Newsletter of the Shard*low Study Group

by Gerry Langford

June 2003

Comment
E-mail is a wonderful tool for quick, cheap communication but there can not be many users who are not plagued by unsolicited mail (SPAM). I try to empty my mail box every day and there are often nine or ten messages of this sort, I no longer open any which I do not recognize by subject or sender. This may occasionally result in a genuine enquiry being unanswered and I apologize for this but I would ask anyone writing to me for the first time to make the subject clear in the first few words as long subject lines are cut short by my ISP.

Some ISPs are attempting to filter out Spam messages but this technology does not seem to be too reliable and at least one correspondent is having both some incoming and outgoing messages blocked by this system. Unfortunately neither sender or the intended recipient are informed that this has been done so there is no chance to repeat the message.

Mount Shardelow
By great good fortune after reference to this in the last Newsletter, Cliff Shardalow, who lives in Scotland, was visiting Canada. He made a lengthy detour to send us the following report and photo. Thanks Cliff.

“On reading about Mount Shardelow in the last edition of the newsletter I was intrigued to find out where it was and if the Shardelow it was named after was directly related to me.

As it happened my family and I were off to Canada in April to go skiing courtesy of air miles to Vancouver. Whilst out there I searched maps and found it. It is between Nelson and Nakusp in British Columbia. The drive back from Lake Louise to Vancouver was already 10 hours but a little 4 hour detour including 2 lake ferries to see Mount Shardelow country was irresistible!

Its pretty high and covered in snow of course. We got a sight of it and some photos but must return one day soon to climb it. On return to the UK Gerry confirmed the relationship - the mountain was named after Edward George Shardelow, killed in WW2, his GGGF was the brother of my GGGGGF, they lived in Norton Subcourse, Norfolk. The “a” in the middle of the surname got changed to an “e” somewhere over the Atlantic it seems. Gerry has since confirmed that Edward George’s father Edward worked on the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway linking east and west Canada for the first time. If any of the Shardelows in British Columbia read this then perhaps you can tell us your connection and any oral history/tales, maybe you will join me in the climb sometime in the next few years (I’ll be getting a guide!). The mountain is best climbed in early June when the bush is still covered in snow it seems. What a great tribute to someone who sacrificed their life for our freedom!

New Contacts
Avril Marshall has been instrumental in introducing two new names to our group, Pat Shardlow nee ? and Margaret ? whose maiden name was Shardlow. Avril tells me these two ladies are related and have been put in touch with each other.

Pat’s husband Vincent was a son of Alfred Clement Shardlow and Pat has sent me some interesting biographical details of both her late husband and her father-in-law which she has allowed me to summarise here…

Alfred C. Shardlow was a tall handsome man who was an accountant with the Manchester Ship Canal, he was very exacting in his habits but a kind and interesting man. Alfred and his wife Hannah Mary nee’ Milner lived first in Manchester and later Ellesmere Port, in the depression following the first world war he was laid off and the family moved to a cottage in the village of Caergwrle north of Wrexham.

Vincent and his brothers, Reginald and Raymond, went to school in nearby Hope but when Vincent was 14 he was able to leave and get a job with the village baker. This was much against his father’s wishes as he wanted Vincent to continue his education.

When the depression lifted and the canal opened up again the family moved back to Ellesmere Port where Vincent was able to find employment with a builder, after a trial period he was offered an apprenticeship as a carpenter, to which his father reluctantly agreed. After work Vincent would cycle to night school in Birkenhead [some 9-10 miles] and eventually got his City and Guilds Certificate which enabled him to climb to the top of his profession.

Alfred Clement Shardlow was born in 1876 the youngest of five children of George and Maria nee’ Godber. He died in 1939 shortly after Vincent and Pat were married.

Alfred’s elder brother Sydney G. Shardlow was mentioned in “SHARDS” No..22

Origin of the Shardlow name
From time to time I get receive various stories about how the name started, the latest has come to me from a gentleman called Martin Shardlow via Pat [see above] who got it from her daughter living in China. This version is that the families who worked the barges on the canals only had room for four, if any more children arrived they would leave them at an orphanage when they passed through Shardlow village and these children were given the name Shardlow.

Plausible as this sounds I doubt the truth of it as there were people of that name in the village before the canal age.

“Pay-to –View” Web Sites
Avril Marshall has sent me a long (94) list of Shardlows she has downloaded from one of these sites www.genesconnected.co.uk. These are only those which had some significance for her research but she tells me there were 330 in total. As these included year and place of birth for events as recent as 1980 it sounds like a very useful source. To obtain full details of individual entries one has to be a subscriber but Avril did not tell me the cost of subscription.

Has anyone else made use of this site?