Krakatoa (75th Episode!)

Season 5, episode 10. September 1883 to August 1889. We follow Janie and Fred's growing family, catch up with their family and friends back in Sheffield, and the goings on at the North Eastern Steel Company in Middlesbrough, as well as take a look at the impact of the first globally reported disaster. 

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[Intro]
Welcome back to My Love Letter Time Machine, Hi, I’m Ingrid Birchell Hughes, and I’ve been serialising the love letters of my great great Grandparents, Fred Shepherd and Janie Warburton. Travel 140 years back in time with me now where we take a look at Victorian history through their eyes and today, we try take a look at a disaster that caught the global imagination, the disasters at the North Eastern Steel Company and the disaster that befell John Meays.


[Krakatoa]
Welcome to the 75th episode of My Love Letter Time Machine! It seems rather fitting that we start this one with a bang, in fact possibly the largest bang that was ever heard in recorded history: 

In 1884 the entire planet was effected by a phenomena known as a ‘Volcanic Winter’, caused by the eruption of Krakatoa in Java, Indonesia, which peaked on the 27th August 1883. It’s considered to be one of the deadliest and most destructive eruptions recorded, and it’s possible that as many as 120,000 people lost their lives. As well as the near complete annihilation of the island of Krakatoa, as much 20 million tons of sulphur was released into the atmosphere and resulted in a global drop in temperature over the next five years of 1.2 °C (2.2 °F). The effects of the volcanic activity were felt for years afterwards including harsher winters, increased rainfall and darkened skies. Many artists over the course of the next 10 years showcased lurid and intensely coloured sunsets in their works. There is speculation that the swirling orange sky in Edvard Munch’s The Scream is in part a recollection of the skies that time. 

Here is an excerpt, that Janie and Fred would have almost certainly read, from how the event was reported in the Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough for Monday 03 September 1883, 

THE VOLCANIC ERUPTIONS IN JAVA. TERRIBLE SCENES. 75,000 LIVES LOST.
“Just before dusk a great luminuous cloud formed over Gunung Guntur, and the crater of that volcano began to emit enormous streams of white and sulphurous mud and lava, which were rapidly succeeded by explosions, followed by tremendous showers* of cinders and enormous fragments of rock, which were hurled high into the - air and scattered in all directions, carrying death and destruction with them. With these terrible eruptions came sympathetic demonstrations from the sea. Overhanging clouds were so surcharged with electricity that at one time more than fifteen huge waterspouts were seen. Men, women, and children rushed in terror from their tottering dwelling-places, filling the air with shrieks of horror. Hundreds were unable to get out before the houses fell, and were buried beneath great massess of rocks and mud. On Sunday evening the shocks and eruptions increased in violence, and the island seemed threatened with submersion. At the same time enormous waves began to dash with greater force upon the shores, coming in some places far up into the interior, and great chasms opened in the earth, threatening to engulf the people and buildings. About midnight the most frightful scene of all took place. Suddenly an enormous luminous cloud, similar to that over Gunung Guntnr, but much greater in extent, formed over the Kandang range of mountains, which skirt the south-east coast of the island. This cloud gradually increased in size until it formed a canopy lurid red and whitish grey over a wide extent of territory. During this time the eruptions increased, and streams of lava poured incessantly down the sides of the mountains into the valleys, sweeping everything before them. About two o'clock on Monday morning this great cloud suddenly broke into small sections and vanished, and when daylight came it was seen that an enormous tract of land had disappeared, extending from Point Capucin, on the south, to Negery Passoerang, on the north and West, to the lower east point, covering about fifty square miles. Here were situated the villages of Negery and Negery Babawang. None of the inhabitants of these places escaped death.”

Back in Middlesborough, Janie and Fred were not to know that the difficult weather conditions and the beautiful sunsets they were to live through for the next decade were to do with the eruption, but they would have been completely aware of the disaster. Simon Winchester in his book ‘Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded’ posits that the sheer scale of the event coupled with a highly connected global news network meant that this was the a disaster that potentially kicked off a global awareness, as well as becoming a byword for a cataclysmic event. He writes,
“The story of Krakatoa had a small beginning—seven newsworthy words, buried well down in the pages of a single London newspaper. As the summer of 1883 wore on, it was to become a very much greater story indeed. And when it was over, three months later, it was to have implications for society—for the laying of the foundations of McLuhan’s “global village”—that have reverberated in a far more important way, and for far, far longer, than anyone at the time could ever have supposed.” 

As the world continued to become more globalised around them, Fred and Janie were focused on their growing family. One of the gifts that Janie received on her wedding day was a rather large family bible, given to her by her fellow Handsworth Sunday School Teachers as a kind of leaving present, and we still have it in the family. In the front were several blank lined pages, and on the first page Fred recorded little Frederick’s birth, his now very familiar copperplate wrote: Frederick Shepherd, born 3rd September 1883. Since then every birth, marriage and death has been written down. First in Fred’s hand, then in Janie’s, then in Edith’s and so on. My name has been written in there too, by my mother, several pages on.

After Frederick, is listed: 
Alfred James Shepherd, born 08 December 1884.
Arthur Shepherd, born 23 July 1886 in Middlesbrough. Arthur is the first person that remains in living memory and my mother knew him as ‘Lunk’ (short for uncle Arthur), and 
their first daughter, Agnes Gertrude Shepherd, born 06 September 1888, Edith Mary Shepherd, born 06 November 1890, Redcar, Yorkshire. May Shepherd born in May (on the 22nd) 1893, Middlesbrough. 

So Janie and Fred had three sons, and then three daughters. 

Alfred, known as ‘Alfie’ in the family, arrived just 15 months after Frederick was born. Given that the rest of their children follow with a rough 2 year gap between each other, I wonder if Janie and Fred decided to engage in a bit of family planning, just to try and give Janie a bit of a chance to recover. I’ve found references to condoms and pessaries (what they used to call diaphragms - which came into use in 1882) in publications in the 1900s and later, however there is absolutely no mention of them or any family planning information in Janie’s Advice to a Wife book. The rhythm method wasn’t completely understood at this time, so all that was really available to most couples was the withdrawal method or abstinence. 

Nearly all the information I have that is even remotely connect to Janie and Fred for the rest of the 1880s is gleaned from the newspapers of the day. Fred is name checked once in that time but the first clip I can find that more than likely he was connected with is for a cricket match in the Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough for Monday 21 July 1884:

North-Eastern Steel Works, Married v. Single. — A match between the married and the single at the North-Eastern Steel Works was played on the Middlesbrough Cricket Ground on Saturday, and was witnessed by a large number of spectators, principally the employees at the works. The match proved an easy victory for the single team, who had scored 169 for six wickets when time was called, their opponents having only obtained 93. 

Fred was more than likely playing, I think we can assume he’d have been rather disgruntled about that result. And if ‘the junior’ Alvey was on the opposing team that would have only added to his annoyance. 

However I’m sure he was content at the continued prosperity of the North Eastern Steel Company and a report on the company fortunes by his boss Arthur Cooper featured in the following article that September, it gives a good description as to what they actually made at the steel mill:

[Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough - Thursday 25 September 1884] 
THE FUTURE OF CLEVELAND STEEL. Mr Arthur Cooper, manager of the North Eastern Steel Company, Middlesbrough, in the course of his important paper on these works at the meeting of the Iron and Steel Institute at Chester yesterday, said for the six months ending June 30th, 1884, they had supplied 16,292 tons of basic steel for the manufacture of sleepers, tin-plate wire steels for stamping into hollow ware, for boiler tubes, sectional steel for shipbuilding plates, for boiler rods, for rivets and chains, and for other purposes for which best iron had been used. The metal, as made by the Company for shipbuilding purposes, had been exhaustively tested, and sanctioned by Lloyd's for use in ships to be classed in their register in the early part of the year, and a considerable quantity of materials, … had already been supplied for this purpose. 

Fred’s only name check appears in the Middlesbrough Cottage Hospital Weekly report in September 1886, in their acknowledgment for donations they credit a receipt of ‘a load of sand from the North Eastern Steel Works, per Mr Shepherd.’ There are many regular donations of money also acknowledged over the years from North Eastern Steel and it’s interesting to see that this fell under his remit.  

Given the amount of patients North Eastern Steel works appears to have generated, donating money seems the least the company could do. 

There were several fatal and disabling accidents at the works over the next years. We are talking at least two or three every year. I’m not going to report them in detail or this podcast will just become a litany of industrial disaster. They include accidental amputations, falling into a lime pit, being hit by exploding molten metal, crushed under a wagon, and even buried under a pile of burning slag, the list is horrifying. In the end I had to stop reading the articles because it just became grindingly gruesome. I think what we should take from this is just how brutal and dangerous working in a steel mill was. 

Although I suppose we can hardly blame North Eastern Steel for the occasion of four men being struck by lightening at the works in a thunderstorm in July 1888. None of them died but one was hospitalised. Apparently the lightening was conducted along the telephone wire that ran along the length of the shed where the men were sheltering. Poor sods. I do wonder what the long term effect on fellow workmates was, witnessing all these tragedies, and of course on our Fred, who must have been effected by repeatedly making up death in service wage packets and delivering them to the bereaved families. Industrial progress being paid for in death and men’s broken bodies. How much sense of injustice was there the culture at the time?

I do applaud a Mrs Ellen Asprey for successfully suing The North Eastern Steel Company for the loss of her husband: reported on 22nd July 1889

EMPLOYERS LIABILITY CASE AT MIDDLESBROUGH. At the Middlesbrough County Court this afternoon, before Mr E. R. Turner, Judge, Ellen Asprey, sued the North-Eastern Steel Works Co., Middlesbrough, for £312 for the loss of her husband. On the case being called it was stated that plaintiff had accepted £170 and costs. — lt will be remembered that the plaintiff's husband, John Asprey, a labourer, aged 27 years, was killed in February of the present year whilst following his occupation at defendants' works. Deceased was standing at the bottom of a lift waiting for a bogey [a kind of cart] to come down when the bogey ran off the end of the lift and fell upon him, injuring him in such a shocking manner that he died shortly after admission to the North Riding Infirmary. 

For all Fred’s admiration of his boss, Mr Cooper, it appears the man ran foul of the opinion of the labourers at the works, not for dangerous working conditions as it happens, but for pay, which resulted in a protracted strike in the beginning of 1888. Over the course of the previous year North Eastern Steel had reduced wages on four separate occasions in the previous four years, and in response to the striking action, Mr Cooper threatened to bring in foreign labour, and also tried to create division between unionised men who were striking and non-unionised workers. This situation rattled on for the rest of January but a new substantial trade order may have improved the fortunes of the company and therefore its workers. Better communications and a new wage structure must have been implemented as illustrated by this report on the 5th November 1889

“WAGES IN THE MIDDLESBROUGH STEEL TRADE. Mr Cooper, manager of the North-Eastern Steel Works, Middlesbrough, yesterday afternoon received a deputation of workmen on the question of renewing the sliding scale. The interview was a very amicable one, and resulted in the sliding scale being renewed until the end of next year, with a continuance of the 5 per cent, over and above the scale. The men further asked that their pay for Saturday afternoons should be at the rate of time and a-half, and for Sundays double time; and these demands were granted.”

What else can I tell you about this period, I don’t know if you remember Janie’s friend Carrie Higgs, who was assumed be a sister-in-law-in-waiting. Well, poor old John Warburton missed his chance. It would appear, quite likely at Fred and Janie’s wedding,  that Carrie renewed her acquaintance with Henry Reckless - Jinnie’s bother - and became Jinnie’s sister-in-law instead. The marriage certificate records Henry as ‘Henry Staniforth-Reckless’ ‘Silversmith’ and Jinny has signed her name as one of the witnesses — I suspect she must have been a bridesmaid to Carrie too. This was in the October of 1883 so another wedding that poor Janie must have missed.

Now last time I promised you some information on Freds’ friend and best man John Meays. A lot of the newspaper clips about John concern his secretarial duties to various societies and charities, and he appears to have been rather active in supporting his local community. It did crack me up that stage-struck performance-mad John Meays came up with the following way to help with the destitution caused by a local miners strike in May 1885:

WOMBWELL. A meeting was held Saturday morning in the Congregational Schoolroom for a committee to raise funds to alleviate the suffering which at present exists amongst the families of the miners now on strike. The motion of the Rev. G. Hadfield, Mr. John Meays was appointed hon. secretary. It was decided to hold a concert to raise funds, and distribute the same in the 'most needy cases.

When he wasn’t acting a secretary to a gazzilion organisations or participating in concerts, John worked as a pawnbroker, not a particularly well-respected occupation. I wonder if his efforts in his community was in part to counter that and to raise his own level of respectability. 

I know I often turn to Robert Robert’s book ‘The Classic Slum’, but it’s for good reason, it’s brilliantly written, and on the subject of pawnbrokers he has this to say:

“Position in our Edwardian community was judged not only by what one possessed but also by what one pawned.

Through agreement with the local broker the back room of our corner shop served as a depot for those goods pledged by the week which owners have been unable to redeem before 9 o'clock on Saturday, when the local pawnshop closed. Our service gave women waiting on drunken or late working husbands a few hours grace in which to redeem shoes and clothing before the Sabbath and so maintain their social stake in the English Sunday. Towards our closing time there was always a great scurrying shop-wards to get the ‘bundle’ … 

The gulf between those households that patronised ‘uncle’ even if only occasionally and those who did not gaped wide. Some families would go hungry rather than pledge their belongings. … The interest charged on articles pawned was usually a penny in the shilling per week, 1/2 being paid at pledging time (Monday) and the other on redemption of the goods (Saturday).  …

The great bulk of pledged goods consisted of Sunday best suits, boots, and clean clothing, there lying with ‘uncle’ provided not only cash but also convenient storage for households with next to no cupboards and where the word ‘wardrobe’ was yet unknown. … Only those in dire straits, and with a certainty of cash cover to come, patronised the local ‘bloodsucker’; he charged three pence in the shilling per week. To be known to be in his clutches was to lose [face] altogether. Women would pawn to the limit, leaving the home utterly comfortless, rather than fall to that level.”

It’s strange to think of John Meays being considered in these pejorative terms as ‘Uncle’ and ‘the local bloodsucker’, he comes across as a more gentle and kindly person than that - but there is no doubt that his job would have meant that he was providing a somewhat exploitative service to the poorest members of society. It seems to have been a somewhat precarious venture as on the 27 February 1886 this article appeared in the Sheffield Independent:

BARNSLEY—FAILURE A PAWNBROKER.—On Thursday afternoon the first meeting of the creditors of John Meays. pawnbroker, &c., was held Barnsley, before Mr Clegg, of Sheffield, the official receiver. Mr Porritt of Sheffield, appeared for the petitioning creditors, Messrs Horsfield & Hull, of Barnsley and Sheffield ; and Mr E. J. F. Rideal for the bankrupt. The statement of affairs, according to the printed statement, showed liabilities £4428 6s. 1d. to unsecured creditors, and a sum of £68 16s. to preferential creditors under the heading "rent, rates, taxes, wages," &c. The assets were, cash in hand and the bank, 15s. 7d., book debts (good) 1£32  12s, stock-in trade  £3000, household furniture £25, other property £112, making the total assets £3170 7s. 7d. From this had to be deducted £68 16s. owing preferential creditors, leaving a deficiency of £1326 14s. 6d. After some discussion it was agreed that the official receiver should apply to the court to make an adjudication, and a committee of inspection was appointed.

Another article includes the detail that John had been trading with borrowed money. I can’t seem to parse exactly what was the deciding factor in his downfall. At some point he entered into a partnership with a Mr Morphett. and a later article suggests that John appealed with mitigating circumstances, on the grounds that some of the stock that had been valued had disappeared and that he was unable to trace it through the books or by any other means. The Official Reciever seems to have been sympathetic, suggesting that Mr Morphett, who ever he was, had basically hung him John out to dry, and possibly even absconded with the stock, but with an outstanding debt of more than a thousand pounds, it wasn’t enough to save poor John.

I’ve found John Meay’s name published in lists of bankrupts in newspapers as far afield as Liverpool and Bristol. The level of naming and shaming going on here is brutal. 

However, somehow, details unknown, John picks himself up and gets back on his feet. In the following year he’s reported as becoming the Secretary of a Defence Fund that provided those in the community that couldn’t afford it, legal defence, and in 1888, a company of Auctioneers R. J. Tinker & Son, opens a branch office in John’s business premises. He continues to win prizes for his bantams and life seems to get back to normal for him. 

I also have some information about Janie’s sister Emma for this period too, some happy, some tragic. You might recall that next door to the Cross Keys, were the Nurseries, which employed a large number of men, women and children in the village. One of them was a chap 9 years Emma’s junior called Hugh Brownhill. They obviously became close and I wonder if Emma was able to find a reason in Hugh to try live a more sober life. It was amazing to find this wedding announcement in the Sheffield Daily Telegraph for Monday 19 November 1888 
“Brownhill — Herrod — November 15 at Handsworth Church, by the Rev J Crosland, of Gleadless. Hugh Brownhill, of Handsworth, to Emma Herrod, eldest daughter of the late James Warburton, of the Cross Keys, Handsworth.”

Now given that the church of England did not marry divorced people, I am wondering if Emma’s ex husband, John George Herrod had died by this point. I can not find him in the records after the divorce. Given his propensity for changing his name, it’s possible after his release from prison, he changed his name yet again and did another disappearing act. Whatever happened to him, the vicar at Handsworth must have been sufficiently convinced that it was ok for Emma to remarry.  

So Hugh gave Emma a home and welcomed in her three children, Maurice, who by this time was 18 and apprenticed to a blacksmith, 16 year old Edith (nicknamed Lucy) and Authur who was 14. I’m so delighted that Emma got to have her own home again and it’s beguiling to think of her happy and settled, but I’m sorry to say not a year elapsed before tragedy struck. 

At some point towards the end of August, her daughter Edith fell sick with fever and abdominal pain. It’s quite possible that the poor girl had appendicitis and I can only imagine how helpless Emma and the rest of the family must have felt as Edith suffered. Edith Lilian Herrod died on the 29th of August 1889, of Acute Peritonitis. She was 17 years old.

Her memorial card is silver rather than black, decorated with a spray of snowdrops, and the verse inside reads:
“But since thou couldst not longer stay,
To cheer us with thy love,
We hope to meet with thee again
In yon bright world above”

I know beyond a shadow of doubt that Edith was beloved, and deeply mourned. Although no one has written about her, Emma, and Jane in turn have left behind evidence of what she meant. 

Emma laid Edith to rest in James Warburton’s grave. I’m sure there would have been an economic reason for this as well, but the idea of Edith being buried w her grandfather is incredibly touching to me, and the thought of her in her grandfather’s arms must have brought comfort to the whole family. We don’t know much about Edith as a person, she was loved and adored for certain, she went through a terrible time witnessing her father’s abuse and no doubt she’d have felt abandoned when he left. And how much did she cope with her mother’s alcohol abuse? We do know Janie adored her, took care of her when they lived under the same roof, but the other reason I can be absolutely certain that she was loved and missed by Janie, is when Fred and Janie’s next child was born, a daughter, my great grandmother, she named her Edith, after the niece she loved and lost.

Next time we throw ourselves into Janie and Fred’s social life in Middlesborough in the early 1990s, Fred was going up in the world and we get to take a look at some of the balls, and events they took part in, and we discover that our Fred, became a Free Mason - so that’s going to be some research journey! 

[outro]
Thank you so much for listening to My Love Letter Time Machine. Would you consider showing the podcast some love by clicking on the ratings, leaving a review or sharing it with someone who you think might enjoy it. You can also find excerpts of Fred and Janie’s letters on instagram at my love letter time machine all one word and you can write to me at my love letter time machine at gmail dot com.

Until next time, take care.
© Ingrid Birchell Hughes 2023