This is the start of my research journey into the family history of my wife’s maternal grandmother, Rachel Welsh, who married Andrew Nicol in 1918. Rachel was known to my wife because for a short while Rachel lived in her daughter’s house in Gloucester until she died in the 1960’s. Her connection is not just with the Nicol’s but also with Ireland and a variety of industries and crafts that were popular at that time, some details of which are hard to discover. She is also the namesake of my daughter.
Rachel’s side of the McKie family story is an interesting insight to the trades and professions of the latter part of the 19th Century and offers a view of family life at that time. If the Nicol family have kept me busy during the past three years then I am sure the Welsh and Cunningham families will too.
This is Rachel’s original birth certificate from 1893. It is disintegrating slowly but is archived in an acid free folder. Her father has signed it in person and notice the custom in Scotland at that time of including the date of Martin and Agnes’s marriage in 1890. (From the authors own archive).
Rachel Welsh was born at 75 Raise Street in Saltcoats on 20th November 1893, a town that would be associated with her for most of her life. The house she might have been born in is still there, in a terrace of small townhouses that have been well cared for and preserved over the past 100 and more years. I suspect that I might be wrong though because the 1901 Census return shows several large families living at the same address which indicates that it was a tenement. The current house must have been built after that date. Her parents were Martin Welsh and Agnes Cunningham and Rachels entry into the birth register also helpfully tells us that Martin and Agnes were married in Kilmarnock in 1890. Martin was a Journeyman Joiner, which means he had finished his apprenticeship but was not yet a Master in his trade, so probably worked for a local firm of joiners. Martin and Agnes had not lived in Raise Street for long because in the 1891 Census return, they are listed as living in Ardrossan, a short way up the coast, at 17 Ardrossan Road. This was between the two towns and not far from Raise Street where they would go on to live and where Rachel was born.
The searches of the Census return for Martin, and his family, have been a challenge. They may have either been lost or he didn’t bother to respond to the Enumerator’s knock on the door. Then I stopped putting too much detail into my searches and the helpful Scotland’s People computer began to throw up the results that I was looking for. For example, the Welsh family may have lived in Saltcoats but in the 1901 Census return for example, their address in Saltcoats is found under Old Ardrossan. Omitting the town that I thought they lived in meant that I was offered alternative towns in the search results.
Martin was born in Dalry, a village further inland not far from Kilwinning and close to the Garnock Valley. He was brought up in one of the industrial heartlands of the 19th Century where coal mining and iron ore, together with the beginning of the dynamite industry, was the main employment in Ayrshire. Although I would like to think that his upbringing on Baidland Mill in Daly might have been a bit more idyllic than that, surrounded by farmland and hills.
Martin was born on 17th August 1869 at Baidland Mill which is a short way out of the centre of Dalry. I can remember driving past it when it was a visitor centre during the 1990’s but it is now closed and there are probably holiday cottages and lettings there now. His father was also Martin Welsh, and he was described in his son’s Birth Register as an Iron Miner. The Garnock Valley, to the northeast of Dalry was the centre of the Iron Industry and there would have been furnaces and associated industries all around this part of Ayrshire. There would have been many iron ore mines around Dalry attracting workers from all parts of Scotland and, in this case, Northern Ireland. So, here are two of our connections, the iron ore mining industry and Ireland. Martin Welsh senior and his wife Mary McDowall lived in Newtonards, a town in County Down, where they were married on 29th October 1855, 14 years before Martin Jnr was born.
The 1881 Census return show the Welsh family living in Dalry at a street that the enumerator has given two spellings for, either Synne Street or Lynne Street, both have distinctive L and S copperplate lettering. Neither street exists in Dalry now. Martin and Mary Welsh had six children. William, the eldest, 15 years old, was an apprentice Baker. His younger sister, Eliza, aged 13 years, was a Winder in a woollen mill. Martin, Samuel and David were aged 11, 9 and 5 and they were at school. Lastly there was Robert, aged 2 years. This Census return also confirms that Martin and Mary were both born in County Down, Northern Ireland.
How and where Martin Welsh met Agnes Cunningham will never really be known. Martin was living in 19 Raise Street in Saltcoats, a few doors down from where Rachel was later born, and Agnes was living in Kilmarnock at 9 Union Street. This street has been completely redeveloped and there is no evidence of the property that Agnes might have lived in. Martin had already finished his apprenticeship as a Joiner, and he was 21 at the time that he married Agnes Cunningham. She was 26 years old and described as a Furniture Polisher. Finding her trade is a pleasant surprise because most women at that point in time during the 19th Century would not have had their profession or trade described in their marriage registration. However, it was a trade that she entered early because the 1881 Census return shows that Agnes, at the age of 16, was a French Polisher then. That Census return also shows that she was living with her Grandparents, William and Maggie Alderdice who were living in 7 Union Street, Kilmarnock.
They were married at Agnes’s parents’ home in 9 Union Street on 19th December 1890. Her parents were William Cunningham and Rachel Craig. We can now see how the names Rachel and Cunningham were to be included in the names of Martin’s daughter and granddaughter when they were born.
William Cunningham had an interesting trade. He was described as a Journeyman Bonnet Dresser in Agnes’s wedding registration. I struggled to understand this and wondered if it was to do with hat making or hat embellishment for women. Why would William describe himself as a Journeyman? This would have implied that he has completed an apprenticeship and was working for someone else. I made a quick search for the term Bonnet Dresser and discovered that it was the term for a piece of specific domestic furniture to store hats in. Many of these dressers were designed and made to have two large square drawers at the top with perhaps a pair of trinket drawers between them. Beneath this would be three general purpose drawers. So, the conclusion that I am coming to is that William was making this furniture. It was a very popular item of furniture throughout the 19th Century. This could also be the reason how Martin Welsh met Agnes Cunningham, Martin being a Joiner. Perhaps it was through work. Agnes was described as a Furniture Polisher and so it all fits. Agnes may have been working for her father and Martin may have had work with William. This is conjecture on my part because there are contradictions about William’s trade in earlier Census returns. This will be an area of further discussion in the future.
Martin and Agnes settled in Saltcoats, and it was here in Raise Street that they raised Rachel, named after her Grandmother. She was one of six siblings and in the coming months I shall be exploring the lives of the Welsh family in greater detail.