George Beardmore to Olive Dale, 4 August 1967
A carbon copy of George’s own letter, with the transcript of his family Bible that he enclosed. Olive’s reply of 22 August is the next letter.
Transcription
Burchfield, Four Marks. 4th August 1967
My dear Olive,
I’ve come unstuck somewhere. Would you mind helping out? Put very simply it is that my grandfather was John Beardmore, the ironmonger, of Burslem. He I guess is the man you call a “brassfounder, living in 1905”. (He died in fact in 1909.) Now his father was George: this is indubitably so, and I enclose a letter from my Aunt Agnes, John’s only surviving daughter, giving one or two charming reminiscences about her grandfather George. BUT you say John’s father was Benjamin, the man who married Hope Thomas. In fact, in the rough sketch of the family tree you were good enough to enclose with yours of the 13th July, you say that John (brother of the Barlaston Edward whom I vaguely remember) is the son of George. I wonder if perchance you are under the impression that my grandfather was someone other than the Pidduck & Beardmore JOHN? Because he was. I know this, having spent my childhood Christmases with his widow (born Emily Hancock) at 188, Waterloo Road.
It’s quite on the cards that somewhere I have misread your tables. Just put me right on this one point and I will trace the rest back from your comprehensive tables.
Needless to say I can’t thank you enough and am looking for ways to repay you. Would you for example like a copy of the book I’ve got coming out on Thursday next? Funny you should say that you felt a relationship with me: when I got back in the car I told the missis (this was at the School): “I know it’s absurd, but I feel I’ve known that woman all my life.”
I enclose a note of the handwritten entries made in a 1794 Bible I inherited.
Best wishes
Enclosure: Transcript of handwritten entries in a Bible printed by Mark and Charles Kerr in 1795, now in possession of George Beardmore, Alton, Hants., 1967.
George Beardmore born July 18 1787, married Jan. 1st 1811 in his 24 year of age.
Mary Beardmore Born Nov. 27 1811, married July 30 1835 in hir 24 year of hir age.
George Beardmore Born Sept. 20 1813, died August 27 1834 aged 21 years.
William Beardmore Born July 9 1815 ½ pas 8. William Beardmore died June 24 1848 aged 27 years.
Hannah Beardmore died Nove 10 1816.
Emma Johnson Born Decm. 10 1816 [the Bible itself appears to read December 29, 1803]. (Here is stuck in a newspaper obituary: “Deaths, On the 14th inst., at Fegg Hays Villa, Chell, aged 56 years, Emma, the beloved wife of W. Ford Esq., chief bailiff of Burslem”. Handwritten are the words: “September 1860”.)
Hamlett Johnson born May 29 1805.
Catharine Beardmore Born June 5 1785 [added in pencil: m. Thos Repton of Norton 6/6/1805].
Elizabeth Leigh Beardmore Born June 3 1818, Burslem, Staffordshire.
William George Beardmore. Born Nov 25th. 1842. 37 Isah., 9 II Kings, 32 II Cron.
William G. Beardmore, Northwood, 186?
Within the end pages: George Beardmore died February 17 1839 in his 51 year of his age. Catharine Beardmore died on Sunday September 15th. 1844, her end was peace, aged 58 years. Mary Beardmore, sister to the above George Beardmore, died February 17th. 1860, aged 77.
What it tells us
George and Olive had recently met in person (“this was at the School”), and George felt the same kinship that she did. Olive’s tables had confused two Johns – George’s grandfather John of Pidduck & Beardmore, and John the Hanley brassfounder – and George set her right from his own memories of Christmas at 188 Waterloo Road.
The enclosure is George’s transcript of the family Bible, which he had inherited. It gives the full entries, including William George Beardmore’s birth on 25 November 1842 and the three entries in the end pages. The pencilled note that a Catharine Beardmore married Thomas Repton of Norton in 1805 has not been explained.