Whatmore Family History

One  of the earliest settlements of the Watmough family in Lancashire was at Blackrod, a small town between Bolton to the east and Wigan to the west. An enormous number of Watmough children were baptised at the parish church of St Katherine’s, Blackrod, over the centuries, but quite a number of these were to families coming into the town from elsewhere. A correlation of the families of Blackrod, Bolton and Wigan is called for but this would be an enormous task. I have thus focused on  Watmoughs who stayed in Blackrod  for many generations and I have been fortunate in coming across the results of research carried out by Gerald Kerry into his wife’s Watmough ancestors from Blackrod. Gerald has placed on the net details of his wife’s tree which extend form the earliest time down to the present day. Gerald has most generously agreed to let me make use of these charts for this post, and I have supplemented his work by information provided by Geoffrey Whatmore in his book ‘Watmough People’ by by details I have myself discovered on the internet.

 Click to enlarge

St Katherine’s church, Blackrod     Copyright: Paul Bennett   Photograph reproduced from the Geograph website in accordance with the site licence which can be read at this link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

The earliest Watmoughs traced at Blackrod by Geoffrey Whatmore were Hugh Watmough, a tenant of Henry and Clemency Norris, the principal landowners, in 1507, and William Watmough who was a witness in 1535 at a manor court hearing in the adjacent parish of Wigan. A Hugh Watmough married a Dorothy at Blackrod in 1693 and a James Watmough married a Catherine at Blackrod in 1611. How these individuals relate to the family described below, is not known.

The earliest known member of the Watmough line which remained at Blackrod for centuries, was James or Jacob Watmough, born about 1565 and who died at Blackrod in 1611. He married a Catherine and their known children were Hugh born about 1589, who married an Elin, Henry born about 1595 and  Jacob baptised on 22 June 1606.

Hugh, son of James/Jacob and Catherine,  married an Eline. Their known children were James born 1611 and died the same year; Katherine born 1612, Elizabeth born 1613, Hugh born 1616 and James born 1621. The Hugh born 1616 appears to have had three children – Hugh 1648, Elline 1649 and Elizabeth 1654. We can go further on this line.

Henry, son of James/Jacob and Catherine married Anne Lowe on 26 May 1622 at Bolton. The chart of their descendants runs to many pages so I shall  restrict myself to just their immediate descendants.

Henry was parish clerk at Blackrod, but presumably there must have been doubt in some quarters about his orthodoxy as the  following  memoranda in the parish records indicates:

 28 day of July 1658Memoranda that the day above said, wee the inhabitants  of Blackrod whose names are here subscribed  doe consent and agree the Henery Watmough the elder shall continue Clarke. He behavinge himself respectively to the minister and the inhabitants and that one of his sonnes shall succeed him behavinge himself as the above said Henery or his sonne in the said office shall take for his pay the benefit of the void burials without the church of such that live out of the townJohn Holt    Pastor Roger Steppard  Church WardenThomas DilworthHugh LongworthJames HollandRichard NightgallAlexander VauseRalph vauseAlexander HodgkinsonThomas DutsonThomas Dootson 

I am most grateful to Gerald Kelly for the above transcript.

Henry and Ann’s known children were James born 1623 in Wigan, Thomas born 1627 in Wigan and Anne who was buried in 1673.  Henry was buried on 13 May 1674 at  Blackrod.

On Henry’s death it was his son James born 1623 who took over as parish clerk at St Katherine’s Blackrod. The parish records  for 1678  include an inventory of church furniture and there is mention of James Watmough, Clarke, in connection with this.

 Elsewhere in the parish records is a ‘Petition to the Lancashire Magistrates Quarter Session – James Watmough Honest to be licensed to brew ale for the parochial chapel and wayfairing men’. 

James Watmough, born 1623, married first to an Ann and their known children were Hugh 1661, Alice died 1669, Henri 1659, Ann 1652, James 1664 and Robert died 1668.  James’ second wife was an Alice.

In 1704, for some reason James sold the Watmough family pew in St Katherine’s  to a Richard Holland who may have been his son-in-law. Gerald Kelly has made the following transcription of the transaction:

It was probably the James Watmough born 1664, son of James and Ann who together with Matthew Hall, wrote a manuscript which criticised the Quakers. James sent a copy to  Henry Mollineux, a eminent local Quaker and they met to discuss it.  Henry conceded that James Watmough’s arguments were ‘pretty well spelled and cunningly contrived’ but Henry nevertheless published in 1714 his own 200 page pamphlet entitled, ‘Popery Exposed by its Own Authors’  in which he slated Watmough and Hall – ‘two Romish champions’ for ‘their hot and rash onsets and attempts against the people called Quakers’.  I am indebted to Geoffrey Whatmore for this information.

Turning back to Thomas Watmough born at Wigan in 1627, son of Henry and Ann, he married an Elin and their known children were Thomas 1652 Wigan, Eleanor 1656 Blackrod, Ann 1661 Blackrod and Katherine 1661 Blackrod.

Much later on, one of the descendants of the Watmoughs of Blackrod emigrated to the State of Victoria in Australia. This was Peter Watmough who was baptised on 24 January 1808 at Bolton. He married Ann Crompton  in 1828 at Bury and he died on 6 April 1877 at Ballarat, Victoria, Australia.

A history of the church of St Katherine’s at Blackrod can be read at this link:

http://www.stkatharine.net/history.php