© 2016 David E. Spencer
Joseph was born and lived in the Spring Lane area of Colne until the 1850's. He was a cotton weaver who became an overlooker ("tackler") later in life.He married Margaret Bounder in 1839 at St. Bartholomew in Colne. Margaret gave her father's name as "Hartley Whittaker" and her birthplace is given in census records as Leyburn in Yorkshire.
When Joseph and Margaret moved to Burnley they took his widowed mother Ellen with them. They settled in the Burnley Wood area of the town. They had three daughters and one son.
Joseph and Margaret's eldest child was their daughter Mary born in 1841. She married a cotton mill manager called Alfred Jackson. They were childless and lived on Oxford Road in Burnley.
The second child of Joseph and Margaret was their son , my great grandfather John. To read about John and his family Click here.
Ellen born in 1847 was the third child of Joseph and Margaret. She married a tailor called Benjamin Riley who was born in Burnley but with his wife and family spent most of his working life in Keighley, West Yorkshire.
The youngest child of Joseph and Margaret was Elizabeth Ann, born in 1850. She was unmarried all of her life. She was a grocer at 10 Parliament Street, Burnley - a shop later run by her brother John.In 1901 she was a milliner living with her sister Mary.