Abraham Booth

 Abraham was  my Great, Great , Great, Great, Great Grandfather who was born in 1786, and was christened on April 1st 1786 at St. Mary Magdalen, which is the largest church in Newark and stands in the Market Place.  He died on February 23rd 1865 at 13 Temple Place, Narrow Marsh, Nottingham, and is buried in the Rock Cemetery in Nottingham.

 He was a Bookkeeper by profession, so he could read and write, which in that time and day, was an achievement.  On the Church records of the Christening of his sons.  Thomas and John, his trade was shown as a Grocer and Chandler.

 He married Mary Smith (nee Scoffam) of July 27th 1809 at Newark, she was born August 23rd 1789 at Newark.  Mary died at 13 Temple Place, Nottingham, October 21st 1849, no place of burial has been found yet.

 Abraham and Mary lived in Newark, and the entry in St Marys, Newark baptisms records for Thomas on  August 9th 1813, shows Abrahams occupation as a Grocer.  In 1816 Abraham and Mary and their three children moved to Nottingham, which is 26 miles from Newark.  I believe they would have travelled by barge down the river Trent to the Nottingham Canal, and into the wharf near where they went to live. The Watch and Ward card index for Nottingham ( I believe this showed individuals who were elegible to act as constables if required ) has an entry for 1816 for Abraham Booth aged 30 yrs living in Cheapside. Later censuses show the family as living at  13 Temple Place, Narrow Marsh, which was about a mile away.  This was a new property which according to records, I have researched, would have had just been built.

 Narrow Marsh was very highly populated, and turned into one of the worst slums in Nottingham, even the Police patrolled in twos, and crime was rife.  Some of the housing in the Sneinton area was so bad, that death through Diptheria and Scarlet fever was an every day occurrence among the children.  Families of eight people, or more, would have shared an outside toilet with six other families; these were emptied once a week, usually at night, so you can imagine what the conditions were like in the height of the summer.  The families mostly worked in the lace trade and the pay was poor, and the hours long.

 In the 1920's some of the properties were demolished, and the area was thinned out.  In 1933 to 1945, the Nottingham City Council demolished all the area of Narrow Marsh, and the Sneinton area was demolished in about 1964.

 Their children were as follows:

 1   Mary Booth, born 30 August 1810 in Newark, no other information.

 2   Thomas Booth, born August 9th 1813 in Newark, and was married to a Mary ?  In the 1841 census of Nottingham, he lived at Walnut Tree Lane, which ran near the bottom of The Nottingham Castle.  Thomas's trade was a Lacemaker.

 3   John Smith Booth, born May 17th 1815 in Newark, and was married to Jane Owen, and in the 1841 census, lived at 2 Cherry Place, Nottingham, there were three children of the marriage.  John's trade was a Lacemaker.

 4   Hannah Booth, born September 23rd 1816 in Nottingham and married John Brown, who was a Cow Leek (an old name for an animal doctor), on January 23rd 1838 at St Stephen's Church, Sneinton, Nottingham.  I have found three children of the marriage; they lived at 4 Walker Street, Sneinton, and in Pennyfoot Street, Nottingham.  In the 1851 census, Hannah was a Lace Mender by trade.

 5   Joseph Raynor Booth born August 1st 1818 in Nottingham, and was married to Caroline Houldsworth Bowman, who was born in London, the daughter of Thomas Bowman, a Bookkeeper.  They were married at St. Mary's Church in Nottingham on August 15th 1841.  There were five children of the marriage.  Joseph's trade was a Shopkeeper and later, until his death, was an Innkeeper.  He was the licensee of the Vernon Arms, and it is still there today, as a pub.

 He died on June 21st 1883, and Caroline died on June 20th 1889, they are buried in the Rock Cemetery Nottingham, with their son Henry Houldsworth Booth and his wife Susannah Alice.

 6   No trace yet of the sixth child.

7   Henry Septimus Booth born 1824 in Nottingham, at 13 Temple Place, and was married on January 1852 at St Stevens Church, Sneinton Nottingham, to an Ellen Dodd.  There were five children of the Marriage.  Henry's trade was a Lace Warper.  No trace of their death, or where they are buried has been found yet.  He enlisted  in The Grenadier Guards in June 1845 , his army number was 5476 ,  and served for 3 years and 12 days  when he purchased his own discharge from the Army for the sum of  £20.00, which would have been about 40 weeks wages in that time of day.

 8  Martha Helen Booth was born on October 19th 1828 in Radford Nottingham.

 9  Alfred Booth was born on March 14th 1830.

 Abraham was Married again on 23rd October 1853, to a Mrs Elizabeth Linneker, a widow of Nottingham, who was 63 years of age, at St Johns Baptist Church in Narrow Marsh.  She died on April 23rd 1863 at 13 Temple Place, Narrow Marsh, and is buried with Abraham in the Rock Cemetery.