In the late 1960s, a retired Leeds plumber called Ernest Bracewell passed the time by writing his reminiscences, which included memories of the Headingley he knew as an apprentice in the years leading up to the First World War. It was his favourite part of Leeds with its leafy streets, fine houses and beautiful young ladies to admire. Among them was local celebrity Miss Mary Joy, a singer and actress who lived with her widowed mother Elizabeth at 22 Cardigan Road, a substantial Victorian semi overlooking Headingley Cricket Ground.[1] Ernest described an image which stayed with him all his life—that of Mary and her mother walking arm-in-arm down St Michael’s Lane in the spring of 1912. It was the picture he saw in his mind’s eye when he recalled Mary’s fate.
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| Miss Mary Joy, YEP, 28 October 1911 |
He would have been astonished to learn how much of Mary’s story it has been possible to piece together, over 100 years later, using newspapers of the time (which are available online in the British Newspaper Archive) along with information from genealogy websites. Here is the tale uncovered so far.
‘Miss Mary Joy, soprano’ attracted the attention of the Yorkshire Post (YP) in March 1906 when she featured as one of the ‘principal performers’ in a charity concert staged by the students of the Leeds College of Music.[2] She would have been 23 or 24 at the time and was presumably a current or former student of the college.
Three years later, the YP mentions her appearance in another charity concert, this time held at the Queen’s Theatre on Saturday 23 January 1909.[3] Mary’s role as the fiancée of a military officer in a ‘musical dramatic sketch’ called The Death Waltz, allowed her to display her acting as well as musical skills. The sketch was based on an incident at the Brussels Ball on the eve of Waterloo, the officer promising to return to his intended, whatever the outcome of the battle. He kept his word, but as a ghost—with, you would imagine, not a dry eye in the house.
Mary became a member of the York Amateur Operatic Society and 1910 brought a new development in her career, as reported by ‘Peter Quince’, Music and Drama correspondent of the Yorkshire Evening Post (YEP), on 29 October:
‘I now hear that Miss Mary Joy will appear in pantomime in Sheffield. Miss Mary Joy, who is very well known on the concert platform in Yorkshire made a charming Princess Melaneh in York Operatic Amateurs’ production of “A Country Girl”.’
Mary’s growing reputation was confirmed by her inclusion in the line-up for the YEP’s annual ‘Santa Claus Fund’ charity concerts at the Leeds Theatre Royal in December 1910, with the paper describing her as ‘one of the most talented ladies in the York Amateur Operatic Society’.[4] The concerts, which raised money for poor children in Leeds, featured leading amateur performers alongside stars of the local music halls.
Then, in the summer of 1911, the YEP gave advance notice that Mary would return to the stage of the Theatre Royal later in the year in a reprise of her role as Princess Melaneh, this time with the County Comedy Company (CCC):
‘The numerous admirers and friends in Leeds of Miss Mary Joy will be pleased to hear that that lady has been offered and accepted the part of Princess Melaneh in an autumn production of “The Country Girl”.’[5]
The musical opened on 6 November 1911[6] amid press speculation that Mary would shortly turn professional.[7] The rumours were true. Five days later Peter Quince of the YEP brought the news that:
‘Miss Rose Garden will make her London debut shortly in musical comedy, having signed a contract with Mr Robert Courtneidge for one of his forthcoming productions. Rose Garden is the stage name of Miss Mary Joy who, in the part of the little Princess, has captivated everyone who has been at the Leeds Royal this week. Success she deserves and all will wish her it.’[8]
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| Cartoon of Miss Mary Joy, YEP, 8 November 1911 |
She had certainly captivated ‘Koster’ of the YEP, who included her in a cartoon of the ‘Leading Members of the County Comedy Company’ printed in that paper on 8 November 1911. Unfortunately the poor quality of the newsprint makes the online copy very dark and the beautiful little drawing of Mary difficult to make out. I have adjusted the contrast a little in an effort to make her easier to see.
Mary’s first professional engagement was with Courtneidge’s production of Lionel Monckton’s The Mousme or The Maids of Japan.[9] On Saturday 17 Feb 1912, the YEP reported that she was delighted with her experience on the professional stage and would be appearing in Newcastle the following week. Then, a couple of months later, they commented that:
‘The season has been marked by the number of amateurs who have gone over to the professional stage. Miss Marie Blanche heads the list as the most distinctive success followed by Miss Blanche Tomalin of the Leeds Amateur Operatic Society, Miss Mary Joy and Miss Dot Kitchen of the C.C.C.’[10]
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| Norman and Mary Stones, YEP, 8 May 1915 |
However, this was apparently the final report on Mary’s musical career—just as her star was on the rise in the UK, it is evident her thoughts were elsewhere. Her fiancé, 25-year-old Norman Stones, had sailed for Canada in October 1911,[11] with the intention of acquiring a farm and making a life for them both on the other side of the Atlantic. His reports back must have been positive. After joining her friends at the CCC for their annual day out to Boston Spa on 15 June 1912,[12] she said a last goodbye and on 27 June 1912 set sail from Liverpool aboard SS Corsican, bound for Quebec and then Vancouver.[13] The passenger list describes her as ‘To be married’ alongside the name of her intended ‘N Stones, Rancher’.[14]
On 11 July 1912, a fortnight after her departure from Liverpool, she married Norman using her full name of Hilda Mary Joy.[15] However, as she used the name Mary Joy on the amateur stage, as well as when emigrating to Canada, it seems likely that was how she was usually known.
The Ilkley connection
Mary Joy and her husband Norman Stones were both descended from generations of innkeepers and between them had connections with several of the major hotels and inns in Ilkley.
Mary was an Ilkley girl born and bred, with deep roots in the town. Her great-grandfather John Lister had opened the Lister’s Arms (now converted into flats) in 1825[16] and was succeeded in the 1840s by his daughter Mary Brumfitt and her husband George.[17] Like his wife, George Brumfitt had been raised in the licensed trade, as his mother was the landlady of the Red Lion in Burley-in-Wharfedale.[18] The Brumfitts prospered sufficiently at the Lister’s Arms to consider expansion and took over the recently opened Crescent Hotel in 1863,[19] running the two hotels side by side.
George Brumfitt died in 1868,[20] aged just 50, and for a while the family continued to operate both establishments, with their elder son William responsible for the Lister’s Arms whilst his mother was at the Crescent with her younger son George and daughter Elizabeth (Mary Joy’s mother).[21]
However, by the time of the 1881 census the family appear to have made the decision to give up innkeeping.[22] They were still in Ilkley but Mary Brumfitt had retired to ‘Ferncliffe’ in Riddings Road[23] with Elizabeth and George, whilst William had become a ‘discounter of bills’, living at 4 Alexandra Crescent with his second wife Cora.[24]
The following year Elizabeth Brumfitt married Augustus Bowdin Joy, son of the gamekeeper at Middleton Lodge on the north side of the Wharfe. Augustus was working as a commercial traveller in 1871[25] but his life apparently changed course in 1877/8 when his uncle Orlando Joy returned to Ilkley after several years in Liverpool. Orlando took over the Midland Hotel[26] (following the death of the landlord Thomas Lister,[27] another member of the Lister clan and cousin of Mary Brumfitt) and also acquired the business of the Ilkley Wells Brewery, taking Augustus into partnership. They traded under the name O J Joy and Co.[28] and occupied the building in Cunliffe Street which was part of the Lister’s Arms.[29]
Augustus appears to have been enthusiastic about his job and something of an inventor—in October 1879 he took out a patent on bottle and barrel stoppers[30]—but the partnership would be short-lived. It was dissolved on 22 September 1880[31] (possibly because Orlando was ill, he died the following year[32]) and Augustus continued with the brewing business alone.[33]
He was apparently still sufficiently optimistic about his prospects to marry Elizabeth Brumfitt on 15 September 1881,[34] shortly after a press announcement that he had applied for another patent, this time relating to:
‘Improvements in apparatus for the conversion of animal energy and gravitation into rotary motion.’[35]
The Joys moved into 8 Middleton Terrace where their daughter Mary was born in 1882.[36] However, it was not long before things went awry – a creditors’ meeting was called on 10 January 1883, the business put into liquidation[37] and Augustus declared bankrupt.[38]
Eight years later in 1891, Mary Joy was still living in Ilkley with her mother (and cricket-loving uncle George[39]) but by then they had moved to Brook Street where Elizabeth ran a fancy goods shop.[40] Her father Augustus, however, was nowhere to be seen—after obtaining a passport in May 1888,[41] he had sailed for the USA. He was a night-watchman, living at 8 Dorchester Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts, when he died of a stroke in 1899.[42] Back in Ilkley, Elizabeth and Mary Joy had remained at the shop in Brook Street (no. 33), although by 1901 it had become a ladies’ outfitters.[43]
Throughout Mary’s childhood, her uncle William and aunt Cora Brumfitt lived nearby. Like her husband, Cora (nee Holroyd) had been brought up in the licensed trade, so it is perhaps not surprising that by 1891 the pair had returned to innkeeping, running the North View Hotel in Station Road with the help of two of Cora’s sisters[44] and re-acquiring the Lister’s Arms later in the decade.[45]
Cora had grown up at the Dyers Arms in Lingards, near Penistone, where her great aunt was the landlady.[46] Several of her siblings were also in the licensed trade—in the early 1880s her eldest brother Joseph had taken over the Rose and Crown (one of Ilkley’s oldest inns),[47] while brother Sutcliffe ran the Black Bull at Shepley near Holmfirth[48] and sister Sarah Jane was at the Man and Saddle in the Market Place Dewsbury, with her husband George Stones and their children—including son Norman.[49]
With aunts, uncles and cousins living in Ilkley, it seems likely that Norman Stones first met Mary Joy at a family gathering. The death of their uncle William Brumfitt in 1906,[50] which left aunt Cora to run the Lister’s Arms on her own, was just one of many events which may have brought them together.
Whilst Mary was developing her musical career in Leeds,[51] Norman had embarked on a BA at Leeds University and featured in the Intermediate BA exam results displayed in the YP on 29 September 1909.[52] The following year his father George died in Penistone[53] and shortly afterwards his mother Sarah Jane moved to Ilkley, presumably to be nearer her widowed sister Cora, then still at the Lister’s Arms. At the time of the 1911 census, Norman (described as an arts student) was living with his mother at 4 Tarn Villas.[54] Meanwhile in Leeds, Mary and her mother had moved to 22 Cardigan Road, overlooking the cricket ground, and as they walked around Headingley they were spotted by a young plumber’s apprentice….
Life in Canada
Newly-weds Norman and Mary Stones settled on Texada Island, just north of Vancouver, where Norman became a rancher and fruit farmer. Their marriage certificate[55] lists his address as Vananda, an old copper mining town on the north-east coast of the island. The record of his entry into Canada shows that he was no mere Arts graduate—he also had farming experience in the UK going back nine years.[56]
Mary may have made a solo visit to the UK in 1913—a Mrs N Stones, aged 30, travelled from Quebec to Liverpool on the Empress of Britain, arriving on 22 May 1913, and then returned to Canada on 19 July 1913 on the Laurentic.[57]
But the deteriorating health of Mary’s mother and the outbreak of war in August 1914 were to change everything. The Stones made the decision to sell up and return home—Norman would join the Leeds University Officer Training Corps whilst Mary looked after her mother in Headingley. Tragically they chose to travel on the Lusitania, setting sail from New York on 1 May 1915. The ship was hit by a German torpedo off the coast of Ireland on Friday 7 May 1915.
Reports of the tragedy
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| Postcard of the Lusitania from Ernest Bracewell's papers, postmarked Liverpool 29 April 1910 |
Reports of the tragedy
The first report in the YEP of the local connection with the Lusitania tragedy appeared the following day, Saturday 8 May 1915. Under the by-lines ‘A Headingley young lady given up for lost’ and ‘Husband saved, wife missing’ together with pictures of the couple (see above), the paper brought the bleak news:
‘A telegram was received from Mr Stones this afternoon stating his wife was lost’describing Mary simply as:
‘..a Miss Joy, whose mother resides at Headingley, Leeds.’
However, by Monday 10 May, the connection had been made with the actress Mary Joy, who had captivated the audience of A Country Girl in November 1911. The paper reflected:
The Leeds Mercury of 10 May contains more details under the headlines ‘Yorkshire Folk on Board’, ‘Well Known Leeds People Missing’ and ‘Leeds Man’s Sad Homecoming’:‘Deep regret will be felt in Leeds and district, and particularly in amateur theatrical circles, at the tragic fate of Mrs Norman Stones, better known by her maiden name of Miss Mary Joy, who is recorded amongst the missing. Her husband was rescued.’
‘Amongst the passengers were Mr & Mrs N Stones who were returning from Vancouver to Leeds. Mrs Stones had a large number of friends in Leeds, particularly in amateur theatrical circles, and the news of her tragic death will be a big shock to them. Mary Joy, as she was known when taking part in the County Comedy Company’s productions was a general favourite. She had a very jolly disposition and her stage talents were good enough to secure a professional engagement in pantomime. She possessed a very fine voice. Deep sympathy will be extended to her mother who was looking forward to her daughter’s return to live with her at Headingley.
Mr Stones is amongst the rescued but his wife, unhappily, is amongst the victims. Mr Stones is the son of the late Mr George Stones who formerly kept the Man & Saddle, Dewsbury. His aunts, Mrs Brumfitt and Mrs Jones, now keep the hotel and the first-named went to Liverpool on Friday to meet Mr & Mrs Stones.
Mrs Brumfitt, like the other anxious relatives who were waiting at Liverpool, had a trying time and was greatly distressed when the news came through that her nephew’s wife was amongst the missing.
The deceased young lady was well known in Leeds, having been a member of the Leeds Amateurs and the County Comedy Company. She took leading parts in their production of “The Country Girl”, “San Toy” and “Merrie England” and secured an engagement with Mr Robert Courtneidge’s professional company.
She went to Vancouver to be married to Mr Stones about 3 years ago.
Her mother, Mrs Joy, who lives at Normar, Far Headingley, has lately been in indifferent health and it was on this account that Mr and Mrs Stones were returning to England.
Mr and Mrs Norman Stones, says the Ilkley correspondent of the Mercury, have a very close connection with Ilkley. Although Mrs Stones had resided a few years at Headingley, her whole life had previously been spent in Ilkley and both she and her husband were connected with two of the oldest and best known families. In Ilkley Mrs Stones was better known as Miss Mary Joy and possessed a considerable ability as a vocalist. She was particularly fond of theatrical and operatic work.’
A similar but shorter article appeared in the YP on 10 May[58] with one additional piece of information, namely that it was Mrs Jones in Dewsbury (Norman’s aunt Zada) who had received the telegram containing the news that Mary was amongst the victims.
By 11 May, Norman had arrived at his mother-in-law’s home in Leeds, where he spoke to a YEP reporter.[59] The interview titled ‘How Mrs Stones met her death, Her Husband’s tragic story, Hope to square accounts with the Germans’ contains touching details of the couple’s last conversation:
‘Very poignant is the grief of Mrs Joy of Normar, Far Headingley, who lost her only child, formerly well known in Yorkshire amateur operatic circles as Miss Mary Joy—in the sinking of the Lusitania. Miss Joy was married three years ago to Mr Norman Stones, a son of the late Mr George Stones of Penistone and with him went out to the Far West. They recently sold their ranch in British Columbia and were returning to England by the Lusitania to live with Mrs Joy at Headingley.
Mr Stones arrived at Headingley this afternoon—alone. To a representative of the Yorkshire Evening Post he told the sad story of how he lost his wife in the swirl of waters that enveloped them as they jumped overboard together. To-day his heart is full of bitterness and in his desire for revenge upon the perpetrators of the foul deed he exclaims “All I can hope for now is to get a chance of striking a blow for my wife and my country and of squaring accounts with the Germans.”
He says he and his wife were standing on the sea deck when he saw a narrow lane of foam pointing straight for the ship “Look Kiddy” he said to his wife, “that must be a torpedo!” A moment or two later it struck the ship throwing up wreckage and clouds of spray. In the fatal panic which ensued Mr Stones said there was no panic, but it was a fact that he did not see a single boat properly launched. Word was passed round from the captain that the ship would not sink for about an hour and that probably allayed fear.
“All the same” says Mr Stones “I soon realised that the position was critical and so I suggested that we should slip down one of the ropes hanging from the boat davit into the water. To show how self-possessed my wife was, she calmly opened a little bag she was carrying and gave me her purse saying “You had better take care of this.” Then we both climbed down the rope to the water’s edge, and just before telling her to jump I said “Don’t be scared, Kid.” She replied “Oh, I’m not scared” and that was the last remark she made.
We jumped into the water together but at that very moment the boat must have been going down because we were sucked right under. I came to the surface and had just time to catch one breath before I was sucked under again.
When I came to the surface a second time, the boat was gone, and my wife was nowhere to be seen. I got hold of a deckchair and paddled myself to an upturned boat where I remained until I was rescued about three hours later.’
On 15 May 1915 a YEP column entitled ‘What is Happening in Theatreland’ makes a final mention of Mary saying:
‘…to bring the disaster home to Leeds, among the victims is Miss Mary Joy, well-known and warmly liked in amateur circles in the district’.
Other accounts of Norman and Mary on the Lusitania
At least two other descriptions of Norman and Mary’s experience on board ship are available, although the source of the information is not always provided. The Last Voyage of the Lusitania by A A Hoehling and Mary Hoehling[60] includes an account by passenger Archie Macdonald, who said he was on deck with the couple just before the boat went down. He claimed that Norman ‘was methodically tearing all the clothing’ off his unprotesting wife, a plausible move in the circumstances, but one understandably not mentioned in Norman’s description of events. The Hoehlings did not have the benefit of access to the YEP interview with Norman Stones and cause some confusion by referring to the couple as Mr and Mrs Norman Stone. They go on to make the unlikely claim that Norman was a veteran of General Pershing’s Mexico expedition on the trail of Pancho Villa—perhaps a misunderstanding connected with the fact that the daughter of one Norman Stone, coal merchant from Fitchberg USA, was married to John Van der Zee Sears, an author and a veteran of the Pancho Villa expedition in 1916.[61]
Some of the Hoehlings’ comments are repeated in a short entry concerning Norman and Mary in the ‘People’ section of the website www.rmslusitania.info.[62] However, a much longer description of the couples’ experience appears in Section 5 of Lest We Forget the Lusitania, a very detailed piece of work by Jim Kalafus, Michael Poirier, Cliff Barry and Peter Kelly which pulls together a huge amount of information relating to the disaster and can be found at www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/lest-we-forget-the-lusitania.html.[63]
Much of the information relating to the Stones has already been covered by the YEP interview referred to above. However, an extended quote from Norman is also reproduced which is a little more detailed than the YEP article and describes the moment they saw the track of the torpedo, the impact and the aftermath. He says that he had hung onto the folded deck chair for around half an hour, ‘swimming and floating and looking for my wife’ before joining a group of six or so men clinging to an upturned boat. Their numbers had increased to around twenty by the time they were picked up by the steam trawler Indian Empire and taken to Queenstown. Comments made by Norman in another newspaper interview are also included, questioning the time it took for fast-moving destroyers to reach the area, given that they had left Queenstown at the same time as the ‘8 knot trawler’ which rescued him. Norman was convinced that the confidence of officers and crew that the ship would float for at least an hour (in the event it sank very quickly) resulted in greater loss of life.
Friends in Leeds are described as hoping that Norman and Mary would defer their plans to return to the UK, after Germany warned that the Lusitania was a target, and mention is also made of Mary’s successful career as a singer and actress. She was said to have taken part in a second-class concert on the night before the disaster, singing The Rosary.[64] Survivor Phoebe Amory, who later wrote a booklet about the Lusitania,[65] recalled that performance and how, once safe on land, she had talked to the husband of the woman with the beautiful voice. As when interviewed by the YEP reporter, Norman had told her of his intention to enlist and kill as many Germans as possible. He must have spent hours on a desperate and fruitless search for his wife amongst the survivors before finally giving up hope.
When Norman Stones vowed to avenge Mary’s death, he was as good as his word. He emerged from the Leeds University Officer Training Corps on 29 September 1915 as a Second Lieutenant,[66] joining the Manchester Regiment. He arrived in France in January 1917 and in November of that year, as acting Captain of 2/9 Battalion, he was awarded the Military Cross.[67] The citation stated:
‘For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. At one period of the attack he realised that he would be more useful on the right than on the left flank, and executed a clever movement to achieve this object. His company, as a result, played a prominent part in the operations.’[68]
His rank for the period 13 November 1917 to 12 December 1917 was later changed to Acting Major as he was performing the duties of second-in-command.[69] Norman survived the war. He remarried and died in Somerset in 1964.
A passing reference in Tim Binding’s On Ilkley Moor: the Story of an English Town[70] mentions a memorial stone in Ilkley cemetery by the river Wharfe. It is inscribed with the words:
‘Hilda Mary Stones, May 7th 1915, who lost her life on the Lusitania.’
An initial search amongst the gravestones has proved fruitless but I hope there may be locals able to point me in the right direction.
SOURCES
www.ancestry.co.uk (censuses, birth/marriage/death records, parish registers, passenger lists for Atlantic crossings, military records)
www.findmypast.co.uk (as ancestry.co.uk above plus Index to Register of British Passport Applications (1851-1903)
www.rmslusitania.info
http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/lest-we-forget-the-lusitania.html
www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk
www.thegazette.co.uk (London Gazette and supplements)
www.familysearch.org
http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/lest-we-forget-the-lusitania.html
www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk
www.thegazette.co.uk (London Gazette and supplements)
www.familysearch.org
A A Hoehling & Mary Hoehling, The Last Voyage of the Lusitania (London: Longmans Green and Co., 1957)
Ilkley Conservation Area Assessment, March 2002 (City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council) which can be found at www.bradford.gov.uk.
Ernest Bracewell, private papers
Ilkley Conservation Area Assessment, March 2002 (City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council) which can be found at www.bradford.gov.uk.
Ernest Bracewell, private papers
[2] Yorkshire Post, 14 March 1906.
[3] Yorkshire Post, 25 January 1909.
[4] Yorkshire Evening Post, 30 November
1910.
[5] Yorkshire Evening Post, 15 July 1911.
[6] A
copy of the playbill for A Country Girl can
be found at www.leodis.net/playbills/
(as at 5 December 2014). First performed in 1902 at Daly's Theatre in London, it was one of the most popular musicals of the Edwardian era. Excerpts from a 2012 revival by "Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Victoria" can be found at www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0etNblrJgk. Mary Joy's character, Princess Melaneh, appears just under five minutes into the film clip by the side of the Rajah of Bhong.
[7] Yorkshire Evening Post, 28 October 1911:
‘In their choice of female principals, the committee of the C.C.C. have been exceptionally fortunate, for I do not know of any amateur organisation in the North able to produce at one and the same time artistes of such admitted ability as Miss Dot Kitchen, Miss Mary Joy, Miss Gertrude Baxter and Miss Maude Ferens. All of them are well-known in Yorkshire in connection with amateur performances and two at least are more than likely to go over to the professional stage. Miss Dot Kitchen has received an offer to go into pantomime, and Miss Mary Joy will probably join a musical comedy company. The decision rests with the ladies themselves.’ Reporter: ‘Peter Quince’.
[8] Yorkshire Evening Post, 11 November
1911.
[9] Yorkshire Evening Post, 17 February
1912. Mary was originally scheduled to
appear in the 1911 Santa Claus concerts (YEP
15 November 1911) but her name disappears from a subsequent list of performers
(YEP, 4 December 1911) suggesting she
may have withdrawn after turning professional.
[10] Yorkshire Evening Post, 20 April 1912.
[11] Canadian Passenger List, SS Corsican,
12 October 1911. Norman is described as
24 years old and bound for Vancouver, British Columbia. He answered ‘Yes’ to the question ‘Have you
ever worked as a farmer, farm labourer, gardener……?’ and stated that he had
worked as a farmer for 9 years. ‘British
Bonus Allowed’ is stamped next to his name.
The British Bonus was a commission paid by the Canadian Government to
steamship booking agents in the UK for each suitable immigrant who purchased a
ticket (Library and Archives Canada website at www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/immigration/Pages/terminology-abbreviations.aspx,
as at 5 December 2014).
[12] Yorkshire Evening Post, 22 June 1912.
[13] UK Outward Passenger Lists, SS Corsican,
Liverpool, 27 June 1912.
[14] Canadian Passenger Lists, SS Corsican
Quebec, 5 July 1912.
[16] Lister’s Arms was the name used in Trade Directories but for many years it was
also referred to as ‘The New Inn.’ It was built in 1825 according to the Ilkley Conservation Assessment, March
2002. It seems there may have been
teething problems—John Lister placed an advertisement In the Leeds Mercury of Saturday of 10 May
1828 saying:
‘John Lister returns his sincere Thanks to those Friends who have so kindly supported him during the Time he has occupied the above Inn, and respectfully begs to inform them and the Nobility, Gentry, Commercial Travellers, and the Public in general, that he has made extensive Improvements in the House, and his is determined to do every Thing in his Power to Please. From the excellent Quality of his Wines, [food] and the superior Accommodation that the Premises afford, he hopes to meet with a continuance of their Patronage and Support. NB Good Stabling.’
[17] In the 1851 census, George and Mary Brumfitt were running the Lister’s Arms and
John Lister was living with his son Joseph, a farmer, and two unmarried
daughters, Margaret and Ann.
[18] The announcement of George’s marriage to Mary Lister on 4 June 1846 (Bradford Observer, 11 June 1846)
describes him as ‘of the Red Lion Inn’. The
1841 census records him living in Burley-in-Wharfedale with his mother
Elizabeth who is described as an innkeeper.
[19] The Crescent was built around 1860 according to the Ilkley Conservation Area Assessment March 2002. The Leeds
Mercury of 11 June 1861 contains a letter from a visitor to the hotel
extolling the sumptuous breakfast but bemoaning the inaccuracy of Walker’s Railway Timetable. The following year, an advert in the Bradford Observer on 3 July 1862 says:
‘The Charges in this Establishment will be found extremely moderate. Attached to the Hotel is a good Billiard Room, Bowling, Croquet and Archery Grounds.’
It appears that the Brumfitts did not acquire the hotel
until the following year as George put adverts in several newspapers in May
1863, including this from the Leeds
Mercury on the 16th:
‘ILKLEY—CRESCENT HOTEL—GEORGE BRUMFITT begs to inform his friends and the public that he is now Proprietor of the above Hotel, as well as the Lister’s Arms Hotel, and he trusts that by paying strict attention to the comfort of his customers he will receive the same liberal support at both houses which has for some years been accorded to him at the latter. Coaches to and from Leeds, Bradford, &c., daily.’
[20] National Probate Calendar, 1858–1966.
[21] 1871 census.
[22] There were signs that Mary Brumfitt was ready to retire from active involvement
in the trade by 1871—a large quantity of high-class wines bought by her husband
were put up for auction on 12 May 1871 ‘in consequence of a change of tenancy’ while
an advert on 30 May 1871 describes the Crescent as being ‘under new
management’. In September of the
following year, William Brumfitt tried to find a tenant for the Lister’s Arms
(possibly due to the illness of his wife—she died shortly afterwards) and
eventually put it up for sale in July 1874. It was still on the market in March 1875 when
the sale was described as ‘By Order of the Second Mortgagee’. It seems the sale was unsuccessful as the
Lister’s Arms was referred to as ‘Mr Brumfitt’s’ in a newspaper report of a
church outing in August 1877. (Sources: Yorkshire
Post and Leeds Intelligencer, 9 May 1871, 14 September 1872, and 28 July
1874; Leeds Mercury 30 May 1871; Leeds Times 30 November 1872; Bradford Observer, 11 March 1875; Huddersfield Chronicle 3 August 1877;).
[23] 1881 census.
[24] William had married his first wife, Elizabeth Alderson, in 1870 but his wife
died in 1872, aged only 27, leaving him with a 2-year-old son George. William married Cora Holroyd in 1877.
[25] 1871 census.
[26] 1881 census.
[27] National Probate Calendar, 1858–1966.
[28] London Gazette, 28 September 1880, issue
24886, page 5087.
[29] The Lister’s Arms Hotel, ‘lately in the occupation of W W McLauchlan’ was
offered for sale at the Rose and Crown on 17 March 1875. The property details included ‘a brewery
known as the “Ilkley Wells Brewery”’ which adjoined the hotel (Bradford Observer, 16 March 1875).
[30] Sheffield Independent, 24 October 1879.
[31] London Gazette, 28 September 1880, issue
24886, page 5087.
[32] National
Probate Calendar, 1858-1966.
[33] Augustus
was still renting the brewery at the Lister’s Arms in February 1881 when the
inn was bought by Mr Adam Brown of Brown and Carson, wine and spirit merchants,
for £4,360—the sale details included ‘the Ilkley Wells Brewery, detached,
occupied by Mr A B Joy’ as well as 7,120 square yards of land (Leeds Mercury, 3 February 1881).
[34] Leeds Times, 24 September 1881.
[35] Nottingham Evening Post, 10 September
1881 and Leeds Mercury, 12 September
1881.
[36] Hilda Mary Joy was christened at St Margaret’s, Ilkley, on 20 September 1882. The parish register does not record her date
of birth. I think Middleton Terrace had
been renamed Middleton Road by 1901.
[37] London Gazette, 12 January 1883, issue
25187, page 234.
[38] London Gazette, 24 July 1883, issue
25253, page 3746.
[39] In 1887 George Brumfitt and Joseph I Kirby compiled and published England–v –Australia at the Wicket (Ilkley:
Brumfitt and Kirby, 1887) containing details of all 176 matches played between
the two countries (Obituary of George Brumfitt, Leamington Spa Courier, 24 September 1920 and Western Times, 6 September 1887).
[40] 1891 census.
[41] Index
to Register of British Passport Applications, 1851-1903.
[42] Death register for Boston, Massachusetts (www.familysearch.org) and National
Probate Calendar, 1858-1966.
[43] 1901 census.
[44] 1891 census.
[45] Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 11 July
1896. An advert for the Lister’s Arms
Hotel describes William Brumfitt as the proprietor.
[46] 1861 census, 1871 census.
[47] 1891 census, 1881 census.
[48] 1891 census.
[49] 1891 census.
[50] National Probate Calendar, 1858–1966.
[51] By
1908 Mary and her mother were living in Leeds at 5 Sagar Place, Headingley (Kelly’s Directory, West Riding of Yorkshire,
1908, vol.2, Leeds and Borough, p624).
[52] Yorkshire Post, 29 September 1909.
[53] National Probate Calendar, 1858–1966.
[54] 1911 census.
[56] See note 11 above.
[57] UK Incoming Passenger Lists, RMS Empress
of Britain, 28 May 1913; Canadian Passenger Lists, SS Laurentic, 26 July 1913.
[58] The Yorkshire Post article of 10 May 1915 reads as follows under the heading ‘A Former Member of the Leeds and County Comedy Company’:
‘Mr and Mrs Norman Stones who were passengers of the Lusitania have a very close connection with Ilkley, particularly Mrs Stones who is among the missing, for although she resided for a few years at Headingley, Leeds, her whole life had previously been spent in Ilkley and both she and her husband were connected with two of the oldest and best known Ilkley families. In Ilkley Mrs Stones was better known as Miss Mary Joy. She was possessed of considerable ability as a vocalist and was particularly fond of theatrical and operatic work. She was a member of the Leeds and County Comedy Company, later appearing in pantomime and with a touring operatic company. She went out to Vancouver a year or two ago to marry Mr Stones who had an extensive farm. She has not been well in Canada and relatives and friends were aware they were coming back, and Mr Stones aunt, Mrs Brumfitt, landlady of the Man & Saddle, Dewsbury, went to Liverpool on Friday to meet them. It was not until her arrival in Liverpool that Mrs Brumfitt heard of the calamity. She remained, with many others, on the Quay all night in order to glean the latest news of the fate of the passengers but nothing was heard of Mrs Stones until Saturday afternoon when a telegram was received by Mrs Jones, another aunt of Mr Stones at Dewsbury, informing her that Mrs Stones was amongst the victims.’
The article contains one or two errors—Mary was a member of the County Comedy Company, rather than the Leeds and County Comedy Company. It also suggests Mary had not been well in Canada—as this is not mentioned in other sources, it seems likely that the reporter had misheard a comment regarding Mary’s mother.
[59] Yorkshire Evening Post, 11 May 1915.
[60] AA and Mary Hoehling, The Last Voyage of
the Lusitania (London: Longmans
Green And Co, 1957).
[61] The National Cyclopaedia of American
Biography (New York: White and Co., 1892-1947, vol 21, 1931). I have seen nothing to indicate that either Mr
Van der Zee Sears or his wife was on the Lusitania on its final voyage.
[62] See
www.rmslusitania.info/people/second-cabin/norman-stones/ (as at 5 December 2014). The author Jim Kalafus corrects the spelling
of Stones but also describes Norman as a ‘professional vocalist’. He changes this to ‘occasional night-club
singer’ in Section 5 of Lest We Forget
the Lusitania.
[63] As at 5 December 2014.
[64] The Rosary (words, Robert Cameron Rogers; music, Ethelbert Nevin) was written in 1898 (Michael R Turner and Antony Miall, eds, The Parlour Song Book, Pan Books Ltd, London, 1974). Tenor John McCormack made a recording of the song which can be found at www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnZqAFjFN00 (as at 5 December 2014).
[65] Phoebe
Amory, The Death of the Lusitania, (Toronto:
William Briggs, 1917). A copy is available in the British Library.
[66] London Gazette, 28 September 1915, issue
29310, page 9567.
[67] London Gazette, 24 November 1917,
supplement 30397, page 12291.
[68] London Gazette, 6 April 1918, supplement
30614, page 4229.
[69] London Gazette, 5 March 1918, supplement
30556, page 2773.
[70] Tim
Binding, On Ilkley Moor: the Story of an
English Town, (London: Picador, 2001).
