Exciting elopement from Moseley village! Youthful passion; parental horror! Well, the headlines to the event described here might have read something like that. This story comes from the James Watt papers, held in Archives and Collections, Library of Birmingham.

Heathfield House, home of the Watt family (Library of Birmingham, WK/H5/0335)

The following extract from a letter recounts the terrible tale of Miss Taylor. The Taylors were major landowners in Moseley and in the later eighteenth century lived at Moseley Hall.

The writer of the letter on 13 April 1796 is Ann Watt, James Watt’s second wife, who was living at Heathfield, their house in Handsworth to which they had moved in 1789. It is addressed to her son Gregory, who was at university in Glasgow:

Poor Mr & Mrs Taylor of Moseley have met with a very severe affliction. Their eldest daughter, a girl of sixteen, has for some time carried on a correspondence with a worthless fellow who was her father’s footman, but was discharged last Autumn when it was discovered that Miss T. was very fond of him. How they have carried on the connexion since, no one can tell as she has been constantly under the eye of her Mother or with her Governess who is a well behaved middle aged woman, but about three weeks ago, someone, on going into her bedroom after she had retired for the night, found she had not been in bed. After making a strict search all over and about the house they sent to the man’s Master, a Mr Wallace, who lives in the Square. As the man was found in bed, they were afraid she had drowned herself, but on looking into her drawers, some part of her dress was amissing. On which, 3 chaises set off different roads, and she was over taken on the Litchfield road in company with a brother of our butcher, who, they say, is a very worthless man, who she had met with, as it is said, in the Square, where she was waiting for her lover who had never received the letter in which she made the appointment to go off with him; and this Nevell, who was artful enough as to persuade her her lover was waiting for her at Sutton. The Butler was the person who overtook her and brought her back. Next day she was taken to her Grandfather’s at Bewdley. I sincerely pity her father & mother. I think her death would have not have been a less affliction……..’.

(The punctuation and spelling has been modernised, for convenience).
Letter. Ann Watt (Heathfield) to Gregory Watt (Glasgow; c/o Mr James MacGregor). 13 Apr 1796. (Birmingham Archives and Collections: JWP 6/14 : MS 3219/7/1/2828).

These archives, as well as providing one of the most important sources in the world for the history of the Industrial Revolution, hold a wealth of information on the social and domestic side of eighteenth and early nineteenth century life. The records and correspondence in the Archives of Soho are available to be consulted in Birmingham Archives and Collections.

Fiona Tait

Please e-mail archives.heritage@birmingham.gov.uk to find out about opening hours, readers’ tickets etc. Some information about this is also available on the website: www.birmingham.gov.uk/libraries/archives