Recent Posts
Scarlet fever in the 1800s
Scarlet fever in the 1800s was a common disease among children – and a deadly one. And sadly, cleanliness and ventilation were either a luxury for poorer households, or maybe not appreciated as impo... Read More
Facts about coats of arms – and some fun
Coats of arms are colourful, meaningful, mini-puzzles, and great fun. People use them to illustrate online family trees. And there are loads of websites and physical tourist shops where you can buy co... Read More
The Port Carlisle Dandy – a symbolic curiosity
The Port Carlisle Dandy was a curious invention – even in its day, it was regarded as an oddity. It also symbolises how high hopes of transforming Port Carlisle (by the canal, by the railway) were d... Read More
Cumbrian lodging houses – dens of disease
If you imagine Cumbrian lodging houses in the 1800s were in any way better than those in the big industrial cities elsewhere in England, you’d be wrong. Conditions for those forced to live in th... Read More
James Ainslie – and Georgian medicine
Georgian medicine wasn’t so much ‘kill or cure’ as ‘kill or do very little’. With nothing resembling quality control, or advertising standards, you could peddle any old c... Read More
Port Carlisle – Britain at Low Tide
Port Carlisle featured a little in episode three of the third series of the excellent Britain at Low Tide. You can currently watch it on catch-up here. The episode focused on the area round the Sol... Read More
Ann Little – driven to a terrible act
On July 11, 1881, Ann Little, 45, who couldn’t read or write, was charged with attempting to drown herself and her two youngest children, Ann and Joseph, in the River Caldew, near Hutton Roof. It so... Read More
Victorian burials, a grave and unhealthy issue
Victorian burials may conjure up images of widows in black, and brooches containing hair. They were also a major public health concern… In a previous post on the ‘connection’ between tempera... Read More