James Cooper was born in Pilkington, Lancashire, lived in Blackburn for a number of years, and spent the last years of his life in Southport. I've found no evidence of him having spent any length of time outside of Lancashire. He had twelve children in all, but they didn't all share his apparent satisfaction with life in Industrial Lancashire.
The letter from Frank Seymour Cragg to which I referred in the chapter on James and Alice Cooper makes mention of the fact that some of the Coopers seemed to have a strong desire to explore:
"......I have always wondered at the wanderlust which seems to have seized these families. My father and mother went to South Africa in '79, came back a few years later and immediately set off again to New York, returning to England in '95. But that was noting compared to the wanderings of my mother's family [the Coopers]. Her brother John went as a missionary to India about 1870. Another brother Jim [name not clear] went as a boy of 16 to Australia before 1870; he worked his passage on a small sailing ship which took six months to get there. A few years later he was in South Africa and not many years after was in the Argentine. There he became a millionaire building railways and was later joined by his younger brother Tom. Unfortunately, he had all his money in the Baring Bank which smashed and he lost the lot. He returned to England, did some farming and building and finally went to California where he ended up as a fruit farmer...."
Now this is an interesting but slightly confusing part of the letter. Remember this letter was written by Frank Seymour Cragg (1888 ~ 1974), son of Isabella Cooper who was James Cooper's daughter, born in 1852 in Pilkington
Isabella married Richard Cragg at St Paul's in Southport on April 20th 1878, and Richard Edward and Thomas James were born in Birkdale, Lancashire on October 26th that year (!! - ah yes, there's that arithmetic again!). Frank wrote that his mother and father went to South Africa in 1879 and came back a few years later: while the fact that I can't find any record of them travelling to or from South Africa proves nothing, they do show up in the 1881 England Census living again in Birkdale. This suggests that they went to South Africa in 1879, returning to England a year or two later (as opposed to "a few years") in time for the census on April 3rd 1881, before heading off to America perhaps later that same year. Richard was a bricklayer, and while I haven't actually found documentation to show exactly when, I know that they went to live in New York in the 1880's because Frank Seymour Cragg was born there in 1888. It's quite likely that they did leave almost immediately given that Isabella's brother, James Edward, may have been in the States at that time.
 |
| Isabella (Cooper) Cragg: 1852-1924 |
But according to T.L. Cragg, my Third Cousin who sent me the transcript of Frank's letter, Isabella was not happy living in New York. In an email to me he wrote: "The family story (which is quite limited) about this is that at some point my Great Grand Mother, Isabella, decided she had had enough of America and told my Great Grand Father she was moving back to England, with or without him. He apparently sold everything in the U.S. and moved back to England a reasonably well-off man." In his letter Frank Seymour Cragg wrote that Isabella and Richard returned to England in 1895. Interestingly, I found a passenger list entry for the arrival in Liverpool of the ship "Majestic" on February 2nd, 1895, carrying Mrs I Cragg, Richard Cragg, age 15, and Frank [Seymour] Cragg, age 6. It would appear that Isabella did not make idle threats, and returned to England without her husband after all. Evidently, young Richard Edward stayed with his Dad to help sell up.
Frank says that Isabella's brother John travelled as a missionary to India. In my mother's notes she also mentions that John was a missionary in India, and I have confirmed that he was a clergyman. Although I haven't yet found evidence of him going to India, it seems pretty well assured that he did.
The only "brother Jim" that Isabella had was James Edward, my Great Grandfather, and I'm pretty sure that he neither went to Australia nor made millions in Argentina. T.L. Cragg does mention that the name wasn't clear in the letter, and I suspect two things: 1) it was actually Allan Cooper, born 1848, who travelled to Australia but 2) it was not Allan who went to Argentina. Allan was present in the home of James Cooper in the 1861 Census, aged 12, but does not appear in the 1871 Census. Frank wrote that "Jim" (I believe Allan) travelled to Australia at age 16, before 1870 - Allan would have been 16 in 1864. While it is possible that Allan went on from Australia to South Africa, and "not many years after" to Argentina, it is doubtful that he was the railway contruction magnate: "he worked his passage on a small sailing ship which took six months to get there. A few years later he was in South Africa and not many years after was in the Argentine" - sometime before 1873 Allan returned to England and married Mary Barton from Cheshire on April 28th of that year. This means a period of only eight years in which to travel to Australia, stay a few years, have a few years in South Africa, and still have time to make a fortune in Argentina.
Allan and Mary had children in 1875, 77, 80 and 85, born in Blackpool, Burscough, and Blackburn. Where some confusion may have set in could be the fact that he did work for the railways - as a coachman and as a signalman - but not building railways in Argentina. Mary Barton died in 1887, and in the 1891 Census Allan is living at 20 William Henry Street, Blackburn, and is recorded as a widower, working as a Railway Signalman. In 1892, he married Mary Jane Bee, and they had two more children: May, born in 1893 and Edith, born in 1896. In the 1901 Census he was living at 14 Furthergate, Blackburn, just a kilometre away from 3 Higher Barn Street, where he had lived in 1861. He was working from home as an Oatcake Baker (no sign of building or farming). According to some other Ancestry members, Allan returned to Brisbane Australia in 1910, and I have an Australian death listing of an Allan Cooper, born 1848, Father James, Mother Alice, who died in Brisbane on December 21st, 1928.
Allan and Mary had children in 1875, 77, 80 and 85, born in Blackpool, Burscough, and Blackburn. Where some confusion may have set in could be the fact that he did work for the railways - as a coachman and as a signalman - but not building railways in Argentina. Mary Barton died in 1887, and in the 1891 Census Allan is living at 20 William Henry Street, Blackburn, and is recorded as a widower, working as a Railway Signalman. In 1892, he married Mary Jane Bee, and they had two more children: May, born in 1893 and Edith, born in 1896. In the 1901 Census he was living at 14 Furthergate, Blackburn, just a kilometre away from 3 Higher Barn Street, where he had lived in 1861. He was working from home as an Oatcake Baker (no sign of building or farming). According to some other Ancestry members, Allan returned to Brisbane Australia in 1910, and I have an Australian death listing of an Allan Cooper, born 1848, Father James, Mother Alice, who died in Brisbane on December 21st, 1928.
My mother spoke from time to time of a Great Uncle who went to Argentina and made a fortune building railways. Her notes suggest this was Francis Aspinall Cooper, and I've been able to ascertain that he did spend some time in Argentina. In the 1881 Census he was living at the home of John Turnbull, his uncle, in Blackburn, and working as a joiner. But his first child, James Stuart Cooper, was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1887 or 88. In or around 1888 he married Christine Elizabeth Southerland, from Ross-Shire in the Scottish Highlands. I have found no record of their marriage, other than the 1911 Census which said they had been married 22 years. It's possible they were married in Buenos Aires around the time of the birth of their first child. I could not find them in the 1891 Census, but in August 1892 Francis was a witness to the marriage of his sister, Harriet Emily, to Samuel Nuttall in Bolton. Francis's next child, Louisa, was born in Southport in 1893, and their next six children were all born in either Southport, Manchester or Prestwich. This all suggests that sometime between the 1881 Census when he was in Blackburn, and 1887/88 when James Stuart was born, Francis did indeed travel to Argentina, and that he returned to England somewhere between the 1891 Census and the marriage of Harriet Emily in 1892. So there is a period of potentially eleven years in which Francis appears to have been living in Argentina. Francis had a younger brother, Thomas Soanes Cooper (presumably the Tom referred to in the letter) who may well have spent some time there with him. I have no information (so far) on Tom's whereabouts after the 1881 Census. In the 1901 Census Francis and family were living in Manchester and he was working as a joiner again.
By the 1911 Census Francis Aspinall Cooper was living in Headcorn, Kent and was indeed farming, at Waterside Farm, a dairy farm which he owned and operated with Christine and Louisa. Daughter Eileen Leon Cooper, 17, was a Dressmaker, four younger children were at school, and a further two were aged 5 and 2. James Stuart Cooper was living in Manchester and working as a "Salesman (Hosiery)".
True to what Frank Seymour Cragg wrote in his letter, on December 31st, 1913, this bunch of Coopers sailed out of Liverpool bound for Philadelphia on the good ship "Haverford", along with all the children except James Stuart, plus one new child, Arthur, born in 1912. By the 1920 US Census, he was living in Varina, Henrico, Virginia and working as a sheep farmer.
True to what Frank Seymour Cragg wrote in his letter, on December 31st, 1913, this bunch of Coopers sailed out of Liverpool bound for Philadelphia on the good ship "Haverford", along with all the children except James Stuart, plus one new child, Arthur, born in 1912. By the 1920 US Census, he was living in Varina, Henrico, Virginia and working as a sheep farmer.
 |
| Frank & Eileen Cooper 1948 |
I have found a death record for a Francis A Cooper in 1927 in San Bernardino, and although it shows his age as 64 (would have been 68), I suspect this might well be the right Francis A Cooper: my mother visited his daughter, Eileen, while she was in America in 1948, and Eileen was then living near San Bernadino, California, with her brother Frank.
New information: see Update
New information: see Update
Isabella's brother, James Edward, was another Wandering Cooper. James Edward first went to America in 1880, and returned to England sometime before 1884, and married Isabella Smith on August 20th of that year. By 1888, now with two children, James Sydney and Isabel Ethel, the Cooper "Wanderlust" again appears to have taken hold of James Edward, and he returned to New York with his family. James Edward and Isabella lived in New York City and in Newark, New Jersey, and had a further seven or eight** children before returning to England in 1901, ultimately settling in Salford for the rest of their days. They would have been in New York/Newark for much of the time that Richard and Isabella (Cooper) Cragg were there, prior to their return to England in 1895.
Of the other Cooper siblings, I know that Edward died at age 2 and Thomas died at 17 in 1860 (not to be confused with Thomas Soanes, born 1863) , while Jane, Mary Alice, William and Harriet Emily don't appear to have been smitten by the urge to travel. That said, I am still researching their histories.....who knows what I might find.
I can't help being impressed and inspired by the courage, tenacity, and enduring spirit of these Wandering Coopers. A trip to Australia wasn't a simple 24 hours on a 747, and even the Eastern United States was a ten day journey on a sailing ship, or about seven on a steamer. Coming from an area and an age where most people rarely left their home town, and leaving the County was considered an expedition, these Coopers undertook what must have seemed like epic ventures to their family and peers. And they weren't necessarily young - James Edward seemed settled in Newark, and was apparently a naturalised US Citizen, yet at about 45 pulled up stakes to return to England with his family, not all of whom were happy with that idea. Francis Aspinall Cooper made and lost a fortune in Argentina, but undaunted he returned to England, resumed his old trade and carried on. Some would have left it at that, but not him. He later took up farming, and at the age of 54 he again left England and took his family to America, worked as a Sheepman on a farm in Virginia, finishing up as a Californian Fruit Farmer. And then there was Allan, having spent his late teens and early adult years working his way through Australia and South Africa, possibly also Argentina, returned to England to marry and raise a family, lost his wife fourteen years later, subsequently remarried, and at the tender age of 62 decided he was going to return to Australia!
** According to my mother's notes, James Edward and Isabella had two children who died in infancy, and Jenny Emily who died age 13 in England. But her notes say nothing about when or where the two infants were born. I have found death records for three children born in New York to parents James Edward and Isabella Cooper, in the time period they were living there, hence the "seven or eight". At first I thought perhaps my mother was simply mistaken about two children dying in infancy, but in their 1911 Census form they stated that they had nine children born alive, three that had died, and six living. That points to two besides Jenny Emily. At this stage I suspect that either there was another James Edward and Isabella Cooper who lost a child around the same time in New York, or more likely, that one child was actually still-born, and therefore would not have been counted in "born alive" in the 1911 Census.
No comments:
Post a Comment