James Archer (founder of Archer Cowley & Co)’s cv:

Curriculum Vitae: James Archer, who started the family carrier/removals business:

Reminder (to me) of the Raison d’etre for this Curriculum Vitae:

From the preface to Simon Schama’s ‘A history of Britain’ (BBC published 2000), slightly editorially adapted and condensed for inclusion here: History (including family history – per pba, and Schama is talking about history as seen by Churchill and Macaulay) is a living instruction, not a spare-time luxury, and a requirement of informed citizenship. And (page 16 of the preface), Schama refers to ‘Cicero’s warning that cultures without history doom themselves to remain trapped in the most illusory tense of all, the present, akin to small children who know neither whence they come nor whither they go’. And Schama goes on to ‘Imagine a history in which alteration, mutation and flux …. are the norm, a history that sees the period (in my case, the period of the 19^thth and early 20 century growth of the family) as just one epoch among many in the evolution of (our island nation)/(in my case: our tiny part of humanity.

And a reminder to me to make haste to make progress with this project:

(From Simon Schama’s ‘A history of Britain’, page 52, a quote from Bede’s ‘Ecclesiastical History of England’, a speech by one of the Saxon nobles, summoned by Edwin of Northumbria to advise him on the adoption or rejection of the New Church (Christianity):

‘Much seemeth to me, my lord, the present life of men here on earth ….as if a sparrow should come to the house and very swiftly flit through….. which entereth in at one window and straightway passeth out through another while you sit at dinner with your captains and servants in wintertime, the parlour being then made warm with the fire kindled in the midst thereof, but all places being troubled with raging tempests of winter rain and snow. Right for the time it be within the house it feeleth no smart of the winter storm, but after a very short space of fair weather, it soon passeth again from winter to winter and escapeth your sight. So the life of man here appeareth for a little season, but what followeth or what hath gone before, that surely we know not. Wherefore, if this new learning hath brought us any better surety, methinks it is worthy to be followed.’

And a reminder to me to rejoice in the heterogeneity of my family, including (especially) those whose lot in life was not amongst the elite:

(Schama, ibid, page 16, bottom paragraph): ‘Imagine instead a British history in which alteration, mutation, and flux, rather than continuity and bedrock solidity, are the norm; a history that does not lead inexorably to a consummation in the unitary state of Great Britain but that sees that period – only, after all, three centuries old, barely as long as Roman Britainnia – as just one epoch among many in the evolution of our island nation. This would be a history in which national identity – not just in Britain, or in England, but in Scotland, Ireland and Wales – was not a fixed but a decidedly shifting and fluid quality; a history in which the allegiance that mattered might, from generation to generation, from place to place, be matter of clan or class, town or manor, language or dialect, church or club, guild or family, rather than of flag or dynasty. It would be a history in which the ragged frontiers of regions might count for a lot more than the fixed borders of countries; in which north-south divisions within Scotland and Wales could be as profound as those between either of them and their English neighbour. It would be an elastic history of nationhood, with England or Scotland sometimes closer in spirit and interest to France and even to Rome than to each other; but at other times genuinely and wholeheartedly (for good or ill) bound together within the British union. But it would also be a history which does not try to abandon the necessary impurity of Britishness for some cleaner, tidier, smaller concept of nationality, but instead embraces that historical impurity as our great strength. The unity presupposed by a ‘united kingdom’ may be no more coherent, in the end, than the unity of a ‘united states’, and no less worth defending, for precisely its generous heterogeneity. Finally, this history might be history respectful of contingency, mistrustful of inevitability, indifferent to any predetermined route or destination; a history refusing to take for granted (as the victors’ texts always want) that the way things turned out was the way they were always meant to be; a history that can see, but for a happenstance – Harold not falling out with his brother; Anne Boleyn giving birth to a healthy son; Oliver Cromwell not dying when he did – an altogether different outcome. How likely, after all, was it, for a clairvoyant of the 1750s to prophecy that, by the century’s close, Britain would end up, not with colonies that spoke, for the most part, English, but with colonies that spoke, for the most part, Bengali and Urdu?

There is a risk, of course, of lost moorings in these kinds of British histories, of the familiarity of the bulldog breed, island race story going astray, amid countless competing alternatives, a risk of the consoling simplicity of the old story being traded in for the bewildering confusion of the new. But Clio, properly respected, is the least straightforward of the muses. Her beauty lies in the complexity, not the simplicity, of her truth. Which is why her votaries, attentive to the sometimes difficult and winding path they must follow, are sworn to tell stories in order to make the journey easier. For in the end, history, especially British history with its succession of thrilling illuminations, should be, as all her most accomplished narrators have promised, not just instruction, but pleasure.

And, finally, that well-known quote from George Eliot’s Middlemarch, on the same point:

But we insignificant people with our daily words and acts are preparing the lives of many Dorotheas, some of which may present a far sadder sacrifice than that of the Dorothea whose story we know. Her finely touched spirit had still its fine issues, though they were not widely visible. Her full nature, like that river of which Cyrus broke the strength, spent itself in channels which had no great name on the earth. But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growinggood of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.

Not to mention a quote by Schama from Colin McInnes:

(Schama ibid, vol 3, page 550, para 3, discussing British nationality): “Suppose, instead of listening to the paranoid rant of an Enoch Powell prophesying that a multi-racial Britain would end like Rome with the ‘River Tiber foaming with blood’, a multi-racial Britain actually took pride in what Colin MacInnes, the ‘rebel’ writer of the 1950s, called even then its ‘mongrel glory’.”

(re item 4 above, from ‘The Oxford Companion to English Literature’ ed: Margaret Drabble, 6^th edition: “MacInnes, Colin: 1914 – 1976, novelist, son of singer James McInnes (sic) and Angela Thirkell, brought up partly in Australia; on his return to England after a period in art school and (during the war) in the army, he embarked on a career as a writer and journalist. (Then a list of his novels including ‘To the Victor the Spoils’ (1950), ‘June in her Spring’ (1952), and the novels for which he is best remembered, ‘City of Spades’ (1957) and ‘Absolute Beginners’ (1959)). These describe teenage black immigrant culture and the new bohemian underworld of Notting Hill, of coffee bars, jazz clubs, drink, and homosexuality. MacInnes called himself an ‘anarchits sympathizer’ and defended several of the causes of the 1960s, including Black Power and the writers of Oz”(sic).

Names and place in the family:

James Archer, 3^rd son (according to an envelope, in copperplate hand, marked ‘Freedom, City of Oxford’) of John Archer (Jnr, per pba);
Only his younger brother Alfred George seems to have been given two ‘Christian’ names;
The sons who preceded him were John and Thomas, names corresponding to those of the preceding generation.
And he was the sixth child, being preceded also by Fanny, Elizabeth, and Ann (the first three children, and likewise names from the preceding generation).
So, his sister Fanny was 7 years and ten-and-a-half months when he was born.
And after him came four sisters (Ellen Matildas (1) and (2) and Rose Ann) and four brothers (Edward, Charles, Alfred George and William Samuel).

Dates (birth and death):

4^th December 1836 (confirmed by above envelope), and by his brother Alfred George’s own family dates list;
Baptised 21^st December 1836;
Died 12^th October 1922, aged 85.
Notes: 1. and 2. above confirmed by his memorial card;
Death certificate says that he died of:
(i)Bronchitis and heart failure; and
(ii)Chronic emphysema;
Chambers dictionary: “emphysema: a) enlargement of the air sacs of the lungs causing breathlessness; b) a swelling caused by air in the connective tissues of the body”.

Education:

Not yet known.

Need to find an obituary.

Probably reasonable to assume was similar to that of his siblings.

Marriage:

James married Fanny Porter on Tuesday 31^st March 1874;
The wedding was at St Peter-le-Bailey church, (now the chapel of St Peter’s Hall college) Oxford;
The wedding was conducted by the Rev Canon Linton;
The wedding was followed by a wedding breakfast at 35 Hythe Bridge Street, at 9 am;
Searches show that the church of St Peter le Bailey, the third of that name on the site, is now (2008) the chapel of St Peter’s College (known in Oxford in my (pba’s) day as ‘St Peter’s Hall’, which was founded 55 years later in 1929) was actually built in 1874 (presumably meaning completed), so, in early 1874, the wedding must have been in a brand-new church, just along New Inn Hall Street, from where Wesley Memorial Church now stands (completed later in 1878), where the Methodist branch of the family later went for Sunday services – see map of the area (now scanned-in);
Fanny/Frances is noted as the only daughter of the late Mr Thomas Porter;
Fanny Porter’s baptism certificate shows she was born on November 13^th 1839, and baptized on 25^th December 1858 at the age of 19 years and one month - 16 years before she was married at the age of 35;
Fanny Porter died on18^th April 1908, aged 69 (about 14 years before James), and is interred at Osney cemetery. According to ‘WGRA.notes.1’: ‘Fanny Archer, wife of James Archer died at 320 Banbury Road, Oxford, 18^th April 1908 age 69 years’. So, perhaps James and Fanny were living at 320 Banbury Road in 1908, and had moved there from Kidlington, where they were in 1901 – see census results below.
So she was married for 34 years from about the age of 35;
Fanny Porter.Archer’s funeral card confirms these latter details, and has been scanned-in;
See also the wedding invitation, and the attached paper-cutting (giving simply the date and place and names of the bride and groom) reporting the wedding, which have been scanned-in as a graphic;
Fanny Porter’s brother Alfred appears in James Archer’s story as from 1871, when James was living at the Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford, with his sisters Frances and Matilda (see census data below), and Alfred is a lodger, age 28, ‘Coal Merchant’, in the house next door, ‘New Road Boot Shop at No. 10 New Road, unmarried, though with an infant daughter of 5 days with him. He provides the means for finding Fanny Porter’s family in London. There is a strange coincidence about some of this data, that Alfred Porter, the son of Thomas Porter, Boot Maker, of 17 Henrietta Street, St Marylebone, London, should be there at the home of Joseph Barrett, boot and shoe manufacturer in New Road, Oxford, when his sister’s husband-to-be is living next door. For the moment this coincidence strongly suggests to me that James Archer met his wife-to-be as a result of Alfred being there next door in New Road, and that Alfred was there in New Road, as a result of the boot and shoe trade connection with the Porter family.

James Archer’s Children:

None. Hence the leaving of his business share and wealth to his nephew, William George Reed Archer.

James Archer’s Father:

John Archer (1803/1884), indicated as “publican” on James Archer’s baptism certificate; The above-mentioned ‘Freedom’ envelope says that James Archer was the 3^rd son of John Archer. It appears that James himself may well have been a publican in the 1870s (at The Anchor inn, New Road, Oxford), when he was in his 20s/30s – see census data below. Perhaps, to own a hotel, you did not need to be a publican.

James Archer’s Mother:

Fanny (Frances) Leaver.Archer. James was the sixth child – see below. I have not yet found Fanny Leaver’s family in London. I have one lead – via William Leaver who appears aged 4 in the 1841 census in Market Street, but on ordering his death certificate 2 years later, the response from the GRO checking service was that the William Leaver in question ‘was not aged 6’.

James Archer’s Brothers and Sisters:

Fanny (or Frances) Mary, born 20^th January 1829, who apparently helped James in his venture at the Anchor Hotel in New Road, Oxford in the 1870s, and who, died single at 7 Tackley Place, Oxford, 15^th May 1894 (age 65);
Elizabeth, born 29^th January 1830 (one year and nine days after sister Frances Mary), married John Gray, buried at Rose Hill cemetery;
Ann, born 11^th June 1832, (two years and four months after sister Elizabeth), married Tom Wood, buried at St Sepulchre’s cemetery, Walton Street, Oxford;
John, born 4^th January 1834, (one year and seven months after sister Ann), married Miss Castle, buried St Aldates. John’s census record shows him: (1891), living at 15 Banbury Road, retired farmer age 57, living with his wife, Sophia A. Archer age 63, and daughter Ada Archer, age 22, both born in Oxford, and one servant; (1881): same as 1891 but ages 48, 55, and 13, and they are living at 3 Park Villas, St Giles Road (ie John was ‘retired farmer’ even at the age of 48); (1871), living at 77 St. Aldates, same household as 1881 but ages (sic) 42, 45, and 3 years, and he is ‘Farmer (90 acres) employing 5 men and 1 boy’; (1861), haven’t found yet; (1851), see below, he is a ‘Cooper’ aged 18 and living with his parents at No. 63 St. Aldates; (1841), he is aged 8, and living with his parents in Market Street;
Thomas, born 2^nd January 1835, (one year less two days after brother John), died 1920 (aged about 85), buried at Cowley with wife and daughter.
‘FGBA.notes.1’ (undated) says: (Re)Thomas:
(i) Anna Maria (pba: wife presumably) died 1885 and buried at St James church, Cowley. (ii) Annie (pba: daughter?): single, living at St Mary’s Road, (pba: no indication of where, presumably Cowley or Oxford), died (“?”) 1935.
(iii) Bessie (pba: daughter?) ditto signs for same address as Annie.
(iv) Florence: single (pba?): Mrs Earle, London. One son died before his father and buried in same grave;
James, born 4^thth December 1836, (one year and eleven months after brother Thomas), died 12 October 1922 (aged 85), married Fanny Porter 31^st March 1874, buried Osney Cemetery, started the family furniture removal business, no children;
Ellen, born 16^th May 1838, (one year and five months after brother James), died single;
Matilda “(1)”, born 1840, appears in the 1841 census, as being of age 1 year, but from the family bible she was born on 10.12.1846, and her age in the 1851/61/71 censuses roughly corresponds with this. So, it seems reasonable to assume that there were two Matildas (shown as “Matilda (1)” and “Matilda (2)”), the first, born in 1840 and dying before the second was born, and perhaps before the next child (below) Edward, was born on 07.02.1842. I have not yet searched for her death ccrtificate (21.11.2008);
Edward, born 7^th February 1842, (almost four years after sister Ellen), died single, buried in St Sepulchre’s cemetery (age 64, per pba manuscript notes);
Charles, born 20^th August 1843, (one year and six months after brother Edward), married Miss Wells, no children;
Matilda (2): born (10^th): June 12^th 1846; died (*)(5^th): 20^th May 1892; (aged 45 years and 11 months).
Alfred George, born 16^th February 1848, (almost four and a half years after sister Ellen), died 7^th February 1913, in his 65^th year; had eleven children;
William Samuel, born 10^th July 1852, (almost four and a half years after brother Alfred George), one son and one daughter, died 2^nd January 1917, aged 64, buried in St Sepulchre’s cemetery, married Matilda Saunders (dates 12^th June 1846 to 20^th May 1892, age almost 46);
Rose Anne, born 6^th February 1854, (one year and seven months after brother William Samuel, died 6^th September 1889, aged 35, single, buried in family vault in St Aldate’s; and
Seven (not quite sure where the “seven” came from, pba, as FGBA’s manuscript note says just refers to “other children”) children who died in infancy; (if so, a total of 19 children apparently born). Perhaps one of the ‘seven’ was “Matilda (1)” above, now inserted in the above list after ‘finding’ her in the 1841 census, aged 1. That was pure chance (that a census occurred before a child who died young did actually die). Perhaps the other 6 (or however many there were, died before a census could record them). I now (21.11.2008) believe I recall that the handwritten notes on the family show that there were indeed two ‘Matildas’. Must investigate this point.

James Archer in the decades of the 19^th Century:

The 1830s:

(One elder sister, Frances, born in the 1820s: Fanny (or Frances) Mary, born 20^th January 1829);
Siblings born before James, in the 1830s:
(i) Elder sister Elizabeth born 29.01.1830;
(ii) Elder sister Ann born 11.06.1832;
(iii) Elder brother John born 04.01.1834;
(iv) Elder brother Thomas born 02.01.1835;
James is born on 4^th December 1836, nearly 2 years after Thomas, probably at Market Street, Oxford, the sixth of a long series (of about 19) children to John and Fanny Archer;
Other events of the 1830s:
(i) 26.06.1830: George IV died without legitimate issue and was succeeded by his brother The Duke of Clarence, age 64, ‘the oldest person ever to assume the British throne’, who was crowned as William IV, and seems (pba) to have been a man with the right approach, giving much of his brother George IV’s painting collection to the nation, and refusing to live at Buckingham Palace (despite, or perhaps because of, its recent expensive renovations) and tried to give the palace away, once to the army for use as a barracks, and once to Parliament after the houses of Parliament burned down in 1834. William IV is remembered for his involvement in controversy with Lord Grey over the Reform Bill, which extended the franchise to shopkeepers
(ii) Opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway: 15.09.1830. This was about 5 years after the opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway;
(iii) Death of King William IV: 20.06.1837;
(iv) Queen Victoria’s Coronation: 28.06.1838, when James was 18 months and 24 days;
Siblings born after James in the 1830s:
only Ellen, born 16^th May 1838 – the subsequent child, Edward was born in 1842. So, altogether, his parents had James and five siblings in the 1830s;

The 1840s:

1841 Census:
(i) James is a 4-year-old living with his parents and 7 other children in the house at the corner of Market Street and Ship Street, Oxford;
(ii) James’s father, John, is a victualler, not yet working with his father (James’s grandfather) in the family brewery;
Siblings born in the 1840s:
(i) Matilda (1) born approx 1840 (no date, but she is ‘1 year’ in 1841, and she is believed to have died very young;
(ii) Edward, born 7^th February 1842;
(iii) Charles, born 20^th August 1843;
(iv) Alfred George, born 16^th February 1848;
(v) (no more in the1840s, as William Samuel was born in 1852; so, in the 1840s, James acquires four, then three siblings in the second decade of his life;
Other events in the 1840s:
(i) Railway Mania: the Stockton and Darlington Railway had opened in 1825. Five years later the Liverpool and Manchester Railway had opened, in 1830. The 1840s saw ‘Railway Mania’. By 1851 6,800 miles of track had been laid. Soon it was possible to travel from London to Bristol in hours rather then days, at speeds of around 60 mph;
(ii) “The spread of railways stimulated communication, and Rowland Hill's standardisation of postal charges in 1839 saw a boom in mail services. But this was nothing compared to the revolution of the telegraph. If you think the internet is big (and given you're reading this online the chances are you do) then just imagine how much bigger it would seem if you had never before seen a computer or telephone. That's what the telegraph was to the Victorians. If rail travel shrank the country, the telegraph crushed it. It opened in the 1840s and soon went stratospheric - within ten years exchanging telegrams had become part of everyday life. By the mid 1860s London was connected with New York and ten years later messages could be exchanged between London and Bombay in minutes. This had vast implications for business and communication. The telegraph marked the start of truly global markets and news. It marked an irreversible acceleration in the pace of commercial and everyday life. New mass communication via the telegraph, newspapers and - from 1876 - the telephone meant that the rate of change accelerated further. New inventions, like the X-ray in 1895, could be flashed around the globe in days. The age of media frenzy had arrived.” (‘All Change in the Victorian age’, by Bruce Robinson.

The 1850s:

1851 census: James is a ‘Scholar’, age 14, living at No. 63 St. Aldates, with his parents and 9 other children/siblings; 1851 census: James’s brother-in-law (to be), Alfred Porter, is a scholar, age 8, living in Henrietta Street, London, with his sister Fanny, age 11;
James founded James Archer & Co. in 1857 (from PBA’s manuscript cv records), aged 21;
Siblings born (some of them) in the 1850s:
(i) William Samuel, born 10^th July 1852;
(ii) Rose Anne, born 6^th February 1854;
(iii) Seven (not quite sure where the “seven” came from, pba, as FGBA’s manuscript note says just refers to “other children”) children who died in infancy; (if so, a total of 19 children apparently born);
Fanny Porter’s baptism certificate shows that, born on November 13^th 1839, she was baptized on 25^th December 1858 at the age of 19 years and one month - 16 years before she was married at the age of 35;
The Great Exhibition of 1851:
(a) “The Great Exhibition, also known as Crystal Palace, was an international exhibition that was held in Hyde Park, London, England, from 1 May to 15 October 1851 and the first in a series of World's Fair exhibitions of culture and industry that were to be a popular 19th century feature.” (Wikipedia);
(b) The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of all Nations was organized by Prince Albert, Henry Cole, Francis Henry, Charles Dilke and other members of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce as a celebration of modern industrial technology and design. It can be argued that the Great Exhibition was mounted in response to the highly successful French Industrial Exposition of 1844. consort, was an enthusiastic promoter of a self-financing exhibition; the government was persuaded to form the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 to establish the viability of hosting such an exhibition.Prince Albert, Queen Victoria's consort, was an enthusiastic promoter of a self-financing exhibition; the government was persuaded to form the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 to establish the viability of hosting such an exhibition.
(c) A special building, nicknamed The Crystal Palace,[1] was designed by Joseph Paxton (with support from structural engineer Charles Fox) to house the show; an architecturally adventurous building based on Paxton's experience designing greenhouses for the sixth Duke of Devonshire, constructed from cast iron-frame components and glass made almost exclusively in Birmingham and Smethwick, which was an enormous success. The committee overseeing its construction included Isambard Kingdom Brunel. The massive glass house was 1848 feet (about 563 m) long by 454 feet (about 138 m) wide, and went from plans to grand opening in just nine months. The building was later moved and re-erected in an enlarged form at Sydenham in south London, an area that was renamed Crystal Palace; it was eventually destroyed by fire.[1]
(d) Six million people – equivalent to a third of the entire population of Britain at the time – visited the Exhibition. The Great Exhibition made a surplus of £186,000 which was used to found the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Science Museum and the Natural History Museum which were all built in the area to the south of the exhibition, nicknamed "Albertopolis", alongside the Imperial Institute. The remaining surplus was used to set up an educational trust to provide grants and scholarships for industrial research, and continues to do so today.[2]
(e) The exhibition caused controversy at the time. Some conservatives feared that the mass of visitors might become a revolutionary mob,[citation needed] while radicals such as Karl Marx saw the exhibition as an emblem of the capitalist fetishism of commodities. Today the Great Exhibition has become a symbol of the Victorian Age, and its thick catalogue illustrated with steel engravings is a primary source for High Victorian design. [3]

The 1860s:

According to an envelope, in copperplate hand, marked ‘Freedom, City of Oxford’, of John Archer (Jnr), James Archer took up his freedom on 27^th July 1860; ie:
Admitted freeman 27^th July 1860, aged 24;
1861 Census: Four years after the founding of Archer & Co, James is ‘Clerk’, age 25, unmarried, living with his parents at Isis House, St. Aldates, Oxford, in a household of 13:
(From family bible): Elizabeth Archer: born (2^nd): January 30^th 1830; died (*)(1^st): 4^th December 1866; (aged 36 years and 10 months). Elizabeth was James’s elder sister (the 2^nd – born of the family), who had married John Gray, and was buried at Rose Hill cemetery. I wonder whether she died of consumption or in childbirth? Must see if I can find her death certificate; (ordered 18.11.08).
Nothing else relevant found for inclusion in the 1860s (22.11.08)

The 1870s:

1871 Census: Fourteen years after the founding of ‘Archer & Co.’, and 3 years before he will be married, James is ‘Carrier’, unmarried, age 37, living at The Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford, with his sisters Frances and Matilda (2), ages (from their d.o.bs) 42 and 25, presumably as a ‘family team of three’ for running the hotel. Whether James owned the hotel, I just do not yet know. Presumably he had not, by 1871, had the time to put together the capital for that, but I do not know.
The Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford was next door to No. 10 New Road, which is ‘New Road Boot Shop’ at which (coincidentally in view of James Archer’s wife (to be)’s maiden name (Porter) is living/staying one Alfred Porter, unmarried, age 28, coal merchant, born ‘London’, with ‘infant’ daughter age 5 days (born Oxford) – what an amazing difference to James Archer’s life (later), and my family would the arrival of such a (well, a male one) child to his wife. Interestingly, next door on the other side to the Anchor Hotel is ‘New Road Anchor Tap’, presumably a more informal drinking establishment;
Only 3 people were apparently resident at Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford, that night in 1871, as follows. No other persons are listed there in the census, no staff whatever, so I suppose the place is ‘the building formerly known as’ ‘The Anchor Hotel’, or anyway did not offer (or anyway that night provide) accommodation to anyone. Whether James was the publican, as, according to a note from FGBA, one ‘Archer’ was, is an interesting question;
James Archer is entered in the 1871 census as ‘head’ (of the household), unmarried, age 37;
James married Fanny Porter on Tuesday 31^st March 1874 and the wedding was at St Peter-le-Bailey church, (now the chapel of St Peter’s Hall college) Oxford;
Copied from a tiny paper cutting, apparently from the classified advertisements, and reading: “Marriages: Archer – Porter - March 31 (presumably 1874, though not shown), at St Peter-le-Bailey Church, by the Rev. Canon Linton, Mr James Archer, of the “Anchor” Hotel, to Fanny, only daughter of the late Mr Thomas Porter.”
The paper cutting of item 13 above is pasted to a printed paper slip which is apparently an original invitation to the wedding, and reading: “Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford, March 24, 1874.
Mr JAMES ARCHER requests the favour of your company at his Wedding Breakfast, on Tuesday, March 31^st , 1874, at 35 Hythe Bridge Street, at 9 am”. There is apparently a (or is it more than one?) signature at the bottom with the name “Porter” clearly legible, and the preceding name might just be “Francis”, so perhaps the invitations were signed (and sent out?) by his fiancee a week before the wedding;
(Copied from below): M.J. Cowley joined James Archer in 1876, and retired in December 1933, after the death of R.Rippington (57 years service), and Mr Cowley died in February 1944. To do: find/order the will of: “Mack J. Cowley, retired furniture remover … etc … died February 1944”. Done 19.1.09. From the 1901 Census, Mack J.Cowley was at that time living at 40 Leckford Road, with his wife Sarah M.A. Cowley, and his father-in-law Alfred Maltby, and Mack Cowley was then aged 45, and had a daughter (Winifred Rose Cowley) aged 12 living with them, and Mack Cowley’s “profession or occupation” was entered as “Carrier’s clerk”, and he is indicated as having been born in Oxford.
There is a reference to the 1870s in WGRA’s hand-written note about the family firm: “The firm” (presumably JA & Co) “.. ran Daily Carrier to Radley and Abingdon from 1886 for many years with a two wheel horse van (photo in scrap book)” (such scrap book never seen by PBA). “Horse pantechnicon vans 1870 (but should it be 18990?) for many years until 1925 were put on rail for long distance removals. Lift vans also were used for rail many years. Oxford’s first concrete warehouse added at Park End Street when I, WGRA, joined the firm in 1919, and it was completed in 1920.
On the night of the 1871 census, there were living/staying at 10 New Road, St Peter le Bailey, Oxford, next door to The Anchor Hotel, where James Archer and his two sisters were residing, one Alfred Porter, lodger, unmarried, age 28, coal merchant, born London, and his ‘Infant’, daughter (looks like), age 5 days, born Oxford; and James Archer’s destiny is to be quite closely linked to that of this Alfred Porter;
Nothing else found for the 1870s; still to do: Oxford and England in the 1870s;

The 1880s:

1881 Census, James Archer, living with his wife in Pembroke Street, Oxford:
(i) 37 Pembroke Street, Oxford: James Archer, head, married, age 43,
(ii) occupation/profession: ‘Furniture Depository’ (sic), born Oxford; and
(iii) Fanny Archer, wife, age 41, born London, St. Marylebone;
Meanwhile, likewise in the 1881 census, Alfred Porter, James’s brother-in-law, is, or says he is: ‘General Manager to Carrier’, living with his widowed mother and one servant in Hythe Bridge Street, Oxford, where the wedding breakfast was held in 1874:
Meanwhile, additionally in the 1881 census, James Archer’s business partner-to-be ‘Mack Cowley’, is living at 3 (yes it does seem to be 3, not 40, (perhaps they moved) Leckford Road, Oxford, with his mother, Ann Cowley, Head, married, age 48, builder’s wife, born Oxford; James being recorded as: “James M.Cowley, son, married, age 24, clerk, born Oxford”, and Mack’s younger brother, “Charles W.Cowley, son, age 16, born Oxford” being likewise present, together with their lodger: “Archibald J.Heacher”;
There is a reference to the 1880s in WGRA’s handwritten note about the family firm: “The firm” (presumably JA & Co) “.. ran Daily Carrier to Radley and Abingdon from 1886 for many years with a two wheel horse van (photo in scrap book)” (such scrap book never seen by PBA). “Horse pantechnicon vans 1870 (90?) for many years until 1925 were put on rail for long distance removals. Lift vans also were used for rail many years. Oxford’s first concrete warehouse added at Park End Street when I, WGRA, joined the firm in 1919, and it was completed in 1920.
James’s mother, Fanny Archer; born: December 10^th, 1808; died: 13^th February 1881; (aged 72 years and 2 months);
James’s father, John Archer (junior), born: June 22^nd 1803, died: 6^th December 1884, (aged 81 years and 5 months);
James’s sister, Anne Archer: born (3^rd): June 11^th 1832; died (*)(2^ndth): 25 December 1886; (aged 54 years and 6 months);
James’s sister, Rosa/Rose Anne Archer (13^th): born: February 6^th 1854; died (*) (3^rdth): 6 September 1889; (aged 35 years and 7 months);
Nothing else found for the 1880s; still to do: Oxford and England in the 1880s;

The 1890s:

R.Rippington was in partnership with James Archer from 1890 and died in December 1933 – according to WGRA’s hand-written note;
Census of 1891: James’s brother-in-law, Alfred Porter, is living with James, and James’s wife Fanny, in Stanton St John, Headington, Oxford, at No. 90 (no street name) Stanton St. John; and at that address, James Archer, is ‘head’, married, age 54, Carrier, born Oxford, Oxon, and his wife, Fanny Archer, is shown as “married, age 51, born London”, Francis Mary Archer, James’s elder sister (who had been with him at the Anchor Hotel, New Road in 1871) is also living with them, and she is shown as ‘single, age 63, born Oxon’; and Alfred Porter is entered as ‘brother-in-law, single, age 48, (no occupation/profession shown), born London’, and also living/staying there that night in 1891 is: “John Archer Sanders, nephew, single, age 14, born Oxon”;
Also in the 1891 census, at 37 Pembroke Street, St.Ebbes, Oxford, were (i) “Mark” (not Mack) J. Cowley, Head, married, age 34, Carriers Manager – Furniture Remover, employed, born Oxford, Oxon; (ii) Sarah M. St. Cowley, wife, married, age 30; (iii) Winifred R.Cowley, daughter, single, age 2; (iv) Alfred Maltby, boarder, married, age 55, bookbinder, employer, born Oxon-Oxford; (v) Rose L. Maltby, boarder, married, age 55, born Oxford, Oxon; (vi) Charlotte J. Maltby, boarder, single, age 29, born Oxford, Oxon; (vii) Rose L. Maltby, boarder, single, age 27, born Oxford, Oxon;
James’s elder brother, John Archer: born (4^th): January 4^th 1834; some time cooper, and farmer, died (*)(4^thth): 7 October 1891; (aged 57 years and 9 months);
James’s elder sister, Matilda Archer (2): born (10^th): June 12^th 1846; died (*)(5^thth): 20 May 1892; (aged 45 years and 11 months);
James’s elder sister, Frances Mary Archer: born (1^st): January 20^th 1829; died (*)(6^thth): 15 May 1894 (aged 65 years and 4 months);
Nothing else found for the 1890s; still to do: Oxford and England in the 1890s;

The 1900s:

In the 1901 census: James Archer was then living at “Church Street, Kidlington, with his wife “Fanny Archer”, aged 64 and 61 respectively, he being born in Oxford, but she being born in London. His profession or occupation is given as Furniture Carrier, and his employment status as “Employer”. They have one general domestic servant, namely Mary Turner” aged 16 from Stanton St John;
M.J. Cowley joined James Archer in 1876, and retired in December 1933, after the death of R.Rippington (57 years service), and Mr Cowley died in February 1944. From the 1901 Census, Mack J.Cowley was at that time living at 40 Leckford Road, with his wife Sarah M.A. Cowley, and his father-in-law Alfred Maltby, and Mack Cowley was then aged 45, and had a daughter (Winifred Rose Cowley) aged 12 living with them, and Mack Cowley’s “profession or occupation” was entered as “Carrier’s clerk”, and he is indicated as having been born in Oxford.
Note: in the 1901 census at 37 Pembroke Street: the household of Richard Rippington consisted of himself only, at that address, (so perhaps he was not married or else his wife was away that night), and he described himself as “Contractor’s clerk” (well, “Clerk Contractors” actually); and he states that he was born in Oxford, and is aged 39 last birthday (whereas James Archer was aged 64 in the same census), cf the household of 7 of Mack Cowley in the same building in 1891;
James’s wife Fanny Archer, nee Porter died on 18^th April 1908, age 69, and was interred at Osney cemetery;
James’s nephew, William George Reed Archer came back to Oxford in, I think, about 1901/2/3 and married Elizabeth Emma Gilder very soon after, and their sons Arthur and Fred were born in 1903 (ish) and 1905 respectively, and William worked for his wife’s (adoptive) father, George Blake through the 1900s and 1910s and the first part of the 1920s, until Uncle James must have approached him about coming into the AC & Co business, at about which time, presumably, UJ was making his will, or not very long after;
James’s Carrier business (Archer & Co) acquired (according to WGRA’s hand-written record) its Wallis Stevens steam tractor on November 15^th1901 and replaced it by a Fowler steam tractor in June 1907, which was sold in 1923;
James’s younger brother, Edward Archer: born 8^th February 7^th 1842 died 7th (13^th?) February 1907; (aged 65 years and 0 months);
Nothing else found for the 1900s; still to do: Oxford and England in the 1900s;

The 1910s:

My grandpa, William George Reed came back to Oxford in, I think, about 1901/2/3 and married Elizabeth Emma Gilder very soon after, and Arthur and Fred were born in 1903 (ish) and 1905 respectively, and he worked for his wife’s (adoptive) father, George Blake through the 1900s and 1910s (which of course include ‘The Great War’ (1914 – 1918) and the first part of the 1920s, until Uncle James must have approached him about coming into the AC & Co business, at about which time, presumably, UJ was making this will, or not very long after;
James Archer retired in 1919 and “put WGRA in his place”, as grandpa says in his hand-written note;
Oxford’s first concrete warehouse added at Park End Street when I, WGRA, joined the firm in 1919, and it was completed in 1920, as grandpa also says in his hand-written note;
James Archer’s firm acquired its First Foden steam wagon on October 18, 1913, according to grandpa’s hand-written note. Presumably such technology was to replace or supplement horse-powered transport, and would have done so at speeds at best only the same, or lower than, those of horses. The technical gulf between road transport and rail transport in those days can be grasped from the fact that train speeds had climbed to a routine 60 mph, with 100 mph being reached by the Great Western Railway’s ‘City of Truro’, long long before road transport began to erode this differential.
James’s slightly younger sister, Ellen Archer: born (7^th): May 16^th 1838; died 8^th (22^nd?) June 1912; (aged 74 years and 1 month);
James’s significantly younger brother, my great-grandfather, Alfred George Archer (born: February 14^th 1848) died (9^th) (7^th ?) February 1913; (aged 65 years and 0 months);
James’s even younger brother, William Samuel Archer (the 12^th child of their parents), (born: July 10^th 1852) died 10^th (2^nd ?) January 1917; (aged 64 years and 6 months);
From ‘deaths’ list in James Archer’s family bible: (i) Hellen Archer: 22^nd June 1912; (ii) Alfred George Archer: 7^th February 1913; (iii)

William Samuel Archer: 2^nd January 1917;

(From list of siblings): Alfred George, born 16^th February 1848, (almost four and a half years after sister Ellen), died 7^th February 1913, in his 65^th year; had eleven children;
The Great War (1914 – 1918). None of the Archer family seems to have been involved. WGRA’s wife ‘Lizzie’ Archer (formerly Gilder) (age approximately mid-thirties) lost a half-brother (nephew?), one Tony Gilder on the Somme.

The 1920s:

That business apparently made James Archer a very rich man, as the probate to his will shows that his ‘effects’ were valued at £59,530 5s 4d in December 1922. And yet it is clear that, subsequently, in the hands of WGRA and his sons, the business though pursued with energy and, apparently, thoroughness, was not profitable enough to earn sums of that kind.
His address when he died in 1922 was 320 Banbury Road. I will see if I can find his wife Fanny Archer, nee Porter, who died on 18.04.1908;
From probate of James Archer’s will: Archer, James, of 320 Banbury Road, Oxford. Retired general carrier; Died 12^th October 1922; Probate Oxford 11^th December (1922 presumably); To William George Reed Archer furniture remover, Thomas John Wood, saddler and harness maker, and Charles Archer retired coal merchant; Effects: £59,530,5s, 4d;
James Archer’s nephew, WGRA, came back to Oxford in, I think, about 1901/2/3 and married Elizabeth Emma Gilder very soon after, and Arthur and Fred were born in 1903 (ish) and 1905 respectively, and he worked for his wife’s (adoptive) father, George Blake through the 1900s and 1910s and the first part of the 1920s, until Uncle James must have approached him about coming into the AC & Co business, at about which time, presumably, UJ was making this will, or not very long after;
George Blake’s Will: (for comparison): 1925 Wills: Blake, George of The Chestnuts, Woodstock Road, Oxford; died 29^th March 1925; probate 6 June, Oxford; to William George Reed Archer, removal contractor and warehouseman, Francis William Nix, retired civil servant, and Herbert Terry Banes(?), solicitor; effects: £66,518.9s.6d. So George Blake died only two-and-a-half years after James Archer, and WGRA was an executor for both men;
WGRA’s note: “The firm” (presumably JA & Co) “.. ran Daily Carrier to Radley and Abingdon from 1886 for many years with a two wheel horse van (photo in scrap book)” (such scrap book never seen by PBA). “Horse pantechnicon vans 1870 (90?) for many years until 1925 were put on rail for long distance removals. Lift vans also were used for rail many years. Oxford’s first concrete warehouse added at Park End Street when I, WGRA, joined the firm in 1919, and it was completed in 1920.
Steam transport in the family firm: a) First Foden steam wagon October 18, 1913;
b) Fowler steam tractor: June 1907 sold 1923;
c) Wallis Stevens steam tractor: November 15^th , 1901; replaced by above Fowler steam tractor in 1907; (to here 27.11.08).

The significance of James Archer’s life to me:

James Archer was my great grandfather Alfred George’s elder brother, who founded the family’s carrier business, and who passed it on to his nephew William, who then ran it with his two sons Arthur and Fred, not to mention making his daughters Nora and Elizabeth and Olive directors also, who all came to directors meetings and participated in decisions.

That business apparently made James Archer a very rich man, as the probate to his will shows that his ‘effects’ were valued at £59,530 5s 4d in December 1922. And yet it is clear that, subsequently, in the hands of WGRA and his sons, the business though pursued with energy and, apparently, thoroughness, was not profitable enough to earn sums of that kind. It did however provide reasonable incomes for WGRA and his two sons, and (largely) unearned incomes for his three daughters, so no doubt it did not do too badly. Probably, it was the effect of the two world wars, that changed the overall operating environment for the business, from that of a prosperous country that, in the latter part of the nineteenth century was the centre of the largest and probably the most profitable empire the world had ever known, into a debtor nation (to the United States) struggling to get back to any semblance of normality and knowing that its days of empire were long gone. That was the world into which I was born in the 1940s.

And it was the world of ‘Archer Cowley & Co’ that my father went down to the office to, every morning, when I lived at 17 Sandfield Road, Headington, Oxford. That was his world, that beckoned to him, as he dropped me off, age 7 or 8, from his ‘Austin 10’ at the top of St Ebbes Street, to walk down to Christ Church Cathedral Choir School, each school-day morning in 1948.

It was ‘Archer Cowley’ that paid our bills, including my school fees, and kept the family going. And it was ‘Archer Cowley’ at which Dad was still working (of course), eight or so years later when, age 15 or 16, I went to work there as a holiday job in the office itself during the summer when Ray Cox, the accounts manager went on holiday, and the men working on the vans needed to be paid. And at other times, my brother Michael and I worked in the summer holidays on the removal vans themselves, getting to know the men of the firm, and realizing that they had a wonderful camaraderie (as such men do) amongst themselves.

And, again, it was ‘Archer Cowley’s wealth’, or so I always assumed, that had provided for ‘Grandpa’ Archer, his magnificent home at 130 Banbury Road, Oxford, where, as a little boy, I would be free to roam the two-or-so acres of well-maintained garden and orchard and massive soft-fruit-cage and shrubberies and outbuildings and heated greenhouse - the world of William Greenaway ( or was it William Gurden? Yes, I think Gurden), grandpa’s full-time gardener. That exotic ‘garden world’ of grandpa’s massive estate in North Oxford, has lived with me ever since. He had a housekeeper, Mrs Hayes, who had a ‘fridge’ (which we did not) in those days of the late 1940s, from which, excitingly, she would offer me ice cubes to suck. He had a Lanchester car with a pre-selector gearbox, which was very different from our Austin, and sounded like a ghost. And so on. ‘Somerville’, as grandpa’s house was called, was a whole new world to me, that has continued to exert its influence on me in various ways, ever since. It was in my mind when Ruth and I came to choose our present house, 33 Main Street, here in Lyddington, Rutland. Its magic has been in my mind so often as I have worked in the garden here. Not exactly seeking to copy it, but having in mind that natural world of trees and shrubs and plants and living things, that was there at Somerville, and which was a welcoming refuge and delight. Nature in history …..

It has been an object of this family history exercise for me, to come to a better understanding of the lives of my forebears. After all, it is they who, directly or indirectly, gave me the ultimate gift of life itself. One is born with, or acquires, feelings about the world one inhabits, and its people. And the feeling has grown on me that it is the least I can do in the short time given to me here, to work out a picture of the ‘family’ into which I was born. Such birth being one thing over which, apparently, I had no control or effect whatever. My brother Edward, who has clear and strong views about reincarnation, may well have views to the contrary on that. Such ‘picture’ of the family has some relevance to seeing and understanding the ‘context’ into which one was born, and thus its effect and influence on the life which, as one looks back on it, one was able to lead. And not least among the concepts for me to understand better in this family history is that of grandpa’s ‘Golden Country’ down there at ‘Somerville, 130 Banbury Road, Oxford, of which I had tempting visions in my young days, and which, ‘like this insubstantial pageant faded’, has left ‘not a rack behind’. Where did that world come from? How did a young man, who in the census of 1901 was a ‘schoolteacher’ and then went to work as an assistant for his father-in-law for about 19 years, become able to inhabit a world of ‘cloud-capp’d towers and gorgeous palaces’, when even his beneficent ‘Uncle James’ clearly did not? And it seems reasonably clear that his siblings likewise did not. Well, there is much for me to do. Of course I have the simple and easily-found answer to that question: it all came from Uncle James. But did it? Clearly, Uncle James himself did not live remotely like WGRA, or not in the period to 1901 which one can investigate via the censuses. So perhaps it was just a matter of inclination. One man was inclined to earn and save it. And the other was inclined to spend and enjoy it, including spending it on the education of his daughters, though it had come too late to change the educational opportunities of his sons. (See also ‘PBA Musings’ below);

(Added 29.12.17): A further thought about James Archer’s contribution to the 19th and 20th century transport revolutions. By the time he founded Archer & Co in 1857, the steam railway revolution was well under way, but road transport was, relative to the progress on the railways still in the dark ages and would remain so until the turn of the century. Thus it was still more far-sighted of James Archer to see that until the technology had been invented (in the 20th century) to revolutionise road transport, there was a great opportunity to ‘use the already-existing railway technology to advance road transport’ by putting road containers on railway trains. This was the basis of his long-distance removals system. And it worked. And made him successful and rich. Probably much more so than if he had done what everyone else was doing in the 1850s, which was investing in rail transport.

And from Simon Schama on History and Nature:

This is my abridgement of page 558 of Schama’s ‘A history of Britain, volume 3, The Fate of Empire (1776 – 2000): “Until one reads the book (George Orwell’s ‘1984’,‘his imperishable masterpiece’, as the novel it is …it is easy to overlook that… he was penning one of the most impassioned argurments for the indispensabilitiy of history. History and memory are not the antithesis to free will, but the condition of it. Winston Smith (a tribute to Winston Churchill), the ‘last man in Europe’ has been persuaded by O’Brien, the arch-deceiver, that he is running a resistance group, and when bidden by O’Brien to drink a toast to the future, drinks instead “To the past”. “The past is more important” agreed O’Brien gravely.’ And of course, for the reason that history is the enemy of tyranny, oblivion its greatest accomplice. By encouraging forgetfulnees, The Party becomes free to impose on its hapless subjects its own version of whatever past it chose. Winston’s lover, Julia, had no memories of anything before the early sixties. But somehow memory was not quite obliterated from Winston’s consciousness.. and he is reckless enough to denounce the revolution and the party for destroying all archives: ‘History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which The Party is always right.’

Nothing could be more British…than for George Orwell to insist that to have a future, a free future at any rate, presupposes keeping faith with the past. Only one thing mattered more to him, and that was nature. …. Winston Smith does not have access to the archives, but he does dream, not unlike Wordsworth and Coleridge, of a ‘Golden Country’. In his dream it was an old rabbit-bitten pasture, with a foot-track wandering across it…. Somewhere near at hand, though out of sight, there was a clear, slow-moving stream where dace were swimming in the pools under the willow trees. And of course there was, because in Orwell’s fugitive Golden Country, nature, love, freedom and history are all ravelled up together. Some before him called such a place of hopes and blessings ‘Jerusalem’. And some of us, obstinately, think we can still call it Britain’.

Prospero:

You do look, my son, in a moved sort

As if you were dismay’d. Be cheerful, sir.

Our revels now are ended. These our actors

As I foretold you, were all spirits and

Are melted into air, into thin air;

And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,

The cloud-capp’d towers,

the gorgeous palaces,

The solemn temples, the great globe itself,

Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,

And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,

Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff

As dreams are made on, and our little life

Is rounded with a sleep.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE 1564-1616

SONNET 18:

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer's lease hath all too short a date:

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd,

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or natures changing course untrimm'd:

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest,

Nor shall death brag thou wandrest in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou growest,

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see

So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Census data:

Census dates: (per Nick Barratt’s ‘Encyclopedia of Genealogy’):

Sunday 6 June 1841;
Sunday 30 March 1851;
Sunday 7 April 1861;
Sunday 2 April 1871;
Sunday 3 April 1881;
Sunday 5 April 1891; and
Sunday 31 March 1901;

The censuses:

1841 Census:

James is a 4-year old with his parents and 7 other children in Market Street, Oxford:

Market Street, Oxford (no house numbers shown, and the street can only be found by going to the preceding page, which also shows Cornmarket Street adjoining (of course) Market Street; and Ship Street (which is the next street northwards along Cornmarket Street) begins immediately after the John Archer household, so apparently the house was the last house in Market Street, perhaps (to be investigated) at the corner with Turl Street;
John Archer, age 35, victualler, born Oxfordshire;
Francis Archer, age 30, born Oxon;
Elizabeth Archer, age 11, born Oxon;
Ann Archer, age 9;
John Archer, age 8;
Thomas age 6 (not clear);
James Archer, age 4;
Ellen Archer, age 3;
Matilda Archer, age 1; and
William Leaver, age 4, and
Jane Jefferies, age 20, (possibly a servant/domestic: in the occupation column she has the letters ‘FJ’ or ‘FL’ against her name (not understood); so
Notes: (i) James in 1841 is (of course) living with his parents, and it is noteworthy that John Archer (junior), the 2^nd John Archer who was a brewer is in 1841 apparently not in the brewery business, but is supplying ‘victuals’; (ii) James’s mother, Fanny Archer, is aged 30 and has a household of 11 persons including children aged 1 to 11 to care for; and (iii) the family is living in the very centre of Oxford, close to where the Covered Market was when I was a little boy in the 1940s, and which may well have been a market then;
Number of people in the ‘John Archer (junior) household in Market Street, Oxford on census night

1851 Census:

Six years before the founding of ‘Archer & Co’, James is a ‘Scholar’, age 14, living at No. 63 St. Aldates, with his parents and 9 other children/siblings:

Parish of St. Aldates, City of Oxford, No. 63, St. Aldates Street;
Other houses on same sheet in same street: Nos. 61, 62, and 64;
John Archer, head of family; married; age: 45 (definitely 45, not 48), brewer, born Oxford, St. Aldates;
Fanny Archer; wife; married; age 42; born: London;
Fanny Archer; daughter; unmarried, age: 21, born Oxford, St. Aldates;
Elizabeth Archer, daughter; unmarried, age 20; born: Oxford, St. Michaels;
Ann Archer; daughter, unmarried; age 19; born: Oxford, St. Michaels;
Matilda Archer; daughter, unmarried, age 5, born (1846): Oxford, St. Giles’;
John Archer, son, age 18; cooper; born: Oxford, St. Michaels; (so John was born approximately 1833);
Thomas Archer, son, age 17, brewer’s labourer; born Oxford, St. Michaels; (so Thomas was born approximately 1834);
James Archer, son, age 14; scholar; born: Oxford, St. Michaels;
Edward Archer, son, age 9; scholar; born: Oxford, St. Michaels;
Charles Archer, son, age 8; scholar; born: Oxford, St. Michaels;
George Archer, son, age 3; scholar, born: Oxford, St. Aldates;

Notes: (i) 4 daughters and 6 sons living at home with John and Fanny Archer, ages 45 and 42, at No. 63 St. Aldates; (ii) next door, at No. 62 St. Aldates: ‘Thomas Hewes, College Servant’

1861 Census:

Four years after the founding of Archer & Co, James is ‘Clerk’, age 25, unmarried, living with his parents at Isis House, St. Aldates, Oxford, in a household of 13:

Isis House, St Aldates, Oxford;
John Archer, head, married, age 56, brewer; born Oxford;
Frances Archer, married, age 53, born London;
Frances Archer, daughter, unmarried, age 32, born Oxford;
Elizabeth Archer, daughter, unmarried, age 31, born Oxford;
Thomas Archer, son, unmarried, age 26, Agent (Coal), born Oxford;
James Archer, son, unmarried, age 25, Clerk, born Oxford;
Ellen Archer, daughter, unmarried, age 24, born Oxford;
Edward Archer, son, unmarried, age 19, Clerk, born Oxford;
Matilda Archer, daughter, unmarried, age 15, born Oxford;
William Archer, son, age 8, born Oxford;
Rosa Archer, daughter, age 6, born Oxford;
Mary Cutch, age 84, born Oxon, Ewelm (?);
Also present: Frank Mappleson, lodger, age 20 (or 26) Railway worker, born London;
Note: next door is apparently ‘Grandpont House’ with Thomas Randle, magistrate and hatter living there;

1871 Census:

Fourteen years after the founding of ‘Archer & Co.’, and 3 years before he will be married, James is ‘Carrier’, unmarried, age 37, living at The Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford, with his sisters Frances and Matilda:

Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford (next door to No. 10 New Road, which is ‘New Road Boot Shop’ at which (coincidentally in view of James Archer’s wife (to be)’s maiden name (Porter) is living/staying one Alfred Porter, unmarried, age 28, coal merchant, born ‘London’, with ‘infant’ daughter age 5 days (born Oxford) – what an amazing difference to James Archer’s life (later), and my family would the arrival of such a (well, a male one) child to his wife. Interestingly, next door on the other side to the Anchor Hotel is ‘New Road Anchor Tap’, presumably a more informal drinking establishment;
Only 3 people are apparently resident at Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford, as follows. No other persons are listed there in the census, no staff whatever, so I suppose the place is ‘the building formerly known as’ ‘The Anchor Hotel’, or anyway did not offer (or that night provide) accommodation to anyone. Whether James was the publican, as, according to a note from FGBA, one ‘Archer’ was, is an interesting question;
James Archer, head, unmarried, age 37, (apparently should be 35), Carrier, born Oxford. I suppose James may have been the publican of the Anchor Hotel, but this is not shown or stated in the census;
Frances Archer, sister (of James), unmarried, age 36, Housekeeper, born Oxford;
Matilda Archer, sister (of James), unmarried, age 21 (or could be 24), (so born 1850 or 1847), Housekeeper, born Oxford;
Notes: (i) Where was ‘New Road’? It was in the Parish of St. Peter le Bailey. Was it the road which is now Park End Street, I wonder, or near there? I will look for the names of adjacent roads on this census:
I note ‘New Road Coal Wharf’ further along New Road, and ‘Cowley (sic) Police Station nearby, and 2 or 3 houses called ‘Jews Mount Private House’, and then several houses called (apparently) ‘Broken Hopes Cottage’ – no street name, just that, and all having this name (?), followed by ‘George Street Mews Cottages’ Nos. 3,4 and 5, followed by ‘Wards Yard Cottages’;
In the other direction (quite a long way) I found (looks like) ‘Brasenose Alley, Catte Street’, and then (coming towards New Road) ‘Paradise Street;
(17.2.2009): Note photograph in ‘Victorian Images of Oxford’ on page 153 of the corner of Castle Street and New Road, in 1888, with a hotel in the foreground RHS, which could, I suppose, just possibly be the Anchor Hotel, though no name can be seen. TO DO: go back to the censuses to see if can relate the location of the Anchor Hotel to the corner of New Road and Castle Street, so as to see just how close this view really was to JA’s premises;

Other things occurring in the life of James Archer in the 1870s:

James married Fanny Porter on Tuesday 31^st March 1874 and the wedding was at St Peter-le-Bailey church, (now the chapel of St Peter’s Hall college) Oxford;
(Copied from below): M.J. Cowley joined James Archer in 1876, and retired in December 1933, after the death of R.Rippington (57 years service), and Mr Cowley died in February 1944. From the 1901 Census, Mack J.Cowley was at that time living at 40 Leckford Road, with his wife Sarah M.A. Cowley, and his father-in-law Alfred Maltby, and Mack Cowley was then aged 45, and had a daughter (Winifred Rose Cowley) aged 12 living with them, and Mack Cowley’s “profession or occupation” was entered as “Carrier’s clerk”, and he is indicated as having been born in Oxford.

Following-up on Alfred Porter (1): First found in searches as Lodger, age 28 in 1871, with 5-day-old daughter, living next-door to Anchor Inn, New Road, Oxford:

Census of 1871:

10 New Road, St Peter le Bailey, Oxford;
Alfred Porter, lodger, unmarried, age 28, coal merchant, born London;
‘Infant’, daughter (looks like), age 5 days, born Oxford;
(Next entries on this page are James, Frances, and Matilda Archer at ‘New Road Anchor Hotel’;
(Previous page, but of which household Alfred Porter clearly forms part): 10 New Road, Boot Shop;
Joseph Barrett, head, married, age 24, boot and shoe manufacturer, born ‘Whittlebury’ (can’t read county because it is crossed-out);
Julia Barrett, wife, married, age 21 (could be 24), born Longford Lane, Oxon;
Jane Robinson, nurse, widow, age 55, born Cumnor, Berks;
Rosa Ashley, visitor, unmarried, age 28, born ‘Longford Lane’ (no county stated);
Frances E. Barrett, sister, unmarried, age 18, born Wytham, Berks; and
Alfred Porter (as above) lodger, unmarried, age 28, coal merchant, born London;
‘Infant’, daughter (looks like), age 5 days;

Following-up on James’s brother-in-law, Alfred Porter (2): Census of 1851:

Alfred is a scholar, age 8, living in Henrietta Street, London, with his sister Fanny, age 11:

17 Henrietta Street, St Marylebone, Middlesex, in evaluation district 14, page 124, previous streets being (page 1) Somerset Street, (page 50) James Street, (page 100) Bird Street, and (page 110) Bird Street;
Thomas Porter, head, married, age 46, Boot Maker, born London, Middelsex;
Fanny Porter, wife, married, age 49, born Iver, Bucks;
William Porter, son, unmarried, age 22, boot maker, born London;
Joseph Porter, son, age 20, porter (!), born London;
Thomas Porter, son, age 15, porter, born London;
Alfred Porter, son, age 8, scholar, born London;
Fanny Porter, daughter, age 11, unmarried, born London; and
(apparently in same house, No. 17 Henrietta Street) after a space in the census data, with a horizontal line drawn: 10 lodgers, 2 daughters of one lodger, and one visitor. These come from (were born in counties) all over the country, and only one (a shoemaker) is apparently connected with the business of Mr Porter; but
George Thomas age 37 and Catherine Thomas, his wife, age 28, next door at No. 18 Henrietta Street, are both shoemakers, and that house likewise has a somewhat separate section of its census return in which there are a number of lodgers;

Following-up on Alfred Porter (3):

Census of 1861:

(Not yet found. 1861 (when he would have been aged 18) is missing from the general findings in my searches for him so far 11.11.2008)

Following-up on Alfred Porter (4):

Census of 1871: (see above)

Following-up on Alfred Porter (5):

Census of 1881: (7 years after James’s wedding), he is ‘General Manager to Carrier’, Living with his widowed mother and one servant in Hythe Bridge Street, Oxford, where the wedding breakfast was held in 1874:

35 Hythe Bridge Street, Oxford, St Thomas;
Alfred Porter, head, unmarried, age 38, Manager to Carrier, born St Marylebone, Middlesex;
Fanny Porter, mother, widow, age 79, born Iver, Bucks;
Mary Harris, servant, unmarried, age 17, general servant, born Headington, Oxford;
On same page of this census are (at 33 Hythe Bridge Street): Joseph Havard, Coffee House Keeper (whether in that house or not?), at No. 34 is James Jones, a horse-dealer, and at No. 35 (same No. as Alfred Porter) are Harriett Allen (age 49, widow) and her family who are (mainly) ‘mineral water manufacturers’;
This may have been the address from which Fanny Porter was married. I recall that a Hythe Bridge Street address is mentioned in that connection;
Alfred Porter has (or says he has) a significant position in James Archer’s carrier business, and at the same time that James himself is living ‘on the premises’ in Pembroke Street, with his wife, Alfred’s elder (by 3 years) sister Fanny, Alfred is living not very far away with his widowed mother, who has moved from London;
To do: look into the dates at which Cowley and Rippington came into the carrier business, in relation to Alfred Porter;

Following-up on Alfred Porter (6):

Census of 1891: Alfred Porter, living with his brother-in-law James Archer, and James’s wife Fanny, in Stanton St John: (same data as below for James Archer):

Stanton St John, Oxfordshire, rural sanitary district of Headington;
No. 90 (no street name) Stanton St. John;
James Archer, head, married, age 54, Carrier (and another word that looks like ‘Carm’ (no such word), born Oxford, Oxon;
Fanny Archer, wife, married, age 51, born London;
Francis Mary Archer, sister, single, age 63, born Oxon;
Alfred Porter, brother-in-law, single, age 48, (no occupation/profession shown), born London;
John Archer Sanders, nephew, single, age 14, born Oxon;

1881 Census, James Archer, living with his wife at 37 Pembroke Street, Oxford:

37 Pembroke Street, Oxford;
James Archer, head, married, age 43, occupation/profession: ‘Furniture Depository’, born Oxford;
Fanny Archer, wife, age 41, born London, St. Marylebone;
Note: in 1891 at 37 Pembroke Street, St.Ebbes, Oxford: (i) Mark (not Mack) J. Cowley, Head, married, age 34, Carriers Manager – Furniture Remover, employed, born Oxford, Oxon; (ii) Sarah M. St. Cowley, wife, married, age 30; (iii) Winifred R.Cowley, daughter, single, age 2; (iv) Alfred Maltby, boarder, married, age 55, bookbinder, employer, born Oxon-Oxford; (v) Rose L. Maltby, boarder, married, age 55, born Oxford, Oxon; (vi) Charlotte J. Maltby, boarder, single, age 29, born Oxford, Oxon; (vii) Rose L. Maltby, boarder, single, age 27, born Oxford, Oxon; ie the 7 persons (including 3 ‘family’ boarders) of the Mack Cowley household cf James Archer’s household of two, ten years before, with no servant(s) at all, though there was clearly room for such;
Note: in the 1901 census at 37 Pembroke Street: the household of Richard Rippington consisted of himself only, at that address, (so perhaps he was not married or else his wife was away that night), and he described himself as “Contractor’s clerk” (well, “Clerk Contractors” actually); and he states that he was born in Oxford, and is aged 39 last birthday (whereas James Archer was aged 64 in the same census), cf the household of 7 of Mack Cowley in the same building in 1891;

(Continuing with the censuses for James Archer): 1891 Census, living with his wife in Stanton St. John, with his brother-in-law, Alfred Porter:

Stanton St John, Oxfordshire, rural sanitary district of Headington;
No. 90 (no street name) Stanton St. John;
James Archer, head, married, age 54, Carrier (and another word that looks like ‘Carm’ (no such word), born Oxford, Oxon;
Fanny Archer, wife, married, age 51, born London;
Francis Mary Archer, sister, single, age 63, born Oxon;
Alfred Porter, brother-in-law, single, age 48, (no occupation/profession shown), born London;
John Archer Sanders, nephew, single, age 14, born Oxon;
Note: no servant present at all;
Neighbours: next door at No. 89 Stanton St. John are: Harry Hill, head, single, age 40, farm labourer, and Stephen Soanes, lodger, single, age 60, also farm labourer; and next door to them, at No. 88 is the White Horse pub, in which are living Mark and Jane Saunders, ages 74 and 53, the publican and his wife, and their daughter Blanche, aged 18; and on the other side of the pub are more farm labourers. His neighbour on the other side is a ‘Hurdlemaker’, so presumably No. 90 was not a very grand house; and perhaps it was James Archer’s way to live in a not-very-grand style, and perhaps that was why he left such a large estate – he had not spent it;

1901 Census:

I could not find James Archer at all in the 1901 census via the usual name index, at first - not at Stanton St. John, nor in Oxford.
His address when he died in 1922 was 320 Banbury Road. I will see if I can find his wife Fanny Archer, nee Porter, who died on 18.04.1908;
I have now found data (below) from earlier searches at the Family Records centre, which show that in the 1901 census: James Archer was then living at “Church Street, Kidlington, with his wife “Fanny Archer”, aged 64 and 61 respectively, he being born in Oxford, but she being born in London. His profession or occupation is given as Furniture Carrier, and his employment status as “Employer”. They have one general domestic servant, namely Mary Turner” aged 16 from Stanton St John;
Even with this ‘Kidlington’ data, I still could not find James and Fanny Archer in the 1901 census, nor Mary Turner their 16 year-old servant, via the usual name index;
But now I have found them, by finding the address in Kidlington, namely Church Street, Kidlington, and the data is as follows:
Church Street, Kidlington, Rural District of Woodstock, ‘Mid-Oxfordshire’;
There is no number for the house in Church Street. It is No.13 in the ‘schedule’, as the census sheet calls itself, the first six items/persons showing ‘Inmate of almshouse’, and occupying one room only of the relevant habitation, No.7 occupying 3 rooms is a ‘Carter to Coal Merchant’, and his wife; No. 8 is an ‘Ordinary Agricultural Labourer’, age 62, and his wife aged 55, 2 sons, a daughter, and a boarder, No. 9 is a ‘Formerly Agricultural Labourer’ and his wife – a charwoman, and their son; No.10 is an agricultural hay turner, and his wife and son; No. 11 is a ‘Sand merchant/Stones’ working ‘on his own account’ and his wife, and No. 12 is a Carpenter working on his own account; and No. 13 is:
James Archer, head, married, aged 64, furniture carrier, employer, born Oxford, Oxon;
Fanny Archer, wife , married, age 61, born London;
Mary Turner, servant, single, age 16, general servant – domestic, born Stanton St. Jobn, Oxon;
Other people on same page, as head of house are: Coal merchant and famer’s labourer;

James Archer’s Will:

Notes apparently made at the family records centre in London:
(i) Archer, James, of 320 Banbury Road, Oxford. Retired general carrier; (ii) Died 12^th October 1922; (iii) Probate Oxford 11^th December (1922 presumably); (iv) To William George Reed Archer furniture remover, Thomas John Wood, saddler and harness maker, and Charles Archer retired coal merchant; (v) Effects: £59,530,5s, 4d.
Cf: (other wills on the same page): £247,11s; £404, 7s,7d; £7371,19s,11d; £4610,2s,5d; £1360,13s,0d; £5553,17s,7d;
Notes on the will itself:
Uncle James Archer’s Will - notes to accompany the scanned document:

This Will seems to me to have had considerable effect and significance in the lives of the generations following James Archer, brother of Alfred George Archer;
I believe it changed the life of my grandfather, William George Reed Archer (WGRA), very significantly. He became a (by my standards) very rich man, and a significant businessman in Oxford, the owner (I believe) of a number of properties in Oxford, and so on;
As far as I can presently see, the reason why WGRA was thus-rewarded was firstly that his uncle James Archer did not have any children of his own, and secondly (presumably) that he, WGRA, was deemed the most worthy of this inheritance, among the other potential candidates – presumably other nephews;
More research/refreshing my knowledge of already-known facts about WGRA’s background may be needed, but, broadly, he was the son of an excise officer who moved fro m place to place over the years (as apparently had been Alfred George’s father-in-law), and he (according to the census(es?) had been a school teacher before he went to Holland and worked/stayed/both at the paper factory of his uncle (in-law) Albert Edwin Reed. But for reasons which I have never heard (and now wish so much I had the opportunity to ask him) he did not stay permanently in Holland. I think he says (must check these family records) that he stayed six years, which is long enough (to me) to mean that, at least for the latter part of that period he may have meant to stay. But presumably something happened which caused him to change his mind. Presumably we shall never know about that. It could, of course, have been something relatively small like falling-out with someone, or falling in-love with someone (perhaps his future wife Lizzie, on a visit home?), though the latter is not something ‘relatively small’ in my view. Anyway, he came back to Oxford in, I think, about 1901/2/3 and married Elizabeth Emma Gilder very soon after, and Arthur and Fred were born in 1903 (ish) and 1905 respectively, and he worked for his wife’s (adoptive) father, George Blake through the 1900s and 1910s and the first part of the 1920s, until Uncle James must have approached him about coming into the AC & Co business, at about which time, presumably, UJ was making this will, or not very long after;
So what did the will say? I’ll list the main provisions:
CLAUSE 1:
a) WGRA and Uncle James (UJ)’s other nephew, Thomas John Wood, and UJ’s brother Charles Archer to be trustees/executors;
b) legacy of £50 free of duty (‘fod’) to his trustees/executors;
CLAUSE 2: £400 f.o.d. to UJ’s housekeeper Annie Franklin (if with him at time of his decease);
CLAUSE 3: To WGRA: all my freehold houses properties and premises which I shall die seised of or entitled to;
CLAUSE 4: To WGRA: £3,000 f.o.d.
CLAUSE 5: The residue of my estate to my trustees to sell/call in and convert into money as they think fit;
CLAUSE 6: The trustees then:
a) to pay all my debts/funeral and testamentary expenses/ legacies/ death duties; and then
b) to divide the remainder between all my nieces and nephews in equal shares, including WGRA in addition to his other benefits;
CLAUSE 7: (Clause about any nieces/nephews who predecease UJ);
CLAUSE 8: Previous wills revoked;
So, WGRA got:
a) £50 as an executor: (Clause 1);
b) all UJ’s freehold houses properties and premises; (Clause 3);
c) £3,000 (Clause 4);
d) an equal share of the residue of the estate (with all other nieces/nephews of UJ);
So, of these benefits, item 6b) was presumably by far the greatest, since it may well have included the freehold of the Archer Cowley premises as well as Uncle James’s house at 320 Banbury Road, Oxford; (pba.ends.30.7.07).

George Blake’s Will: (for comparison)

1925 Wills: Blake, George of The Chestnuts, Woodstock Road, Oxford.
Died 29^th March 1925.
Probate 6 June, Oxford;
To William George Reed Archer, removal contractor and warehouseman, Francis William Nix, retired civil servant, and Herbert Terry Banes(?), solicitor;
Effects: £66,518.9s.6d.

Occupation: Founded the carrier/removal business which became known as Archer Cowley & Co.

PBA musings on Archer Cowley & Co:

(2.12.2008): Archer Cowley & Co. (‘AC & Co’) was a family institution surrounding the world in which I grew up;
I have always thought that, probably, my father would have liked me to follow him into the business, if that were my wish, though he never said so, nor even ventured to encourage me to do so, but always allowed me to pursue my own interests; so
It has been a concern of mine, especially while doing this family history to look into the facts surrounding the demise of AC & Co and my relationship to that demise, notably, my departure from Oxford in 1961 for University in Manchester, just eight years before the business was sold;
With such things in mind, I was musing this evening on these questions while walking Fred over Colley Hill to the Turnpike and back via Stoke Road, and the thoughts below occurred to me, without any prompting, which seem of potential significance in moderating my tendency to feel that I may have failed to live up to the wishes of my father, and so on;
Perhaps the main point is one of timing. WGRA came into AC & Co in 1919 when James Archer retired and ‘put me, WGRA in his place’ (or words to that effect). At that time, in 1919, WGRA was aged approximately 22 + 19 = 41 years;
Mr Cowley retired in 1933, the year that Mr Rippington died, ie 14 years later, so it was in 1933, when WGRA was 55 that he probably achieved sole control of the business; so
It can now be seen that when I arrived on the scene (in 1941) and began to assimilate the impressions of ‘Grandpa’s house and garden and firm’ (which had probably taken a clear reality in my mind by, say, the time I was 7 in October 1948) that now I am seeking to understand better through these investigations, my grandpa, WGRA, had at that time, 1948, only been living at Somerville House, 130 Banbury Road, Oxford, about 25 years and had had sole control over the business about 15 years – appreciable periods of time admittedly, but not at all a length of time whereby a ‘dynasty’ became established; and
It seems very clear that WGRA’s lifestyle at Somerville in the 1930s/40s/ and 1950s, which included a housekeeper, two or more maids in the 1930s, a full-time gardener, a Lanchester car, sole proprietor (very probably) of a reasonably well-known local business operating on its own freehold sites and with about 50 employees, was one which had come to him entirely, or almost entirely, as a result of his Uncle James’s generosity. Without that, WGRA would have probably remained as an assistant to his father-in-law, George Blake, in his house-furnishing business, though it is entirely possible that he might have been Mr Blake’s successor in that business and in his wealth, if Uncle James had not retired and died first;
Nevertheless, it seems most likely that WGRA did not himself make much of the wealth that he later possessed, and though he probably did not needlessly squander it and it lasted him well throughout his life, his ‘rich or wealthy-man’s lifestyle’ came from nowhere but from Uncle James, and it was entirely contrary to the lifestyle and inclinations of Uncle James himself, who seems most likely to have been a man of quite modest tastes and spending habits. Indeed, but for these prudently modest habits of his uncle, it is most likely that James Archer’s estate would have been much smaller, and WGRA’s inheritance very much smaller; so
The ‘affluent world of WGRA and Archer Cowley’s prosperity’ (or whatever we should call the figment of the imagination of this (PBA’s) little boy in the 1940s, was then of relatively short existence (15 to 25 years), not really of WGRA’s creation, not ‘a family dynasty’ or anything of that sort, but simply WGRA’s way of saying that he had inherited much wealth – or, if not that, of making the most, while he could, of the ‘gift from the gods’ that had come his way. Another man, a man more like Uncle James himself, would have continued to live in Kingston Road in the modest way that WGRA’s income as an assistant to George Blake permitted. But if that had been the case, I would never had the pleasure that the ‘Somerville experience’ gave to me, with various consequences, not least of which may be the buying of my present house, 33 Main Street, Lyddington, Rutland!
Thus the picture is emerging of James Archer’s business in, perhaps, a somewhat truer perspective, as:
(i) a business concern that probably developed out of his experience with the transport aspects of his father (John Archer, junior)’s brewery business. That brewery business inevitably included the provision of transport for barrels of beer to their destination – no doubt by horse-drawn conveyance;
(ii) it started in, no doubt, a very small way, perhaps, as the record says, as a “Daily Carrier to Radley and Abingdon from 1886 for many years with a two wheel horse van (photo in scrap book)”. Very sadly, the scrapbook was ‘lost in an office move’ by WGRA’s successors, Messrs Cantays, without anyone making any copies of the materials of the scrapbook;
(iii) exactly what the business consisted of between its nominal founding in 1857 and when it became the daily carrier to Radley and Abingdon’ is not yet clear to me. Perhaps to here 4.12.08.
(Still to be said):
(i) that AC & Co was really just a one-man with 2 partners business;|
(ii) that WGRA took control in 1933 and made it (as Paul Bennett/ his father put it) a workplace for his two sons and a place for him to amuse himself for the rest of his life; and
(iii) WGRA continued in the business until he was about 90 in 1969 – showing conclusively that he was a man willing and intent on never leaving his sons the freedom to do their own thing, but willing always and throughout their lives to be in their way and (inevitably) interfering with everything that they wanted to do;

Lived:

a) Apparently in or near Oxford most if not all of his life;
b) His address given on the marriage certificate, is just “New Road”, whereas Fanny Porter is stated as living at 35 Hythe Bridge Street, St Thomas;

Born, presumably at his parents home, which, 4 years later (census of 1841) was in Market Street, Oxford;
1841 Census: age 4, with his parents at Market Street, Oxford;
1851 Census: age 14, with his parents at 63 St Aldates, Oxford;
1861 Census: age 25, unmarried, ‘Clerk’, living with his parents at Isis House, St Aldates, Oxford;
1871 Census: age 37, unmarried, ‘Carrier’, living with his sisters Francis and Matilda, at the Anchor Inn, New Road, Oxford;
1881 Census: age 43 (sic), married, ‘Furniture Depository’, living with his wife at 37 Pembroke Street, Oxford;
1891 Census: age 54, married, Carrier, living with his wife, aged 51, at No. 90 (no street name) Stanton St. John, with his brother-in-law, Alfred Porter;
1901 Census: age 64, married, ‘Furniture Carrier’, employer, living with his wife age 61 and one servant age 16, at the house (no house number, but 13^th in the schedule) in Church Street, Kidlington, with other people who are head of house in neighbouring houses being a coal merchant and a ‘farmer’s labourer’;
According to ‘WGRA.notes.1’ James’s wife Fanny died in 1908 at 320 Banbury Road, so apparently they had moved there from Kidlington during the 7 years since the 1901 census;
Kelly’s 1903 Directory of Oxford, Oxfordshire, page 222, shows James Archer living at 320 Banbury Road, about 4 houses from Hernes Road; (note that on same page is Robert James Grubb, living at 130 Banbury Road, later to be bought (in the 1920s) by James Archer’s nephew, William George Reed Archer, with the fortune left to him by James Archer;
According to his memorial card, James Archer lived at 320 Banbury Road, Oxford, when he died on 12^th October 1922. He was interred at Osney Cemetery;

Other biographical details:

Question from Gwen 3.3.03: did the £1000 which Gwen and Fred used to buy their (own) first house at 386 London Road, Headington, come from Uncle James Archer? Gwen thinks it did. Answer (31.7.2007): No, it is not a provision of his will. That will leaves almost everything to his nephews, mostly WGRA, apart from about £400 to his housekeeper, so there is nothing about his nephews’ children (except in the case where a nephew or niece predeceases him). (28.11.08): It was George Blake’s will that left that sum to FGBA – see the following pasted clause from the transcription of his will: “I bequeath the following legacies: to my assistants William Clarke: one hundred pounds; Herbert W. Pike: five hundred pounds; (blank in original) Dobson: two hundred and fifty pounds; Frederick Copsey: five hundred pounds; Frederick George Blake Archer: one thousand pounds; Walter Harwood: three thousand pounds;” so it is clear that FGBA was George Blake’s most senior (or favoured) assistant, but-one, in his firm. So, I think, it also follows from this that FGBA was then at the date of the will (27.03.1925), still working for George Blake. He was then aged 20, and it was still another 11 years before he would meet Gwen Penfold, his wife-to-be.
Founded James Archer & Co. in 1857 (from PBA’s manuscript cv records), aged 21;
According to the above envelope (see ‘Names’ above), James Archer took up his freedom on 27^th July 1860;
Retired in 1919 and “put WGRA in his place”;
WGRA’s note: “The firm” (presumably JA & Co) “.. ran Daily Carrier to Radley and Abingdon from 1886 for many years with a two wheel horse van (photo in scrap book)” (such scrap book never seen by PBA). “Horse pantechnicon vans 1870 (90?) for many years until 1925 were put on rail for long distance removals. Lift vans also were used for rail many years. Oxford’s first concrete warehouse added at Park End Street when I, WGRA, joined the firm in 1919, and it was completed in 1920.
(Continuing WGRA’s note):
a) First Foden steam wagon October 18, 1913;
b) Fowler steam tractor: June 1907 sold 1923;
c) Wallis Stevens steam tractor: November 15^th , 1901; replaced by above Fowler steam tractor in 1907;
d) Our first Dennis petrol 4 ton van bought 25^th August 1921, cost £1184 (PBA: this figure seems significant for putting in perspective the sums appearing in the will of James Archer and George Blake. Although we know that a large detached house could be bought for not much more than £1000 in the 1930s, which might be worth anything from £400K to £750K now, nevertheless the same sum would only buy a Dennis 4 ton van in those days;
e) the Dennis van was sold on 4^th June 1934 (just under 13 years later) for £40;
f) M.J. Cowley joined James Archer in 1876, and retired in December 1933, after the death of R.Rippington (57 years service), and Mr Cowley died in February 1944;
g) From the 1901 Census, Mack J.Cowley was at that time living at 40 Leckford Road, with his wife Sarah M.A. Cowley, and his father-in-law Alfred Maltby, and Mack Cowley was then aged 45, and had a daughter (Winifred Rose Cowley) aged 12 living with them, and Mack Cowley’s “profession or occupation” was entered as “Carrier’s clerk”, and he is indicated as having been born in Oxford. It is perhaps of some slight interest that the household in which Mack Cowley lived did have one general domestic servant, aged 18, though there is no Mrs Maltby shown - she may have just been away for the night of the census. However, presumably one can reasonably infer that the household was not particularly affluent if Mack Cowley lived with his father-in-law at the age of 45;
h) R.Rippington was in partnership with James Archer from 1890 and died in December 1933;
i) From the 1901 census, the household of Richard Rippington consisted of himself only, at 37 Pembroke Street, (so perhaps he was not married or else his wife was away that night), and he described himself as “Contractor’s clerk” (well, “Clerk Contractors” actually); and he states that he was born in Oxford, and is aged 39 last birthday (whereas James Archer was aged 64 in the same census), so the age profile of the firm’s management at that time was: 64/45/39 (Archer/ Cowley/ Rippington);
(From FGBA 3^rd October 1989): James Archer became as rich as Mr Blake, and did it all in his own lifetime;
(From NERA 1^st January 1993):
a)Re the Pembroke Street office: the Rippingtons lived there and then Uncle Oswald (Bennett) and Aunty Olive (Olive Helena Archer), [in their early married life, presumably, PBA];
b) No need to regret the passing of Archer Cowley & Co. It is people that matter;
James Archer lived at 320 Banbury Road, Oxford (when he died, see memorial card);
Died 12^th October 1922. Interred at Osney Cemetery;
Admitted freeman 27^th July 1860, aged 24;
From the 1901 census: James Archer was then living at “Church Street, Kidlington, with his wife “Fanny Archer”, aged 64 and 61 respectively, he being born in Oxford, but she being born in London. His profession of occupation is given as Furniture Carrier, and his employment status as “Employer”. They have one general domestic servant, namely Mary Turner” aged 16 from Stanton St John.
Copied from a tiny paper cutting, apparently from the classified advertisements, and reading: “Marriages: Archer – Porter - March 31 (presumably 1874, though not shown), at St Peter-le-Bailey Church, by the Rev. Canon Linton, Mr James Archer, of the “Anchor” Hotel, to Fanny, only daughter of the late Mr Thomas Porter.”
The paper cutting of item 13 above is pasted to a printed paper slip which is apparently an original invitation to the wedding, and reading: “Anchor Hotel, New Road, Oxford, March 24, 1874.
Mr JAMES ARCHER requests the favour of your company at his Wedding Breakfast, on Tuesday, March 31^st , 1874, at 35 Hythe Bridge Street, at 9 am”. There is apparently a (or is it more than one?) signature at the bottom with the name “Porter” clearly legible, and the preceding name might just be “Francis”, so perhaps the invitations were signed (and sent out?) by his fiancee a week before the wedding;
Notes on James Archer (mainly about his wife) from the handwritten notes document which I have indexed as: “FGBA.notes.1” (meaning the first set of notes, perhaps written by FGBA, with an indexing reference):
(i) Buried Osney cemetery;
(ii) Married Fanny Porter: (a) the only daughter of Thomas Porter, bootmaker, of 17 Henrietta Street, Portman Square, London;
(b) born 13^th November 1839; (c) baptized 25^th December 1859; (d) whose mother, Fanny Porter, died 19^th August 1885, aged 84 years and was interred at Osney Cemetery; and (e) who herself (wife of James Archer) died 18^th April 1908 and was interred at Osney Cemetery;

From James Archer’s Family Bible, Family Register:

Family Register from the bible of James Archer of St. Aldate’s Street and Pembroke Street, Oxford, rearranged by PBA with dates of death moved up to alongside dates of birth, etc:

Parents’ Names:

Husband: John Archer; born: June 22^nd 1803; died: 6^th December 1884; (aged 81 years and 5 months);

Wife: Fanny Archer; born: December 10^th, 1808; died: 13^th February 1881; (aged 72 years and 2 months);

Married: (nothing further entered on this page);

Children’s Names:

Frances Mary Archer: born (1^st): January 20^th 1829; died (*)(6^th): 15^th May 1894 (aged 65 years and 4 months);

Elizabeth Archer: born (2^nd): January 30^th 1830; died (*)(1^st): 4^th December 1866; (aged 36 years and 10 months);

Anne Archer: born (3^rd): June 11^th 1832; died (*)(2^nd): 25^th December 1886; (aged 54 years and 6 months);

John Archer: born (4^th): January 4^th 1834; died (*)(4^th): 7^th October 1891; (aged 57 years and 9 months);

Thomas Archer: born (5^th): February 2^nd 1835; died (*)(11^th): 6^th September 1920; (aged 85 years and 7 months);

James Archer: born (6^th): Dec 4^th 1836; died (*)(12^th): 12^th October 1922; (aged 85 years and 10 months);

Ellen Archer: born (7^th): May 16^th 1838; died (*)(8^th): 22^nd June 1912; (aged 74 years and 1 month);

(From WGRA.notes.6 – not transcribed): Matilda Archer: born 16^th May 1840; died Sept 2^nd 1841; (age 1 year and 3 months and 17 days);

Edward Archer: born (8^th): February 7^th 1842; died (*)(7th): 13^th February 1907 (WGRA.notes.6 says 1897); (aged 65(55)) years and 0 months);

Charles Archer: born (9^th): August 20^th 1843; died: (*) (date not shown); (aged years and months); (WGRA.notes.6 says ‘died at Leckford Rd’);

Matilda Archer: born (10^th): June 12^th 1846; died (*)(5^th): 20^th May 1892; (aged 45 years and 11 months);

Alfred George Archer (11^thth): born: February 14 1848; died (*)(9^thth): 7 February 1913; (aged 65 years and 0 months);

William Samuel Archer (12^th): born: July 10^th 1852; died (*)(10^th): 2^nd January 1917; (aged 64 years and 6 months);

Rosa/Rose Anne Archer (13^th): born: February 6^th 1854; died (*) (3^rd): 6^th September 1889; (aged 35 years and 7 months);

Marriages:

(No information entered);

Deaths:

Parents:

Fanny Archer: 13^th February 1881;

John Archer: 6^th December 1884;

Children:

Elizabeth Archer: 4^th December 1866;

Annie Archer: 25^th December 1886;

Rosa Anne Archer: 6^th September 1889;

John Archer: 7^th October 1891;

Matilda Archer: 20^th May 1892;

Frances Mary Archer: 15^th May 1894;

Edward Archer: 13^th February 1907;

Hellen Archer: 22^nd June 1912;

Alfred George Archer: 7^th February 1913;

William Samuel Archer: 2^nd January 1917;

Thomas Archer: 6^th September 1920;

James Archer: 12^th October 1922;

Fanny Archer, wife of James Archer: 18^th April 1908, age 69.

(ends.pba.16.12.06). 18.12.06: work remains to be done in terms of cross-relating this ‘Family Register’ information to James Archer’s CV generally. The above family register info is itself already somewhat processed in terms of having the death information repasted-in, so as to give ‘from-and-to’ dates for each person (except Charles, who is omitted from the deaths list).

(Re Archer Cowley & Co. Ltd):

1901 Census data:

Mack J. Cowley, living with his wife and daughter at his (widower) father-in-law’s home, with his sister-in-law, at Leckford Road:

40 Leckford Road, Oxford;
Alfred Maltby, Head, age 66, widower, bookbinder, employer, born Oxford;
Mack J. Cowley, son-in-law, married, age 45 (so born 1856), Carrier’s Clerk, born Oxford;
Sarah M.A. Cowley, daughter, age 42, born Oxford;
Winifred Rose Cowley, granddaughter, single, age 12, born Oxford;
Charlotte J. Maltby, daughter, single, age 40;
Caroline F. Phipps, servant, single, age 18, general domestic (worker), born Toot Baldon, Oxon;

1891 Census data, re Mack J. Cowley:

37 Pembroke Street, St.Ebbes, Oxford;
Mark (not Mack) J. Cowley, Head, married, age 34 (so born 1857), Carriers Manager – Furniture Remover, employed, born Oxford, Oxon;
Sarah M. St. Cowley, wife, married, age 30,
Winifred R.Cowley, daughter, single, age 2;
Alfred Maltby, boarder, married, age 55, bookbinder, employer, born Oxon-Oxford;
Rose L. Maltby, boarder, married, age 55, born Oxford, Oxon;
Charlotte J. Maltby, boarder, single, age 29, born Oxford, Oxon;
Rose L. Maltby, boarder, single, age 27, born Oxford, Oxon;

1881 Census data

‘Mack J.’ Cowley, living with his mother at Leckford Road, Oxford:

3 (yes it does seem to be 3, not 40. Perhaps they moved) Leckford Road, Oxford;
Ann Cowley, Head, married, age 48, Builder’s Wife, born Oxford;
James M. Cowley, son, married, age 24 (so born 1857), Clerk, born Oxford;
Charles W.Cowley, son, age 16, Printer’s Apprentice, born Oxford;
Archibald H.J. Fletcher, lodger, married, age 24, solicitor/undergrad/St.Albans, born Bath, Somerset;
Notes: so James M. Cowley’s father is apparently a builder (though not at home on the night of the 1881 census), and he, at the age of 24 and yet 5 years after (according to my notes) joining James Archer in his carrier business is ‘clerk’ – which is entirely consistent. James would need, as the business grew, ‘office staff’ for the records and accounts and correspondence;

1871 Census: re Mark J. Cowley, living at Walton Street, Oxford with his parents, Thomas and Ann, two brothers and two sisters:

Walton Street, Oxford (the houses do not appear to be numbered in an understandable way, all the 5 households on this page being numbered “62 Walton Street” (by means of ditto signs) and on the previous page not having numbers at all, so I do not understand what is going on in that regard;
Thomas Cowley, head, married, age 48, Builder, born Horton-cum-Studley, Oxon;
Ann Cowley, married, age 49, Builder’s Wife, born Oxford, Oxon;
George F. Cowley, son, unmarried, age 16, Builder, born Oxford, Oxon;
Mark J. Cowley, son, age 15, Railway Clerk, born Oxford, Oxon;
‘Thirza’ (sic, looks like, can’t think what name it really is) A. Cowley, daughter, age 11, born Oxford, Oxon;
Esther S. Cowley, daughter, age 9, born Oxford, Oxon;
Charles W. Cowley, son, age 5, born Oxford, Oxon;
Next door in Walton Street: Charles Taphouse, age 55, Furniture something or another (can’t read it: words look like ‘Bev’ ‘Rer’) and his wife and widower son, age 33 who is a ‘Pianoforte Tuner’, and niece age 19 who is ‘Assistant in Music Shop’; cf David Taphouse who was a little lad (younger than me) at Christ Church C.C. school in Oxford, in the late 1940s, whose dad ran ‘Taphouse’s’ music shop in Oxford (adjacent Ellistons?) where Gwen would buy (some of) her sheet music in my young days. Next door to them was Ferdinand Ellrodt, head, married, age 74, ‘retired merchant’ born in Frankfurt, Germany, and his wife age 59, ‘landowner’, born London, Middlesex; and next door (ish) in the other direction on the adjacent census page is Frederick R.J. Crapper, age 31 and his wife, ‘Carpenter employing 4 men and 1 boy’ who may be, I suppose, related to the ‘Crappers’ removal firm of later years, whom dad (FGBA) did not think represented any significant competition at all;

Mark James Cowley: birth certificate:

1856, birth in the sub-district of Oxford, in the counties of Oxford and Berks; (note Berkshire started very close to central Oxford, just across Folly Bridge, at the bottom of St Aldates Street, exactly where the John Archers lived);
When and where born: 12^th June 1856, at New Osney, St Thomas, Oxford. This means south-west Oxford, on the south side of the east-west Botley Road (A420) which proceeds under the station bridge towards Carfax) and on the west side of the (possibly then not yet built) railway line;
Name: Mark James Cowley;
Sex: boy;
Name and surname of father: Thomas Cowley;
Name, surname, and maiden surname of mother: Anne Cowley, formerly Marsh;
Occupation of father: carpenter;
Informant: Thomas Cowley, father, New Osney, St Thomas, Oxford;
When registered: 7^th July 1856;

Musings on Mark James Cowley:

Born very much of the time of G.J. Churchward (born 31^st January 1857);
Compare birth date of James Archer: 1836 ie 20 years earlier;
The 1850s was a time, arguably around the heyday of the British Empire, and when the Great Exhibition must have inspired entrepreneurship, and when many successful enterprises were started or expanded;
And so it was with Archer & Co, later to become Archer Cowley & Co; (pba.19. 01.2009).

1901 Census data, re Richard Rippington, age 39, Contractor’s Clerk, living with his widowed mother age 63, at 37 Pembroke Street, Oxford:

37 Pembroke Street, St.Ebbes, Oxford;
Richard Rippington, Head, Single, age 39, (so born 1862) Clerk – contractor’s, worker, (as opposed to ‘employer’), born Oxford city;
Alice Rippington, mother, widow, age 63, living on own means, born Oxon, Noke;
Note: (13.01.2009) have been so far unable to find Mark J. Cowley’s death on the official records. According to my notes (in WGRA’s cv) he died in 1944. Have ordered his 1856 birth certificate in case this assists. Now received – see above.

1891 Census data, re Richard Rippington, age 29, Corn Dealer, living with his widowed mother age 54, at 49 Kingston Road, Oxford:

49 Kingston Road, Oxford;
Alice Rippington, Head, widow, age 54, living on own means, born Oxon, Noke;
Richard Rippington, son, single, age 29 (so born 1862, tallies with 1881 and 1901 censuses), corn dealer, employed, born Marston, Oxfordshire;
William H. Rippington, son, single, age 20, born Marston, Oxfordshire;
Henry de Winter (?), could be ‘Carpenter’, single, step-grandson, age 17, something illegible, could be ‘Inspector’ of Radcliffe Observatory, employed, born Greenwich, Kent;
Cyril de Winter(?), step-grandson, age 12, scholar, born Leatherhead, Surrey;
F de H de Winter(?), age 10, scholar, born Bexley Heath, Kent;
Annie de Winter(?), daughter, married, age 23, born Marston, Oxon;
Alice de Winter(?), grand-daughter, age 1, born (looks like): ‘Durham, Durham’;

1881 Census data re Richard Rippington, age 19, Clerk to GWR, lodger at 63 Mill Street, Oxford, St Thomas:

63 Mill Street, Oxford, St. Thomas;
Thomas Watts, head, married, age 31, Parcel Porter, born Freeland, Oxon;
Rose Watts, wife, married, age 23, born Eynsham, Oxon;
Children Ellen Watts and Annie Watts, ages 2 and 2 months respectively;
Richard Rippington, lodger, age 19 (so born 1862 – tallies with 1891 census), Clerk to GWR, born Marston, Oxford, Oxon;
William Jones, lodger, age 17, Railway Ticket Collector, born Kings Sutton, Northamptonshire;
Next door: Thomas and Elizabeth Richard, ages 27 and 30, he being a Railway Porter born at Tackley, Oxon;

1871 Census data re Richard Rippington, age given as 16 (perhaps actually only 9), farm labourer, living with Charles and Mary Randall, farm labourer and his wife, as ‘son’, with his brothers William and Charles, in Marston:

(May not be correct, but seems worth recording): Address: Marston, ‘The Village’, Charles Randall, head, married, age 30, farm labourer, born Oxon, Oxford;
Mary Randall, married, wife, age 35, no occupation, born Marston, Oxon;
Sarah Randall, daughter, age 2, born Marston, Oxon;
Richard Rippington, son (sic), unmarried, age 16 (sic), so born 1855 instead of 1862 for consistency with 1881/91/1901 censuses, farm labourer, born Marston, Oxon;
William Rippington, son (sic), unmarried, age 14 (sic), so born 1857 instead of 1871 for consistency with the 1891 census, farm labourer, born Marston, Oxon;
Charles Rippington, son (sic), age 10, scholar, born Marston, Oxon;
Note re above data: the coincidence of the names Richard and William Rippington, and their birth location at Marston, which are in-line with the later census (names and birth location) data for William (1891) and Richard (1891 and 1901) Rippington, and despite the presence of another ‘brother’, Charles, (who wouldn’t have been born in 1891) seems sufficient for it to seem quite possible that this is the same Richard Rippington who was later in partnership with James Archer. More research needed.(pba.28.6.07).ends.

1861 Census data, re Richard Rippington, age 6, living with his mother Alice Warland/Wasland, servant, and his ‘godfather’ Richard Rippington, farmer, in Marston, Oxford:

The Street, Marston, Oxon;
Richard Rippington, head, widow, age 57, farmer of 318 acres employing 8 men and 5 boys, born Marston;
Alice Wasland/Warland, servant, unmarried, age 26, born Noke, Oxfordshire;
Richard Rippington (jun), son, married, age 37, ‘Father’s Assistant’, born Marston;
Mary Rippington, son’s wife, married, age 24, born Elsfield;
Richard Rippington (this is the one), godson, age 6, so born 1855, scholar, born Marston, Oxon;
William Rippington, godson, age 1, so born 1860, born Marston, Oxon;
John Rippington, godson, age also shown as 1 year, born Marston Oxon. Presence of John adds uncertainty, but he could have died young;
Perhaps Alice Wasland/Warland, servant, unmarried, age 26, thus born 1835, is the ‘Alice Rippington, mother widow’ of the 1901 census above. Her birth location of Noke, very strongly suggests to me that she is. The ages of her sons (‘godsons’ of the head of house), Richard and William are probably given reasonably accurately in 1861 as 6 years and 1 year, as their ages have not yet become a sensitive issue. Later, perhaps, after the death of their natural father, the widowed Richard Rippington senior (born 1804), it may have become desirable to adjust their dates of birth to the (latterly consistent, for ‘our’ Richard Rippington) one of 1862, after their natural father’s death (not yet looked-up).

Cross reference data:

Reference for this sheet: 1836/JA
Reference for related sheets:

Dates of entry of data:

21^st/22^nd November 2005; 29.10.2006; 17.12.2006;

Phil’s History:

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James Archer (founder of Archer Cowley & Co)’s cv: