© 2016 David E. Spencer
Ellen was the third of ten children of John Spencer and his wife Jane (nee Hartley). John and Jane were both born in 1799 Jane died in 1841 so that by the 1841 Census in the Spring of that year, John was a cotton weaver, widowed, alone and with ten children to bring up. At some point before the next census of 1851, most probably about 1850, John and his children had moved from Carry Lane Head in Colne to Grimshaw Street in Burnley. One exception was Ellen who had married James Scragg and was living nearby in Mount Pleasant Street.
By the next census of 1861 John had moved locally in Burnley to Sackville Street, off Trafalgar Street on the edge of what is known as the Weavers' Triangle in Burnley. By 1861 several of his children were married and had children of their own. John and many of his surviving children all lived in the same part of the town and close to each other.
Between the census of 1861 and John's death in 1865 was the time of the Cotton Famine when the American Civil War was raging. The Union blockaded exports of cotton from the Confederate States to Lancashire with the result that many factories closed, people in places like Burnley had no work and many starved. In spite of the fact that much of the Confederate Navy was built and crewed from Liverpool and that some cotton manufacturers attempted to run the blockade to get much-needed cotton into their mills, Lancashire openly stood behind the efforts of the Union. Abraham Lincoln wrote to the textile workers in Lancashire to thank them for their sacrifice and support.In commemmoration there is a statue of Abraham Lincoln in Lincoln Square in Manchester.
The eldest child of John and Jane Spencer was their eldest son James(1857-1937), a cotton weaver.He married Mary Bracewell and they had 6 children.
Their eldest child was Jane (born 1848), a cotton weaver who was married and widowed twice. Her first husband was Benjamin Craven and she had a son, John Craven (born 1869) by him. John was a cotton weaver who became a market gardenerat Marton near Blackpool.He married Margaret Fisher and had two children.
Jane's second husband was John Bibby, "marine store keeper" from Padiham!, an inland town some twent miles away from the Ribble Estuary and the Irish Sea. He and Jane had six children.
The second child of John and Jane Spencer was called Betty (born 1824) who married John Pollard, a cotton weaver born in 1823. They had 6 children. Their eldest son called Spencer (born 1850) was a life insurance agent who was twice married and had two children.
Ellen (1825-52), my great great grandmother was the third child of John and Jane Spencer. She married James Scragg in 1851 at the Bethesda Independent Church in Burnley. In 1852 their daughter Ann was born and Ellen died, leaving her husband James to bring up Ann alone. To view the information about Ann's marriage and family click on the link to go to the other Spencer page.
The fourth child of John and Jane Spencer was Hartley (1827 - 1909). Hartley had a life that could be the "rags to relative riches"plot of a novel.When he arrived in Burnley from Colne he was illiterate and only learned the "three R's" in his 30's - he was apparently one of a group of adults taught by a private teacher. He was locally famous as Burnley's first "four loom weaver". He managed to save enough money to go into partnership as a cotton manufacturer but was ruined by the Cotton Famine. He was on board the ship "Oregon" when it foundered off the coast of Louisiana - Hartley escaped in a boat. He recovered financially and was able to set up in business again but this time as a manufacturer of textile machinery - he was the first of several family members to be a "Heald and reed manufacturer" and his firm survived until after his death.He married Priscilla Duerden (born 1836) and had seven children. He died in Blackpool.
Hartley Spencer - Burnley's first four loom weaver
(Picture provided by Karie Harvey,
A descendant of Hartley)
Hartley and Priscilla's eldest son was James (1857-1937), like his father, a "reed manufacturer". he married Mary Watson and they had four children - William Arthur(1879 1954) who was a greengrocer then a nurseryman, Fred (born 1883) who was a "Heald and reed manufacturer" as was his brother Hartley (born 1886). They had a daughter called Maggie.
Hartley and Priscilla's second child was a daughter called Grace (born 1860)
The second son of Hartley and Priscilla was John (1863 - 1944), a reed maker who married Margaret Walton.They had three children - Smith Dearden (born 1886) was yet another "Heald and reed manufacturer", Maud (born 1889) and Priscilla (born 1891).
The third son of Hartley and Priscilla was also called Hartley (1867 - 1919). He lived at Rose Hill Road in Burnley but spent the last years of his life on the Isle of Man. He was, in partnership with his brothers, a "Heald and reed manufacturer at Stanley Street Mill in Burnley.He married twice - his first wife was Sarah Nutter with whom he had a son Arthur who was a reed manufacturer. His second wife was Hannah Fell. By political persuasion Hartley was Liberal and by religious persuasion he was a Baptist.
The fifth child of John and Spencer was John (born 1830).
The sixth child of John and Jane Spencer was their daughter Margaret (born 1832) who married a Barrowford weaver called Timothy Green and had two children - Alice and Arthur.
The seventh child of John and Jane Hartley was their son Robert (born 1834), a cotton weaver of Burnley. They had seven children - John Thomas, Edmund,Amy, Margaret, H artley, Elizabeth, Robert and James.Of these John Thomas (born 1861) was a cotton weaver who married Mathilda Astin and had three children. Edmund was also a cotton weaver who married Jane Hirst.
The eighth child of John and Jane Spencer was Edward (born 1836).
John and Jane Spencer's ninth child was Martha (born 1838) who married William Wilkinson, a retired Indian Army officer and had a son John William by him.
The youngest child of John and Jane Spencer was their daughter Jane (born 1840). She married William Kirk, a cotton manager and sometime manufacturer from Thornton in Craven. they had two daughters and moved to Cheshire - first Mottram and then Stalybridge.