The Hooley family

Now walking on from the  two beerhouses, Adeline writes that “again in Nottingham Road. In one house lived the Hooley family. Miss Hooley had a girls’ school”.

In 1871 and 1881, this was 65 Nottingham Road … by 1891 it had become 274 Nottingham Road.

The Hooley family was another one fiercely attached to this part of town.
The father of the family was Trowell-born cordwainer Esau, son of John and Millicent (nee Bacon).
The mother was Cossall-born Ann Wheatley, daughter of framework knitter Mark and Sarah (nee Wallner).
The couple married at Cossall on April 23rd 1829 and at least nine children were born to them.
The family moved to the Hunger Hill area in the early 1840’s and the parents remained there for the rest of their lives — as did sons Thomas, Esau junior, Oscar Joseph, Mark Wheatley and John.

Still residing in Nottingham Road, shoemaker Esau junior died of ’alcohol poisoning’ on 6th January 1893, after a Christmas drinking celebration with his brother who lived in Derby. Esau was so ‘soddened with drink‘ that he had to be brought back to Ilkeston in a cab, to then be attended by Dr. Tobin. He was a ‘portly man’ weighing about 20 stones.
Appropriately the inquest into Esau’s death was held at his ‘neighbour’s premises … the White Cow beerhouse

Elder brother and master shoemaker Thomas died five months later at 274 Nottingham Road.

Daughter Sarah was the schoolmistress. In 1863 she found herself residing in Bath Street, next door to cordwainer John Chadwick, a proximity which led to an appearance at Ilkeston Petty Sessions.
A common gutter served both Sarah’s school and John’s house, taking away rain water from both premises. The pair had quarrelled and the result was an unseemly ‘water-fight’ interlaced with a variety of other assaults.
The magistrates couldn’t sort out the contradictory evidence, dismissed the case and ordered both to pay costs.

Another brother was Oscar Joseph, born on September 18th, 1840, who remained unmarried and remained at the Nottingham Road home nearly all his adult life; he died there on March 1st, 1917, aged 76.
In 1899 OJ had a field at Larklands where he kept a game cock and two game hens in a hut. One Saturday afternoon in April he went down to feed them and lock them up for the night. Laten the following morning his brother Mark alerted him to the fact that the hut had been broken into, and his cock and one hen had been taken. All that remained of the birds was an array of scattered feathers. The police were soon on the case but investigations throughout that day were fruitless.

On the Monday morning, and on an unconnected case, Sergeant Roland visited William Bradley, also living in Nottingham Road. The eagle-eyed policeman noticed a small feather on William’s kitchen floor, and adopting his newly-acquired “Sherlock Holmes” persona, he took the feather to compare to the sample he had taken from the hut. The comparison proved positive and Sergeant Roland, with OJ as companion, again visited William to search his property. In the kitchen was a suspicious pot simmering on the stove and when the sergeant gingerly reached inside, he pulled out a wing and fowl’s carcass. This discovery prompted a more extensive search and in the bedroom a pillow with freshly-plucked game feathers was uncovered. Back at the station, after an initial denial, William confessed to the theft and was remanded in custody, bail being refused.

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“Little Hallam Lane was simply a lane” asserts Adeline.

Traffic warning!  April 12th 1879.

Having just delivered a parcel in Trowell for his father Charles, George William Woolliscroft was riding his pony up Nottingham Road when the animal was startled by seven-year-old Jesse Clifton who was ‘obstructing the highway’. The pony reared and George William was thrown to the ground but not seriously injured.
This was not the first time the pony had been frightened by loitering lads and although he wished the practice to cease George William didn’t really want to press the matter.
Thus when the lad appeared at the Petty Sessions he was admonished by the Bench and the case was withdrawn.

Jesse’s mother, Eliza (nee Phillips), informed the magistrates that the lad had been severely flogged by her husband, ironworks labourer John Walter.

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At the bottom of Nottingham Road we meet Thomas Attenborough.