Page revised 21 August 2001

EDWARD LAW

HUDDERSFIELD & DISTRICT HISTORY

AN OBSCURE FAMILY HISTORY RESOURCE.

In 1818 a medical treatise, Observations on a stridulous affection of the bowels, was published by James Bradley of Huddersfield. The book is now scarce but a copy is held by the John Rylands Library of the University of Manchester.

James Bradley was a doctor who had lived and practised in Almondbury and Huddersfield, being the first physician of the Huddersfield Dispensary, a post which he relinquished after two years due to ill health. He subsequently removed to Longroyd Bridge where he lived in semi-retirement.

The book has a particular interest, not for its medical revelations, but for a store of more or less interesting personal detail which it contains. The information is given in an appendix of cases and was noted as a contribution to his researches. The salient details are

LUCY ARMITAGE 27 Unmarried
ELIZABETH WOOD 26 Applied at the Dispensary in the Summer of 1814 in order to be relieved from toads or frogs, which, she was confident, infested her belly. About 5 years previously, a month after her accouchement …
ELIZABETH SHORE 18 Admitted at the Dispensary in the Autumn of 1814.
ANN GLEDHILL 20 A nurse maid, lived in service, was under the care of a medical man at York for 10 to 12 weeks.
ELIZABETH FOZARD 19 Dispensary April 1815.
MARY GIBSON 28 Married, born 5 children. Dispensary Summer of 1815. She died rather suddenly a few weeks after her accouchement.
MARY BRADFIELD 16 Dispensary Summer 1815. She had been employed in the cotton manufactory for some time, reduced to applying for parochial relief.
GEORGE PLATT 23 A tall and handsome young man. June 1815. Employing himself as a clothier as formerly. Died just before his intended marriage.
ANN WILCOCK 15 Applied 13 September 1816. Used to carrying large pails of milk on her head.
ANN CHAPEL 17 Close of 1817. Last 3 years followed occupation of a weaver. A surgeon had extracted a pretty large quantity of blood from the temples by leeches.
JAMES HIRST 22  
RICHARD DAWSON 33  
JOSEPH LIVERSAGE 27 Autumn 1813
WILLIAM HAIGH 42 Clothier by trade. September 1813.
JOSEPH BROOK 53 Dispensary 1815.
RICHARD SYKES 20 A clothier. Winter 1815. For the last two years his employment had consisted chiefly of wheeling wet wool in a hand-barrow up a very steep hill from the dye house.
MASTER R[OBINSON] 4 mths Summer of 1816. Son of Mr Robinson, a surgeon in the town.
RACHEL KAYE 23 Unmarried. Dispensary September 1814. Three years previous to this period she had the misfortune to have an illegitimate child. [The charitable way in which this is put may stem from the fact that James Bradley was himself the father of an illegitimate child.]
ELIZABETH HAWTHORN 28 Married without children. Dispensary August 1814.
BENJAMIN STEPHENSON 30 Dispensary Summer 1815. Five years prior to this he was a militia man, exposed to hard duty.
ELEANOR SHAW 41 Born 7 living children. Dispensary Summer 1815.
MARTHA GOODHALL 52  
SARAH MELLOR 35 Married. Has had 6 children. Dispensary August 1815. She daily span on a large jenny.
MRS. HINCHLIFFE 47 Married with 2 children, the youngest 8. 6.5.1815.
HANNAH MILLS 38 Has had 8 children. 23.3.1813.
MR. J T 28 Married, a cloth merchant. Spring 1817.
SARAH SMITH 52  
ELIZABETH DAWSON 35 Summer of 1814, delivered of her seventh child.
GEORGE HILL 27 Dispensary September 1814.

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