16 BARNINGHAM LOCAL HISTORY GROUP BUT NOT FORGOTTEN A selection of extraordinary lives featured in The Archive, newsletter of Barningham Local History Group By JON SMITH Written, designed and produced by Jon Smith using Adobe PageMaker, Microsoft Word and Adobe Photoshop. First printed 2015 Digitalised 2017 © Barningham Local History Group 2015 Printed copies of this booklet may be obtained from Barningham Local History Group www.barninghamvillage.co.uk Tel 01833 621374 or email jonxxsmith@gmail,com BLHG 16 1710 [2] BUT NOT FORGOTTEN 3 Introduction The rich and the righteous, the doomed and the damned WHEN in 2009 I produced the first issue of theArchive , the newsletter of Barn- ingham Local History Group, I thought we’d be lucky to find enough material to fill half a dozen pages three or four times a year. Eight years, 55 issues and half a million words later, I’m still astonished how much we’ve discovered to tell about the past of one tiny village and its neighbours. Among the hundreds of stories we’ve printed are many about long-forgotten people who made headlines during their lifetime. Their existence would have remained buried in the past but for the arrival of the internet: the digitalisation of parish records, censuses, and above all local newspapers has made it wonderfully possible to re-discover them and put together the jigsaw of their lives and times. This file offers a small selection of those I’ve found and written about in the Archive. They include the rich and the righteous, the poor and the persecuted, doers of good deeds and convicted criminals, the unbelievably fortunate and the tragically ill-fated, the daring, disgraceful, the doomed and the damned. All gone but, thanks to the internet and the Archive, not forgotten. Jon Smith Archive editor 2017 BUT NOT FORGOTTEN 4 Contents Who’s who in this file John Alderson, Dragoon................................................................................................................ 6 Margaret Anderson, Maidservant.............................................................................................. 9 Edwin Atkinson, Joiner ............................................................................................................................11 George Bell, Preacher........................................................................................................................... 12 Lanny Bryant, Wrestler.............................................................................................................................15 Miss Cash, Barrier breaker........................................................................................................... 16 James Coates, Schoolmaster.......................................................................................................... 20 Thomas Coates, Farmer’s son....................................................................................................... 23 Ben Cole, Innkeeper................................................................................................................................ 27 Muriel Currie, Schoolmistress................................................................................................... 31 Frederick Dinsdale, Word collector........................................................................................ 34 John Franceys, Sinner ................................................................................................................................36 John Gibson, Robbed .....................................................................................................................................37 Edwin Spencer Gough, Rector....................................................................................................... 38 Thomas Greenhow, Schoolboy....................................................................................................... 41 George Hales, Rector ...................................................................................................................................44 Kexwith Hannah, Housekeeper..................................................................................................... 45 George Hogg, Poacher ................................................................................................................................49 James King, Innkeeper ..............................................................................................................................50 William Kipling, Convict.................................................................................................................... 51 Richard Kirtley, Grabbler .......................................................................................................................53 Ada Lovelace, Computer pioneer................................................................................................. 54 Thomas Lodge, Killer............................................................................................................................. 56 Jonathan Lowe, Rector.......................................................................................................................... 59 Frances McCulloch, Heiress.......................................................................................................... 61 William Melville, Bastard heir..................................................................................................... 65 Harry Milbank, Duellist...................................................................................................................... 68 Henry Nelson, Tramp.............................................................................................................................. 73 Ellen Patterson, Poisoner .......................................................................................................................74 Agnes Robinson, Servant................................................................................................................... 75 BUT NOT FORGOTTEN 5 Geoffrey Smith, Gardener.................................................................................................................. 78 Ralph Leconby Snowden, Detective ...............................................................................................................80 Jack Stapleton, Bus operator ...............................................................................................................82 John Todd, Cheesemonger................................................................................................................. 93 Robert Todd, Farmer .....................................................................................................................................100 William Todd, Farmer .................................................................................................................................101 Alfred Vivian, Hostage.......................................................................................................................... 102 James Wild, Milne wreet.................................................................................................................... 105 Unknown Wild Man .......................................................................................................................................106 Unknown Clerk ..................................................................................................................................................94 LEST WE FORGET Roll of Honour ..........................................................................................................................................................108 Cpl William Barnett .........................................................................................................................................110 Pte Christopher Johnson...........................................................................................................................112 Pte John Peacock ...............................................................................................................................................114 Pte Robert Sayer ..................................................................................................................................................116 BUT NOT FORGOTTEN 6 John Alderson Dragoon at the heart of the Indian Mutiny ON June 20th 1858, a young soldier from Greta Bridge sat down to write a letter to his parents 4,000 miles away. John Alderson was 22, a private in the 14th Regiment of Light Dragoons, and he was about to take part in the last great battle of the Indian Mutiny. John was among the thousands of British troops who later that day would storm the rebel-held city of Gwalior, south of Delhi, in a desperate attempt to wipe out its defenders. “I hope we should soon have it over,” he wrote to his parents, John and Emma Alderson, “for I have not been in bed for four nights past.” John’s father was a Startforth-born coachman working in Rokeby, probably Soldier of the 14th for the Morritts. The family appears in Light Dragoons the 1851 Rokeby census, which lists John, his parents, and sisters Harriet, Emma, Elizabeth and Mary. His parents had earlier lived in Clerkenwell, Middlesex, where John was born, and Egglestone, birthplace of the two elder girls. The family had moved to Greta Bridge by 1846 when Elizabeth was born. Three more children – William, Eleanor