William Cartledge: A Hucknall Apprentice

One of the minority of Hucknall hosiers working in the fancy branch was John Woollatt, who on the 5th of October 1833 acquired a new apprentice called William Cartledge. Woollatt operated warp net frames, which were essentially a hybrid of the stocking frame and a weavers loom and enabled the production of more intricate fabrics than were possible on a traditional frame.

William Cartledge was born in Hucknall on May 1815, the son of Gervaise and Martha Cartledge. After finishing the apprenticeship he made good use of his skills and moved to New Basford to work in the Nottingham lace industry.

In an eventful life, William, together with his wife second wife Ann and young son Thomas, emigrated to the USA in 1852 to join and older brother John. That the apprentice indenture has survived in such immaculate condition suggests it was a treasured possession, and seen as a guarantee of reasonable employment. If the original plan was to continue lacemaking in the USA, for whatever reason this does not appear to have transpired. Instead, the brothers settled in Bainbridge, New York State where they farmed on 50 acres of land.

During the civil war 1,000's died not from bullets, but from what we today think of as mild childhood diseases. Many soldiers were drawn from rural communties and had no immunity to these infections, and in William's case the symptoms described in his service record are sufficiently detailed to make a probable diagnosis of mumps.

In September 1862, at the age of 47, William joined the Union Army as a volunteer during the American Civil War, and served as a private in the 168th Regiment of New York Infantry. The regiment took part in several campaigns during this period, but saw little combat - only two men out of a regiment of 935 were killed in action. William's war ended in July 1863, when he was left behind, feverish and exhausted, during a long march through the South Mountains of Maryland as his regiment persued General Lee's army after the battle of Gettysburg. After spending some six weeks in hospital in Baltimore recovering, he was discharged from active service in the October of that year.

William died in Bainbridge in March 1895 at the age of nearly 80.

Sources:
Many thanks to Tom Wilkinson in the USA for the copy of William Cartledge's apprenticeship indenture and providing information about his Cartledge ancestors, without which this page would not have been possible.