Charles Jenkinson

Charles Jenkinson worked originally as a Wheelwright and then in the 1901 Census this changes to a Joiner/Carpenter. At this time, he was living at 6 Mount Street, Stone. The house was a two up two down terrace with a kitchen extending out from the house at the rear. Above the kitchen was an attic but described then as a cock-loft. It was accessed through a large wooden trapdoor in the ceiling with a substantial set of wooden steps leading up to it from the kitchen. This was used as a workshop by Charles. At some time during his working life he made coffins, I know from my father that he still made them in the cock-loft of the house in Mount Street. As Price and Stubbs, (one of the local undertakers) is based in Mill Street, Stone, it is possible that he made the coffins for them as he also lived in Mill Street at number 24 according to the 1891 census. The house in Mount Street is where I was born and spent the first 11 years of my childhood there. Other than the provision of electricity into the house, it remained very unchanged from when Charles lived there. There was a small front room parlour leading directly onto the street via the front door. Passing from the parlour towards the rear of the house was an enclosed stairwell between the parlour and the main living room at the rear of the house. The stairs were very narrow and steep with a door to the left leading to a front bedroom and a door to the right leading to a larger back bedroom. Both the bedrooms and the two downstairs rooms had fireplaces. Under the stairs was an enclosed space with a door which was used as a pantry for food. Leading off the living room was a very small kitchen built out from the house with an even smaller washroom at the very end. A Belfast sink with a single cold tap was the sole supply of water. A back door from the kitchen led on to a brick backyard and beyond that a long narrow garden led down to an outside toilet and brick built pigsty at the very bottom of the garden. All the houses in the terrace were exactly the same. They had no damp courses and quarry tiled floors laid directly on to sand which meant that damp rose from the floor up the walls and resulted in mouldy wet walls for much of the time. When I lived in the house the cock-loft was used for storing little used items and was referred to as the glory hole by my parents. Since leaving, the house has been modernised over the years and the cock-loft has been converted into a bathroom with access via a door in the back bedroom.

Brian Jenkinson 2017