Introduction
In 1837, the Regency period that was governed by elegance and etiquette with “the first gentleman of England” the Prince Regent at this head was replaced by the Victorian era, an era of science, an era that would applaud the arrival of the innovative and hard working self made man.
Some 53 years later, author and playwright J B Priestly was born in Yorkshire in 1894, the same year my great grandfather, Thomas Toon arrived in the small
mining community of Royston, just sixteen miles from Priestly’s home in Bradford. Unlike Thomas, Priestly wasn’t destined for a life in the coal mines, his future
lay in literature writing such works as The Prince of Pleasure and his Regency, one of three social histories and An Inspector Calls, a condemnation of Victorian society. Priestly, like Orwell, was at one with the common man, he had great admiration for coal miners like my great grandfather, saying
“If your supply of coal depended on my walking several miles to a pithead, descending in a cage for half a mile, then slogging away for seven hours in that hell, all for something like two pounds a week, your grates would be empty”
The beginning of the 19th century, and the onset of the Industrial Revolution, my Toon ancestors hawked their wears in and around the villages of Leicestershire, however, they would eventually venture from their native county, the county that had been the family's home since the reign of Henry VIII, in search of a new life that employment in the coal mines might bring. Fifty-four years into Queen Victoria’s reign, the family would make another move into Priestly home county, the West Riding of Yorkshire.
The Industrial Revolution brought great changes, families no longer wished to earn a living from the land, they looked to a bright future in steady work that coal mining offered, an occupation was not affected by the availability of work and the seasons. So it was in 1874, unaware of the danger a life in the coal mines could bring, the first of the Toon family set forth, pick in hand, to the coal fields of Nottinghamshire.
Some 53 years later, author and playwright J B Priestly was born in Yorkshire in 1894, the same year my great grandfather, Thomas Toon arrived in the small
mining community of Royston, just sixteen miles from Priestly’s home in Bradford. Unlike Thomas, Priestly wasn’t destined for a life in the coal mines, his future
lay in literature writing such works as The Prince of Pleasure and his Regency, one of three social histories and An Inspector Calls, a condemnation of Victorian society. Priestly, like Orwell, was at one with the common man, he had great admiration for coal miners like my great grandfather, saying
“If your supply of coal depended on my walking several miles to a pithead, descending in a cage for half a mile, then slogging away for seven hours in that hell, all for something like two pounds a week, your grates would be empty”
The beginning of the 19th century, and the onset of the Industrial Revolution, my Toon ancestors hawked their wears in and around the villages of Leicestershire, however, they would eventually venture from their native county, the county that had been the family's home since the reign of Henry VIII, in search of a new life that employment in the coal mines might bring. Fifty-four years into Queen Victoria’s reign, the family would make another move into Priestly home county, the West Riding of Yorkshire.
The Industrial Revolution brought great changes, families no longer wished to earn a living from the land, they looked to a bright future in steady work that coal mining offered, an occupation was not affected by the availability of work and the seasons. So it was in 1874, unaware of the danger a life in the coal mines could bring, the first of the Toon family set forth, pick in hand, to the coal fields of Nottinghamshire.