Today Maureen and Steff took us to the village of Elsecar, where the Elsecar Heritage Centre is housed in the workshops of the former Elsecar Ironworks.
The Earls Fitzwilliam of Wentworth Woodhouse were innovative industrialists who ran an enormous estate which included a colliery, a farm and all the associated industries needed to support them. They had their own private railway built and a canal dug for easy transport of their coal. The workshops included a blacksmith’s shop, engineering works, joiners shop, paint shop, saw mill, wagon repairs shop, timber store, granary and offices – not a bad start for earls wanting to be self sufficient – and they then built a village for the workers. A benevolent employer for the times, providing progressive housing, we learnt later that the workforce was controlled not just at work but also in their leisure time. Anyone wishing to visit away from the estate had to inform the Earl.Coal was mined here as early as 1367 but it was not until the 1799 and the building of the canal that it could really be developed. The boats on the canals were called keels, and they could move 100 tons at a time, using large square sails as far as possible and then being hauled by horses. Coal and flour from Elsecar was transported along the canal to ships on the Humber River. The incredible growth is illustrated by the fact that in 1795 there were 79 workers and in 1856 there were 867. Pits owned by the Fitzwilliams included the Elsecar New Colliery, which was deeper than precious ones and used a beam engine to pump out water, allowing deeper seams of coal to be exploited, and the Elsecar Main Colliery, which opened in 1908. They were taken over by the National Coal Board in 1947 when the pits were nationalised, and the workshops were taken over as part of the deal. In 1986 most of the workshop buildings were heritage listed.
Now the buildings have been restored by the Barnsley Council and are occupied by artisans, a children’s play centre and small shops, as well as by the most fabulous antique market. The antique market is two storeys high and is composed of a multitude of small open divisions where antique sellers have set up displays. Two people were downstairs to assist and to organise purchases on behalf of all the sellers. It was an absolute treasure trove with various parts providing specialist areas and others being a free for all, where a potpourri of old to antique items spilled out over tables and shelves. One chair with crinoline stretchers attached baffled us, so ignorant are we of the need to stretch crinolines at all, let alone while sitting down. I know that we have thrown out items from our early years that could have been on sale here so I was feeling pretty old; antique to be exact.
I was particularly impressed by some Moorcroft vases, knowing nothing about them at this stage. But as I write this more than a week later and we have seen an exhibition of them, I know them to be highly valued and the product of a unique and time consuming process which master potter William Moorcroft passed on to his son, Walter. The drawn design is adapted to the contours of a pot and then a thin line of clay is virtually piped, as in cake decorating, along the outlines of the design, creating raised edges. Colours are then applied and the pots are fired, with a second glazing and firing creating the luscious tones, and gloss for which the Moorcroft ware is famous.
The Earl’s railway still runs, although for enthusiasts now and not to transport coal. We wandered around looking at the engines, which had names like ‘The Earl of Stafford’, ‘The Countess Fitzwilliam Diesel Locomotive’ and ‘The Earl Fitzwilliam’. There was no risk of mistaking these for commoners’ rolling stock. A sign at the engine shed saying ‘Stop, await orders’ seemed to sum up what life for one of the Earl’s employees must have been like. The black coal lumps were hard and heavy, in contrast to the brown coal we have previously handled.
A particular highlight of our visit was the ‘Coddswallop Trust and Bottle Museum’, which is free and fascinating. A wide range of bottles is on display as well as items from chemist shops in bygone days. The mouth gags looked effective but we wondered about their use, and the shiny steel masticator could only have been made in the industrial north and looked as if it would be possible to masticate a brick for an invalid to swallow. Edward Scissorhands would have been proud to wear a set of them. Bottles for poisons were in the shape of skulls, coffins, a grim reaper, or with the neck to one side to avoid confusion. The neck set to one side was particularly good for poisons because the design made for accurate measurements because it stopped the mix going ‘glug glug’ and coming out too quickly.
Labelling in words would not have been adequate in times when literacy was not universal, and when all sorts of lotions and potions as well as everyday items were sold in bottles. Every doctor seemed to have bottled his own mix of wonder tablets and creams for every possible ailment. Dr Robert’s ‘Poor Man’s Friend Ointment’ for skin diseases came in a nice pottery jar, and after it had cured all the skin diseases that poverty is heir to, the jar would have been re-used for jam or some such. No wonder innovations that reduced poisoning were greeted with acclaim. ‘Genuine Russian Bear’s Grease’ for increasing hair growth is an intriguing one in terms of collecting the ingredients but also it made me wonder exactly who the advertising was aimed at – obviously desperate hair losers, but why Russian bears - unless something exotic was needed to entice the English men who had spent heavily and were disillusioned by failure using the grease of English species. Perhaps the Russian bear is particularly hairy? There was much patenting competition with bottle shapes and colours and it seemed that there were no altruists in bottle design. Some of the doctoring appliances were genuinely scary but the moulds for making pessaries and enemas obviously showed concern for all shapes and sizes.
Maureen and Steff had gone back to Monk Bretton and we were free to look around the village and call them when we wanted a lift back. We started up the village street where the houses closest to the workshops seemed to be the oldest, so we surmised that they had been the ones the Earls provided way back. The town has obviously grown in more modern times but it still seems to have been built in group lots, rather than in the one by one individual fashion that is more common in small town Australia. There was not much life in the village streets, other than men at the pub sitting outside to drink and to survey the non-existent passing crowd.
After a bit of a ramble we turned down towards the Holy Trinity Parish Church, which was shut, and spent a happy hour reading the grave stones in the church yard. I don’t know why I find this so fascinating because there is usually very little information to flesh out the stories of people’s lives, which is what really intrigues me, but I suppose even this little glimpse gives a sense of the times and of some individual situations.
So many children died in infancy, mothers also died young so a guess is that it was in childbirth. Twins were more likely to die since, if premature, there would have been little to save them. Young men died – some were victims of mine disasters but others could have been also, and England was in many wars too.
We followed our noses past an old mill, and down towards the railway bridge. Turning back towards the Heritage Centre, we walked along the canal, all the while thinking how much power, influence and money the Earls had to cause a railway and a canal to be built. The canal edge is overgrown now but must once have had a path for the horses. Equally it was impossible to see much at the site of the Simon Wood Colliery, 93 ½ yards deep to the Barnsley coal seam, which was closed in 1903 after fifty years of operation. We met friendly walkers, one of whom told us that in the mornings you could see lots of birds, including kingfishers, along the canal.
Maureen and Dean were off to Steff's husband, Jimmy's, birthday so we had a reasonably early night and I started to read about Ian Thorpe’s life. The Olympics are nearly upon us but it is not dominating the papers in the way that it does in Australia, where weeks of articles about our stars and their training, food, uniforms etc etc is breaking news.
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