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Where am I? DCC > ALDERLEY EDGE > HISTORY > BIOGRAPHIES
BIOGRAPHIES
Apart from the miners who formed the backbone of all the operations at Alderley, a number of other named people feature and on this page, biographies will be found for these people. Some are fairly detailed, others very brief but all should enable the reader to find where a named person fits into the history of Alderley. A long list of named miners from the 1860s is contained on the page with mining employment data.
NAMED PEOPLE
* For copies of the biographies with references included, please contact the Webmaster.
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William Adshead
Director of Mottram St Andrew Mining Company Limited in 1862.
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James Ashton
Miner in 1805 period. Came from Derbyshire.
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Jonathan Down
Mine agent in 1860s. Named in Mining Journal 1860, p.686, in 1863 and in 1864. Lived Bradford Lodge in 1861.
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Edward Gard
Director from start. Gave name to Gard's Shaft. May be same as Edward Gard
MP from Exeter who invested in Devon Consols and gave his name to a shaft there.
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William Henderson
William Henderson was born in Scotland some time around 1828 . He moved to London some time before 1851 and married Esther (or Ester or Hester) Jane Cowtan on 25 February 1850 at Christ Church, Greyfriars, Negate, London . Esther was born in Limehouse in about 1828 . In 1851, he was living at 6 Randall Street, Poplar, London with his wife and eldest son, James, born about 1850 . He was described in the census as “Smelter and Refiner”.
His parents may have been Robert and Margaret Henderson married in Edinburgh in 1824, 1825 or 1826 but this cannot be confirmed. There was a William Henderson of the right age living with his parents in Sevenoaks, Kent in 1841 but born in Scotland .
In 1861, Henderson was living on Dicken Lane, Chorley with his wife and family :
| NAME | AGE | OCCUPATION | WHERE BORN |
| William Henderson | 33 | Chemist | Scotland |
| Est[h]er | 33 | London | |
| James | 10 | Scholar | Scotland |
| Est[h]er | 4 | Gloucestershire | Bristol |
| Emma | 3 | Gloucestershire | Bristol |
| Clara | 1 | Cheshire | Alderley |
Clearly, he spent some time between 1851 and 1861 living in Bristol which is of course where James Michell was living in 1861. Esther junior was christened on 03 August 1856 at Temple, Bristol and Emma Louisa was born on 27 February 1857 and christened on 23 August 1858 at St Andrew's, Clifton, Bristol .
Unfortunately, no trace has yet turned up of the Henderson family from 1871 onwards but as the Scottish census is not yet on line, it is possible that they had moved back there after 1861.
William Henderson’s education has not been researched but he described himself as “smelter and refiner” by the time he was living in London in 1851. By 1860, he was in Alderley Edge and he clearly lived there for a while as he had a child in 1858 or 1860 and is on the 1861 census. He was described as a “chemist” and is recorded as being “William Henderson of Glasgow” when he invented in 1859 a process for roasting pyrites with salt and washing the copper out with water . He is accredited with having introduced the wet method to copper extraction along with J A Phillips (date unknown) . Henderson’s patents covered the use of sodium chloride and other chlorides which he patented in 1859 (No 2900) and 1860 (No 2525). He also proposed use of chlorine gas in refining in 1849 (No 12534) .
Henderson is not mentioned at Alderley Edge after he writes to the Mining Journal in 1863.
Research into old chemical industry journals has not thrown up any more information about William Henderson .
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John Lawton
Miner who became liquidator in 1878 after the mine closed in 1877. He died in 1905 after serving as school manager, parish councillor and churchwarden. The obituary says he was manager of the Alderley mines for 20 years but this is probably an exaggeration.
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George Leaman
Miner, agent, who probably left his initials in Brynlow in 1866. Named as Captain in Mining Journal 1866. Was a miner living at Mottram St Andrew in 1861 but had moved to Nether Alderley as Agent in 1871.
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James Michell
James
Michell was born in Gwennap, Cornwall in around 1796. There were many Michells
in Cornwall, many in Gwennap and most of them miners at that time so
distinguishing this James Michell from the others is not easy. However, it seems
probable that the James Michell who started the Alderley Edge Mining Company in
1857/8 was christened on 26 July 1796 at Gwennap of parents James (b. c. 1770)
and Mary Michell (b. c. 1774) both of Gwennap as well . He was the eldest of
seven sons or possibly eight named James, Edmund, Joseph (possible), Henry,
John, Richard, Frederick and William with birthdates between 1796 and 1813 . He
married Lovdy Lakes Geach on 30 November 1824 at St Austell from where she came
(born 16 June 1784 ). Her names are variously spelt Lovdy, Lovedy or Loveday and
Lakes or Lakas in the transcriptions studied.
In 1841 , there is a Mary Michell, widow, living with two sons in Gwennap with the right age but identifying the subjects from the census is not easy when there are, as in the case of Gwennap, 18 Mary Michell’s to choose from. The sons are named as Jos. (probably Joseph) who is a Mine Agent and Rd. (Richard) who is a copper miner.
James Michell was not recorded in England in 1841 but his wife was at Old Weston Turnpike, St Austell with her niece Eliza Lanyon and Anna Lanyon . The Lanyon name crops up again so it is probably the surname of Lovedy Michell’s brother-in-law. It is almost certain that James was in Spain where he was probably Managing Director of the San Ramón factory at Almagrera in Almería where many British miners were working deposits of iron and lead . He wrote a paper about the Spanish lead mines in the Transactions of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall .
In 1849 or thereabouts, he introduced the Spanish Slag Hearth to the lead smelting cupola at Stonedge, south west of Chesterfield. As a result, in 1851, James Michell was in Thornfield House in Newbold and Dunston parish, on the western outskirts of Chesterfield, where he was described as a Lead Smelter . He was accompanied by his wife and her niece Emma Lanyon and three servants, showing that he was reasonably affluent by this time.In 1857, Michell came to Alderley Edge and negotiated a lease from the Stanleys. The first lease was dated 12 April 1858 and was supplemented by a further lease dated 5 May 1859. This latter lease was granted to James Michell . He became one of the three directors (with Edward Gard – who may have been an entrepreneur and MP for Exeter at the time – and Samuel Rowe Sanders – accountant who is discussed in the next paragraph) and signed shares issued in 1862 (his signature is shown on the left) .
In 1861, James Michell was living at Westbury-on-Trym outside Bristol at The Hermitage. Lovedy Michell had died by now and James Michell was living with her niece Emma Lanyon while another niece, Eliza Lanyon, was visiting. All three of James Michell and the two nieces are described as Proprietors of Copper and Lead Mines . Also visiting them were Anna Geach, presumably another relative of Lovedy Michell née Geach and Sarah Sanders who from an 1871 census turns out to be Anna’s sister . Samuel Rowe Sanders was one of the first three Directors of Alderley Edge Mining Company Limited and on the 1851 census, he was an Iron Works Cashier at Kimberworth in Yorkshire with Sarah and yet another Geach, Grace, who was an 8 year old scholar at the time .
James Michell died in November 1862 when he fell about 30 feet down a shaft during an inspection of the mines ; was he the first casualty of Plank Shaft? It is believed that he is buried near his Westbury-on-Trym, Bristol, home.
Note that James Michell should not be confused with James F. Michell who was Secretary in 1862.
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James F Michell
This
Michell must not be mistaken for James Michell (b.1796). James F Michell was
secretary to the mines when the shares were issues in 1862 and also in 1863 when
an advertisement was placed for a Mine Agent. His signature is shown to the
left. There is no historical reference to this person by name. Apart from this
information, there is an absence of material to identify James F Michell. For
example, the only census entry is for a James Fredk Michell living in Gwennap
but born in Budock who was a Commercial Clerk in the Copper Trade (b.c.1835) who
could be the person as Budock is not far from Gwennap and he was nephew of
Joseph Michell, b.c.1802, who could have been one of James Michell’s brothers .
This is however inspired guesswork.
One would expect further entries for James F Michell in 1871, 1881, 1891 and 1901 but the only person of that name who could fit was born c.1837 in Gwennap, was living in Machester (and married a Manchester lady: Hannah Hordern in 1867 ), and is listed as a Railway Clerk in 1871 and Accountant’s Clerk in 1891 .
The search continues.
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Stephen Osborne
Mine agent in 1860s. Named as Captain in Mining Journal in 1863 and 1864.
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Francis Phillips
Mine agent in 1860s. Named in Mining Journal 1860, p.686. Lived in Great Warford in 1861.
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E C Proctor
Chairman in 1865 (ref the Japanese visit in September 1865). Could be the same person who signed a receipt on the Mottram St Andrew Mine as Chas. Edw. Procter as Secretary.
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Charles Roe
A detailed history of Charles Roe and his industrial enterprises has recently been published but the summary below should help if the reader’s interest is primarily with Alderley Edge. Unless otherwise referenced, detail has been taken from W H Chaloner’s papers supplemented by Stella Davies’ account.
Charles Roe was born in 1715 and died in 1781. He was born in Castleton,
Derbyshire on 7 May 1715 as the son of the Thomas Roe, vicar of Castleton.
Thomas Roe had investments in lead mines in the Castleton area so Charles would
be familiar with mines and mining . He died around 1723. Charles moved to
Macclesfield some time late in the 1720s or in the early 1730s and became a
Burgess there, having to buy land to do so but, as a result, gaining
considerable status.
He is recorded as having built a silk mill in Macclesfield in 1743-44, so starting a long association with that town. He started the Macclesfield Copper Company in 1758, possibly because of the possibility of obtaining copper ore locally from Alderley Edge but at the same time, he was already importing ore to the area from his mines in Coniston. His business at Macclesfield was built in conjunction with Rowland Atkinson and developed into the industrial village known as Havannah where they manufactured copper wire, copper and brass sheets and bolts. Another site at Bosley was established in 1766 where copper was hammered and rolled and brass was rolled. Both these sites were powered by water.
Alderley Edge is named as one of the sources of copper ore and Charles Roe’s men are supposed to have “opened the tunnel in the Brynlow dell, with the view of drawing off the water which was lodged in the bottoms of the old shafts. They kept twenty or thirty men at work, and for a time got a considerable quantity of ore, so much, it was said, as to give them a clear profit of £50 a week” . This implies quite an undertaking and evidence of it can still be seen in Brynlow Mine but other sources of copper were also becoming available including Parys Mountain (the Mona Mine) where Roe & Co leased the mine in 1764 and the major find of copper was said to have been made in 1768 . This must have been the death knell for Alderley Edge as part of the change in arrangements was the construction of a new smelter at Liverpool in 1767 although copper was still shipped to Macclesfield for finishing. It is normally stated that Roe worked the Alderley Edge mines between 1758 and 1768 or 1770. The mines at Alderley Edge may also have been worked after Roe’s time but by the company in 1788-91 . It was in Brynlow that one of the miners carved his initials, JW, in 18th century style, along with the date 1764; according to one source, this was Josiah Wagstaff , brought in to sort out drainage problems.
The company continued to operate with new partners joining until 1811.
Roe married three times to Elizabeth Langford (m.1743), Mary Stockdale (m.1752) and Rachel Harriott (m.1766). He died at Macclesfield in 1781 and was buried in Macclesfield where a monument was erected in Christ Church.
He was succeeded in business by his son William Roe (1746-1827) who kept the copper and brass works running. However, in 1785, the Parys Mountain lease was not renewed. In the late 1780s and early 1790s, Roe & Co issued their own copper halfpennies which were struck for them in Birmingham. A similar coin was issued in Ireland where Roe & Co also had interests. These coins still turn up periodically (it is said that 11 tons of them were made). Roe & Co also moved their smelter from Liverpool to Neath in this period and the Macclesfield factories were advertised for sale in 1801.
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J Sinclair Ross
Chemist of mineralogist with the 1918 company.
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Samuel Rowe Sanders
Samuel Rowe Sanders was one of the first three Directors of Alderley Edge Mining Company Limited. He was born around 1820 and on the 1851 census, he was an Iron Works Cashier at Kimberworth in Yorkshire, living with Sarah Sanders and Grace Geach, who was an 8 year old scholar at the time .
Although part of the Alderley Edge Mining Company board, no trace of him is seen on 1861, 1871 or 1881 censuses. However, his wife appears on the 1861 census living with James Michell at Westbury-on-Trym outside Bristol at The Hermitage . She then appears on the 1871 census in Cornwall named as Anna Geach’s sister . In all cases, she is not described as Widow and in the 1871 census she is described as Accountant’s wife. The implication is that Samuel Rowe Sanders might have been outside England at the time.
The censuses strongly suggest that Samuel Rowe Sanders was brother-in-law to James Michell’s wife.
That Samuel Rowe Saunders was described in one case as cashier and in another as accountant suggests that he was what would now be described as Financial Director to the AEMC.
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Josiah Wagstaffe
Employee of Charles Roe. May have left the initials JW 1764 in Brynlow.
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