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Hi Hi @AvrilG! Welcome to the forum. If Edward was 2 years and 10 months, rather than ‘almost 2’ then I believe that the following is his obituary, published in the Newcastle Evening Chronicle on March 15 1929. My 11-year experience of rummaging through old documents, digital or hard copy, leads me to believe that the churchyard you refer to is Cambois Churchyard. Old newspapers, and therefore digitalised copies, can vary in quality due to the ravages of time. I can understand your mistaking Cambois for Cambels. The letter ‘i’ can look very much like the letter ‘l’ in faded or blurred print (compare the ‘li’ in ‘Bedlington’ next to the MORTON name). Likewise, ‘e’ and ‘o’. It might help you in your search to know that St Andrews (Cambois) was a small church built in the 1860s as the mission church of St Peter (West Sleekburn). West Sleekburn is often referred to as Bedlington Station, as in the obituary. St Andrews didn’t have the full status of a parish church but was supported by the parish. You could say that St Andrews was a ‘subsidiary’ of St Peters (West Sleekburn) which was the parish church of both West Sleekburn and Cambois. St Andrews was, therefore, served by the vicar of St Peters with the help of a non-stipendiary priest until its consecration in 1998 when it became a parish church. All parish records for St Andrews would be held at St Peters (West Sleekburn) until that date. Andy has given you a link to St Andrews and here you can see where St Peters is. Good luck with your search! I have some newspaper cuttings about Edwards death if you would like them.

@Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)Make yourself a cuppa! This is going to be long! It’s quite easy to mistake schedule numbers with house numbers. Another common mistake is to think that every schedule number is a house. What the census documents record are the number of ‘households’ and it is these ‘households’ that are given a schedule number. Space was at a premium and living space could be rented out by the room so that several households often lived in the same house. This was very common practice in Bedlington. At the time of the 1911 census, the ‘Market Place’ had 33 households of which one was a common lodging house with 25 male residents and one private house which was unoccupied. If we look at the enumerator’s summary book these 33 households, with the exception of the Post Office, the Turk’s Head public House and the Howard Arms Hotel all had the same address – Market Place Bedlington. This, you could say, was the ‘formal’ address at which the household resided. This was the address written by the enumerator on the census form which he delivered to the household to be filled in by the head of that household. It was also the address he used when transcribing the completed form to his summary book. While this system worked well for the enumerator, who had a set route to follow, it wasn’t the ideal system for the people who lived there should they, for example, need to impart the whereabouts of their home to intended visitors or tradesmen. The residents of the Market Place (and many other places) found their own way of describing their location and this was usually by means of easily identifiable features in the vicinity of their home. One of the wonderful things about the 1911 census is that the forms filled in by each household were not destroyed once the enumerator had transcribed their content to his summary book. The householders, regardless of what the enumerator had written on his part of the census form, often wrote their address in the manner in which they would give it to would-be visitors. So is the case with MarknMargaret’s relative, Mr John T, which greatly eases the task of identifying where he lived. The schedule nr 26 refers to this address written by the enumerator: Mr John T, however, gives the following address as his place of residence: In other words, John’s household comprising himself, his wife and his grandson, lived in the yard of the Rawlings family home. There were a number of such yards all along Front Street, Vulcan Place and Glebe Row. The main family home, in this case the Rawlings, faced the main street and the yard faced away from the street at the rear of the house. Basically, anything in the yard that was deemed ‘habitable’ could be rented out. They could be small houses to accommodate employees but equally well they could just be small outhouses or lean-to buildings. Mr William Rawling lived in the Market Place in a building facing the main street and in this building was also his business - Merchant Tailor & Mens Wear. The location is easily identifiable from its location, next door and to the east of the Howard Arms hotel, as recorded in the summary book. As I said, the enumerator had a set route to follow: Here is the Rawling family home and business, arrowed red. I’ve also marked a doorway, adjoining the tailor’s shop, in blue. This opened into a passageway leading to the yard: If you look closely at the angle between the house which I’ve arrowed and the larger building to its right, you can just make out the roof and chimney of the yard buildings where Mr John T lived. I don’t know the date of this photo but the map below is from 1910 and you can clearly see that there are two small buildings in the yard. These had each two rooms, one of which served as kitchen/livingroom/diningroom (and at times even as bedroom). In the first of these two buildings (marked green), adjoining the tailor’s shop, lived Mr William Errington, the previous occupier of the tailor’s shop. It was in his day, however, a grocer’s shop. He occupied just one room. In the second of the two houses (marked red) lived MarknMargaret’s relative, Mr John T, who occupied two rooms – probably one up and one down. On the map I’ve also arrowed in blue the doorway to the passageway which I marked in blue on the above photo This is the same doorway shown on Alan’s photo (reproduced below): Hope this is of help. If MarknMargaret would like copies of the original documentation let me know. If they could pass on an e-mail address through yourself, Alan, that would be ideal.

That picture of the Platform Ticket brought back fond memories. Back in the 60s loads of us lads used to go to the Mayfair in Newcastle to see bands ... we'd get the United bus from the Red Lion to the Haymarket. Trouble was the last bus back from the Toon would have been maybe 10 or 11pm, so no transport back when the show ended at 1 am approx. The only solution was to go to the Central Station and catch the 3am London to Edinburgh Mail Train which stopped at the Toon and Morpeth. We'd then walk from Morpeth to Bedders. The trouble was you couldn't wait in the Central Station as the British Transport cops used to throw you out unless you had a ticket. We weren't going to buy one for the full travel cost to Morpeth but always got a Platform Ticket out the machine (I think it might have cost 2d), waited in the station, then got on the train ... no ticket checks that time of night ... we did this for years.

Old tickets

@Alan Edgar (Eggy1948) @AvrilG St Andrews wouldn't have a graveyard as it wasn't a parish church. All burials would take place at St Peters (West Sleekburn). As for the Methodist churches in Britain, the majority didn't have graveyards either. Their members were also 'parishioners' of the churches parish and were buried in the churchyard of the parish church. The Methodist church was allowed to do christenings and marriages and at some point the Methodist ministers were even granted permission to conduct marriage services within the parish church. Multi-denominational chapels in graveyards and crematoriums, together with municipal burial grounds solved the problem.

@Canny lass & @Harry.T.S this is just me trying something different. This is a direct link to a 202 map on the NLS site, same period as the 1921 map CL posted above, but a bit more detail :- https://maps.nls.uk/view/132278981

Hi @Harry.T.S, welcome to the forum. As I said I’m not too familiar with the area but Rutters Buildings starts to appear on maps at some point between 1866 and 1896. It was a long row of housing lining the main road at Scotland Gate (between Choppington and Guide Post). In the 19 11 census there were 15 families living in Rutters Buildings. 13 of them were living in just 2 rooms and the remaining 2 families had 3 rooms each. There were some big families so living conditions for most were cramped, to say the least. Rutters buildings was located between the methodist church at the north end and the Kings Arms public house which adjoined the terrace at its southern end. You can see it on this map from 1924 which is the earliest on which I find its name but there may be others.

Hi, thank you both for your help regarding my question, I would love to have copies of the original documents. John Tait, I think was estranged from his wife Mary Jane (my 2x great grandmother) at the time as she is living in Shiny Row with some of the children, I can't find him in 1901 but it was after 1891 where they lived in Front Street, Bedlington schedule 162 that they separated, as I have a newspaper article where they went to court, he was accused of striking Mary Jane. It's all very interesting so I would love to know who the other people are in the house with him, possibly not wife but one of the daughters and her son? My email address is [redacted] Regards Margaret

I have asked the question, on Wednesday, but still no response

The Market Place 'dwellings' didn't have numbers in the 1911 census. Could Mark & Margaret be confusing the schedule number with a house number? Ask if her relative's surname started with the letter T? If so I can probably pin-point the right house for her.

I would never have believed that of your good self! Did Bedlingtonians really get up to such mischief!

Maybe these were your tickets to Newcastle Symptoms!

@AvrilG Living in Ashington makes things a lot easier for you! Pop along to the Northumberland Archives at Woodhorn. I'm pretty certain that they will have taken care of the parish records from St Peters (West Sleekburn). You can find their opening hours at https://www.northumberlandarchives.com/. I don't think you need to book before visiting. They can do a search for Edward’s grave, verify which cemetery and give you the plot number of his grave. I forgot to mention that St Peters (West Sleekurn) got a new cemetery when the original was full. It is located next door to the Forresters Arms on Wansbeck Terrace in West Sleekburn, and just opposite the site of the old St Peters church and cemetery. Just when it was opened, I can't be sure but it is registered by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission as having a few war graves from WW1 so it was there at the time of Edward's death. It might be worth having a wander round the gravestones to see if any names ring a bell.

Hi i live on Ashington so i think i will have a drive over to have a look at where tge church was. Thank you for the info,

Distance from Red Row to Cambois :-

I don't know if you know the area at all so I thought you might like these as well. The first, and larger, of the photos is St Andrew (Cambois) and the second, smaller, photo is St Peter (West Sleekburn. I'll get all of these off to your in-box now.

Thank you so much this. You are right with rbe obituary, i got the age. wrong. The sad thing is my mam was born one month after he died. Thank you for the information about the church. What a really helpful site this is.

Latest updates I can find on this rollout is https://www.northumberlandgazette.co.uk/business/consumer/openreach-to-upgrade-broadband-in-bedlington-belford-embleton-prudhoe-and-seaton-delaval-4645315 In May 2024 it was announced as being added to the rollout plan so sometime before end of 2026.

Then and Now (Malcolm's photos)