Robert & Rachel Jolly

The tranquil valley of the River Yarrow in Heath Charnock, near Chorley, Lancashire, with Winter Hill and the Anglezarke Moors beyond - this is where I was born (literally, in our home which is just out of the picture on the left side), and this valley and surrounding hills were my childhood playground. In 1972 I left these enchanted hills and migrated to Australia, and while I have been happy to call Australia home for more than four decades, I have always felt an insatiable urge to return to this valley, the Leeds-Liverpool Canal, and the Chorley area in general. Now, as I uncover the stories of our ancestry that I never knew, I begin to understand why. This is more than just the stamping ground of my youth - it's in my DNA.

In 1824 Robert Jolly was born in Heath Charnock. It's hard to be certain, but I believe he was the son of Nancy Jolly, a single woman also from Heath Charnock, and I have no knowledge of who his father was. Evidence of Robert's parentage is based on a Baptism record from the Parochial Chapelry Of Rivington which is my only real lead, showing him as the son of Nancy, whose surname was spelt Jolley, and no mention of a father. The different spelling of the surname is not unusual: many people didn't know how to read or write and therefore wouldn't have known if it was written incorrectly - from the point of view of whoever recorded the event, Jolly and Jolley are both correct. Census reports indicate that Robert was born in 1823, 1824, 1825, and even 1826 - this can vary depending on the census year and Robert's actual date of birth. The variance is usually only +/- one year, but sometimes the enumerators made errors transcribing from the householder's schedule to the summary sheet. In some cases, the householders themsleves may not have actually been sure how old they or other members of the household were. The point that swung me into considering this as the most likely candidate is that I could only find one Robert Jolly (of any spelling) born to a single woman in that area and that period, and in the record of Robert's marriage, the spot that normally contains the name of the groom's father contains the word "Illegitimate"

Robert married Rachel Critchley on October 13th, 1844. Rachel was born in Heath Charnock in 1822 and was baptised on May 19th of that year, at St Laurence, Chorley. She was the fourth of ten children of Thomas and Ann Critchley. Thomas appears to have been born in Clayton (see Updates) while Ann was also born in Heath Charnock. At the time of their marriage Robert and Rachel were living in Anglezarke, an adjoining region to Heath Charnock, and Robert was shown on the marriage record as an engineer. Their first child, Rachel, was born some time before March 30th, 1845 (shown as 6 years old in the census of March 30th, 1851) - evidently a lot of children didn't pay much attention at Sunday School! See Update

Water Street Chorley, I'd say in the 1960's.
Image Courtesy Of Lancashire Lantern 
(permission pending)

The Jolly's remained in the Heath Charnock area until at least 1848, but were living at 27 Water Street in Chorley when the 1851 census was taken, and Robert was working as an engineer, probably in one of the many cotton mills in the area. Rachel was recorded as doing house work - out of the cotton and coal boom of the nineteenth century rose a middle class of people who built nicer houses than the red brick terraces of the workers, and who often employed working class ladies to cook and clean for them. Robert and Rachel had three children now, Rachel, age 6, Maria, age 5 and Daniel, age 3, but Maria does not appear on the 1851 census. See Update

In December 1851 Lucy Ann Jolly was born in Chorley, and somewhere in the next ten years the family moved to East Street, a couple of blocks away from Water Street, on the other side of the railway line. In the 1861 census, their address is recorded as "Cotton Mill Weaving Shed, East Street", and it would seem they were sharing that abode with a young couple named James Lowe, a coal miner, and his wife Alice, a cotton weaver. Robert is recorded as a mechanic in a cotton mill, Rachel is still a housekeeper, and Maria is back in the picture, now 15 and working as a cotton weaver. Daniel and Lucy Ann are both recorded as scholars. First child Rachel does not appear in the 1861 census, leaving me wondering what might have become of her. In the September quarter of 1861 Robert and Rachel's fourth child, Joseph, my Great Grandfather, was born.

Fewer than one in ten working class families ever owned their homes in Lancashire's cotton towns. As mills started to pop up like mushrooms, the wealthy cotton lords knew they would have to provide housing for the many workers they would be bringing into town to work in their mills. In Chorley, like many cotton towns, rows and rows of terraced houses were built specifically to house the workers, and they usually belonged to the mill owners who would rent them to their employees. Consequently, when employment ceased for whatever reason, so did tenancy for many people, and so we see a population frequently on the move through the nineteenth century. 

By 1871 the Jolly's had moved again, this time to 40 Friday Street, still in Chorley. Robert's occupation was listed as "Engine Driver Cotton Mill" and Rachel was recorded as "Housewife". Maria, now 24, and Lucy Ann, 19, were both cotton weavers, and 9 year old Joseph was a scholar. Rachel's sister, Lucy Critchley, 42 years old, unmarried and a cotton weaver, was living with Robert and Rachel at the time of the census. Daniel had married Mary Brindle in February 1869 at St Thomas, Blackburn, and was now living at number 2 East Street Chorley, working as an Engine Fitter. He and Mary had an eleven month old son, named Robert.



Ten years later, in the 1881 census, Robert, Rachel and Maria were still at 40 Friday St. Robert was working as a cotton mill engine driver, Rachel had no occupation recorded, and Maria, now 35, was still unmarried and working as a cotton weaver. Lucy Ann had married Robert Calderbank on October 9th, 1879. Robert was a book keeper from Sackville St in Chorley, and interestingly, the census report shows them also at 40 Friday St, but as a separate household, with Robert Calderbank as head of household. 40 Friday Street was a five-room house according to the 1911 census, so I'm not sure how that would have worked. Lucy Ann was working as a clerk, and they had a 10 month old baby, Frederic. Daniel and Mary were living at 26 Peabody Street in Bolton, and Daniel was listed as an Aerated Water Manufacturer. They now had five children - Robert, 10, James, 8, Emma, 6, Rose Ann, 4, and Clara, 1. Joseph was living in Kirkdale at his Uncle David's house, and was working as a clerk.

Rachel Jolly passed away in the December quarter of 1887 and in the 1891 census we find Robert with only his daughter, Maria, now aged 46 and still single, still working as a cotton weaver, still at 40 Friday Street in Chorley. But the passing of his wife wasn't the only tragedy Robert Jolly had had to deal with in the decade between these last two censuses.

Once again the historical records highlight the hardship of life in the 1800's. Robert's daughter, Lucy Ann, and her husband Robert Calderbank, lost their first child Frederic before his third birthday, in the January-February-March quarter of 1883. Their second child, Lucy Ann, was born in the July-August-September quarter of 1882, and died before her first birthday in the April-May-June quarter of 1883, just weeks after the death of Frederic. In one of life's vicious blows that would surely have shattered this family, Lucy Ann Calderbank (nee Jolly) died a few months later, in the April-May-June quarter of 1884. In the space of less than five years, Robert Jolly lost two grandchildren, a daughter, and his wife. One possible explanation for this tornado of family devastation is an outbreak of diphtheria which swept across England in the 1880's, including Lancashire, causing as many as 20 deaths per hundred infected. I have found no trace of Robert and Rachel Jolly's first child, Rachel, since the 1851 census in which she was 6 years old, and I suspect poor Robert may well have lost her too, at a very young age. See Update

In 1891, Joseph Jolly reappears in the census, now living at 220 Crown Lane, Horwich, a railway clerk, and married to Elizabeth Ann Waddington. They had a son, Fred Jolly, my Grandfather, just one year old. They possibly named Fred in memory of Joseph's nephew, Frederic, who had died a few years earlier.

I haven't found Robert Jolly in any census after 1891, but I have found a Deaths Index listing for a Robert Jolly, age 70, who died in Chorley in the April-May-June quarter of 1895. From obscure parentage in Heath Charnock, Robert Jolly spent his life in the area, a life of hard work, laced  with tragedy and sorrow in industrial Chorley.

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