This part of the Salthouse family is from Liverpool and Nether Alderley, UK

Salthouse Tree

Salthouse Family

Salthouse History

Individual members of the Salthouse family 

John would have completed his apprentice as a boot and shoemaker with James Hough, shoemaker of Great Warford, in the Parish of Alderley, in 1841, when he was 21 years of age. The tithe maps on the Cheshire County Council website show that John then rented two plots of land and a small farmhouse close to Soss Moss Hall. The following year, in 1842, he married Lucy Walters at St Mary, Alderley. No doubt John's choice of accommodation was dictated more by the availability of property to rent than by his personal choice, but in those early years trade for a boot and shoemaker at Soss Moss could have been very brisk as a temporary village of railway navies was housed on land at Soss Moss Hall.

From John's marriage until the census of 1861 John is self employed as a master boot and shoemaker - in 1851 he has a shoemaker (described as a servant) boarding with the family at the cottage in Soss Moss so it may be presumed that the business was profitable. In 1861 John is still described as a boot and shoemaker but his wife and two oldest daughters are working as laundresses. Is this because trade is slack (the cotton famine was affecting Lancashire) or simply because there were, by now, a family of ten to be fed and clothed?

When John and Lucy married in 1842 the main railway line was just being built. In the next 20 years the town of Alderley Edge was created and developed so, by the mid 1870's, the ladies and gentlemen of Nether Alderley might have preferred to shop in Alderley for their shoes instead. There had been at least one other boot and shoemaker in the village, did the demand fall sufficiently for John to look for alternative work or did ill health make him take on easier work? 

There is no trace of John Salthouse after 1861. He is not buried at St Mary Alderley (or anywhere else, apparently); his death is not recorded in the GRO indexes although I still have to search through the Registrar's volumes to be sure that there is no record. John just disappeared and in 1871 Lucy describes herself as a widow. There are references to John Salthouse on later certificates. Generally the family seems to be proud of him: when his widow died in 1875 the family recorded her as the widow of John Salthouse, Master Boot and Shoemaker. Annie, who never married, was described on her death certificate of 1906 as Daughter of John Salthouse, Master Boot and Shoemaker. His son, William, however, when he married in 1871 referred to his father as a labourer, not a boot and shoemaker.

There is simply no record of John's death. There was no reason why he should not have been buried in one of the family's plots in Nether Alderley as there was space available, the family could afford to take Lucy to Southport a few years later (1875) and to convey her body back to Alderley for burial so, even if only because the sons were earning, this family was not impoverished. John left no will.

In 1854 Sophia, who was a nurse,  was with her daughter, Lucy, when she had a very difficult confinement; Sophia informed the Registrar of the baby's death.

Sophia died, age 77, on 1 April 1859, she was widowed (her occupation is shown as widow of Anthony Salthouse, coach driver), but we don't know when her husband died. Sophia lived at 32 Renshaw Street, Hulme in Manchester and died of chronic bronchitis; James Chappell of 15 Bark Street, Hulme, registered her death. 

Lucy Salthouse

(née Walters) (1822-1875) of Nether Alderley

William received the sum of £25 from grateful inhabitants in respect of the courageous and meritorious conduct he displayed on 22 June 1870. Shortly after his marriage he left the police form to go into business on his own account. The 1881 and 1901 census returns show William Salthouse as a hide and leather warehouse foreman in the Liverpool area and living firstly at Rydal Street and then at 4 Ash Leigh, Liverpool (Everton). Shortly after 1901 the family moved to a smallholding in Ditton, possibly because his son, also called William, was in poor health, the smallholding was on Green Lane, Ditton. William Salthouse died at Ditton in 1912.

SS Sachem

James Thomas Salthouse was born in Liverpool, lived at 4 Ash Leigh, Walton on the Hill, Liverpool, at the time of the 1901 census, must have moved to Ditton after that time, but was in Widnes Technical Institute until he was about 14. After school he was apprenticed to Grayson Rollers, engineers of Widnes, and trained to be an engineer, fitter and turner, a 7 years' apprenticeship to the age of 21.

By this time the First World War had started he had entered the Merchant Service as an Engineer, then he went into the Navy from the RNVR (Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve). His rank was commissioned Warrant Officer and we think he was 4th engineer on board his ship. He served on Q ships which were highly secret, as they were heavily armed naval ships masquerading as merchantmen. His ship (Sunhill, Ovita or Sachem) was torpedoed but fortunately he had just come off watch and was in his cabin when the torpedo hit and he escaped the ship, ending up in an open boat for three days in the Atlantic. The survivors were picked up by a friendly ship (fortunately). During WWI he visited South America and saw the Sugarloaf Mountain, visited South Africa and Capetown and he had been in the Pacific.

At the end of the First World War, Churchill asked for volunteers to go to Russia to help the White Russians, who were the Czar's army, to fight the Red Russians who were the communists. He volunteered (he said he'd never been to Russia!). He was still in the Navy and his ship, HMS Slavol  went to the Baltic Sea, to Estonia, near the town of Revel/Tallinn to 'oil the fleet' - which meant taking essential supplies of oil and mostly coal for the ships. It was so cold that when they went ashore they walked across the ice (the ship was firmly stuck in the ice). Details are in 'The Times Atlas of World History', p259, The Russian Revolution'.

After the war, he is remembered for his motorbikes. He loved motorbikes. In the 1920's he met Maud Ralston, who worked in the cigarette shop in Walton Lane. In WWI she had been a driller, and moved to the cigarette shop after the war.

William Salthouse was James Thomas' father. He is shown on the 1901 census as having been born in Alderley, and my grandfather said that the estate at Alderley was beautiful, so perhaps they visited family there occasionally? In the 1901 census William Salthouse is shown as living at 4 Ashleigh, Walton-On-The-Hill, Liverpool, and having the occupation of Hide Leather Warehouseman.

Please remember that the information on this website is only accurate to the best of my knowledge and belief. If any of the information is relevant to your own research, please double-check the sources.

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