Adeline leads us on … “Next to Mr. Hawkins foundry was a house and some kennels built by Mr. Edwin Whitehouse of the White House, High Lane (and The Firs?). This house was occupied by Mr. Fred Flint, tailor. He had three children.
“Both Mr. Whitehouse and Mr. Flint were in the Gentlemen’s cricket team”.
Frederick Flint was a son of John and Ann (nee Hickson) and in the 1840’s the family was living in Anchor Row where John worked as a tailor.
As a youth John was a member of St. Mary’s Church choir, a member of the Ilkeston Brass Band and an accomplished musician. He was also a prominent player in the Rutland Cricket Club in its heyday, when it was a force to be reckoned with.
In July 1849 tailor Frederick married Elizabeth Knighton, daughter of Cotmanhay labourer and victualler Samuel and Elizabeth (nee Boam) and four months later their first child William was born.
The 1851 Census shows the three Flints living in South Street with Elizabeth’s mother and the latter’s second husband, Shipley labourer Thomas Clay, whom she had married just over a year after her first husband’s death in November 1836.
Several more Flint children were born but Thomas and Sarah Ann were the two others to survive into adulthood. Sons James and John both died in childhood in June 1858 during a scarlatina epidemic.
By 1861 the family had moved into the house described by Adeline and in the later 1860’s it moved into the Market Place area, close by ironmonger and druggist William Merry, where Frederick’s wife died in 1870.
For some time she had been ‘subject to fits’ and one morning Frederick found her lying in the house-fire, having fallen on the kitchen range.
Although quickly removed she had been severely burned over her chest, face and eyes.
The Derby Mercury believed that she had “received no internal injuries, and that she will recover”, but she did not. She died three weeks later.
Frederick died in February 1881, aged 53, at his Market Place home and was buried at St. Mary’s Church.
Elder son William, with his brother Thomas, continued the business at 10 Bath Street, premises which they moved into about June 1878 and where William advertised himself as “tailor, woollen draper &c.”, promising “all orders punctually attended to and perfect fit guaranteed”.
William Flint was a member of St. Mary’s Church choir.
The waterworks had not yet put in an appearance so the land between Sanders’ orchard and the foot bridge was still vacant, and in a rough condition.
And over this land might walk Mr. and Mrs. Cope.
