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It all started with William and Hannah Jackman who farmed Old Hall Farm in Langcliffe, known locally as Stubbins Farm. This is now Old Hall Cottage. William and Hannah had six children, Christopher, Norman, Leslie, Lily, Rose and Isabella (Bella).

John James Middleton was born in 1896 to John and Jane who came from Deep Dale in Dent and had eight children. Three of the children died in infancy.

William Jackman m Hannah                     John William Middleton m Jane Charnley

John William (d): Thomas (Tucker ) 1920 d.1999:  James (Janucs)1923:  Jack ( Dicky Moore) 1925:  John James (d): Richard (Dick) 1928: Dennis  (Faith) 1931: Frank ( Buller) 1933: Harry (Pom)1935: Harold (Poppy) 1937: Allan (Scodger)1939

Jimmy, as John James Middleton became known, worked at Hill Top farm in Dent until 1914 when he joined the Tank Corps. It was during his service that he met and befriended Leslie Jackman, Bella’s brother, and through this friendship was introduced to Bella. Jimmy and Bella were married on the 4^th May 1918 at St John’s Church in Langcliffe. Their first home was in Main Street, then they moved to 10 New Street and it was there that their eleven sons were born.

As many locals know, all the Middleton boys had nicknames. No one seems to know how this came about other than their Grandfather Jackman gave them to them when they were young. Thomas became ‘Tucker’, James became ‘Janucs’,Jack became ‘Dicky Moore’, Richard is ‘Dick or Snowy’ Dennis became’Fate’,Harry is ‘Pom’,Harold became ‘Poppy’, Frank is ‘Buller’ and Alan is ‘Scodger’.

On leaving the Tank Corps in 1918 Jimmy worked as a Lime Drawer at Nibble Quarry in Horton in Ribblesdale but in the evenings and at weekends he did odd jobs round the village, one of which was grave digging.. As his boys, Buller, Pom, Dick and Poppy grew older they helped and took over as grave diggers. Eventually, Dick, and Jimmy’s great grandson, John Henry , continued the tradition. The Middletons have been responsible for digging graves in Langcliffe for 80 years.

Both Jimmy and Bella worked for Dr Tony Hislop who seems to have been a good friend to the family. He always turned up on baking day to enjoy some of Bella’s freshly baked bread. Jimmy was well known for his gardening skills and it is said that for many years after he retired his pipes were still being found in Dr Tony’s garden. Bella also worked at Bowerley and at Langcliffe Hall.

The brothers had lots of fond memories of their childhood. Their tiny two-bedroom cottage was always full to bursting but Bella was well known for always finding a place for a friend, offering good food and friendly chat

‘Upstairs there was no door and we had a double bed and a single bed with a piece of wood in’t middle. We slept top to tail. Mam and Dad lived in’t front bedroom. Last into bed blew’t candle out’.

‘Friday night were bath night and it were three in the bath wit youngest first. By time it got to’t middle ,watter were black. Mam’d pull down a shirt from’t rack and say ‘Get it put on!’ even if it were our Pom’s’.

‘We had rabbits, bread pudding and rice. The lady next door made big rice puddings that she and her husband couldn’t finish so she sent them round’. Violet’s mother made big meat and potato pies which everybody shared. Breakfast was bread, milk and toast.

All the brothers started school at three years old and claimed to enjoy it, ‘we didn’t like stopping off’, although cousin Violet recalls Bella , ‘chasing ‘em up to’t school wi a clothes line when they wouldn’t go’. Everybody liked Miss Brennan, the infant teacher. She had taught Bella. There was a big sand tray and they learnt ‘Round and Round the Mulberry Bush’. In the afternoon ‘you used to have a sleep in little canvas beds with little blue quilts on’. ’She learnt us to knit. ‘In, over, through and out’. We made dishclouts. Miss Graham was in charge of the middle section of the school. Gardening was added to the curriculum and was very popular. The allotments were on each side of Pike lane. The school children grew onions, beans and cabbages, which were sold in the village. ‘We used to go up at night and collar one!’ ‘Every Monday morning, me (Pom) and me mates got cane on each hand for summat she’d seen us doing in’t village at the weekend’. ‘Gaffer’ Bland taught the top classes. All three sections of the school were choc a bloc. Scodger won a certificate for attending school every day of his primary school years. ‘I never missed a day,and then when I went to Ingleton I was never there’. Pom had a technique for avoiding school, ‘we used to wait for ‘t school bus coming then jump over’t wall’. Pom also took unofficial days off. ‘Every Fiday I had a day off to help my brother - he used to go rabbiting. Janucs only had one arm, (the result of a motorbike accident), so I’d carry snares up on top and bring t’rabbits back and then during t’week I used to have a day off to wind t’old wringing machine for my mother’

Although all the boys were christened in the church they attended the chapel Sunday school. ‘We always went to Sunday school – you got a book and they took you on picnics. Old Jack Benson used to be the Deputy and Bob McGill – you could listen to him for hours’.

The boys were not allowed out of the village but they found plenty of opportunities for amusement.

We’d play in the Planting, scrounging in the ashes, climb up trees, play Hide and Seek – played cricket on ‘t village green; t’owd fellahs used to play football and cricket. At eight or nine we had a team – we played in Norcroft. It belonged to Fosters and his son used to play with us’ Everybody used to mix and there would be twenty two kicking a ball on the green. We played for hours on the monkey bars’. Pom had a mishap. ‘I broke the biggest window in Langcliffe, which was the butcher’s , ( J C Hartley’s) shop window. I let fly and it were right through’t window – and you couldn’t see anybody. Everybody run and they were all in’t church yard hiding in’t long grass. Nobody dare go and ask for’t ball back. I had to go and ask cause I’d hit it through. I had to muck J C’s pigs out’

They played rounders until dusk and then continued the game on the road by the light of the street lamps.

The boys were not allowed down to the river where there had been several tragic accidents by the dam pool. They did however go up to the ‘tops’.

‘We used to go up the hill and ride down on a bicycle with no tyres and we had an old motor bike with no engine – an old Douglas and we used to come down on that. Dad’s bike had no brakes and you stopped it by t’heel on’t back tyre’.

You were ‘never a Langcliffian ‘til you’d tumbled in’t fountain. It were slimey on’t side and you’d be leant over drinking out o’t spout –and in!

In Winter,  when forced indoors, the games were Dominoes, Whist and Pontoon. When the snow arrived, sledging was the main sport. The runs were down the green, on Stubbins, back of the church and on Low Breast. The sledges from Langcliffe Hall were brought out and men, women and children joined in.

Everybody in the house had jobs to do. They helped on the allotment where vegetables were grown and where there was a pig, calves and chickens. There was also a pet lamb fed on the bottle. The older boys helped Dad with the grave digging. ‘When it were dark we used to have to hold t’candle sitting on th’end o’t grave while he were at t’other end swinging t’pick so he could see where he were digging’. Sometimes he’d use a ‘pop’ (explosive) to blast the rock out. Once he blasted a hole in’t church roof – it were too hard!’ He’d go to work at three in’t morning so he could come home at dinner time to fill t’graves in . He worked hard’

There were other jobs - winding the wringer, washing and shopping. Violet remembers the boys ‘going with yer pillow case to t’co-op for loaves of bread’.

If the boys wanted spending money they had to go out and earn it. They worked mostly for local farmers. Fate used to milk for Bob Sutton of Manor Farm when he was only eight and Dick, at twelve years old , would go and help Mr Hogden for the weekend. Pom worked for a week helping to get the harvest in for Mr Towler. He got £2.10s. for the week. When he went to work for him permanently he got an Irishman’s rise - £1.10s per week. Pom also worked as a pony boy at Langcliffe Hall.

‘When they were driving birds, I used to walk-up with the ponies (to Pen y Ghent ) with all the shooters who couldn’t walk and then I’d fetch ‘em back. I worked for Betsy Dawson.’

‘We brought milk from Far End’s barn .There were three shippons with six cows in each .We usedto bring the milk back in back cans . You’d set off straight, like a soldier ,but by the time you’d got to the yard you were stooped and t’milk were running down your neck’.

Everybody helped with the hay making, ‘fourteen or fifteen men turning a swathe faster than the machines could do it in them days. Old Eddie Soames used to tap your ankle if you were slow’.

‘On Sunday we’d all t’papers to do. My father went down to Kitchener’s to fetch ‘em all up in bags and then we had to deliver ‘em. Then we went to Sunday School.'

One of the places the lads spent their money was Marchbank’s. He sold ‘owt and everything’. He had twist in a barrel which he pulled out and cut off. The boys went for broken biscuits, ‘he used to break ‘em up specially so you could have a haporth of broken biscuits’. Horniman’s tea van came to the village and showed films while dispensing free sample cups of tea. More exciting films were shown in Settle and ‘the pictures’ was a popular venue. Hollywood came to the district in 1950 when some scenes from the film ‘Another Man’s Poison’ were shot above Malham Cove. It starred Bette Davis and Gary Merrill . ‘There was a railway coming to the edge and a jeep kept coming and then going back because the scene wasn’t right. Gary Merrill was trying to ride a horse. He were that thick he didn’t know how to open t’gates’

Throughout the year there were special events. The bonfire on November the fifth was built up on Blua and all the wood was carried up there. Carnival was a major event and the boys helped to collect the greenery for the bowers. The women made paper flowers and stitched bunting. Pom had to dress in his cousin Violet’s dress and act as a flower girl with a tray of paper flowers. He hated it. On Sports Day men dressed as women and women dressed as men. ‘Everybody mixed and the whole village was family’,

Nobody went away for holidays but there were trips to the Illuminations in Jack Carr’s cattle wagon.

Christmas was celebrated with a turkey . ‘Jack Carr would bring a turkey down at Christmas and chuck it through t’door and next morning it was in ‘t pan’. You all had your own present in a sack. Dr Tony brought us his off toys’.

As the boys grew older the Pig and Whistle became a popular meeting place. It was a ‘selling out shop’ but the customers used ‘the passage way, the coal house and up t’garden. If a stranger came you’d a big pocket in your jacket and t’bottle went in’. There was also a betting shop in the wash house of a neighbouring farm.

Jimmy and Bella worked hard to raise their family . She kept order with the clothes line and a wet dish clout across the back of the legs. When they were sick, Bella nursed them downstairs. Goose grease was rubbed into chests and coal tar night lights were burned to ease coughs and colds. Bulle, at the age of three, was knocked down by a police car in New Street. His ankle was smashed. He was pushed around in a little red car until he could walk again. His compensation was a bottle of milk a day. Fate contracted diphtheria and had to go to the isolation hospital at Harden Bridge. A farmer,Ted Robinson, took Bella to see Faith but she could only look through a window at her son. On one famous occasion,Tucker and Buller had some teeth removed by the dentist. He operated on the kitchen table using ether gas to numb the pain but unfortunately he gassed the budgie in the process.

When Bella had the babies, the older children were sent to relatives, the Metcalfs , at Sherwood House, Horton.

Jimmy was a few weeks short of fifty years service when he finished at the quarry. In spite of two heart attacks, he got a new job at the mill and earned more money than he had earned at the quarry. ‘it was beer and baccy as kept him going’. As a lime drawer he had to wheel a metal barrow full of lime up a sloping plank. ‘He’d chew his twist, spit it out then wheel it up’. After a visit to the Pig and Whistle he went to the church to lift some flagstones .He fell down the church steps and broke his ribs. He still went to the quarry the next day.

At the age of fourteen the boys left school. All except one went into farming. Poppy became a barber. Violet at fifteen, went cotton spinning. All the boys married local girls and, although Dick is the only one living in Langcliffe today, all the others live close by in surrounding towns and villages.

The simplicity of their lives is shown in these reflections, with humour and fondness of memories from their childhood, their parents and the characters of village life in those times.

The closeness of the family comes through with these reminiscences, even today.

Bella died in 1968 aged 70 John James died in 1975 aged 79.

The background information was researched and compiled by Josephine Crook, (nee Middleton), with contributions from family members and friends and with their co-operation.

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