Week 4: Education #52Ancestorsin52weeks

Nowadays education is seen as being for everyone, no matter their sex, background or age and is something we take for granted. But, of course, it hasn’t always been like that.

Looking at the 1851 census for William Johnston, one of my great grandfathers, who in 1841 had been a grocer, I find he is now a stonebreaker. A bit of a job change there – but what is possibly more surprising to us nowadays, is that his 11 year old son William is also a stonebreaker!

His 14 year old son is an apprentice shoemaker. Both boys are still attending Sunday School as they are also described as ‘Sabbath Scholars’. Their younger brother Thomas, aged 8, is both a Day and a Sabbath scholar. It was not until that Education (Scotland) Act of 1872, that school became compulsory for all 5-13 year olds. Thomas seems to have been fortunate in attending day school and seems to have been in the minority of children in my family tree at that time, who were not listed as scholars of any kind. Below we can see James Young (13) and his younger sister Janet (10), my 2 x great uncle and 2 x great aunt were employed as weavers in a cotton mill. I wonder if they had any sort of schooling at all.

(from Ancestry.co.uk)

We cannot imagine sending our young children out to work nowadays. In those days, it was a necessity.

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