Bobbin and Carriage
- Descendants of the Lacemakers of Calais
- May 31
- 2 min read
Lacemakers of Calais who did not leave Calais
Did they all leave?
We know a lot about the "British" lacemakers and their families who travelled from Calais to Australia in 1848. However, most did not make this journey. What happened to those who remained amidst the 1848 turmoil?
What else did they do?
Many returned to England hoping to find work or support from families and friends. Unfortunately, the British economy was experiencing the difficult problems then affecting the European economies. Those returning lacemakers found little work and “hard times”. Many returned to Calais after only a few months as the local economy slowly improved and the factories began to reopen.
Who stayed in Calais?
Others did not leave at all. Many of those “British” lacemakers had been living and working in Calais for years if not decades and regarded Calais to be their home. So, while friends, work colleagues and members of their families either returned to England or made the long journey to Australia, others decided to stay in Calais and make the most of the situation. Many had names familiar to us such as Brownlow, Courquin, Stubbs, Dewey, Sumner, Cobb and Lander. Another was the Swift family.
The Swift Family
Members of the Swift family had been in Calais since the late 1820s when brothers Thomas and George Swift took their families over the Channel to work in the growing lacemaking industry. In the late 1830s Thomas Swift and his family returned to England but George Swift and his family remained in Calais.
In early 1848 the Swift family members were George and his wife Ann Greet, sons John and George and daughters Elizabeth and Jane. Young George was born in Calais. In early 1848, the sons were still living at home while the daughters lived nearby. Elizabeth was married to Samuel Taylor who was a member of another family long residing in Calais. Jane was married to John Bromhead whose family had lived and worked in Calais since 1840. When in 1848, the Bromhead family decided to leave for Australia, Jane Swift said farewell to her parents and siblings and joined her husband and in-laws seeking a life in another land.
What of the other Swift family members?
George Swift, his wife Ann Greet and their children Elizabeth, John and George continued to work in the lacemaking trade in Calais. Elizabeth, John and young George raised families of their own and they all lived out their lives there.
Descendants of that first Swift family can be found in the Calais records through the 1800s, in military records for World War 1, then into the 1940s and later in other areas of France.
No doubt many other descendants of families working in the Calais lacemaking industry in the 1800s, are also still living and working in France.
What about your ancestors?
What do you know about any of your ancestors who returned to England or stayed in Calais after the turmoil of 1848?
We would like to develop our knowledge of those other lacemakers, so why not tell us about them?
My great great grandfather was Edward Morley. His brother William Morley (1814-1875) was a lacemaker in Calais. William moved in about 1839 from Nottingham to Calais and in 1844 he married Mary Ann Ludlam at Douai. In 1847 he must have sensed bad times ahead and returned to England, staying at Tottenham in London. From there he sailed to New York arriving there in February 1848. His wife Mary Ann and two children followed nine months later. After various wanderings they finally settled at Rochester NY. After a difficult start there he became an upholsterer and eventually established his own business. He wrote a series of letters to my great great grandfather Edward in England over the period 1848 to…