Chapter IV: Some Catholic Families of the Nineteenth Century

The stained-glass window of St George in St Werburgh's Church - a gift from George Brayne Hostage.

One of the best known families in the nineteeth century, though it did not first originate from Chester, was the Tatlocks. They were originally a yeoman family, one of the principal landowners of Kirkby, outside Liverpool, who were convicted of recusancy in 1626. In the middle of the eighteenth century, Henry Tatlock, the son of Thomas Tatlock and Ellen Fazakerley of Tatlock House, Kirkby, became a Jesuit. Between 1750 and his death in 1771, he worked as a missioner in Lydiate and Fazakerley, outside Liverpool.

The first member to have connections with Chester was James. He went to Douai in 1777, but in 1784, after completing his studies in philosophy, he decided not to go on for the priesthood, left Douai, and came to Chester. Here, he married a sister of Father James Lancaster, and set up a cotton business in the city. The business, however, was a failure, and he returned to Lancashire, where he died in 1815.

James Tatlock had a brother, probably named John, who was born in 1760. He too came to live in Chester, but no record remains of his activities here. He died in Chester on March 15th, 1827, at the age of 67, and his death appears in the early Burial Register. Only ten days earlier, his younger son, Henry, died of consumption, at the age of 23. He, like his uncle before him, had been studying for the priesthood at Ushaw, and had received Minor Orders. The two burials were among the earliest to take place in the small burial ground behind the Queen Street chapel.

Mr. Tatlock had another son, named John, who was older than Henry. It was this John Tatlock who began the close connections of the family with the Catholic Church in Chester. He was born, though not in Chester, in 1797. About 1824, he married Dorothy Bromley, who came from Upper Pitt Street, Liverpool where she ran a "Ladies' Seminary". Dorothy and her sister, Ann, had arrived in Chester in 1824 to set up a similar school for girls in White Friars. She was six years younger than her husband, and had been born in Jamaica. Sometime before her marriage, she had inherited a considerable fortune, from property and investments in Montego Bay, Jamaica, which by 1836 were worth about £4,000. Presumably, she belonged to an English family that had invested money in the sugar plantations on the island or, since she married a solicitor, her father may have belonged to the legal profession on the island. Among Father Briggs's papers, there are several Accounts, sent to him as the Trustee of her property, from her agent in Jamaica. How this connection arose, it is impossible to say. The Accounts afford a fleeting glimpse into life on the island in the early nineteenth century. They mention "the Penn House", the typical great wooden house owned by Dorothy Bromley, where her agent, John Manderson, lived. He was constantly having to purchase boards and cypress shingles for its repair. These were the days before the emancipation of slavery in the West Indies, and there are many entries on the Accounts to do with the negroes working on the property. For instance, "Old Daphne's" coffin cost 10s.; clothing for "the old negroes and children" came to £4 12s. 6d.

By 1840, John and Dorothy were living in Queen Street, then a pleasant street, full of elegant Georgian houses. It was here that Dorothy bore her husband at least three children, a girl named Ann, who was born in 1825, and two sons, Thomas Joseph, born the following year, and John, born in 1833.

Thomas went to Ushaw in 1840, when he was almost fourteen years of age. As a student, he became known for his straightforwardness and kindly disposition, qualities which ripened over the years. He was ordained a priest in 1854. After his ordination, he remained on at Ushaw, where he spent the greater part of his life, holding one important office after another. In 1860, he was appointed to teach Mathematics, until in 1876, he was made deputy rector of the Junior Seminary. He held this position for ten years, until his appointment in 1886, first to the post of House Pro­curator and then Vice President of the College. He retired from Ushaw in 1890, crippled with rheumatism, and went to live with his brother in Chester. Bishop King made him a Canon in 1891, in recognition of his priestly virtues. He died in 1899 at the age of 73, the last surviving member of his family.

His younger brother, John, was a boy of sixteen at the time of his father's death in 1850. By 1851, he was an articled clerk to a solicitor, and starting off on the career in which he did much as a Catholic in Chester. He was an established solicitor and Deputy Coroner in 1860, when he entered into partnership with another important Catholic, John Hostage. He was then living at Flookersbrook, but in 1864 he made his home in St. John's Street, first at Number 26, and then from 1874 until his death in 1892, at Number 21.

The Tatlock family was very generous to both the parishes in Chester. John was among the benefactors who contributed towards the building of the Franciscan Friary, and his name appears among those who helped the friars in 1876, by paying the cost of their rooms. By his will, Canon Tatlock paid off the parish debt of £3,750 on St. Werburgh's, and the £3,000 still owing from St. Francis's. The High Altar at the latter church was erected as a memorial to the Tatlock family.

The family of Hostage was another closely associated with the growth of Catholicism in Chester, from the early days of the Queen Street chapel until as late as 1915. Like John Tatlock, and indeed in partnership with him, they were a firm of solicitors, illustrating how quickly after Catholic Emancipation, Catholics were able to take their rightful place in the public life of the town. The first recorded member of the family was John Hostage, who was an attorney, living in Abbey Square and practising between the years 1781 and 1828. Soon after 1810, he was living in Northgate Street and married to Mary Street. His bride had been born in 1798, the daughter of Thomas Street and Ann Fox, both of them well known in the Queen Street chapel. There were six children by the marriage. The eldest and the youngest were girls, Mary, born in 1813 and Frances, born in 1826. Of the four boys, James, born in 1819 became a priest, and Thomas Brayne, two years his senior, became a Civil Engineer. He died at the age of 45, in 1861. The eldest boy, baptised John Brayne Hostage in 1815, studied for law. By 1850, he had set up on his own as a solicitor, employing two clerks, and was appointed Deputy Clerk of the Peace. He married a girl from Chelmsford in Essex. Six years later, he held the position of Under Sheriff and Coroner. His son, John Brayne Arthur Hostage, who was born in 1839, also became a solicitor and Under Sheriff of the county. By 1874, he joined the partnership with John Tatlock, so that the Firm became known as Hostage, Tatlock and Hostage. By then, he was married to Elizabeth Boleshans, and was living at 119 Boughton, where two years later, Mrs. Mary Street died, at the advanced age of 86. He had already lost a young brother, Thomas, who died suddenly at the age of 18, in 1874.

The last son of this distinguished line of solicitors was George Brayne Hostage, who died at his residence in Eaton Road, in 1907. The stained glass window of St. George in St. Werburgh's church was his gift. His widow, Mrs. George Hostage, lived on for several more years. In the early months of the first World War, she and her daughter sent out clothes, prayer books and rosaries to the men in the training camps. When she died on 25th October, 1915, she was described as a "truly Christian woman".

Another family closely associated with the Church in Chester in the nineteenth century and well into living memory in the twentieth was the Tophams. This family has become famous in the horse-racing world through its associations with the Grand National Steeplechase at Aintree. There is, however, another and less well-known side to their history which links them with the growth of Catholicism in Chester.

The first member of the family to settle in Chester, at Foregate Street was Edward W. Topham. He came, about the year 1830, from Middleham in Yorkshire, where for four hundred years, his ancestors had been known for their racing stables. At the time of his moving into Chester, he was about twenty four years of age, and married to Elizabeth Galley Metcalf, who came from Richmond in Yorkshire. Several children were born to them in Chester, the best known being Christopher Reuben, at whose baptism in 1840, Father Carbery and Elizabeth Tatlock stood sponsors, and Joseph Bell, born in 1844.

Edward W. Topham became Clerk of the Races first at Chester and then at Aintree, where his perspicacity enabled him to lease the Course from the Earl of Sefton. In both places he revitalised the Race Course, and it was through his ability as a handicapper - he was nicknamed "The Wizard" - that the Grand National Steeplechase was founded at Aintree in 1843. After his death in 1873, his work was carried on by his two sons, Christopher and Joseph, and in the next generation, by Joseph's sons, Edward who died in 1932, and Arthur Ronald who lived until 1958.

It is, however, their generosity to the Catholic parishes of Chester which concerns us here. The name of Edward W. Topham appears regularly in the 1860's, among the contributors to the various diocesan funds established by Bishop Brown. One such was the Church Education Fund, which helped to support boys being trained for the priesthood. This practice was continued by his son, Joseph Bell Topham, after his father's death. All the members of the family took an active interest in the erection and opening of the Franciscan church and friary, and their names appear among the benefactors who helped to defray the expenses which the Capuchins then incurred.

The announcement of the death of Joseph B. Topham in September, 1910, was made in St. Werburgh's Parish Magazine. The editor then commented, "the name of Topham is a household word in the parish", and continued, "the family have been identified with every charitable work in the past history of Catholicism. Great have been their benefactions to the Church and the poor of St. Werburgh's parish".

Reticence about their charities and reserve of character were marked family features. The magazine spoke of "the deep faith and great charity for which Joseph Topham was remarkable", and of "his retiring disposition, which preferred to conceal from public notice his innumerable kindnesses to the Church and to the poor". His generosity reached out beyond Chester into the Church at Birkenhead, for it was he who bought the sites for the present churches of the Holy Name and of St. Joseph's in that town.

The same trait of reserve showed itself in his eldest son, Edward A. C. Topham, who died at his home, Boughton Hall near Chester, in December 1932. Speaking of his ability in organising the Grand National, the Liverpool Echo wrote that "the followers of Aintree racing knew nothing of the man himself. Even those who had met him found him reserved, and knew little more about him than that he went regularly to Aintree".

There were a number of other old Catholic families in the early nineteenth century, who made their way in life by trade or craftsmanship. They lived mostly in the more central part of the city, not on its outskirts, as the Irish Catholics tended to do. Their influence in the life of the parish is indicated by the frequency by which their names appear in the registers, especially in the baptismal registers, where, time and again, they are entered as standing sponsor to a child.

Throughout the nineteenth century, Chester remained essentially a commercial city, which turned its back on industrial ventures. As a market for the surrounding area, its wealth lay in the retail trade which grew out of and flourished from its many trades and crafts. Among the wide variety of retailers, drapers whether in silk, linen or wool, had a flourishing trade, and consequently, tailors, milliners, and dressmakers prospered. Dealers in all kinds of foodstuffs, such as butchers, bakers and grocers naturally did a good trade, but there were also shop keepers selling luxury goods, like jewellers, clock and watchmakers, booksellers and fancy dealers. Apart from the clothing crafts, wood crafts gave employment to many men, such as cabinet makers, joiners and also coach builders.

Since the sixteenth century, the importing of hides from Ireland had led to Chester's main industry, the leather industry, with the tanning, dressing and curing of skins used in its processing. Though the manufacture of gloves was not as flourishing as it had formerly been, there were many boot and shoe makers, and some saddlers in the middle of the nineteenth century. It is hardly surprising to find that the Catholics, debarred as they had been for so long from entering the professions, should find their way into many of these walks of life. Families like the Tatlocks and the Hostages were the exceptions, not the rule.

Among the oldest of such families were the Gorsts. They could, indeed, trace their origins well back into the eighteenth century, for Mary Gorst, a widow, appears on the Papists' Returns for 1767. At the time, she was already sixty years of age, but she had been living in St. John's parish only eighteen months, and there is nothing to indicate where the family had originated. The early Directories of Chester, dating from 1781, show that the surname was a fairly common one, though all may not have been Catholics. A Richard Gorst, however, who was probably her son, appears on the baptismal register as early as 1795, when he was already married to Elizabeth MacMillan, and they were having their first child, Elizabeth, baptised. One of the sponsors for the newly baptised baby was Sefton Carter. We can see here the close ties of friendship which must have existed in the still small Catholic community, for Sefton Carter's father was also a Papist in St. John's parish at the same time as Mary Gorst and, as a man of 55, had been living in Chester thirty years. Sefton Carter the younger was on the Polling List in 1818, and had a tobacconist's shop in Little St. John's Street. Elizabeth was followed in the Gorst family by twin brothers, William and Thomas, who were baptised in 1799, and in 1804 by another boy, baptised Richard.

From 1795 down to as late as 1822, Richard Gorst's name appears fifteen times as a sponsor in the baptismal register. On one occasion, in 1807, he acted in this capacity for Joseph Street, the son of Thomas Street and Ann Fox, the parents-in-law of John Hostage. He seems to have been not only an active member of the Catholic congregation, but also an articulate one, ready to take up the cudgels on behalf of his faith when he thought it necessary. Three long letters written by him to the local press have survived among the correspondence of Father Briggs. Presumably they had been sent first to him for censoring, before being published in the newspaper. They are written in justification of the visible church. In spite of the errors in spelling, their tone brings out clearly the controversial topics upon which leading Catholics had to engage. The following extract illustrates this:

You have conjured up a freightful specter and cloathed it with all the horrors of immagination, and this you call Popery ... You can have little desire of informing yourself of their real tenets, but content yourself with the fictitious ones that you have seen pleased to father upon them.

What kind of answer these letters drew in the press we have no means now of knowing.

Pigot's Commercial Directory for 1818 lists Richard Gorst as a cabinet maker, living at 6 Watergate Row. It also includes John Gorst, a leather dealer and currier, living in Bridge Street. John Gorst's name appears on the baptismal register, so he was probably Richard's brother. Richard himself died in 1832. He was followed shortly afterwards by John Gorst's wife, who died from the dread disease of cholera.

Another Catholic living in Watergate Row was Charles Cliffe, an upholsterer. Here again, their faith and possibly their trading relations brought these two Catholic families together, for by 1823, Charles had married Elizabeth Gorst, and their first child, also called Elizabeth, was baptised. Father Briggs was one of the sponsors. The following year, another daughter was baptised Mary. The sudden death of Mrs. Cliffe is recorded in the burial register in 1832.

Charles Cliffe had a brother, named Joseph, who was also an upholsterer, living in Bridge Street Row. He seems to have been more successful than Charles. By 1840, he had moved to Watergate back Row, near the Cross, and was an auctioneer and appraiser. His name appears on the Polling Lists for the city in 1820, and again in 1835.

Some successful shop keepers were of Irish extraction. Greenwood Campbell, for instance, set up a draper's shop in Northgate Street in the 1830's, and married a girl from Dodleston named Ann Burkey, by whom he had six children. By 1851, he was a master draper, advertising in the Directories the sale of Irish, Scotch and other linens. His two eldest sons, Samuel and William, were working as assistants in the shop, with a view, presumably, to taking over the establishment on his retirement.

Another successful Irish Catholic was Joseph Fitzgerald, who had a clay pipe industry in Love Street in 1818. His brother was also a pipe maker, in Barker's Lane, as Union Street was then called. By 1820, both brothers had the right to a vote, and Joseph had moved to Newgate. James, meanwhile, had set up as a victualler and was probably finding this more profitable. In 1828, Joseph advertised in Pigot's Commercial Directory as a pipe and tobacco manufacturer, resident in Newgate Street. He continued to live there until at least 1840. This made him the neighbour of another quite important Catholic family, that of Thomas Montgomery, an umbrella maker. Thomas Montgomery had been born in Chester in 1809, and had a brother, William, who was a cooper, living in Castle Street. They were probably the sons of John Montgomery, also a cooper from Watergate Street. In 1839, Thomas married an Irish woman three years his senior, named Mary Murphy, who must have been a young widow, for she already had a girl of eleven, born in Ireland. Their first son, also called Thomas, was baptised in the Queen Street chapel in 1840, an uncle, Michael Murphy, standing sponsor to him.

In addition to the Irish immigrants, there was also a group of Italians living in Chester in the nineteenth century. One of them, Antonio Rivolta, must have been a well-known figure in the Queen Street congregation, for between 1818 and 1826, he was sponsor no less than twenty nine times, nearly always to Irish children. He does not seem to have married himself. It is impossible to say what his calling in life was, but he was certainly not poor. Some of his suggestions for raising money for the Mission seem to have been rather original, as this letter to Father Briggs illustrates. It was written in 1819.

Signor Rivolta presents his very humble respects and proposes to him his very good plan that the Signor may have the use of the chapel, to perform a grand and impressive dirge with his complete and wonderful band. Signor Rivolta will give him 2,000 tickets, and charge 10/6 only for the gentry of the true religion, but for the heretics and schismatics he will charge 5/-.

No answer of Father Briggs to the offer has survived, so it is impossible to say whether the dirge was performed, and if so whether it was a success.

Most of the Italians possessed shops, where they sold the more sophisticated goods. Many of them already had ties of relationship or friendship, and they seem to have immigrated into England from Lombardy. When they married, however, it was usually into Chester families - so that the next generation became Cestrian, rather than Italian in their outlook. One such family were the Testi's. Charles Testi, who was born in Lombardy in 1805, had a jeweller's shop in Claremont Walk, off Eastgate Street, by 1841. He lived here with his wife and four young children, sharing his home with Hugh Rigney, the master of the Catholic boys' school. He seems to have been less successful than some of his fellow compatriots, for ten years later, he was already widowed, and he had moved out into Lower Bridge Street where he set up as a general dealer with his youngest son, then aged thirteen, serving as his shopboy. His eldest son, Joseph, who had been born in 1824, married a Chester girl in 1854.

The Bordessa family seem to have been more numerous, were perhaps more successful as business men, and took a prominent part in the Catholic community. Peter Bordessa also came from the States of Lombardy, where he was born in 1801. His name first appears in 1825, side by side with that of a Chester girl, Elizabeth Martin, as a sponsor to the son of another Italian family, the Pozzi's. Shortly afterwards, he and Elizabeth were married. It must have been a double celebration for another Italian, Antonio Menga, married Elizabeth Jones at the same time, and two at least of the witnesses of both weddings were related.

By 1850, Pietro Bordessa, as he usually called himself when he advertised in the Chester Directories, had a fancy toy shop in Bridge Street Row, His wife helped him in the shop, and they were well enough off to keep a servant, named Harriet Williams. They had two girls, Maria and Elizabeth, but they had already lost two children, another Elizabeth who had died at the age of six months from whooping cough in 1835, and a boy named John, three years earlier. Their eldest son, also called Peter, born in 1829, was an attorney's clerk by 1851, and had set up his home in Queen Street, where he lived with his Chester born wife, Hannah Jones, and her mother. Within ten years, he had become important enough to act as Sheriff's officer, a position he still held in 1864. By then, he had moved to Newgate Street, and was an auctioneer and valuer, pipe maker and cork cutter, as well as Sheriff's officer, with an office at 4 Cuppin Street. The Bordessa family continued right into the twentieth century, for the death of Mrs. Elizabeth Humphrey (nee Bordessa) was recorded in the Parish Magazine in 1909.

Two other closely connected Italian families were the Pozzi's and the Rodiri's. Both married into Chester families, and established themselves in the trading life of the city during the 1820's. Charles Pozzi had a toy shop at 59 Foregate Street in 1828, while Ferdinand Rodiri advertised in the Directories as a wireworker, with a shop in Watergate Street. It may well have been the presence of a number of prosperous Catholic shopkeepers in Watergate Street, in the middle of the century, which persuaded the Capuchins to start their first chapel in that street. It was also in the same street that a room was used for the first boys' school in Chester.

A number of other Catholic families can be traced in this way from the parish records and city directories. There was, for instance, Geoge Pickering, whose career was different from any so far mentioned. Born in Yorkshire, he came to Chester in the early 1820's. He established himself as a drawing master and landscape painter, and quickly made a name for himself by his fine paintings of street scenes in Chester. Reproductions of his pictures are frequently found as engravings in books on Chester. He also had a studio in Bold Street, Liverpool, and exhibited his paintings at the Liverpool Academy. Sometime before 1821, he was married to Magdalen Ferrers, by whom he had six children. Their baptisms are entered all together by Father Briggs, on a separate sheet in the baptism register, and it is clear from the godparents that he was on intimate terms with many of the Catholic gentry of the area. For instance, his second son, born on January 23rd, 1825, had as godparents Sir S. Smythe, Bart. of Acton Burnell, Shropshire, and Sir John Gerard, Bart. of New Hall, Lancashire, while a daughter, Maria, born in 1827, had as godmother, Lady Bultney of Beaumaris, formerly a Miss Stanley of Hooton. George Pickering himself lived for a time at Flookersbrook, but later moved to Upper Northgate Street, which he reproduced so often in his paintings. Towards the end of his life, he made his home at Grange Mount, Birkenhead, where he died in March, 1857.

Finally, this brief survey, which must perforce omit the names of other Catholic families, may be concluded by mentioning one more Catholic woman, Mary Yates. She probably succeeded Ann Abram as housekeeper to the priests, some time after 1767, and her death from old age is recorded in 1827, in the burial register. She was housekeeper to Father Briggs and Father Ashurst. Father Briggs entered in his account book the wages he paid her. They seem to have amounted to about £12 a year, paid to her at rather irregular intervals. He probably left to her the expenditure on housekeeping. A page of "Mrs. Yates's Accounts" has survived among his papers. It has an entry "Bought 20 measures of wheat £12". Her apostolate, however, covered more than the material care of the two young priests who came as missioners to Chester. They called on her, most often when there was no-one except themselves to do it, to stand sponsor to Irish children being baptised. The last time she performed this duty was in 1826, only a year before she died.

Chapter III: Growth in the Nineteenth Century	Contents	Chapter V: Catholic Education in Chester
From Catholicism in Chester: A Double Centenary 1875-1975
© 1975 Sister Mary Winefride Sturman, OSU