WILLIAM LINCOLN BILLINGTON....

THE BLACKBURN POET

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  Born: Samlesbury 10th April,  1825

        My Grandad Walter Billington on the Right, Note Similar Face Features!

Son of Benedict Billington & Ann Bolton

William the Poet was born in 'Samlesbury' on the 3rd April, 1825 to parents Benedict BILLINGTON and Ann
BOLTON, in a house called 'Yew Trees', a wood built straw thatched cottage.

" His parents were the poorest of the handloom weavers and in 1825 both were working as the labourers on the
new road between Blackburn and Preston, Benedict as a road labourer and Ann breaking the stones"(Michael I
Watson-author of -William Billington the Blackburn Poet).

I cannot recall who sent me the yellow paperback copy of William Billington-The Blackburn Poet, on the front cover
was the picture of William, as soon as I looked into his face,  It was like looking into the face of my
beloved own grandfather, Walter Billington, also born in Blackburn in 1901. I wondered if there could be any connection to the Poet.?
Then I noticed that the booklet was written by a Michael WATSON, how coincidental that my
G.Grandmother was called Catherine WATSON........

.I then poured through the booklet absorbing every word.
I found  that William moved to Bradshaw Street in Blackburn around 1875 and became the proprietor of a
Beerhouse, it became a meeting place for writers and poets of Blackburn and came to be known as "The Poets
Corner"........call this coincidence.but that is the exact street my CAMPBELLS lived in 1876, their son John Richard
Campbell is my great grandfather born 1876 at No.11 Bradshaw Street, his daughter Alice, married my Grandfather Walter Billington.


In June of 1846, William married Elizabeth WALMSLEYand they produced two children, Elizabeth however died at  29 years in 1857 and left William caring for these small children at a time when there was a Cotton Famine
caused by the American Civil War, this made work hard to find, it was also however one of the events that gave Wm.
inspiration for one of his many famous poems."Th Surat Weyver's Song" which described the hardship of weavers"who were forced to weave poor quality Indian cotton, and was first published as a broadsheet in Blackburn", fourteen thousand copies were sold in this form"(Watson-pg 5-William the Poet) .

William remarried in July of 1867 to a Maria FAIRBOTTOM of Irish descent, he was forty two years old and she was twenty two years, I noted this age difference to be a trait thoughout the Billington lines as we will learn later, Elizabeth however was not happy with a husband that was continually engrossed in not only poetry, but also in politics and religion, as well as the Union Movement.

They had a son called John Bright who is found in the 1881 Census living with his father in Blackburn,
it appears that Maria had abandoned them whilst son John was young.

William died after a short but severe attack of bronchitis and inflammation of the lungs on Thursday the 3rd of January, 1884.

His published works included:

Sheen and Shade in 1861

Pendle Hill in 1876

Lancashire Songs with other Poems and Sketches in 1883

William became a very popular writer and teacher,despite his humble beginnings, he educated himself and put into words the lives and times of the lancashire factory worker to help us understand what life was really like in 19th Century lancashire.

He was undoubtedly a very talented writer who it seems only got the recognition it deserved towards the end of his life when he came to be known as The Blackburn Poet".

Family Tree of Wm the Poet:

All baptised at Fernyhalgh which is in Broughton Preston NB.Benedict died aged 38yrs in 1832.

1778 -Joseph- Deceased

 1781 - Thomas

1783 - Marie

1784-William-

1786-Helena

 1788- Joseph

 1791-Margaret

1793-Alice

1795-Benedict Richard (M)Ann Bolton-10th October, 1814 at Samlesbury

  1797-Ann...

 1800 -Grace. Decd 1803

Children of Benedict Richard BILLINGTON and Ann Bolton:

 All Bap. at Samlesbury except where  mentioned

1815.John

1816 Alice

1818  Robert

 1820   Thomas

1823    Ann (M)John HASLAMNov 15th 1856 St.Albans B'Burn. Witnesses: Elizabeth Billington and Thos. Haslam

1825     Wm..The Poet (M)  Elizabeth Walmsley (2) Maria Fairbottom

1828 Joseph(M) Margaret Tomlinson

1830     James(M) Isabella  Burton

1832     Marie/Mary

CENSUSUSES OF WILLIAM THE POET AND HIS FAMILY:-

William Married Elizabeth Walmsley in June of 1847 at Blackburn Registry Office.  Elizabeth deceased in 1857 and had two children to William, a Mary shown in 1851 Census below, and a William shown in 1861 Census below. William Remarried to Maria Fairbottom in July of 1867 and had one child, John Bright Billington shown below in 1871.

1851 BLACKBURN:1851: Byrom Street: Page 150...William Billington,25yrs Weaver, B. Samlesbury with wife Elizabeth 23yrs b. Blackburn and daughter Mary 1yr b. Accrington.

HIS MOTHER ANN IN 1851..... Blackburn: 2258 (1)Page 24: 5 Copy Street: Ann Billington 56yrs, b. Samlesbury, Widow, Son James Billington 21yrs, Weaver b. Samlesbury, daughter Ann 27yrs b. Samlesbury Rin 1212 Note: This is Ann Nee Bolton the wife of Benedict Billington and the mother of Wm the Poet with Wm's brother James and sister Ann. Benedict died in 1834, Ann did not remarry and died in 1866 aged 75yrs.Living with Ann is son Joseph 22yrs b. Samlesbury, Power Loom Weaver and his wife Margaret 24yrs b. Blackburn and their children, Alice 4yrs and John 1yr both b. Blackburn

William Deceased on the 3rd January, 1884 in Blackburn, See Below for a picture of his Grave.

FAMILY AND TREE OF JOSEPH BILLINGTON ......THE BROTHER OF WILLIAM

Joseph (M) Margaret Tomlinson in 1849 at the Blackburn Registry Office

Joseph and Margaret had two children.

John 1850

Mary Ann 1874 -Died 1875

Joseph visiting his brother William in 1861:

1861..... 54 HARWOOD STREET, TRINITY WARD:RESIDENCE OF THE POET:William Billington., 36yrs,widower,Tafie Sizer, b. Samlesbury, Daughter Marie 11yrs, b. Church, Reg. March ¼ 1850 under Mary, Ref: XX1 77. Son Wm 8 Years, Reacher for Drawer, b. Church,Reg. December ¼ 1852 Ref. No 8E 238. Brother Joseph 29yrs, son John 11 years, Mechanic in 1881,Son Robert 7 years, Ann his mother 70years, widow all at 54 Harvard Street.Josephs wife Margaret Nee Tomlinson: 1861-  Blackburn: : 8 Prospect Street: George Parker 35yrs with wife Ann 30yrs and children,Mary Ellen 6yrs and Susannah 4yrs, Ellen Tomlinson,Widow 67yrs,Mother In Law with Sister In Law Jane Tomlinson 28yrs, Sister In Law Margaret Billington 34yrs,Married b. Blackburn, Lodger James Booth 24yrs, Butcher b. Royton with Oldham.(Note a James Tomlinson is listed before Ellen the widow aged 12yrs and born breightmet? but listed as Father In Law, so am not sure if age is incorrect or description in relation to head)Possible that Ellen Tomlinson is the mother of Margaret and also in the home visiting is Margarets sister Jane.

 Margaret his wife died in 1878 aged 51yrs

Ellen HOLDEN U 25 F Blackburn, Lancashire, EnglandRel: LodgerOcc: Cotton Warper

William & Josephs sister Ann.(Seems like she may have had a daughter Alice out of wedlock in 1846 prior to marrying John Haslam:

1861 Blackburn] 2 Dock St: (Same Address as Ann and her Siblings in 1841)......John Haslam 27yrs b. Haslingden, Wife Ann(Agnes) 34yrs b. Samlesbury, Son Thos. Haslam 4yrs b. Blackburn, Stepdaughter Alice Billington 14yrs b. Blackburn.Ann married John Haslam in 1856 at St Albans RC, Blackburn.(Note:) I wonder if this is the connection between the Poet and the Hangmen? Reason being that the Hangmen's parents were James Billington b. 1816 and wife Mary HASLAM!????  It is a long shot and conjecture on my part, BUT it has been said that the Hangmen and the Poet were related, The Poet a Catholic and the Hangmen C of E

By 1891

It appears that Joseph has Re-Married again to a Sarah Ann Nee Bridge (M) 1884 at St Marys in Oldham

Son William Edward Vincent Married Mary Ann Green, 1905, Blackburn
 

 According to Michael I. Watson  ( author of 'William Billington" the Blackburn Poet,) After father Benedict died around 1832 at the early age of   thirty-eight years, his widowed mother had to support several children, the family faced illness as well as extreme poverty and within three years, three of the children had been stricken down with consumption.   Ann although uneducated herself, sent William to a Catholic Sunday School in Samlesbury and Osbalderstone where he was taught to read and write.  Robert Robert (or Force Robin) as he became known was a huge influence on William, even though he was somewhat older, Robert was literate and composed poems.  Wm. admired his popular and talented uncle and soon began emulating his uncles love of the written word.

     When William was twelve years of age he moved to 'Mellor Brook" and reluctantly went to work there together with an older sister and younger brother.(The Older sister turned out to be 'Ann and the younger brother was James) They were found in the 1841 Census in Blackburn.

William spent some time at 'Carding and Spinning" however before the age of eighteen years his health started to deteriorate due to the impure air he was breathing

From the time he arrived in Blackburn, William devoted his spare hours to study and the instruction of others, he joined the 'mechanics institution' when it was formed in 1840.    He also read a great range of books, one of them being a book loaned to him by a lodger who was looking at becoming a preacher.   He also joined a Lecture and Debating class and got heavily into politics, in fact his involvement with the Debating Class was quite controversial at times.

This next contribution is from Jack Langton on Wm the Poet, Interesting to note that he writes that 2 of Ann Boltons children were invalids...............I will look into this!

Jack is a fellow member of  St Johns College, Oxford and has published many pieces including the following:• Langton, J. (ed.) (forthcoming) "Where Geography and History Met": English Forests from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. Cambridge University Press.


Billington, William (1825-1884), was born at Samlesbury in the Ribble valley on 3rd April 1825, when his unemployed handloom weaver parents, Benedict and Ann, were working as road navvies. Benedict died aged 38 in 1832, and three of his children died from tuberculosis before 1837. Ann supported the four survivors, two of whom were invalids, by handloom weaving, going without sleep, helped by William, during one night per week. Billington learned to read and write at Catholic Sunday Schools, and although his mother was illiterate, she knew many songs, sung to William during their night-time work. The songs and satires composed for oral performance by her brother, Robert Bolton, and the example of Richard Dugdale, ‘The Bard of Ribblesdale’, with whom Billington began a lifelong friendship in his teens, also inspired him to write poetry.

      Billington loathed the factory work through which he supported his family in Blackburn after marrying Elizabeth Whalmsley (d. 1857) in 1846. Due to ill health, he became a publican (then took to drink) after his second marriage to Maria Fairbottom in 1868. Although both wives were illiterate, and Maria abandoned him and their young child in contempt for his intellectual interests, Billington was an insatiable autodidact. He committed to memory many lines from the major English poets, from Chaucer to Wordsworth, was a founder member of the Blackburn Mechanic’s Institute, taught grammar in a school in exchange for lessons in mathematics, advised trade unions, lectured on and debated religion and politics at any opportunity, and formed a Mutual Improvement Society, which met in a hayloft. He travelled around the North and Midlands to read and sell his poems. The beershop he ran in Bradshaw St. from 1875 became the forum for Billington’s debating skills; known as ‘Poet’s Corner’, it was where Blackburn’s large coterie of dialect poets met, despite its owner’s penchant for devastating criticism.

       The subjects of Billington’s writings in newspapers, broadsheets and pamphlets ranged widely. His first reputation was as a ‘public denier and assailant of ... religious belief’ (W. A. Abram, Blackburn Characters of a Past Generation (1894), p 221), but he was known as ‘The Blackburn Poet’ before he died from tuberculosis on 3rd Jan 1884, and has since been mainly remembered for his dialect ballads about the impact on workers of the Cotton Famine of 1861-64. Published as a broadsheet at the height of the panic, ‘Th’ Shurat weyvur’ sold 14,000 copies and, like ‘Aw wod this war wur ended’ of 1863, it has been frequently anthologised. Selections of Billington’s prose and poems, many first published in The Blackburn Standard and The Blackburn Times, appeared as Sheen and Shade (1861) and Lancashire Songs with other Sketches (1883).