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Manchester
Articles from the Manchester Times dating from 1828 to 1900. Included is a record of a major flood which took place in November 1866, inundating large swathes of Lancashire and Yorkshire.
A number of articles detail the living conditions of the urban poor in graphic detail. Read the details of the murder and suicide in Ancoats from June 1887, or the records for the cold winter of 1891.
Spending time on a canal boat on holiday, cruising through the British countryside, is great for rest and relaxation. But this bears no resemblance to the working waterways of our ancestors. An article from March 1867 details a court case against the Bridgewater Trustees, and the detail it gives of the state of the canal does not make for pleasant reading! The Trustees had used the water from two streams in Manchester for the canal, and the result was that "in December 1865, the state of the canal was such that the whole of the water for many miles was simply common sewage water". Doesn't bear thinking about.
As one might expect, there are a lot of articles in the Manchester newspapers, and the Manchester Courier also covers areas such as Runcorn, Wigan and Warrington.
I have come across a number of articles detailing "Wife selling", and in every case, it is obvious that the bargain between buyer and seller had already been struck before the public sale. But when Peter Cawley "sold" his wife in May 1850, things nearly went awry, as there were two bidders for the lady in question!
An article from September 1866 detailing an affray in Jersey Street shows the police using an early form of a "line up", when the accused parties were put into a group at the police station and the eye witnesses asked to pick out those involved in the affray.
A fascinating article from February 1859 states that one third of all burials in Manchester at that time were pauper burials paid for by the Guardians. Complaints had been made that the Guardians were too slow in providing the money and that the unburied corpses were a source of disease. In one case, a boatman's wife had died, and he had a whip round to pay for the funeral. Having acquired the coffin and shroud from the undertaker, he went to the pub and drank the money, leaving his wife's body at a lodging house. The lodging house keeper complained to the Guardians, who had to retrieve the body, and then made the undertaker take back the coffin and shroud, as they were better quality than normal. Pity the poor soul who got the recycyled goods.
The photograph is of Mode Wheel Lock on the river Irwell.
A small selection of articles with dates 1870 and 1914 to 1917.
In March 1916, the Spiraea, a large steamer with a cargo of oil, caught fire, and the blazing oil floated along the canal for a quarter of a mile, endangering both other shipping and the canal banks and buildings. Must have been terrifying.
The Spiraea was later taken to Morecambe to be broken up, and there are a number of photographs which show her on the beach there, still burning.
