"Memoirs of the Hartley Family of Bingley and Staveley,  Yorkshire"
by Minnie Growse (1864-1939),

Foreward
Introduction
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Low Hall
Notes
Hartley, Staveley
Hartley, Bingley

memoirs Continued 12

Henry Hartley (Brother of the Rev. Richard Hartley of Staveley).

Borrow my eyes and look at Uncle Henry.  He is I suppose about five feet nine, but he is very broad and stocky.  He wears a rough Irish tweed coat and waistcoat and spotless cord trousers.  His hands I do not think had ever been soiled and were always spotless.  He wore a stand-up white collar and of himself was well shaved and groomed.  He had small feet for his size and shining boots.  He had a wonderful face and very good nose, finely cut, and a big strong chin and blue eyes.

I can always picture him now, so unlike other people, so full of a strong personality, so sure he was always right and with all there was a great charm about him.  I don't think he was brainy really, but he thought he was, and that is the next best thing, as this queer world takes humanity at its own valuation,

He was a wonderful rider and a very prominent member of the York and Ainsty Hunt.  He farmed the Rectory Glebe and used to come into his dear old house, the Grange, and say "William and I have been very busy, we have been feeding the hens."

William Smith was one of his old and faithful men and had married his wonderful Eliza, the sexton's daughter, who lived at the Grange with Uncle Henry and Aunt Sarah for 18 years and was indeed a treasure.  Uncle Henry had no "g's" and always spoke of "ridin" and "shootin" and so on.  He loved to go to the old cobbler's shop in the Village and expound the newspaper to an admiring audience of village folk.  He explained the Latin quotations and no doubt thoroughly cursed Mr, Gladstone and his party, and implanted his own idea of politics in the poor folk.

If one walked up the village with him the little girls used to bob him a curtsey and then fly off the path into the road for the Haster as he was called was bound to try and catch their ankles with his crooked stick, calling out amid shrieks of laughter "Let's see at your ankles - and if you've wrinkles in your stockings".  He loved, on these occasions to use a Yorkshire-ism like this.  All the village loved Uncle Henry, and when he wanted extra men for harvest or threshing he would go round and tell all those who were weak and blind or lame to come and work for him instead of the young and strong.

Uncle Henry was about 21 when he eloped with pretty Aunt Sarah who was, I think, 17. She was a distant cousin and they had no money between them so Grandfather Richard took them into the Rectory and there they lived until grandfather gave them a pretty little house in the village, and he took the Glebe farm.

Uncle Henry poor dear had a failing.  Alas he loved his cups. Poor Aunt Sarah was almost demented at these times and used to send frantic notes to my father, Frederic Hartley, a mile away.

She always spoke in stilted little sentences and would write my poor tired father saying, "Your brother Henry is exceedingly tipsy, you must come at once.  I have borne with your brother for so many years (whatever the number then was) and his family must now take him".  Poor father, he simply loathed this and would exclaim "Oh, the pig," And retire instantly, go over to the Grange and read the riot act.  As soon as he recovered Aunt Sarah was as proud as ever of her handsome husband, He never failed to get a rise out of her, by telling us how he kissed Fanny Gibbs behind the door at the Grange.  She and her six pretty sisters lived there with their governess before Uncle Henry married and they used to have dances and lots of fun.  When Uncle Henry said, "I'll tell you about Fanny Gibbs", it was enough.  She got furious and said, "It is an entire falsehood, your uncle did no such thing."  Sometimes she was so exasperated with him that she flew out of her chair and gave him a slap on the face.  This amused him beyond words and his blue eyes twinkled and he would pull up the collar of his coat to protect himself but never leave his chair.

Faithful Eliza and Aunt Sarah used to conspire against him, though never unkindly.  He used to say "Thank God my trousers are clean and washed every week.  I can't understand people being so disgusting as' not to have their trousers washed".  So they were regularly consigned to the soiled linen basket once a week.  From thence Eliza smuggled them out on washing day and, having brushed and pressed them, laid them carefully in his drawer.  Oh had he but known.  Anyway I never remember a speck on those garments.

Uncle Henry was very fond of quoting Shakespeare and on one occasion after a little indulgence he returned to the sofa in the sitting room to sleep it off and Aunt Sarah and Janie Addams, his niece, were sitting quietly talking by the fire.  Uncle roused himself, and throwing out his arms, said "Now Richard is himself again,"  Aunt Sarah turned to Janie and said "And now you see ho^^ tipsy your uncle has been, for he is imagining himself your poor father (Richard Addams).  It was too much for little Janie who loved her Shakespeare.

She must have been a sweetly pretty girl for her features were so very dainty and charming and she seems to have had wonderful curly hair.

One of her great-nieces who only saw her once, when she was a child and Aunt Sarah quite old, was spellbound by her pretty round face, apple cheeks and beautiful curly white hair-

If she was cross with anyone, she always said "I met Mrs. So-and-So today and I was civil but cool".

Uncle Henry delighted in gently tormenting all of us at Low Hall, having never had any children of his own, which was a sorrow to Aunt Sarah and himself.  He always came on Sunday afternoon and, if fine, we all sat in the garden.  He arranged a row of chairs sometimes and we children sat on them before him.  "I'll give you sixpence each if you don't laugh or cry at anything I do to you."  "Sixpence."'  Why a fortune.  What could we not bear for this.  Then he began.  He pulled our hair.  He tickled us until we were quite mad.  He punched us, etc. We generally got the sixpence, but oh at what a cost,

Poor old dear.  He used to ge4- up about four in the morning in the summer and open all the windows through that big house, then draw some Beer and sit and meditate.

When he had had a little bout he used to try to read a weird ' old book called the "Bath Guide".  To say the least of it it was not too nice, though witty.  Aunt Sarah was very angry and used to smuggle it away.  There was a chronic game of hide-and-seek between Uncle Henry and the "Bath Guide", but Aunt Sarah was generally too clever for him, in this respect.

Uncle Henry gave up drinking too much and became a redeemed character in this respect, which showed tremendous strength of character.  But sad to say he had a stroke and lay paralysed for a whole year, with two trained nurses in attendance and then he passed peacefully away to join those many old Hartley's who sleep in Staveley churchyard under the shadow of the Rectory.

My cousin Joshua sold the Grange and some nice people took it, We thought of course the tenants had heard of Uncle's little failing. So we spoke of it.  "Oh", she said, "I have never heard one word of this only over and over again from many villagers the wonders of the Master. All he did and all he was - the beef tea and every kind of thing sent to sick folks.  The never-ending kindness and help to all who needed it, and so on, but never a word of a fault or failing".

 (Amongst other things Uncle Henry used to teach the young illiterate farmhands to read),

Good old Yorkshire folks.  You may keep a stone in your pocket for seven years to hit your enemy with, but your friends' faults are never visible, so Uncle Henry was canonised after death as a saint. 'ell, he was a character anyway, and much beloved.

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