This is a file on three Golden Dawn members who were living in Bradford when they were members - Joseph Clayton, Fanny Isabel Clayton and Eliza Craven. Joseph and Fanny Isabel are father and daughter, and Eliza is a colleague of Fanny Isabel. It seems to make sense to take them together.


BIG UPDATE MARCH 2024

Over the past two or three years I’ve found a lot more information on Joseph Clayton’s involvement in spiritualism and on the various ways in which he earned a living during his life. Alas! I haven’t found much more about Fanny Isabel, but I have identified Eliza Craven at last.


In the revised file below I give more coverage than I did originally to two aspects of Joseph’s life that aren’t strictly GD:


1) I look into his family. Joseph and his older sisters Jane and Isabella seem to have been the only survivors into adulthood of six – possibly more – siblings. As adults the three of them stuck together through all the hazards but also the opportunities of life in a 19th-century industrial town. I thought that closeness was worth pointing out, even though neither sister shared Joseph’s occult interests.


2) Bradford was wealthy and known the world over for its wool and silk industries. However and with the possible exception of Joseph Leech Atherton, TS members who joined the GD as well did not work in the mills. Some members of their families did, but they themselves did not. That’s not to say that their livelihoods didn’t depend on Bradford’s mills; they certainly did. They worked for local government, or for agencies of national government; or ran the kind of small business whose customers were mill workers or mill owners. Joseph and Fanny Isabel Clayton’s working lives are typical – not of Bradford, but of Bradford’s GD members.



THE GOLDEN DAWN

Joseph Clayton was the second person to become a member of the Order of the Golden Dawn at its Horus Temple in Bradford. He joined it in May 1888 along with three other Bradford residents whom he knew well: Thomas W Wilson, Francis Drake Harrison and Jeremiah Leech Atherton. Joseph chose the motto ‘Tollere velum’.


Joseph’s daughter Fanny Isabel Clayton was initiated at the Horus Temple in May 1893, choosing the motto ‘orare’. She joined on the same day as two men who lived in Liverpool: William Ranstead and Robert Sandham.


Two years after Fanny Isabel, in September 1895, Eliza Craven was initiated, choosing the motto ‘semper eadem’. Mrs Emmeline Alice Clark, who lived in Liverpool; and Charles Lowell Richardson, living in Bradford but soon to move away, joined on the same evening.


Of the three, Fanny Isabel was by far the most committed to the GD. She was the only one to pursue the Order’s programme of occult study as far as becoming eligible for its second initiation. She took that initiation, probably in March 1896, and at that point she became a member of the GD’s inner, 2nd Order and was able to try out some practical magic. Eliza Craven did begin the programme of study but seems to have stopped at level 2=9. And R A Gilbert has suggested that Joseph Clayton’s membership of the Order may have been a formality only – a compliment to a well-known local occultist - as he is not included on the GD Members’ Roll. He did have some occult interests. In 1883 he advertised in The Medium and Daybreak as a seller of planispheres, and could send instructions on how to use them. He had written a pamphlet, Questions in Astrology, which was available from his stationer’s shop. However, he was sceptical of one at least of the basics of magic – the use of talismans. He argued that possessing one could never do away with the need to take care.


Although they may not have known each other until they were both in the GD, Fanny Isabel Clayton and Eliza Craven had something in common. They had both been through the training for elementary school teachers in the expanding ‘school board’ system. They both applied to join the Order at a time of upheaval in their lives. It’s noticeable that Fanny Isabel put her best efforts into the GD in the mid-to-late 1890s. At that time, theosophy was going through a traumatic period of infighting. When some kind of equilibrium in the TS was restored in Bradford around 1901, Fanny Isabel gave up active membership of the GD and went back to theosophy, remaining with it until her death. The upheaval in Eliza Craven’s life was more personal – both of her parents died in the year she joined, and she left Bradford to live in Liverpool.


JOSEPH AND SPIRITUALISM IN BRADFORD

In 1899 Joseph wrote to the occult magazine Light describing how spiritualism operated in Bradford. His letter was contributing to a perennial problem in spiritualism and thus a constant theme in Light – fraudulent mediums. Joseph wrote that spiritualism was very active in Bradford but was operating below the level at which it would attract wider attention or be seen as a suitable place for fraudulent mediums to seek clients. It was based on meetings of neighbours and friends; it used mediums who didn’t do it for money; and participants tended to believe in the spiritualist experiences only of those they knew and trusted. He and his family must have been part of this scene; possibly the Cravens were as well. However, in his letter Joseph wrote in a broad terms, he didn’t mention any names.


By the 1890s Joseph had been a keen believer in spiritualism for many years. During the time in the late 1870s and early 1880s when he was running a stationer’s shop, he was selling the spiritualist magazine The Spiritual Pioneer. The Spiritual Pioneer was printed in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Joseph may have known its publisher and editor, William Henry Lambelle, who was a medium and speaker on spiritualism in north-east England. Joseph was also reading the London-based spiritualist newspaper The Medium and Daybreak, and going to talks given on spiritualism in the Bradford area. By 1882 he knew Emma Hardinge Britten (who operated out of Manchester) and in 1883 was on her list of speakers on spiritualism, published in her magazine The Two Worlds.


From the 1880s, at least to 1903, Joseph wrote letters on current themes in the occult, firstly to The Medium and Daybreak and later to Light. At first using a pseudonym (common amongst writers to all types of magazines at the time), by 1889 he had the confidence to put his own name on his letters. He gave his opinion on practical issues like whether spiritualism should organise itself into ‘official’ societies for campaigning and other purposes (he thought not). He also contributed to debates on some very obscure and arcane subjects:

- in 1889 it was whether specific psychic powers ran in families;

- in 1890 it was whether the spirit existed before the body is born – Joseph thought it must surely do so, and similarly it must after the death of the physical body: otherwise how could it be immortal?

- also in 1890 he sent in evidence of one particular Bradford medium’s ability to predict events.

- in 1891 in the wake of the death of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, he contributed to a debate on spiritualism vs theosophy;

- in 1898 he was discussing the reality of existence. This was a continuing theme in Light, to which GD member Isabel de Steiger also contributed that year;

- also in 1898 Joseph argued strongly for reincarnation, another subject of endless dispute in Light’s pages. He thought life in a physical body was part of the spirit’s learning experience.

- in 1899 he was noting how reluctant spiritualists were to use the word ‘death’. As a believer that the spirit continued when the physical body died, he urged spiritualists not be so frightened of the term. His letter didn’t say so, but in taking this view he wrote as a man who had seen a lot of death in his life;

- in 1903 he had an opinion to put forward on perhaps the biggest subject of all for spiritualists and theosophists – what is God?


Though not all spiritualists took any interest in other forms of occult knowledge, there were many people who were interested in both. When Joseph and Fanny Isabel Clayton’s membership details were finally entered in the TS’s membership register in the early 1890s, the details written down for them indicated that they had been members since the early 1880s, from before any TS lodges were established outside London. In the early 1880s Anna Bonus Kingsford and the members of the London Lodge looked to the texts of both western classical occultism and eastern philosophy for knowledge; Kingsford at least also used mediumistic trance to gain understanding. Originally, Helena Petrovna Blavatsky had also studied the occultism of the west; but as she began to focus on eastern philosophy, it was gradually driven out of the TS. In the 1880s at least Joseph was keeping his western and eastern options open. By 1890 he had read Anna Bonus Kingsford’s Clothed with the Sun, and probably other works by her as well, but when Blavatsky’s The Secret Doctrine was published in 1888 he also read that, and was confident enough in his own views to write to Blavatsky about her comments on the teachings of Simon Magus.


The publication of The Secret Doctrine and Blavatsky’s decision to take up residence in London led to a rapid expansion in the number of TS lodges in England, with at least one being set up in most large towns. In Bradford, a meeting was held to found Bradford TS Lodge in 1891. The names of the men who were present (no women’s names were listed in the account) show clearly how closely connected the TS lodge and the GD’s Horus temple would be over the next decade: Oliver Firth, William Williams, Thomas Wilson and Joseph Midgley were Bradford TS Lodge’s officers in its first year; and its committee was made up of Joseph Clayton, Thomas Henry Pattinson, Francis Drake Harrison and Dr Bogdan Edwards. All those men joined the GD in due course though not all stayed in the Order for very long. Bradford Lodge having duly been founded and rooms for its meetings hired, the first members set about recruiting friends that were theosophically-inclined, most of whom joined the GD as well; and so on...


Joseph had inspired an interest in occultism in some (though not all) of his children. Accounts from the early 1890s mention the ‘misses’ Clayton as TS members, so at least one of Fanny Isabel’s sisters was also a member of Bradford Lodge, most probably Ellen Jane; and several years later their brother Robert also joined it. Three potential recruits who did not join either the TS or the GD were Joseph Clayton’s two sisters, and his wife Jane; they seem to have had no occult interests although they may all have been a keen spiritualists.


During his time as a member of the TS, the members’ magazine The Vahan provided another outlet for Joseph Clayton’s ideas on occultism; though his letters tended to focus on western ideas rather than eastern. In 1893 he joined in an ongoing argument over the meaning of the biblical concept of atonement. He objected to attempts being made to reinterpret ‘atonement’ to mean ‘at-one-ment’ in which, Joseph argued, the word lost the requirement for expiation of sins. His letter brought several dissenting responses including one from GD member John William Brodie-Innes. Joseph replied to the dissenters, sticking to his guns and quoting Romans VII, Leviticus, and what he called “the original Kepher”.


Helena Petrovna Blavatsky died in May 1891 and in the following four years factions centered on Annie Besant and William Quan Judge fought for control of theosophy’s organisation and future direction. Judge’s supporters lost the battle, in 1895, but it was a pyrrhic victory for Besant’s faction: so many people left the TS in England during the years 1893-95 that entire lodges closed down; the majority of lodges in the USA left as a group and founded their own theosophical organisation; and membership of the TS in Britain and in Europe never recovered. The issue divided the members of Bradford TS Lodge, with a breakaway group – which I think was made up of supporters of Judge - founding the Athene Lodge. Joseph and Fanny Isabel and probably Ellen Jane as well left Bradford Lodge in 1893 and stopped paying their annual subscriptions to the TS in London. Though Joseph did not, Fanny Isabel and Ellen Jane joined Athene Lodge. However, neither sister remained a member of it for long: Fanny Isabel left in 1894 and spent several years – the years of her best efforts in the GD – without a TS lodge to belong to. And Ellen Jane got married and left Bradford in 1895.


Feelings had run so high in Bradford during the Besant/Judge dispute that despite neither of the two lodges having enough members to be viable, it took until 1902 for theosophists in the city to put the past behind them. Athene Lodge was closed down and Bradford Lodge founded for a second time. Robert Clayton and his wife Ada were the mainstay of the 1902 version of Bradford Lodge for the next 40 years; but Joseph never rejoined the TS. Eliza Craven had never been a member, and continued not to be one. Fanny Isabel rejoined Bradford Lodge but seems to have been wary of playing too prominent a role in it: she never gave any talks, didn’t ever act as lodge hostess for visiting TS grandees and was never an officer of the lodge.


Fanny Isabel worked full-time of course, until the late 1920s, so didn’t have that much time to spare for out-of-school commitment; but did she feel that there was something lacking in the reconstituted Bradford Lodge? When the Minerva Lodge was founded in Bradford in 1917 she joined it and was its secretary for some years, until her death. Minerva Lodge was the project of several old acquaintances. Founder Miss Pattinson (probably Ethel) was one of the four daughters of GD and TS members Thomas Henry and Eliza. Edward John and his wife Ella Mary Dunn were the other founder members: though Ella Mary had not been in the TS in the 1890s, Edward John Dunn and his brother Harold had been in Bradford TS Lodge then, and Edward had been in the GD for a short time as well.



THE EXTENDED CLAYTON FAMILY

The lives of the Claytons seem fairly typical of those members of the GD who lived in Bradford. Many members of the family died young. Those who survived often had two or three relationships during their lives, in and out of marriage. Step-parents and half-siblings were common and moving from one relationship to the next after a partner had died or left was often rapid. Staying close to your relatives helped everyone through these continual and often unexpected changes. Joseph’s daughters spent time living with their aunts; Joseph may have worked for his mother’s second husband and one of his sons married a relation of that man… This way of coping only began to break up a little when some of the children moved away because of work or marriage; even then, they often came back.


Since I first began to research the GD members a lot of Clayton family history has been posted on the web, but I can’t seem to find Joseph Clayton the TS and GD member in any of it. My earliest sighting is on the day of the 1841 census, when he was 5 and living in the household of his mother Jane, who was then about 40. Jane Clayton was already a widow, working to continue her husband’s business selling china, earthenware and glassware, with the help of her eldest daughter Sarah; between Sarah and Joseph came Mary, Jane and Isabella; and there was a one-year-old brother William, who died a few months later, leaving Joseph as the youngest survivor.


True to the life-pattern I’ve described above, in 1845 Joseph’s mother married again though she did not have any more children. Jane’s husband this time was Martin Beanland, who ran his own joinery business. On the day of the 1851 census Jane and Martin were living at 144 Westgate, Bradford. Jane’s children Jane, Isabella and Joseph were living with them, but none of Martin Beanland’s children, who were older. Jane Beanland was still running the china and glassware business; as daughters Sarah and Mary were no longer living with the family it was Joseph’s sister Jane’s turn to work for her mother. Joseph, aged 14, was also working; he was a plane maker, probably employed in his step-father Beanland’s business.


Only a few months after census day 1851, Joseph’s mother was widowed again when Martin Beanland died. Though his joinery business continued, Joseph left it, to take advantage of opportunities opening up in a completely different type of work. Though I haven’t discovered anything about how or where Joseph was educated, his knowledge of the Bible must have been good enough for him to be hired as a teacher for the National School for Promoting Religious Education (NSPRE). He went to work at one of its schools in Liverpool, where he met certainly his first and possibly both his wives.


Joseph’s first wife, Louisa, was the daughter of Simon Shelcott, a master mariner, and his wife Maria. Joseph and Louisa were married in Aigburth in 1858 and went to live in Northampton where Joseph had a new teaching job. Their son William Charles Edward Clayton was born there in 1859, and they were still there in 1861, on Maple Street, lodging with Elizabeth Shepherd, who was in business as a grocer. Joseph and Louisa’s daughter Cora Clayton was born during May 1861, but Louisa did not recover well from the birth and died a few months later. At the beginning of the following year so did Joseph and Louisa’s son William Charles Edward. Joseph had moved jobs again by this time, taking his son with him – William died in Rotherham where Joseph worked for a year or two before returning to Liverpool.


In spring 1862, a few weeks after his son’s death, Joseph Clayton married Jane Arkell. I have not been able to discover much about her, despite her rare surname and her consistency in telling various census officials that she’d been born in Liverpool, around 1839/40. Jane brought a child from a previous relationship to her marriage to Joseph, a daughter born in 1859 or 1860, who was always named in the census as Ellen Roberts; I can’t find evidence of a previous marriage for Jane Arkell so perhaps Ellen was illegitimate.


Future TS and GD member Fanny Isabel Clayton was the eldest child of Joseph Clayton and his second wife Jane Arkell, born in Thorpe Hesley near Rotherham in 1863. Joseph’s next move, back to Liverpool, came between Fanny Isabel’s birth and that of her sister Ellen Jane in 1865. Next came another daughter, Jenny, born in Liverpool in 1867; she died in 1873. Then there seems to have been a puzzling gap, of several years, before the birth of two sons – future TS member Robert in 1876; and Harold in 1878; he died in 1881. Next came Oswald, born 1881; and then the ninth (that I know of) and last of Joseph’s children, Hilda, born 1883 – that is, 20 years after Fanny Isabel.


By 1871 Joseph had moved again, back to Bradford this time. This move was different - after it, he stayed in his home city for the rest of his life, living in the area between Bowling and Horton, near where he had grown up. His mother Jane and sister Jane continued to live very near Joseph’s family. Isabella moved out of that set of streets after a few years, though not very far – she went firstly to Manningham, then to Armley.


After moving back to Bradford Joseph never worked again as a teacher. It’s likely that his return home was in order to take over the family business because his mother Jane Beanland wanted to stop running it. On the day of the 1871 census Joseph, now describing himself as a “shopman”, was at 24 High Street, Great Horton. As well as wife Jane, Jane’s daughter Ellen Roberts, Joseph’s daughter Cora Clayton, and the daughters Joseph and Jane had together - Fanny Isabel, Ellen Jane and Jenny – were living with them. Not far away, at 25 Horton Road, Jane Beanland had moved in with Joseph’s sister Isabella and her husband John Walton, who worked as a stuff packer in a Bradford mill. Joseph’s sister Jane, now married to grocer Joseph Waring, was at 59 Manchester Road Little Horton.


I think Joseph was an unwilling recruit to the china and glassware business. During the next 20 years or so he acted like a man who would rather have been doing something else. He tried to set up other businesses, maybe instead of the chinaware, maybe in tandem with it. He ran a bookshop for a while and then a stationers; he did other people’s accounts for them; he ran a confectionary business; and I’ve already mentioned that he wrote some pamphlets on astrology and tried selling astrological equipment. None of those businesses seem to have been successful and in 1901 he was back where he started - he told that year’s census official he was a dealer in china and glass. Unlike some of Joseph’s sisters in the previous generation, none of his own children worked selling china and glassware full-time and when Joseph retired, the business seems to have closed down.


On census day 1881 Joseph and Jane were at 63 Manchester Road Little Horton where they lived until the mid-1890s. Jane’s daughter Ellen Roberts, Joseph’s daughter Cora Clayton, and their joint family so far – Fanny Isabel, Ellen Jane, Robert, Harold and Oswald - were all at home. Joseph was running the stationer’s shop. The household had more money coming in: Ellen Roberts was working as a barmaid; Fanny Isabel had begun her training as a teacher; and Ellen Jane was working as a worsted spinner. Joseph’s mother Jane Beanland, now 82, was living with Joseph and Jane (she died in 1884); and Joseph’s sister Jane and her husband Joseph Waring were where they were in 1871, a few doors away at 59 Manchester Road.


On the day of the 1891 census Joseph and Jane were still at 63 Manchester Road; at this point Joseph was running the confectionery business and doing accounts. Jane’s daughter Ellen Roberts had got married and moved out but Ellen Jane, Robert, Oswald and Hilda were at home: Oswald and Hilda still at school; Ellen Jane working as a cotton winder; and Robert doing his printing apprenticeship.


Joseph’s brother-in-law Joseph Waring – his sister Jane’s husband – had died in 1889. Jane Waring took over the running of the shop at 59 Manchester Road; on the 1891 census she’s described as a corn dealer. Fanny Isabel had moved in with Jane Waring and Joseph and wife Jane had moved a few streets to Portland Street. Jane Waring died in 1896 and by census day 1901 Joseph and Jane had moved into the Warings’ shop at 59 Manchester Road. Joseph was back selling china. Only Oswald and Hilda were living at home. Cora had gone to live with her aunt Isabella Walton, also widowed now and living in Armley. Ellen Jane had married Harry Wilson in 1895 and moved to Halifax, though she was back in Bradford by 1911. Robert had married Ada Beanland in 1900; they and their son Arnold were living Sandford Road, on the eastern side of Bradford. And in 1901 Fanny Isabel and her fellow teacher Eliza Craven were living at 141 Grafton Street Little Horton. Fanny Isabel was listed as the householder with Eliza as a boarder, the census form not having been designed for a household with two householders and expenses shared, the more likely arrangement in this case.


ELIZA CRAVEN

Eliza Craven had been born in Kirkstall, north-west of Leeds, in 1866. Her father, John, was from Eccleshill and her mother, Mary, from Bradford. She had three older siblings: Thomas Halliday, Frederick Richard and Emma; and one younger sister, Annie. John Craven worked as a stuff finisher and changed jobs twice while Eliza was a child. By 1870 the family had gone from Kirkstall to Shipley-cum-Heaton; and by 1881 they were in Bradford, at Anvil Street in the suburb of Manningham. Quite a few members of Bradford’s TS were living in Manningham in the 1880s and 1890s but I haven’t found any evidence that the Cravens had occult interests, so they probably didn’t know the TS members well. Eliza may not have known about the GD until she was living in Liverpool.


In 1881 Eliza was training to be a teacher in the school board system but in 1891 she wasn’t working in a school, she and her sister Annie were employed as clerks in a drapery business. Eliza must have left that job by 1895, when she was living in Liverpool; perhaps she had moved to Liverpool to take up a post as a teacher.


After 1901 Eliza Craven becomes hard to find. She wasn’t with Fanny Isabel on the day of the 1911 census. I don’t think she had married and she hadn’t died, as far as I can see, but she was not in the UK so perhaps she was on holiday; in which case she and Fanny Isabel might still have been house-sharing partners.


FANNY ISABEL AND ELIZA CRAVEN AS TEACHERS

Joseph Clayton’s time as a teacher took place before the 1870 Elementary Education Act, which began the gradual process of creating a national primary school education system in England and Wales. In contrast, Fanny Isabel and Eliza’s lives as teachers were spent as employees of the school boards which the Act set up. At least in London, the training of elementary school teachers was an equivalent to an apprenticeship: trainees had to have their father’s written permission, they were indentured for four years while they trained, and wages were very low during that time. The training was mostly in the classroom but also included homework and exams; and – again my information is about London – completing the training did not necessary guarantee that the school board would employ you. Completing the training and then not being offered a job – at least, not at once - might have happened to Eliza Craven.


The subjects teacher were employed to teach the girls in the schools were restricted by assumptions about class and gender which were ideological rather than realistic but which were held by most people, probably including Fanny Isabel and Eliza themselves. Even in Bradford in the late 19th century, when and where other kinds of work were available to young women, the elementary school curriculum prepared girls only for a life of doing housework, either unpaid for their husband and children, or paid, for an employer. The elementary school focus was on the practical skills of sewing and laundry work; even basic arithmetic and any understanding of household money were thought unnecessary for girls. Fanny Isabel had most likely had a wider education than this, with a father who was a teacher; though it’s equally likely that Eliza had not. I just note here that none of Joseph’s daughters ever worked as a paid domestic servant, though they did, of course, do housework at home and I think Cora may have managed her aunt Isabella’s household for her.


Women teachers were paid less than the men, of course, and in general could not expect to be chosen for the best posts. There was no provision for retirement or a pension for men or women until the Elementary School Teachers’ Superannuation Act of 1898. However, teaching in the school board system had attractions for the right kind of woman. The pay, hours and working conditions of teaching were good, as work for women went. As the school board system expanded over the next few decades, there were some chances for promotion. Teaching offered some financial independence to members of a social class where women had very little; and it could make marriage a choice rather than a financial necessity.


Fanny Isabel remained a teacher all her working life and never married; once she had found work as a teacher perhaps Eliza Craven did the same. Eliza probably started work as a teacher too late to make it to the top. However, at some point between 1901 and 1911 Fanny Isabel was promoted to school headmistress. Even before that her wages were likely to have been at the higher end of the average for women teachers, as she had been teaching for so long. The average in 1911 was between £50 and £150 per year; but promotion to headmistress presumably included a pay rise. It also took her away from Horton and Bowling; to Baildon, on the north side of Bradford.


FINALLY ON THE CLAYTONS

Between 1901 and 1911, Joseph retired – probably with relief – from the family business. He and Jane and Hilda – the only child still living at home – moved house again. On the day of the 1911 census they were at 204 Tichborne Road, a few streets away. TS members Robert and Ada Clayton had also moved, back to the west side of town; they were at 64 Broadway Avenue, Chapel Green. At least on census day, Fanny Isabel was the sole occupant of 28 East Parade, Baildon.


Joseph Clayton died in 1912; and Jane Clayton in 1917. Hilda had married George Bishell in 1913.


Under the 1898 Act that gave her a pension, Fanny Isabel would have been able to retire in 1928, when she was 65. It’s difficult to calculate what level of pension she would have been entitled to as I don’t know exactly how many years she had been working; but a pension of £50 a year seems likely; though not generous. Not having worked in teaching for so long, Eliza Craven’s pension will have been much less – always supposing she was still teaching at age 65.


Fanny Isabel enjoyed 6 years of retirement before she died in 1934 aged 71.


**


SOURCES FOR JOSEPH and FANNY ISABEL CLAYTON and ELIZA CRAVEN

JOSEPH, FANNY ISABEL AND ELIZA IN THE GD:

R A Gilbert The GD Companion compiler R A Gilbert. Wellingborough Northamptonshire: The Aquarian Press. 1986. Initiations: Joseph p133 with note about his not being on the Members’ Roll; Fanny Isabel p137; Eliza p138.


JOSEPH AS A SPIRITUALIST

The Medium and Daybreak. At iapsop.com, volume 12 issue of 3 February 1882 p71 headed Doings at Bradford. Joseph had written in about several talks he had attended recently: one by Emma Hardinge Britten; one given by a Mr Learoyd at the Bradford Mechanics’ Institute at which the speaker had denounced spiritualism; and one he’d hoped to hear at Bradford’s Temperance Hall. This was going to be another exposé of spiritualism to be given by a Mr Firman – but Mr Firman never turned up.

The Medium and Daybreak volume 14 issue of 16 November 1883 p736 a small ad from J Clayton at 63 Manchester Road Bradford advertising planispheres for sale, for use in astrological calculations; for an extra 2/6 he would send a letter on how to use them. The advert mentioned a pamphlet Questions in Astrology, also costing 2/6. NB that Clayton didn’t specifically claim to be its author; though I suppose he must have been.

At iapsop.com a list of available mediums and speakers on spiritualism transcribed from The Two Worlds, the spiritualist magazine edited by Emma Hardinge Britten; issue of 30 December 1887 p110: Mr Clayton of 63 Manchester Road is on the list though it isn’t clear whether he’s a medium, a speaker, or both.

I didn’t come across any references to Fanny Isabel as involved in spiritualism as a speaker or medium for hire. She may have helped her father in his book and stationer’s shops. If she was a medium it will have been in the ‘family and friends’ circumstances described by Joseph in his letter to Light in 1899.

See also the section on Joseph’s stationer’s shop.


Letters to the magazine Light, whose full publication details are: Light: A Journal of Psychical, Occult and Mystical Research published by the Eclectic Publishing Co of London WC1 which had strong ties with the London Spiritualist Alliance. They shine a light into what one occultist, an ordinary man from Bradford, believed:

1885 volume 5

- Light issue of 3 January 1885 p 4 a letter from Joseph using the pseudonym Ebor. It’s definitely him because the address is 63 Manchester Road Bradford. Topic: Contradictions of Spiritualism.

1889 volume 9

- Light issue of 29 June 1889 p315 a letter in response to an article in issue of 20 June [1889] suggesting that spiritualists didn’t like organising themselves in ‘official’ groupings.

- Light issue of 13 July 1889 p337, one of many letters responding to a recent article by Newton Crosland. Joseph was looking particularly at the question of whether children inherited a parent’s psychic powers. He also argued against Crosland’s assertion that our life’s problems were our own creation.

- Light issue of 20 July 1889 p348 a letter responding to one by George Wyld MD (published issue of 6 July) on the subject of heredity. There were a lot of other letters on the subject in this issue, including one from Resurgam, GD member Dr Edward Berridge.

- Light issue of 30 November 1889 p580 again replying to something Joseph had read in a previous issue; this time a letter from “R” on Spiritualism and Fatalism.


1890 volume 10

- Light issue of 8 February 1890 pp71-72 a letter headed Is the Spirit Immortal? Joseph referred to a talk he must have attended on 30 December 1889 in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. The speaker was the medium J J Morse and he had argued that for an Ego to exist before birth was an impossibilty. As a believer in reincarnation Joseph couldn’t agree with Morse’s view.

- Light issue of 26 April 1890 p207. A short letter in which Joseph related a recent experience he’d had at a séance in Bradford. While the séance was going on a big fire had broken out in Bradford, the medium giving details of it to his or her listeners while the séance continued. It was in this letter that Joseph mentioned having read Anna Bonus Kingsford’s Clothed with the Sun.


1891 volume 11

- Light issue of 12 September 1891 p443: Spiritualism v Theosophy. In his letter Joseph discussed Helena Petrovna Blavatsky’s views on the suppose conflict. Just noting here that Blavatsky herself was a spiritualist medium.


Then there was a pause of several years before Joseph wrote in again.

1898 volume 18

- Light issue of 19 March 1898 p143 a letter from Joseph on Astrology asking why the typical circle was divided into 360 degrees rather than any other number. In the issues of 2 April 1898 p159 and 9 April 1898 pp170-171 “CCM” – Charles Carleton Massey, a regular contributor to Light - replied.

- Light issue of 2 November 1898 pp558-59 Physical and Spiritual, a contribution from Joseph to one of the current themes in the magazine – the reality of existence. GD member Isabel de Steiger also contributed a letter on the subject. Joseph was replying to a letter published in the issue of 10 September 1898. Once again he was arguing for reincarnation, on the grounds that your spirit can’t learn as much during a life in the physical world as it can in the spiritual world.

1899 volume 19

- Light issue of 4 March 1899 p107 Joseph contributing to a the endless problem of fraudulent mediums. It was in this letter that he described the spiritualist scene in Bradford, which he thought of as a way of protecting spiritualists from frauds like the Bangs sisters, whose exploits had ended up in court in the USA.

- Light issue of 25 March 1899 pp143-44 a letter in which Joseph, speaking again from a conviction that reincarnation exists, argued that spiritualists shouldn’t be afraid to use the word ‘death’ – only the physical body died, not the spirit.

1900 volume 20

- Light issue of 12 May 1900 p227: Planetary Influences. Joseph was replying to a letter from ‘Martha’ published on 21 April 1900, about the trade in talismans. His advice was not to buy one as most people who sell them only want to make money; and in any case, having a talisman doesn’t do away with the need to take due care. Talismans were a feature of the GD’s magic; Joseph’s suspicions of them might explain why he didn’t take his membership of the GD very far.

1903 volume 23 but please note I didn’t read all the issues this year

- Light issue of 22 August 1903 p405. Some topics were so enormous that the readers of Light never reached any conclusion on them. Joseph was attempting a reply to a previous letter-writer living in Pietermaritzburg who had asked not only What is God? But also What is Conscience?

It’s likely that Joseph continued to be a regular reader of Light, and an occasional correspondent, after 1903. But so far – March 2024 – my sweep through the issues of Light stops at end 1903.


In all my searches of Light and its fellow spiritualist magazines I haven’t come across any letters or articles by Fanny Isabel Clayton; though of course she could have written in using a pseudonym and not giving a full address.


THE PUBLICATIONS JOSEPH HAD DEFINITELY READ with others by the same two authors:

Blavatsky:

Isis Unveiled: A Master-Key to the Mysteries of Ancient and Modern Science and Theology. New York: J W Bouton September 1877 in an edition of 1000 copies which sold out in 9 days.

Copies from subsequent print-runs were available through J W Bouton’s agent in England, for £1 16 shillings.

Source: The Spiritualist and Journal of Psychological Science volume 11 July-December 1877 p198 issue of 26 October 1877. Advance notice of its publication was printed in The Spiritualist as early as volume 10 January-June 1877 p36 issue of 19 January 1877, though giving it a slightly different title – The Veil of Isis.

The Secret Doctrine: the Synthesis of Science, Religion and Philosophy in two volumes. London: Theosophical Publishing Co 1888.

Source for Joseph having read it by mid-1889: at //leedslodge.com there’s a transcription of a letter Blavatsky sent to “Mr J Clayton” dated 13 July 1889 and written at Fontainebleau, replying to his letter about her assessment of the teachings of Simon Magus.


Anna Bonus Kingsford:

The Perfect Way; or the Finding of Christ. Actually credited jointly to both Kingsford and her occult partner Edward Maitland. London: Field and Tuer 1882.

The Hermetic Works. The Virgin of the World. Kingsford as translator and editor of works originally in Greek and Latin; also writing an introduction and notes. London: G Redway 1886.

Clothed with the Sun: Being the Book of the Illuminations of Anna Kingsford. Edited by Maitland and published after Kingsford’s death. In the UK: G Redway 1889. In the US: John W Lovell and Co in their Lovell’s Occult Series, number 9. New York 1889



THE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY

Theosophical Society Membership Register volume January 1889-September 1891 p103 entry for Joseph Clayton. Annual subscriptions paid 1891 to 1893, then “Lapsed” and “Left Bradford Lodge since Feb 1893”.

Theosophical Society Membership Register June 1893 to March 1895 p30 a belated entry for Fanny Isabel with her original application date as April or May 1890; a note says “Old Member”. Annual subscriptions paid 1893-95 then “WQJ” [William Quan Judge]. Another note describes her as a member of Bradford Lodge, then of Athene Lodge but only until 1894.


In general on the TS in Bradford, in 2012 there was a detailed history of the TS in Bradford at this website:

www.ts-bradford.org.uk/theosoc/btshisto.htm#


Alas! When I looked in March 2024, it was no longer online. Such a pity, not only because it was very detailed and gave lots of names of members – I love a list of names! - but also because it was Fanny Isabel’s brother, Robert Clayton, who had the idea of writing a history of Bradford Lodge in 1941, when its 50th anniversary was coming up. The 50th anniversary history was my source for:

- at least one of Fanny Isabel’s sisters being in the TS in the 1890s;

- the setting up of Athene Lodge by defectors from Bradford Lodge; which included GD members such as Joseph Clayton; Eliza Pattinson; Bogdan Edwards and Joe Dunckley;

- the tricky process that reunited the two theosophical factions in Bradford Lodge in 1902;

- Fanny Isabel not being an elected officer of Bradford Lodge as re-founded in 1902, and as not giving any talks;

- her sister-in-law Ada Clayton’s very active involvement in the re-founded lodge;

- the founding of Minerva Lodge in 1917, Fanny Isabel’s involvement and some at least of its other members;

- and finally that there was no mention of Eliza Craven being involved either in Bradford Lodge 1891 version or 1902 version; or in Minerva Lodge. I did not find her name when I did my sweep through the TS membership registers.


The founding of Bradford Lodge; with names: The Vahan volume 1 1890 p7.

Joseph’s letters in The Vahan, the magazine for members of the TS’s European section:

The Vahan volume 2 number 8 issued 1 March 1893 p1: atonement.

The Vahan volume 2 number 9 issued 1 April 1893 pp1-2: replies.

The Vahan volume 2 number 10 issued 1 May 1893 p1: a riposte from Joseph and p2 continuing argument from John William Brodie-Innes and others, everybody sticking to their original belief.

Joseph Clayton had several friends who were freemasons, but he didn’t take up any offers that might have been made to him, to be initiated himself. He was an Oddfellow:

A List of Lodges Comprising the Independent Order of Odd Fellows issued 1880 p163 in the list of lodges in Bradford: Lodge Benevolence founded 1835. Meets every 4th Monday at the Market Tavern Godwin Street. Contact: Joseph Clayton, 63 Manchester Road.


JOSEPH AT WORK:

1 = plane maker

Wikipedia on planes has pictures of ancient ones looking very modern. The planes Joseph was employed to make must have been very similar - the design hasn’t changed much down the centuries.

Evidence that Martin Beanland’s business continued after he died in 1851: The British Architect volume 2 1874 p264 it’s a google snippet so I couldn’t see the name of the building which was the subject of the article but it was a prestigious one, at Manningham Park, and was to include an assembly room, lecture rooms, a library etc. Amongst the contractors working on the building were Messrs Beanland, joiners, of Bradford.


2 = teacher, employed by the National School for Promoting Religious Education (NSPRE).

Sources: Joseph’s first marriage 1858, see below. 1861 census where he’s described specifically as a “National school master”.

In 2012 I did find a good source for how the NSPRE’s schools were run. When I checked it out in 2024 it wasn’t online any more; though there are other sources online, usually specific to one area but giving the general gist of how many teachers to how many pupils; and indications of wages.


3 = the Clayton family business which sold china, earthenware and glassware. Sources are: census entries 1871; 1901; 1911 as retired. Census entries in 1881 and 1891 have him doing other things. Other sources – directory listings, for example – are in short supply. The details of the bridegroom’s father when Joseph Clayton married Louisa Shelcott show that the business had been going since Joseph’s father William was alive; I think he died in the late 1830s.

1822 Baines’s Directory and Gazetteer of Bradford issue of 1822 transcribed at www.genuki.org.uk. No one called Clayton is running such a business.

1829 and 1834 Pigot’s Bradford Directory the list of trades and professions: there are no entries for it.

However, a caveat about the business’s non-appearance: you might have had to pay to have an entry in the directory.

1837 History, Gazetteer and Directory of the West Riding of Yorkshire: p454 Bradford directory in the list of china, glass and earthenware dealers a Thomas Clayton of Providence Street is included – a father or brother of William? William Clayton is not listed.

1841 census with William Clayton dead and his widow Jane Clayton described as “pot merchant”, carrying on the business with daughter Sarah Clayton aged 15.

1845 Ibbetson’s Directory of the Borough of Bradford p17 in a general list of residents: Jane Clayton dealer in glass, china and earthenware; now of Tyrrel Street.

1851 census with Jane now married to Martin Beanland but still carrying on the business, this time with daughter Jane (later Waring) aged 23.

Then the references get very thin on the ground, eg

1866 Directory of Bradford, Halifax, Wakefield etc doesn’t list anyone called Clayton running such a business.

Searching with google March 2024 I didn’t come across a single directory entry describing Joseph Clayton as proprietor of the business.


A possible 4 = a book shop.

Printing Times and Lithographer 1878 p61 reprinting a notice originally published in the London Gazette. This print was tiny and very hard to read but I think there was a reference to a J Clayton bookseller of Thornton Road Girlington and Bradford.


5 = the stationer’s business. Sources: 1881 census entry for Joseph Clayton (only that one); and the adverts below:

There was an earlier stationer’s business at the same address: Lund’s Directory of Bradford 1856 has Brown and Blackburn, stationers, at 63 Manchester Road.
At website iapsop.com, Spiritual Notes volume 1 number 5 September 1879 piii in the small ads: magazine The Spiritual Pioneer by W H Lambelle, available from “Mr Clayton’s, stationer, 63 Manchester Road Bradford”. However, on piv he’s not in a list of booksellers and newsagents where the magazine Spiritual Notes is for sale. On p199 W H Lambelle is described as The Spiritual Pioneer’s “promoter”. More or less the same advert was in Spiritual Notes volume 1 issue of January 1880 p239 though this time W H Lambelle was described as The Spiritual Pioneer’s editor.

Via google to The Herald of Progress issue of 20 May 1881 p318: a list of places where you could buy it included J Clayton at 63 Manchester Road Bradford.


On William Henry Lambelle (I’ve also seen LambAlle, even in official sources, but on the 1911 census form – which he wrote himself – it looks like an ‘e’ to me). He only seems to have been active in spiritualism in the 1870s and early 1880s. Like Joseph, at one point he was trying to make his involvement in it into a reliable source of income; but like Joseph, he found that was easier said than done.

Sources for Lambelle:

1876 The Medium and Daybreak 18 August 1876 p526 in list of forthcoming talks at Newcastle[-upon-Tyne] Spiritualists’ Society includes one by W H Lambelle on Mythology.

1878 at //digital.nls.uk the National Library of Scotland: The Spiritualist 28 December 1878 announcing a series of talks by Lambelle “for the dissemination of the Gospel of Spiritual Truth”; advert reads as though the talks would be a spiritualist equivalent to a more orthodox Christian Sunday sermon.

On archive.org, Immortality. What a Hundred Spirits, Good and Evil, Say of their Dwelling Places by J M Peebles MD. Boston: Colby and Rich 1880. On p146 there’s a reference to W H Lambelle of England acting as a medium to channel Rev Thomas Scott’s Confession and Progress in Spirit Life.

At iapsop.com you can read issues of The Herald of Progress; W H Lambelle as its editor. Iapsop.com’s introduction to the magazine says that it only ran from 16 July 1880 to 8 July 1881; and incorporated W H Lambelle’s previous magazine, The Spiritual Pioneer. The Spiritual Pioneer was published in Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

There’s a possible connection between W H Lambelle and Kenneth Mackenzie and his group of occultist freemasons: archive.org has a full set of The Kneph, which Mackenzie edited. I couldn’t find the exact page but there was a reference to The Herald of Progress in The Kneph’s volume 1.

In 1880: Spiritual Notes January 1880 p25 in a list of forthcoming talks at Batley Carr, one by Lambelle as editor of The Spiritual Pioneer. The title of the talk wasn’t given in the list.

The end of WH Lambelle’s time being active in spiritualism circles is easier to spot than the beginning: Annual Report of the British and Foreign Unitarian Association volume 48 1885 p53 reported that William Henry Lambelle had been installed as Unitarian minister to lead a new congregation in Carlisle in 1883. On the day of the 1911 census he was still a Unitarian minister, but now working in Middlesbrough.


Back to Joseph’s work:

6 = apparently at the same time: confectioner and accountant. Source: only the 1891 census and it’s daughter Hilda who’s actually doing the baking. By 1901 he’s back at the china and glassware.




THE EXTENDED CLAYTON FAMILY and as much as I can find out about THE CRAVEN FAMILY

On Claytons in general:

- a wikitree with lists of Claytons though I couldn’t see the GD’s Joseph and Fanny Isabel.

- a book about a possible ancestor: Ancestors, Descendants, and Other Relatives of Jeremiah Clayton 1996. Shows that ‘fanny’ was a common name in the family and also that Jeremiah (died 1828) married a Fanny (1758-1835). Jeremiah was a collier. Information on Jeremiah and Fanny has been followed up:

- at Familysearch where Fanny 1758-1835’s original surname is given as Sugden. Jeremiah was from Bradford and died in Bowling in November 1828. He and Fanny had 11 sons and 3 daughters, possibly more!

- at Ancestry where some of the 11 + 3 are listed.

It’s possible Joseph was a grandson of Jeremiah and Fanny but I couldn’t see any definite connections.


Death of Joseph’s father William Clayton. To have a son aged 1 on the day of the 1841 census – that is, born in 1840 - William Clayton Joseph’s father had to have died in 1839 or 1840. Assuming he died in Bradford, freebmd has no death registrations for anyone of that name in 1839. It has 2 for 1840, one in the April-June quarter and one in the July-September quarter.

Birth of William Clayton Joseph’s younger brother; aged one on the day of the 1841 census. There are 2 in Bradford 1840, both in the April-June quarter, though one is a ‘William Henry’ not (just) a ‘William’. However, I think the correct one may be a ‘william clayton’ registered in the April-June quarter 1839.


1841 census somewhere in District 11 Bradford West End where the ages of the occupants are not necessarily correct: the widowed Jane Clayton; her children Sarah and Mary both given as aged 15, Sarah helping her mother with the chinaware business; Jane aged 10; Isabella and Joseph both supposedly 5; William aged 1. Also in the household is Mary Atkinson, aged 15 and possibly a servant.

Sarah and Mary Clayton never appear on any subsequent census in any household occupied by other Claytons; and nor do any children they might have had with surnames other than Clayton. I can see quite a few death registrations for women called Sarah Clayton and Mary Clayton, in Bradford, in the 1840s and I think both girls may have died young.

Death of William Clayton, Joseph’s younger brother, who also doesn’t appear on any census after 1841. There was a death registration for someone of that name, Bradford, January-March quarter 1842; no age at death in the registration details at this early stage, of course.

Second marriage of Joseph’s mother: Jane Clayton to Martin Beanland Leeds July-September 1845.


Joseph’s closest sisters, Isabella and Jane:

Isabella Clayton, later Walton:

1851 census, where she was at home with Jane and Martin Beanland. She wasn’t listed as helping Jane with the business so was probably doing the housework and cooking.

Birth registration of James Clayton, Bradford, January-March quarter 1854. He is Isabella’s son, apparently illegitimate.

1861 census with Isabella and James living with Jane Beanland.

Marriage registration Isabella Clayton to John Walton Bradford January-March quarter 1865.

1871 census at 25 Horton Road Little Horton. Household consists of John Walton, who works as a stuff packer; Isabella; Isabella’s son James, now listed as ‘Clayton Walton’; Jane Beanland; and – difficult to read – an uncle of John Walton who might be called John Beanland.

James Clayton Walton seems to have reverted to just being ‘clayton’ later in life. He isn’t living

with his mother on any subsequent census but he is around – see 1891.

1881 census at 286 Thornton Road Manningham: John Walton, working but I couldn’t read where or doing what; wife Isabella; and a boarder, Robert D Smith, unmarried, aged 67 and described as a “gentleman”.

Death registration John Walton Bradford January-March quarter 1883 aged 43. He and Isabella had no children.

1891 census at 2 Laurel Terrace Armley: Isabella Walton with 2 grandsons: William Clayton aged 18, working as a cabinet maker, born in Ireland; and Jim Clayton aged 9 and born in Liverpool. Isabella was able to employ one female servant who lived in.

1901 census when Cora Clayton is living with her – see below.

1911 census at 1 Laurel Terrace Chapel Lane Armley, with Isabella’s handwriting very shaky though she does fill in most of the form herself: Isabella, and a boarder working as a joiner and wheelwright, Charles Robert [surname unreadable to me and the transcriber]. Her son James has died.

Death registration Isabella Walton Bramley April-June 1912; aged 80.


Joseph’s sister Jane Clayton, later Waring.

1841 census; 1851 census with her still living with her mother.

Marriage registration Jane Clayton to Joseph Waring Bradford October-December quarter 1857. Joseph was a widower with a child. 1861 census at 105 Manchester Road Little Horton: Joseph Waring as grocer; Jane helping in the business; and Joseph’s daughter Sarah aged 8.

I found this death registration: Sarah Ann Waring Bradford January-March 1869 aged 13 which I think must be Joseph Waring’s daughter, who is not in their household in any subsequent census. Jane Waring didn’t have any children of her own.

1871 census at 59 Manchester Road, Little Horton Bradford. There are two households at the address. The one on the ground floor consists of Joseph Waring who’s working as a carpenter as well as a grocer, and his wife Jane.

1881 census at 59 Manchester Road Little Horton Bradford, next-but-one to number 63. Again there are two households but on this census day, someone else is the householder on the ground floor. Joseph and Jane Waring are living above; Joseph is listed only as a grocer – no carpentry this time.

Death registration Joseph Waring Bradford April-June quarter 1889 aged 65.

1891 census at 59 Manchester Road, Bowling Bradford: Jane Waring who is in business as a corn chandler; and Fanny Isabel Clayton.

Death registration Jane Waring Bradford April-June quarter 1896 aged 68.


Joseph’s first marriage, to Louisa Shelcott:

A baptism record for Louisa at

www.lan-opc.uk/Liverpool/Aigburth/StMichael/marriages_1855-60.html

Her parents are named as Simon and Maria.

I couldn’t identify Louisa or her parents on censuses before Louisa’s marriage.

At Familysearch, LDS film 2147881: marriage of Joseph Clayton to Louisa Shelcott, 10 April 1858 at St Michael in the Hamlet, Aigburth Lancs. Occupations of the groom and both fathers are given. Both of the consenting parties were able to sign their names on the register.

Birth registration William Charles Edward Clayton, Northampton April-June quarter 1859.

1861 census at Maple Street, St Sepulchre Northampton.

Louisa’s death was registered before Cora’s birth:

death registration Louisa Clayton Sculcoates April-June quarter 1861

birth registration Cora Clayton Northampton July-September quarter 1861.

Death registration for Joseph and Louisa’s son William Charles Edward Clayton Rotherham January-March 1862.


Cora Clayton, Joseph’s daughter from his marriage to Louisa; Fanny Isabel’s older half-sister.

At Familysearch, England Births and Christenings 1538-1975: baptism May 1861 in Northampton.

Census information: 1881 when she’s still with Joseph and step-mother Jane; 1901 when she’s with Joseph’s sister Isabella Walton, at Laurel Grove Armley; and 1911 when she’s at 29 Borrowdale Road Toxteth Park Liverpool, visiting Charles Alcock, his wife Jane and daughters Frances and Alice. Charles worked for Liverpool’s Dock and Harbour Board; perhaps his family had known Cora’s mother’s family – the Shelcotts.

In all three censuses she is listed as not working; so I guess she was a serial house-keeper for her older relations.

Death registration for her: 1937 in South Leeds.


Joseph’s second marriage, to Jane Arkell. Just noting here that like Shelcott, ‘arkell’ is a very unusual surname; only a couple of dozen people have it in mid-19th-century England. And I still can’t nail Jane Arkell down! And she may have been ‘roberts’ rather than ‘arkell’ at her birth.

Census information consistently gives place of birth as Liverpool; and age indicates born 1839 or 1840.

Registered as Roberts: 1839 – 2 in central Liverpool; 1 in West Derby

1840 – 2 in Liverpool; 1 in West Derby

Registered as Arkell: 2 in 1839, neither of them in Liverpool; none anywhere in England or Wales in 1840.

Jane married Joseph Clayton as Jane Arkell. No one called Jane Roberts married anyone called Arkell 1857-1860; if she was born c 1840 she can’t have married very much earlier.

Jane’s daughter Ellen – surname always given as ‘roberts’ until after her marriage; and consistently said to have been born, in Liverpool, in either 1859 or 1860:

Registered as Arkell: no one with that name was registered in Liverpool in 1859 or 1860; one was registered Pancras July-September 1860.

Registered as Roberts: 1859 none in central Liverpool; 1 in West Derby. 1860: 1 in Liverpool, none in West Derby.

Didn’t have much success identifying Jane on the censuses, either as Arkell or as Roberts.


Marriage registration Joseph Clayton to Jane Arkell Newington (that is, on London’s south bank) April-June 1862. Why Newington is anybody’s guess; and how did they meet?!

Joseph and Jane’s children:

Birth registration Fanny Isabel Clayton Rotherham March-June quarter 1863.

Birth registration Helen Jane Clayton Liverpool July-September quarter 1865. Despite the confusion in a family with one child called Ellen already, Helen was always called Ellen.


Craven family: on the basis of the data Fanny Isabel and Eliza gave the 1901 census official, this looks the most likely birth registration for Eliza Craven: Kirkstall October-December quarter 1866.

Back to Joseph and Jane Clayton:

Birth registration Jenny Clayton Liverpool April-June 1867. Death registration for her Bradford July-September quarter 1873.

After Jenny there seems to be a gap in births of child of Joseph and Jane; until the mid-1870s. I must have missed some children who perhaps died at the birth or shortly afterwards.


1871 census at 24 High Street Great Horton: Joseph Clayton, with Jane, Ellen Roberts, Cora Clayton, Fanny Isabel, Helen known as Ellen, and Jenny.

And the Craven family: 1871 census at an address I couldn’t read in Shipley-cum-Heaton: John Craven, born in Eccleshill, aged 35 and working as a stuff finisher; his wife Mary aged 40 and born in Bradford; their children Thomas Halliday Craven aged 12; Frederick Richard Craven aged 10; Emma Craven aged 7; Eliza Craven aged 4; and Annie Craven aged 1 and – unlike the older children – born in Shipley not Kirkstall.


Back to the Claytons:

For future reference, the birth of Robert’s wife: birth registration Ada Beanland Bradford July-September quarter 1875.

Birth registration Robert Clayton Bradford January-March quarter 1876.

Birth registration Harold Clayton Bradford July-September quarter 1878. Death registration Bradford October-December 1881 aged 3.

Birth registration Oswald Clayton Bradford April-June quarter1881.

1881 census at 63 Manchester Road Little Horton Bradford: Joseph, Jane, Ellen Roberts, Cora Clayton, Fanny Isabel, Ellen Jane, Robert, Harold and Oswald; and Jane Beanland.


The Craven family. 1881 census at 41 Anvil Street Manningham: John, Mary, Thomas, Frederick, Eliza and Annie. Thomas was working as a stuff finisher, probably in the same mill as his father. Frederick was unemployed. Eliza was working as a pupil teacher.

Back to the Claytons:

Birth registration Hilda Clayton Bradford July-September 1883; the last of Joseph and Jane’s children; that is, the last to survive.

Death registration Jane Beanland Bradford January-March1884; aged 84.

Marriage registration Ellen Roberts to Bowker Kay Bradford July-September 1888. I think Ellen may have married her employer. On the 1881 census she’s listed as a barmaid. On the 1891 census Ellen and Bowker Kay are managing the Coffee Tavern in Market Street Cleckheaton.


1891 census at 63 Manchester Road Bowling: Joseph Clayton, Jane, Ellen Jane, Robert and Oswald.

The Cravens: 1891 census at 59 Kensington Street Manningham: John Craven who is still working but I couldn’t decipher what he was doing - I don’t think he was a stuff finisher this time; Mary, Eliza and Annie. Both Eliza and Annie are working as clerks in a draper’s business.


Source for Joseph Clayton and Jane’s change of address to Portland Street, by 1893: Fanny Isabel’s address for letters on her pledge form when she was joining the GD.


Probable deaths of Eliza Craven’s parents; I couldn’t see either of them on the 1901 census.

Death registration Mary Craven Bradford January-March quarter 1895; aged 65.

Death registration John Craven Bradford July-September quarter 1895; aged 59.


Marriage registration Ellen (sic) Jane Clayton to Harry Wilson Bradford July-September quarter 1895.

Marriage registration Robert Clayton to Ada Beanland Bradford January-March 1900.

Birth registration Arnold Clayton Bradford January-March 1901; he was Robert and Ada’s only child.


1901 census at 141 Grafton Street Little Horton Bradford: Fanny Isabel Clayton and Eliza Craven.

1901 census at 59 Manchester Road Listerhills Bradford: Joseph, Jane, Oswald and Hilda.

I think Oswald Clayton may have got married in 1905; but if he did, the marriage didn’t take place in Bradford. Oswald then drops out of sight: I couldn’t identify him on the 1911 census.


1911 census at 204 Tichborne Road Bradford: Joseph, Jane and Hilda.

1911 census at 28 East Parade Baildon Bradford: Fanny Isabel, on her own.

1911 census at 64 Broadway Avenue Bradford: Robert, Ada and Arnold.

1911 census at 36 Bolling Street Bradford: Harry Wilson working as a machine minder; wife Ellen Jane as a shopkeeper at that address, selling “mixed” goods but apparently not china and glassware; children Louisa aged 14 working for a printing firm – perhaps the same one that employed Robert Clayton; Frank aged 10 and at school – an elementary school of course; and Edgar aged 2. Ellen Jane had had five children in the 15 years of her marriage; two had died.


Death registration Joseph Clayton Bradford January-March quarter 1912; he was 75.

Probable marriage registration for Hilda Clayton; husband is George H Bishell. Registered Bradford April-June quarter 1913.

Death registration Fanny Isabel’s mother Jane Clayton: Bradford October-December quarter 1917 aged 77.

Death registration Fanny I Clayton Bradford July-September quarter 1934; aged 71.



FANNY ISABEL and ELIZA CRAVEN AS TEACHERS – general information. Any data particular to their own lives as School Board employees may have been thrown away; if it still exists it will be in the Bradford School Board’s archives in West Yorkshire.

1870 education act: www.parliament.uk a summary of the Act.

Wikipedia on the Act and the school board system which it set up.

National Archives link to West Yorkshire Archives show archives for Bradford’s school board began in 1870 so the city of Bradford got going with elementary schooling very promptly.


London’s Women Teachers: Gender, Class and Feminism 1870-1930 by Dina M Copelman. London and NewYork: Routledge 1996. Though focused on London the book has a lot of information that applies more generally, particularly pp3-4 on the social class of the young women chosen to be elementary school teachers; p129 on the training of the London School Board’s women teachers; p131 on what they would be teaching. Copelman noted that a big change in the curriculum Fanny Isabel and Eliza were required to teach came after the Boer War: there was much more focus on the pupils’ assumed future as mothers, with classes on the care of infants.

The sources Copelman was using included:

- British Parliamentary Papers 1898 volume 26.

- History of Education volume 17 number 1: a special issue on Women and Schooling, edited by Roy Lowe. London, New York, Philadelphia: Taylor and Francis. March 1988 pp71-82: The Education and Employment of Working-Class Girls 1870-1914, by Pamela Horn.


Wages and pensions: website //fileseric.ed.gov reproduces a very useful and more or less contemporary pamphlet published in the US: Teachers’ Pension Systems in Great Britain by Raymond W Sies. US Bureau of Education Bulletin number 34 1913. Particularly pp33-47





Copyright SALLY DAVIS

28 December 2012

April 2024


Email me at





Find the web pages of Roger Wright and Sally Davis, including my list of people initiated into the Order of the Golden Dawn between 1888 and 1901, at:



www.wrightanddavis.co.uk


***