Chorley Road: 1881 Snapshot of Time

67 Chorley Road - Living in this end cottage is 55 year old widow, Elizabeth France, four of her daughters aged 11, 17, 21 and 24 and two grandaughters aged 2 and 4. Her eldest daughter Betty Southern had been widowed two months earlier and she had brought her two young daughters to live with her mother. This meant that this two bedroomed house had seven females living in it. All three of the eldest daughters worked in the cotton industry, as winders and weavers. 

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37 Chorley Road - The biggest house on the main road housed Leonard Fairclough and his young family. It would be another two years before Leonard would go on to establish his funeral monument carving business, but it seems he was still still earning a decent wage as a stone mason, as he could afford to live in this large property. 
Leonard had married his young wife Mary less than two years earlier and their first child Sarah Ann had just turned one. His wife Mary was heavily pregnant with their second daughter.