Titus Schofield was born on August 1st, 1680. Apparently his father, Richard, lived in Heckmondwike, a small village close to Birstall. Here is the record from the Parish of Birstall. Notice the "Schoelfeild" and "Tytus". (Thanks due to Mark for digging this up).
He was married in the parish of Birstall, three miles South of Farnley, on April 8th, 1702 to Elizabeth Steele. The parish register shows his last name spelled as Scolefield. His first two children were born when he lived in Birkenshaw according to the parish register. This is right next to Adwalton, about 3 miles SSW of Farnley (see the Leeds map)
In 1709 he was living in the village of Gomersall about a mile away, did not have a job and apparently found a job in the neighbouring village of Tong. Click to read the rest of the story.
His wife, Elizabeth Steele, was born 17th Aug, 1681 in Farnham about 30 miles north of Farnley. They had at least seven children.
- William was born 11th Oct., 1702 while they were living in Birkenshaw. William had a daughter Ann baptised in Tong 24th August, 1729.
- Richard (1) was born 7th May, 1704 (Birstall).
- David was born 6th Apl., 1712 (Birstall). David died 9th Jan., 1774 in Tong. His surname was registered as Scorfield and Titus was a Collier, working in the mines digging coal.
- Susanna was born 30th October, 1715
- Samual was born 8th June, 1718 (Birstall)
- Elizabeth was born 30th May, 1721, in Tong (Birstall)
- Ann was born 24th Oct., 1729 in Tong, about one mile South west of Farnley.
Richard (1) Schofield was born 7th May, 1704 according to the parish register of Birstall. His father's name was Titus Scolefield, his mother is recorded only as Mrs. Schofield. He was living in Milnsbridge, about 25 miles southwest of Farnley, the other side of Huddersfield, when his sons Richard and Joseph were born.
They had seven children, all were registered at Birstall. Note there are three different spellings of the last name:
- James Schofield was christened on 14th Aug., 1729.
- Mary Schoefield was christened on 29th Sept., 1731.
- John Schofield was christened on 29th May,. 1732.
- Hannah Scofield was christened on 11th Aug., 1733.
- Richard (2) Schofield was christened on 9th Sep., 1737.
- Joseph Schofield was christened on 17th Nov., 1739. He had a daughter Mary and is listed as a "Stripweaver".
- Valentine Schofield was christened on 30th Jun., 1741.
Richard (2) Schofield was born in 1737. We're not sure of the size of his family, but one son was called David. His christening was registered in Tong on 13th Nov., 1768.
David Schofield was born in 1768, married Alice Ingham on 20th May, 1792. Again, we don't know the size of the family but Richard (3) was christened on 4th Dec., 1797
There is a record of Benjamin Schofield, laborer, who married Hannah Walton on November 11th, 1816 at Tong, and another record of Benjamin Schofield, blacksmith, marrying Nancy Woodhead in Tong on August 20th, 1818. There is no proof that this was one man, although the work history indicates it may be, presumably his first wife died soon after they were married. There is also no direct link into our family. Let's leave this mystery to be explored by one of you.
The way we know about the people after this point is that G.T. Schofield, your great grandfather, was an amateur historian and talked to older people such as his grandfather. The people before this point were found by detective work at the Mormon library and by searches on the web. The 1851 census is the earliest available census and lists all the people living in each house along each street. We looked at the census for Farnley to see who in the family was still living together so we could cross-reference dates, and came across Richard (3) living with his wife. His place of birth was recorded as a matter of course - Adwalton - which is about three miles south of Farnley, the other side of Tong. The internet reference noted that Adwalton was in the parish of Birstall, whereas Farnley is in the parish of Armley. So by moving three miles, the family went from one set of records to another. The Church of the Latter Day Saints has the Birstall records on microfilm, the marriages and christenings show the father and mother, their place of birth and the father's occupation. It took many hours of poring over a microfilm reader, but the pieces were eventually put together.
Richard (3) Schofield was born in 1796 and lived in Cow Close Farm for some of his life. The farm, along with eight cottages that were rented out, was destroyed recently. Its site is now occupied by a Catholic Church. When the church was being built, the workmen came across the foundations of a building exactly where old photographs show the farm was sited.
In the map also available from "Miscellaneous" you can see Cow Close Farm in the bottom right corner
He moved to Granny Lane in Wortley in 1830 when he was 34 years old. He worked as a clothier in Wortley for most of his life and is buried in Upper Wortley Cemetery.
To put things into perspective, Richard was born when convicts were still being shipped to Australia, twenty-one years after the rebelious Colonists in America declared their Independence and eighteen years before Wellington defeated Napoleon at Waterloo.
The Farnley Hill Wesleyan Methodist Chapel (much more of this later) was being built as he was born - it was dedicated in 1797. It is still going strong and is designated as a historic monument. Jim Scott, father of Maud and great grandfather of Paul, Mark, Heidi and Kathryn was organist there and died during a performance in the schoolroom. George Turner Schofield, great-grandfather to all of you, was a member and it was a large part of his life. Peter Schofield, father of P, M, H &K and Keith, father of Gregory, Pamela and Judith were christened there (behaving beautifully with no crying according to Mary). It's a large part of our history.
At the top of the Long Causeway which went from the farm up the hill to the village was the village school on Cross Lane. It is likely that he attended the school for a while. In 1846 the school was replaced by the National School and the building became a private residence. It was pulled down in the 1950's and Cyril Shuttleworth (he's in the family tree) found a couple of pieces of paper behind a loose brick in the fireplace. Note the dates on the paper: the first may have been when the school was built; the second was for tuition and paper when Richard was two years old.
Two Pieces of paper found when the old schoolhouse was pulled down 02-03
You can probably make out that the upper paper was from the building of the school; an "end-oven" is a box with a door built at the side of a fire-grate so when there was a fire going it heated the box. This was a very common way of baking before electricity and gas. Typically there would be another box at the other side of the fireplace which had a tap instead of a door: you put water in the top, it was heated by the fire and, voila, hot water. The lower paper was for tuition and supplies. The first line is "to son 14 and daughter 3 weeks at 4@" the last mark is a circled "d" meaning penny, so this was a total of 17 weeks at fourpence a week - 68 pence - and at twelve pence per shilling that is five shillings and eight pence - as written at the end of the line. There's a question as to whether this was sex discrimination or if the daughter had just started. The second line is 12 1/2 pence for paper and six shillings and tuppence - written 6/2@ - on account.
When Richard was 23 years old he married Mary Hudson and they started producing children. They had eight kids. This was a reasonable number of children in those days when half the kids died as children and when parents relied on children to support them in their old age (so what's changed? hint,... hint,...).
When Richard's third child was born, Richard's occupation was listed as "Clothier".
We think that Mary's brother was Isaac Hudson who married Harriett and had a son Joseph Hudson who was born March 22nd. 1829 and baptised at Farnley Hill Chapel
The first child of Richard and Mary was christened Edward Hudson Schofield. He was born in 1819. Here he is in 1886 at age 58. Photographic processes were originally developed by Daguerre (hence the old name for a photo Daguerrotype) in 1838-9 so this is quite an early example of a photograph. It's amazing that it has not deteriorated more.
[CLICK on the picture to enlarge it]
Richard's family looks something like this...
Richard Schofield (1796 - 6th Nov, 1875) married Mary Hudson.
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1. David Schofield (1817 - 1st May, 1872). Christened March 23rd,
1817 at Farnley St. Michaels. Buried at Drighlington Church. Davis
started Cockersmouth Gasworks. He married Miss Martha Newton whose
father William Newton rented (and managed) the coalmines in Farnley
from Mr. Armitage who owned Farnley Hall and most of the land
around. In 1810 Mr. Armitage was sued by the Earl of Cardigan for
trespass because the Earl thought he was mining coal from under the
lands that he owned. This was a David and Goliath story because the
Earl of Cardigan was one of the most powerful men in the whole of
England and the trial was in the House of Lords. Mr. Armitage was
able to prove that the coal had been worked by the Lord of the
Manor, Sir Danby, back in the 1500s so he had prior claim. The Earl
of Cardigan lost his case. All this is documented in the Yorkshire
Archaelogical Society Archives with documents that GT gave to them.
William Newton, David's father-in-law, gave a large schoolroom clock to Farnley Hill Chapel.
David and Martha had four daughters. They all lived in Drighlington and were buried there.- Sarah Emily
- Mary Annie
- Alice Jane
- Clara
- 2. Edward Hudson Schofield (5th November, 1819 - 15th October 1906) - we will follow him in the next chapter
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3. Samuel Schofield (1821 - 25th Sept., 1868), lived in Low Heights,
Armley. Married Hannah Gaunt, daughter of William Gaunt, grocer on
Lower Wortley Road. Their children were:
- Harry (Henry) (b. 1846). Lived at 59 Wellington Road, Wortley in 1881 and was a Pedlar or Hawker. His daughter, Annie, was a spinster who lived alone in Carr Croft
- John (b. 1847)
- Edward Hudson (b. 1854). GT remembers him (he was probably about 40 years old when GT was born) as a spendthrift. He once borrowed money from his Aunt Sarah Ann and didn't pay it back. At a later time he tried to borrow more and ended up in the Bramley Workhouse!. He was considered to be about "11d to the 1/-". Read this as eleven pence to the shilling and remember that there are twelve pence in a shilling.
- 4. Hannah Schofield (born June 30, 1822), married Mr. Dutton
- 5. Sarah Schofield (born May 11 1824). For some reason GT had no record of her - possibly she died very young.
- 6. Richard Schofield (4) (11th Oct 1827 - 12th Jan 1893) (see below). He was baptised at Farnley Hill Chapel with the last name "Scholefield".
- 7. William Marshall Schofield (1830-1852). Note that he had a brother John who was born in the same year. I assume William was born in early January!
- 8. John Schofield (28th Dec 1830 - ?). He was baptised at Farnley Hill Chapel with a last name of "Scholefield", which was a common spelling at that time.
- 9. James Schofield (1st Nov, 1833 - 3rd May, 1900) married Maria Keighley. They had a son Abraham Keighley Schofield who married Miss Hargreaves and had two daughters - Doris and Hilda. They lived in Carr Croft in a house that was eventually demolished to make room for a double railway line for the Great Northern rather than a single line. He is buried in Armley Church. He was baptised at Farnley Hill Chapel with a last name of "Scholefield", which was a common spelling at that time.
Richard Schofield (4), the sixth child, was a cloth weaver in Upper Wortley. He married Sarah Anne who was the same age but died much earlier on Oct. 20th, 1873 at age 45. They are buried together in a grave next to Edward Hudson. His family looks like this:
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1. James Gregson Schofield
- 1. Annie, married Ernest Levishon at Farnley Chapel in 1901
- 2. Bessie (went to USA). Assuming 25 years per generation, this was probably around 1877.
- 3. Marian, married Frank Myers at Farnley Chapel in 1908
- 4. Nellie (went to USA as a nurse)
- 5. Marguarita Hannah Mary (lived in Southport)
- 6. John Schofield (went to USA)
- 2. Thomas Schofield (he became Superintendant of Leeds Police)
- 3. Walter Schofield
Now for a mystery. The Armley census of 1861 shows a Richard Schofield aged 64, born in Adwalton. The only Richard Schofield born there within several years of that date was OUR Richard. But the census shows him married to Elizabeth who was born in Farnley and is twelve years younger. Also living in the house is Mary Barker his step-daughter, born in 1839. What are the bets that Richard's wife, Mary Hudson, died while they were living in Farnley and Richard married again to Elizabeth Barker whose husband had died leaving her with a daughter (remember, divorce was virtually unknown at the time) conveniently living in Farnley. Who knows?
Use the Table of Contents or click here to continue to Edward Hudson Schofield