SOME IREBY FACTS...
* William Tatham of Over Hall in Ireby was High Sheriff of Lancashire in 1724.
* His grandson Charles Tatham was a Lt-Colonel in George Washington's army.
His other grandson Sandford Tatham was a Rear Admiral in the Royal Navy.
* It is thought that the Knights of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem had a rest house in Ireby which they used whenever they visited their possessions in the North of England.
* The nearby Gragareth on top of Leck Fell is the highest point in Lancashire.
* This is NOT the Ireby in Cumbria which has featured on several television documentaries.
*Although in Lancashire, Ireby is in the parish of Thornton-in-Lonsdale which is in Yorkshire!
The next snippet was sent to me by Mrs Margaret Dickinson of Garstang who was making enquiries locally about the Fever Graves at Leck Church, next to Ireby.
"In the churchyard at Leck we found two local men cutting the grass and
they knew exactly what I was talking about. The graves are on the south
east side of the churchyard to the front of the church. In other words, if
you came out of the church porch you would go diagonally to the left, away from
the church towards the top wall. The gravestones are the oldest in the
burial ground and the headstones (which are upright) are the thinnest stone.
They
are both inscribed:
1) Sarah Bicker died in the Clergy School September
28th 1826 aged 11years
There is beyond the sky a heaven of
joy and love
And holy children, when they die, go
to that world above
2) Mary Tate died August 14th 1829 aged 17
She died delirious mind, the fever
raged
But sign was needless, she had lived
to show
What Gods renewing grace in Christ
can do
Emma Tinsley died June 6th 1831 aged
16
Short was her course but long enough
to prove
In sweet reality a saviour's love
And when life's latest storm began to
swell
Her peaceful confidence no tongue can
tell
Amid the wreck of nature Christ was
near
With hidden bread and hope of heaven
to cheer
And when the angry waves their work
had done
Her soul's eternity of peace began.
In Jane Eyre, the character Helen dies of a fever after she and Jane are made to
walk round the school yard in the pouring rain as a punishment. It is
believed that Charlotte Bronte got the idea from the above deaths even though
she had left Cowan Bridge by the time the above children passed away.
Very near the church porch is the grave of Professor Alan R Wellburn who died of
cancer aged 59. He has a publication (which I bought in Cowan Bridge shop)
called "Leck, Cowan Bridge and the Brontes" which explains about the
graves and the Bronte girls' connection with Tunstall and Leck churches."