Hodgkinson’s will & d. 1828 28 Warr. Lib., MS 790–795 (Nov. 1819–1824); Baines’ Dir. 1824 shows Wm Albiston with a boarding academy at Atherton’s Quay & Thos Bowker as a timber merchant at Bank Quay; Pigot’s Dir. 1828–9 again shows Albiston’s school at Atherton’s Quay, together with the Coach & Horses (Martha Moss), Wm Beckwith as a cattle dealer at Green Cottage, Bank Quay & Jn Clare as a coal merchant at Sankey Bridges 29 6" to 1 m., Lancs., sheet 115; 5 feet to 1 m., Warrington (1851, surveyed 1849), sheet 12 30 Valued at £14 & kept by Martha Moss from at least 1824 until at least 1827 (& see 1828–9 dir.), by J. Fleming 1841 & by Thos Crosby 1851 31 See dirs 1824 & 1828/9: rated at £38 & occupied by Wm Albiston, it was empty 1828, owned 1841 by Hugh Clare, yeoman & belonged by 1851 to a wire manufacturer; Albiston also had a gig house & stable 1826 32 Warr. Lib., P 1472, pp. 5–6 [charter of incorporation granted to borough of Warrington, 1847 (Warrington, 1847)] 33 T.M. Steel, ‛Mather of Billinge’, 2010 34 ‘Capt Clare’ formed the Warrington volunteers 1797 & d. 1861 35 He renounced as exec. 1848 36 Warr. Lib., MS 795 (1824), 797–799 (1826–1828); none of these occupiers occur in the land tax returns for those years: L.R.O., QDL/[year]/WD/86 (Warrington) 37 For cmbs St Helens 1788–1837: F. Dickinson (ed.), ‘The Registers of St. Helens Chapel, II, 1788–1837’, L.P.R.S., 111 (1972) 38 Warr. Lib., MS 798; listed next to this house 1824 was Jn Roughsedge: in 1836 a Jn Roughsedge was an owner occupier in Gt Sankey, adjoining whose barn (near Seddons Hey & Brook Meadow) was a cottage occupied by Mrs Hodgkinson (MS 795; MS 1188 (survey of Gt Sankey) 39 Warr. Lib., MS 799–800 (1828) 40 L.R.O., WCW, Dec. 1848*: for estate duty acc: T.N.A., IR 26/1808/945* 41 Evidence of the Warrington rate books 42 For cmbs Eccles: Manchester Record Office, MFPR 562 43 Thos was again a ‘carpenter, Monton’; he does not occur as a Barton occupier in land tax returns (L.R.O., QDL/[year]/S/9); Thos & Alice were to move to Liverpool 1839--1840 & their only remaining connection with Gt Sankey was to be bur. there 1866 & 1878. 44 In 1861 Monton House, Monton Green was occupied by Jas Hodgkinson, master cotton spinner, widr & farmer of 30 acres b. Deane c. 1810: T.N.A., RG 9/2864/44/19 (Census returns 1851 onwards are cited with 4 elements: class [RG 9 et seq.]/piece/folio/page) 45 Named after Jn Mann, oil-stone dealer, who d. Mann Island 1784 46 The gradual development to 1850 can be followed by comparing large-scale maps of Toxteth Park with census returns of 1841 & 1851 & McCorquodale’s Dir. 1848 (the first to include Mann St in its st dir. section) 47 It does not appear on Gage’s map (surveyed 1835), but is an address in the electoral register 1839. Cheshire View is most clearly marked on the ordnance survey 5” to 1 ml. town plans 1849 & 1890: Liverpool Record Office [hereafter Liv. R.O.], Hf 912 LIV & Hf 912 1890 48 A. Hume, Map of Liverpool, ecclesiastical & social, 1858; Liverpool Daily Post, ‘Squalid Liverpool’, V (Toxteth Park), 9 Nov. 1883 49 T.N.A., HO 107/568/21/78/14/20 (census returns 1841 are cited with 6 elements: class [HO 107]/piece/book/enumeration district/folio/page) 50 For cmbs Liverpool: Liv. R.O., 283/PET/2/32 (St Peter's cs 1841); /MAR/2/1 (St Martin's cs 1844); /HAM/3/6 (St Michael's ms 1860); /BAP/3/7 (St Jn's ms 1866); /HAM/3/9 (St Michael's ms 1870) 51 Gore’s Dir. of Liverpool, 1843 lists Cheshire View at 11 New Mann St 52 It seems unlikely that our Hodgkinsons were related to Jn Hodgkinson, a Toxteth Park shipwright shown by 1829 dir. at 47 Harrington St. Jn d. Jul.1829: his will made 1828 spoke of his w. Martha, brothers Wm, Bradshaw, Jas & Thos & sisters Mgt Cooke, Jane Parkinson & Alice Rowson (mother of Peter Rowson of the borough gaol). It seems clear that Jn was b. 1794, youngest s. of Bradshaw Hodgkinson, butcher of Preston 53 F. O’Connor, Liverpool: Our City, Our Heritage (Liverpool, 1990), p. 12 54 Hume, Map of Liverpool, 1858 55 T.C. Barker & J.R. Harris, A Merseyside Town in the Industrial Revolution (London, 1993), p. 226 56 T.N.A., HO 107/563/11/22/44/28 57 Registered Liverpool, Dec. quarter: XX/415 58 L.R.O., EL 1/14 (S), p. 263 [1845], et seq. 59 Gore’s Dir. of Liverpool, 1846, 1847 60 L.R.O., EL 1/15 (S), et seq. 61 There were probably numbering changes at this time. G. McCorquodale's Dir. was 1st to include entries st by st 62 For Thos Ainsworth’s estate duty acc: T.N.A., IR 26/515/204 63 L.R.O., EL 1/19 (S) 64 T.N.A., HO 107/2188/231r/28* (30 Mar.) 65 Thos was ‛smallware dealer’ 1859 & 1860 & shipwright 1862 66 T.N.A., IR 26/4917 & 4921 OR 529/4 & 530/4 67 L.R.O., EL 1/25 (S) 68 Liv. R.O., 283 PET/2/47 69 T.N.A., RG 9/2703/110/31* (7 Apr.) 70 Wits Thos Mather Hodgkinson & Ellen Fisher; Eliz.’s father a shipwright 71 T.N.A., RG 9/2629/16/24 72 For cmbs Cheshire: C.R.O. 73 Wits. Ellis & Eliz. Griffiths; Thos described his father as ‛gentleman’ 74 T.N.A., RG 10/3799/96/12 (2 Apr.); RG 12/2939/52/37 (5 Apr.); dirs checked: 1874-7, 1879-80, 1889-92, 1894, 1896 (x), 1912, 1915, 1917, 1919, 1921, 1923, 1925 75 Liverpool Echo, 19 Jul. 1929; Liv. R.O., Toxteth Pk Cem., bur. reg. (‛subsequent’), section O, no. 270 76 T.N.A., RG 10/3794/79/40 77 Dirs checked: 1871 (x), 1872-6, 1877 (x) 78 Still functioning in its original (now listed) buildings by Waterhouse; for its records: Liv. R.O., 362 TUR 79 C.R.O., P 8/2619/3/6 (mf 140/3) 80 Return of Owners of Land, 1873 (London, 1875), I, Co. Chester, p. 18 81 C.R.O., P 8/2619/5/3 (mf 140/5) 82 T.N.A., RG 10/3693/26r/27* 83 C.R.O., P 2619/5/3 (mf 140/5) 84 Gore’s Dir. of Liverpool & Environs, 1885, 1891; Kelly’s Dir. of Liverpool & Suburbs, 1923, 1925 85 D. noticed in Liverpool Echo 86 D. noticed in Liverpool Echo. Meanwhile Robt jnr had m. Gwyneth Williams Dec. ¼ 1932: their children Mavis & Keith Ridland were b. Liv. Dec. ¼ 1934 & Jun. ¼ 1945 87 T.N.A., RG 10/3728/51/4 88 Potter, jnr & Jane Hodgkinson were children of Wm Potter, a journeyman shipwright living 1851 at 32 Tenterden St, Liverpool. Potter, snr d. by 1861, when his wid. Mary was living Everton: in 1871 & 1891 she was in the household of her s.-in-law Geo. Hodgkinson 89 Gore’s Dir., 1872–1874; another Wm Potter was also a shipwright (b. c. 1840 on Isle of Man) & living 1865 at 37 Caple St, Park Rd & 1872 at 42 Ouse St, Toxteth Park 90 For estate duty: T.N.A., IR 26/3125/409/f. 725 (1879) 91 T.N.A., RG 11/3666/34/7 (3 Apr.) & RG 12/2998/131/33 92 15 Jul. 1899: present at the funeral were his s. Richd & grandss Jn P. & Menlove Marsh, while his dau. sent a wreath. His wid. Marion was not mentioned 93 Marian Marsh, lic. victualler d. Sun Hotel, Canterbury aged 65 on 5 Feb. 1901: exec. was her s. Chas Henry Marsh, lic. victualler 94 C.R.O., ZC1 C/5 95 T.N.A., RG 11/3521/65/12 96 Gore’s Dir. of Liverpool & Environs, 1885, 1889, 1891 97 T.N.A., RG 12/1053/18/30 98 C.R.O., ZC1 C/6--12 99 T.N.A., RG 13/896/16/5 100 T.N.A., RG 13/545/155/30 101 Univ. of California (L.A.), F.A. Crisp (ed.), Visitation of England & Wales, XIII (privately published, 1905), p. 21 102 T.N.A., RG 14/4926/ED19 103 Her translations included The Masquerade and The Apple and Eve; Dutch info. from Fred van der Burg, Indische Brieven, Dutch genealogy website Stamboom Forum, & Bodde gezinskaart 104 Cremated at Bouncers Lane, Cheltenham: no memorial plaque. Frederik & Charlotte’s s. Frits Geo. (then a tobacco manufacturer) m. Johanna Kroon at Headington 4 Apr. 1929. He was a director of British-American Tobacco & deputy chairman 1956—1962: he d. Bracknell in Jan. ¼ 1992. Anna Beatrice Bodde m. Theodoor Slinkers: their s. is F.L. (Derek) Slinkers 105 T.N.A., RG 13/118/79/29 106 Geo.’s dau. Marjorie attended Slade School of Art & m. painter Mark Gertler in Paris 3 Apr. 1930: their only child Luke was b. London 16 Aug. 1932. Mark Gertler d. London 23 Jun. 1939 & a s. Michael was b. to Marjorie & Franz Kostenz 1941: Marjorie & Kostenz were m. Hampstead Dec. ¼ 1946. Geo.’s s.-in-law & dau. Franz & Marjorie Kostenz d. 1976 & 1979: both were bur. Godstone. Geo.’s s. d. c. 1994