EARLY MODERN RATCLIFF WORKERS OF SAILORS TOWN!

THE TRADERS MEDLEY

I'VE FOLLOWED THE ROOTS OF MY MATERNAL LINE OF COCKNEY CLARK ANCESTORS TO THE PORT OF LONDON AND EAST END DOCKS...link here to a summary of 
The living environment of kith and kin.

Within this den of iniquities were a community of shopkeeper/traders who were converted to the Religious Society of Friends, (founded by Lancashire non-conformist, George Fox). 

It was a risky business becoming a Quaker. 

Quakers believe everyone has what they call 'that of God' within them and that each of us has direct access to God. There is, therefore, no need of clergy or only receiving Divine Truth from the Bible alone!
The Parish of Stepney was a haven of Dissenters in the 17th century, and my ancestors are recorded at the Redcliffe Meeting house and the Bunhill Cemetry on Broad Street/Schoolhouse Lane.

Home of the Akers, Best and Clark families.

My maternal 6th Great Grandfather HENRY CLARK, a Mariner from Limehouse married MARY AKERS at St. Botolph without Bishopsgate by License 6th Aug 1788, an ordinary Anglican marriage, but she was born to Quaker parents.

Being a Dissenter means arbitary persecution so to keep the Faith is a revolutionary act.

7th Great Grandfather Abraham Aker's birth was recorded at the Meeting House at Ratcliff in 1740.  
He and wife Ann(Fern) were Grocers of Broad St, Ratcliff Cross.
The rate records show they went from renting their premises to owning it.

The faith of George Fox and beliefs of the early Quakers were very attractive to London's abundance of small business people - 'the middling sort'. They didn't have to doff their hats to anyone...except God!

8th Grt. ABRAHAM AKERS 1715-1743 was a Tallow Chandler at Ratcliffe Cross (Candle maker. He would have been a member of the Guild who set the standards and measurements of the business).

                                           Warehouses at Limehouse - one used by the Akers?

Imports/Exports of London Port 17th century.

The Religious Society of Friends were excellent record keepers! Thankyou brave spirited ancestors!

They were very concientious in recording marriages as many Parishioners from St Dunstans Cof E

considered Quaker couples to be living in Sin because they didn't have a Priest to officiate.

9th Grt Grandparents

Transcribed as: And Anne Best daughter of John Best of Limehouse aforesaid Cordwainer having publickly declared their intention of taking each other in Marriage before several Meetings of the People of God called Quakers in London, according to the Good Order used among them, whose proceeding therein after enquiry and deliberate consideration thereof  with regard 

to the Righteous Law of God was allowed by the said Meetings; they appearing before? all Akers and having also the consent of parents and relations ?

NOW, those are to certify all whom it may ?   That for the accomplishing of their said marriage, this ninth day of the sixth month called August in the year one thousand seven hundred and sixteen, they the said Abraham Akers and Anne Best by this hand ?

openly ?

In the fear of the Lord and in the presence of this assembly(whom I desire to being witnesses) I take this my dear Friend Anne Best to be my Wife(promising through the Lord's assistance) to be to her a true and faithfull husband, until it shall please the Lord by death to Separate us. And then and thou in said Assembly, the said Ann Best did in like manner ? like Friends.In the Fear of the Lord and in presence of this Assembly(whom I desire to be my witnesses) I take this my friend Abraham Akers to be my Husband: Promising(through the Lord's assistance) to be to Him a loving and faithfull wife, till it shall please the Lord by death to separate us.

And the said Abraham Akers and Ann Best as a further Confirmation thereof and in testimony thereunto ?       set their hands. ?                  among Officers

at the solemising of 

We  whose names hereunto are subscribed being present among Officers, at the solemising of this  aforesaid Marriage and Subscription, in manner aforesaid, as Witnesses thereunto, have also to those presents Subscribers our names, the day and year above written.

George and his Friends didn't believe in monuments or gravestones but enough later Quakers thought it was important to mark the place where the founder of their Religious creed was buried.

Quakers were similar to the Levellers in an active pursuit of the principle of egalitarian respect.

 George Fox was confident that Baptism wasn't necessary, nor a woman being Churched when a baby was born, where the emphasis is cleansing of Original Sin. All makes sense to me in Australia of the 21st century! BUT there are still those who believe in the God of Abraham adhering to the Bible and the rules of the Patriarchs.
Unlike most of Westminster Parliament, Calvinist doctrine of Pre-destination was far away from the minds of Quakers. God did not discriminate in His Love for us - we are born as a being of Love not full of sin, not born destined to go to Hell..as the Puritans believed, only the Elect go to Heaven.

BEST - Quakers and Shoemakers of Limehouse 

This little baby ancestor  ANN BEST may not be pre-destined to find her marriage mate - but growing up in the same Stepney Parish there's a high probability they will meet and find a lot in common!

The Quakers made much improvement on recording births, marriages and deaths in their registers. While Geneologists are grateful to Henry Tudor for requiring registers(for purposes of taxation), this birth record of my 9th Great Grandmother shows a recognition for the Midwife and female supporters.

Transcribed as: Ann, daughter of John & Thomzin BEST - Shoemaker was born ? fourth day of eighth month 1689 in Limehouse in ye Parish of Stepney witnessed by Sarah Robinson - Midwife (and 5 other women). Like the Levellers before them, there was an instinct and rationale for equality in any Christian community. This opened the way for abuse and satire but it enabled the voice and participation of females from the earliest days of the movement.

There is an informative web site about this period:ExLibris.org

"Quakerism before the Restoration(1660) was a political, social and religious movement with some different social and religious views from the modern Society of Friends. In some ways they employed some of the same aspects of the contemporary sects of the Levellers and the Surrey Diggers, rejected the privileged structure of English society. They envisioned a new Society based on their own religious views of all godly men possessing the same internal Light or Spirit of Christ." Non-conformity in speech 'Thee and Thou', dress style and etiquette like not doffing their hats to 'superiors' would be like the 1960's rebellion of men growing their hair long and being civilly disobedient. I was a young punk in 1980 - I would have been enticed to this progressive and distinctive sect as a teenager, but I wouldn't fear possible imprisonment or execution. My early modern East London ancestors, the Akers and Best small business families show an Independent spirit in choosing to follow a Quaker life, and a courageous one. SAILOR AND SHIPWRIGHT TOWN

LIMEHOUSE LABOURING - LONDON PORT 1700-1800

EARLY MODERN ANCHOR SMITH OF LIMEHOUSE, EAST LONDON my Great Grand-East Enders x 8 generations ago.

 WILLIAM CLARK, SON TO WILLIAM & ANN OF NEW COURT, GRAVEL LANE. March 4 - 1718   

 ST. BOTOLPH ALDGATE PARISH

                  

Birth and Christening Parish register ST BOTOLPH, ALDGATE

                              

William and Ann Clark and their children would live for many years on the edge of the busy Thames River at Ratcliffe and

Limehouse. 
This was quite a feat of survival considering the notorious nature of dock side sailors, pirates, gangs of robbers and smugglers as their pedestrians!
The environment also attracted artists of all kinds, generating a large cultural expression over the years.

With no identifiable Clarks charged with drunken fights or robberies in the Old Bailey records, my ancestors got on with their honest days work (or they were good at not getting caught). 

The Clark's shared the Limehouse Causeway and Narrow Street with waves of immigrant arrivals including the southern Chinese sailors who had worked for the East India Company in the 1790's. 

My direct CLARK ancestors were witness and workers to a Time of booming trade in Slaves, Sugar, Coal and Tobacco. 
Tea had become highly valued, as much as the glut of Gin made from the over-abundant corn harvest resulting in low prices.

There were thousands of struggling troops returning from Imperial battles and thousands of pauper peasants displaced from their ancestral homes, evicted from their self-sustaining  common land by the authority of the Enclosure Act(s).

Britain had a long tradition of dealing and disposing of surplus and desperate characters caught with stolen property or distributing ideas to change the system that created such injustices...Transportation - offshore!

Narrow Street/Fore St. Limehouse.

William and Ann Clark must have repeated to their children if they didn't stop thievin' or answering back and speaking ill of their betters - whether they were hungry or not, they'd be put on one of the ships in convict chains and sent to the ends of the earth!
 for example 
Between 1650 and 1775 , some tens of thousands of prisoners were sent to the British colony of America, to be sold as labour  in Virginia, Maryland, or Georgia - perhaps as many as 120,000.(The Commonwealth of Thieves by Tom Keneally)

                                   

 The Dignity of Labour 

c.1770 London anchor makers engraving: www.themaritimegallery.co.uk

Sometimes there was fun and novelty to be had: From the Elizabethan to the Georgian era the Winters were worse than usual, but if you happened to be an Anchor Maker you wouldn't be feeling the cold...with muscle and blasting furnace!

The locals made use of a River frozen deep enough to have a party on!

1740 - GIN & GINGERBREAD

Mum's paternal Clark tree has come ashore in the freezing Tower Hamlets borough. 

She would approve of her ancestors keeping warm and jolly by drinking what they liked followed by singing sea shanties and telling stories in Cockney swagger!

The Author of this sketch claims Gin and Gingerbread is on the menu.

This was the cheap drink of the working and malnourished lower-classes of London whom William Hogarth depicted in his famous Gin and Beer Lane pictures published in 1751.

Great Grandparents x 8, William and Anne reside at the end of Lime-Kiln dock on the Limehouse Causeway when their son William is born in 1742 - little brother to Anne Rachel Clark b.1738. who would be apprenticed to a Bethnal Green Weaver.

In 1744 they have moved to Narrow Street(this map it's Fore St).

St Anne's Limehouse parish church 1730.
Christopher Wren's student, Nigel Hawksmoore was a very busy man in the early 18th century when he was commissioned to design this church and more, including  the Parish work/poor-houses.

William Turner the Romantic painter lived on Narrow Street, and Whistler also lived at Limehouse.

LIMEHOUSE -  A  MULTICULTURAL MARITIME COMMUNITY -TAVERNS/PIRATES/PROSTITUTES/SMUGGLERS/DISEASE/HIGHWAYMEN/MUSICIANS/PAINTERS/WRITERS 

THE CLARK'S seem to have kept their head down and out of trouble - following the smugglers advice to 'watch the wall'  when they saw sly carrying of goods off the ships, (so they couldn't tell 'the Law'), keeping free of the hangman's noose and the Prison Hulks on the River Thames.

Living was an achievement! Infant mortality was high. Getting through life without suffering greatly from an array of man-made abuses was a victory, discounting the horrible weather.

Considering one could receive the death penalty for stealing a sheep, living in obscurity was a real-life survival strategy! www.oldbaileyonline.org

BOROUGH OF TOWER HAMLETS, MIDDLESEX.
21st NOVEMBER 1742 WILLIAM CLARK was baptised at St. Anne's Limehouse, son of WILLAM CLARK an ANCHOR SMITH and mother ANNE, residents of LIMEHOUSE CAUSEWAY.His siblings, Ann(1739) and John(1744) are also in the Parish register as being christened there. 

PEACE BE UPON YOU

St. Anne's Parish Register William junior  21/11/1742 

ACROSS THE MILES 

 It's possible my ancestor had a hand in SMITHING of

the HMS Endeavour anchor 

Captain James Cook on a Scientific mission,
Left England aboard The Endeavour 1768 .

ANCHORED IN COOK TOWN       

Australian grandchildren

When he reads this virtual note in the blogger-sphere future he will learn his ancestors may have seen the great Yorkshire-man, Captain James Cook walking or drinking alongside them on the East London riverside.

The Endeavour(replica)         

When Cook wasn't laying claim to Queensland in 1770 and other marvelous discoveries for the British sovereign, King George third, the brilliant Navigator lived on a mediocre seaman's wages on Mile End Road with his family, waiting for his ships to be serviced and fixed at the Royal Dockyard, Deptford.

photo 1924.  In the 1780's Chinese sailors employed
by the East India Company settled here to become London's first China Town.

I'll be home soon Anne - just gonna WET THE BABY'S HEAD...

old photos and history also at http://spitalfieldslife.com/2010/08/09/at-the-grapes-limehouse/
Since this article Sir Ian McKellan(Gandalf) and Co. have bought this old public house, and as it was a place where Charles Dickens frequented.

In William Clark Snr and Jnr's time it was called 
 "The Bunch of Grapes"
76 Narrow Street Lime house  
 www.thegrapes.co.uk

44 - THE NARROW - www.gordonramsay.com/thenarrow

Prospect of Whitby - Wapping