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Found this on Chadwick

William Henry Chadwick, 1829-1908
Willow Green Cemetery, Reddish, Manchester
Imprisoned at the age of 19 for six months, William Henry Chadwick was one of the more colourful political figures to emerge from a movement not lacking in eccentricity. Chadwick had become a Wesleyan preacher at the age of 14 and was lecturing on temperance within two years. His prison sentence followed a series of inflammatory speeches in 1848 in which he pronounced himself tired of speaking and ready for action. He emerged from gaol to become in turns an actor, phrenologist and mesmerist, marrying an actress and touring the country giving seances. Chadwick returned to politics later in life to help found the agricultural labourers' union with Joseph Arch, and to preach for the Primitive Methodists and the Manchester Reform Union. Joseph Chamberlain's private secretary, William Woodings, secured him work as a van lecturer for the National Liberal Federation in 1891, and he was still speaking at the general election of 1906 in favour of free trade and Home Rule.

His headstone read:

_________________________________

"FOR GOD AND THE PEOPLE"
Here lies the Body of
WILLIAM HENRY CHADWICK
("The Old Chartist")

Born May 21st, 1829
Died May 28th, 1908

In 1848, at the early age of 19, he was imprisoned for sedition and conspiracy as a leader of the Chartist movement. His whole after-life was spent in striving to extend the liberties of the people, and to promote temperance, justice, and righteousness.
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mick2007 said:
This one is a corker and I would say this is definitely an original..maybe theres hope that way for the other one yet..

The detail on the high res version is exceptional, you can see all the detail in the hotel windows e.t.c. and have a nosey about.

I would be interested know when this one was taken. The glass plate is just under 7x5 inches.
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Something that may help date it is the building on the right of the scene.

This was the site for the Liberal Club, seen here in an un-dated postcard

http://coventryinphotographs.fotopic.net/p63566237.html

and here, in 1954.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/allhails/5257541228/

Obviously, your photo pre-dates its construction, whenever that was.

Just to orient ourselves, we're standing around here [Google Streetview] which corresponds roughly to the junction of Warwick Row and Warwick Road on this historic map of Coventry, looking up Warwick Lane.

http://www.historiccoventry.co.uk/covmaps/allmaps.php
 
another clue now we can see more clearly, the shop on Warwick Lane is advertising bicycles and tricycles.

Coventry was at the heart of the early British cycle industry. Bicycles had started to become popular from the early 1860s onward, however

http://triporteurs.wordpress.com/page-3-history-of-tricycles/

On November 18, 1876, James Starley introduced the Coventry Lever Tricycle, a side-driven two-track, lever-driven machine, and that started the tricycling craze in Great Britain. It had two small wheels on the right side, that both steered simultaneously. A large drive wheel was on the left side. In 1877, he introduced the Coventry Rotary, one of the first rotary chain drive tricycles.

In 1879, twenty types of tricycles and multi-wheel cycles were produced in Coventry, England, and by 1884, there were over 120 different models produced by 20 manufacturers. Tricycles were used especially by those who could not ride high wheelers, such as women who were confined in the long dresses of the day, and short or unathletic men.
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Probably dates the photo as 1876 or later.

e2a: I'm also wondering whether the shop itself ("SID...") is related to the Coventry-based Sidney Cycle Co., apparently founded in 1898. It might well have been a shop (or son) that later branched out into actually making bicycles as cycling took off in popularity.
 
cybertect said:
If I understand what you're referring to - the right-hand edge of the church in the OP's photo, I wonder if it's just a ragged edge of a partly-reworked stone wall.

http://www.stjohn-the-baptist.co.uk/about.htm



I suspect that this suggests the photo was taken some time between 1858 and 1877.
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Taking my previous post and this into account, if most of the photos were taken about the same time, then 1877 or thereabouts seems a good candidate. It would fit with the costumes seen on some of the people.
 
I reckon you should email the Bablake School as they may have records.

Very little is known of the progress of Bablake in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Throughout this time the boys would have worn the traditional ‘Blue Coat’ uniform: a long tunic of dark blue cloth, with a leather girdle, yellow petticoat, yellow stockings, low buckled shoes, linen collar with bands, round black worsted cap with yellow tassel.
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Obviously the uniform changed at some point (and it's quite like the new uniform remained unchanged for a while), but at least they'd be able to tell you if they are indeed Bablake boys in the picture. If they are, then considering the school moved in 1890, that might help date the picture (unless of course, the boys were on a day trip to visit the old school) :hmm:
 
Hard to even date it from the adult in that Bablake picture as

1) He may be a teacher and be wearing some kind of uniform
2) Hard to tell his age, and therefore hard to tell whether he was into fashion
3) Hard to tell his age, and therefore may have grown attached to his beard rather than be wearing it because it's fashionable
4) He has a walking stick, but is that because it was fashionable to carry one? However, he has two, so maybe he had rickets or polio? Maybe he used them to beat the kids?!
5) The top hat height might be a clue, but could that have been school uniform or was that particular height hat in fashion at some stage?
 
Or it could be his predecessor?

One way of finding out might be to get someone to look at the censuses from then. The school was residential so it stands to reason that some staff also stayed there overnight, and I read somewhere that a house was created for the headmaster.
 
cybertect said:
There's a chance that the chap with the sticks and top hat is the Headmaster?



e2a: F. W. Humberstone MA (1870–1890)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bablake_School
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Francis William Humberstone, very little record of him around although in 1870, 73 and 75 his wife gave birth to children at the school so he was pretty virile for an old guy with walking sticks if that is him.

Baptismal records

e2a: Mander, listed as schoolmaster residing in King St was also siring kids through the late 60s and 70s
 
and furthermore, it seems like the Bluecoat schools actually had uniforms that seem more like what Bablake boys should be wearing (but are not in that picture).

Bluecoat uniforms

013549.jpg


Bablake boys: Throughout this time the boys would have worn the traditional ‘Blue Coat’ uniform: a long tunic of dark blue cloth, with a leather girdle, yellow petticoat, yellow stockings, low buckled shoes, linen collar with bands, round black worsted cap with yellow tassel.
 
miss minnie said:
Francis William Humberstone, very little record of him around although in 1870, 73 and 75 his wife gave birth to children at the school so he was pretty virile for an old guy with walking sticks if that is him.

Baptismal records

e2a: Mander, listed as schoolmaster residing in King St was also siring kids through the late 60s and 70s
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I'd come across a similar set of records in someone's family tree

http://www.michael-outram.com/dat0.htm#19

Humberstone, Francis William

Gender: Male
Birth : 29 September 1846 in 2 Guilford Cotta, Dover, Kent, England
Death : 20 September 1923 in 3 Chester Street, Coventry, England
Burial : 24 September 1923 in Cemetery, Catacomb Walk, Coventry, England
Click to expand...

Even allowing for Victorians looking older than they were, he'd only have been 31 in 1877, which makes it unlikely to be him if the picture is anywhere near that date.

Ah well...
 
miss minnie said:
A History of the County of Warwick: Volume 8: The City of Coventry and Borough of Warwick has some detailed information about Bablake.
Click to expand...

miss minnie said:
Pickard's Pink Pages for Warwickshire with census information and other stuff.
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miss minnie said:
Francis William Humberstone, very little record of him around although in 1870, 73 and 75 his wife gave birth to children at the school so he was pretty virile for an old guy with walking sticks if that is him.

Baptismal records

e2a: Mander, listed as schoolmaster residing in King St was also siring kids through the late 60s and 70s
Click to expand...

I'll leave all that to you. Can't be arsed with all that reading!

How old was he in 1870?
 
I also found someone on Rootsweb who reckoned her grandfather went to the Bablake school but thought the uniform....

er, forgotten what it was

eta:
I have an old picture of my ggrandfather as a boy in school uniform. I had
assumed because of the similarity of unforms that he had gone to a Bluecoat
School. However, I've found no such school in Coventry in the early 19th
century that took boys. But many boys of his station in life attended the
Bablake school. So, I was wondering if Bablake boys wore uniforms anything
like those worn at Bluecoat schools. Does anyone on the list know?
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It would appear that Bablake started as a mixed charity school.

AT the time of the education census of 1851, 1,461 children attended day schools in Warwick. Of these three sevenths, or 640, received education at 34 private schools, and the rest, 821, at nine public schools. (fn. 1) Of the public schools the oldest were the King's Grammar School and the Bablake Charity School, both of which have already been described. (fn. 2) In 1854 there were 130 boys and girls attending the Bablake School, (fn. 3) and in 1867 43 pupils at the King's School.
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The Bablake Charity School had already been closed in 1875 as a result of a Charity Commission Scheme.
Click to expand...
 
The Bablake Charity School had already been closed in 1875 as a result of a Charity Commission Scheme.
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More please? Closed and moved? Closed completely? If whatisname was Headmaster from 1870-1890 (when it moved premises), then how was it closed? Or maybe it was closed to the poorer children and "Charity" was taken out of its name? :confused:

Can you ban OP please for posting these pics? :mad::D
 
Minnie_the_Minx said:
More please? Closed and moved? Closed completely? If whatisname was Headmaster from 1870-1890 (when it moved premises), then how was it closed? Or maybe it was closed to the poorer children and "Charity" was taken out of its name? :confused:
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See "A History of the County of Warwick: Volume 8: The City of Coventry and Borough of Warwick"
 
Birth : 29 September 1846 in 2 Guilford Cotta, Dover, Kent, England
Death : 20 September 1923 in 3 Chester Street, Coventry, England
Burial : 24 September 1923 in Cemetery, Catacomb Walk, Coventry, England

First child born in London in 1869
Next five children (possibly even 6) born in the school, so he was definitely living at the school until he's seen on the census at 4 Barr's Hill Road in 1891

(that's assuming I'm reading this info correctly)

http://www.michael-outram.com/dat0.htm#19

Still nothing to say he's the guy in the picture. There may have been other teachers that lived there
 
miss minnie said:
Ah, I see. :oops:
Click to expand...


and you made me read all that stuff about the other school :mad:





















I just skimmed it really :D

However, I did wonder if their boundaries were different at some stage and therefore it may have been referred to as both Coventry and Warwickshire (a bit like Brixton used to be in Surrey 'til it became London)
 
Cybertect, I would agree with on those dates going just off the negs alone...though maybe go into the 1880's on some. When I say going off the negs, I mean the colour of the emulation used, the different thickness of glass..it does resemble some others I have in some ways that are definitely 1880's.

..so I'm quite taken in by all these! There is something quite dreamy about the lot of them.

OK, for anyone interested here is another of the pub..The Kings Head. Looking at the negative at first I thought the guy at the top of the photograph was some bloke or The Landlord sticking his head out of the window. Turns out it's 'Peeping Tom'..

http://www.historiccoventry.co.uk/nowandthen/nowandthenbroadgate2.php


5492947331_7c96e1bcba_b.jpg


High Res.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5096/5492947331_c72506f44f_o.jpg
 
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