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Great grandad


Lindabuttercup

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Hi I am researching the life of my great grandad Edoardo Ruggia (mis spelt Eduardo Ruggea on marriage certificate )

he came from Italy circa 1907 and went to live in beighton which at the time was derbyshire on his marriage certificate he is living with a mr Carlin at Allen road 

on his marriage certificate 1908 and first child’s birth certificate 1909 he is working as a lobourer on the coke ovens and I was wondering if any body would have a clue as to which colliery he may have worked at

he left beighton in about 1910 to live with other Italian relatives in Ashton under lyne

We only have very patchy history for him and I am trying to piece together his life

he did not appear to be living with or working with other Italians in these early years

any information would be really welcome

thankyou linda

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On 06/10/2018 at 09:32, Lindabuttercup said:

1909 he is working as a lobourer on the coke ovens and I was wondering if any body would have a clue as to which colliery he may have worked at 

There were many coke ovens about at the time, so you would need to find archived documentation. I think it may be too early for Beighton Colliery ( or later Brookhouse ). The ones that spring to my mind near Beighton, which I think had coke ovens at the time are Hollbrook, Norwood, Wiggin Tree, Birley West, possibly Fence and Orgeave as mentioned above.  I have not looked it up but I am sure there were many more with coke ovens, coke was in big demand for steel production.

At that time Birley West was a large producer of coke from the Silkstone Seam and had 129 beehive coke ovens. I would think that some Beighton men would have worked there, just a short walk through the Shire Brook valley or a ride on the train up the branch line through Birley East. Though no coal came from that pit after 1908 the coke ovens produced coke from the other Sheffield Coal Company pits until about 1918.

There are so many places he could have worked, hopefully some of our experts on here may know where records can be found.

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Referring to the chapter on Aston / Beighton / Brookhouse Collieries in Ken Wains excellent book, Beighton Colliery was sunk in 1902 and from the text and photographs in the book, plus looking at maps of the area during the period, it appears that coking ovens may have been operating at Beighton Colliery as early as 1905, until the Colliery was wound down and Brookhouse took over extraction / production.

Beighton and Brookhouse Collieries were different operations, separated by probably less than a mile and their activities were intertwined, especially in late years as their sites expanded toward each another.

I’ll see if there are any more photos and information in the various books of Beighton I have, which may yield more clues.

if this proves to be the case, your G,Grandfather could have been working at Beighton Coking Ovens, which would have been within half an hours walk from Allen Street. I’ll also see if I can find some photos of Allen Street of the time, which will look very different to today.

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Thankyou so much for sharing your knowledge it is much appreciated 

i looked at the 1901 census for Allen road plus the three addresses on that road he is assosiated with and all the men were miners I think the word hewers or the like came up a lot but I could not see any other coke oven workers I thought at first this may have been down to his poor English ( his English was still very broken in 1959 ) but he states coke ovens again on his child’s birth certificate a year later .

thankyou linda

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Here are a few photos and the captions are self explanatory, with a few annotations on the one showing Allen Road.

Your G. Grandad could well be one of the men stood on the bank in front of the coking ovens, posing for the photo?

948889BE-3AD3-471D-969C-FC8AAB9B307D.jpeg

8C58A35B-ED83-426B-BD78-A8359A198ED4.jpeg

0C308B3A-D89C-45BA-87CD-0B83BDC38146.jpeg

5FC978E4-3888-4F73-A045-8A847921DDAB.jpeg

08DA0E71-7C0C-46C6-BB88-F73056629940.jpeg

D13774D1-5365-4FD8-9B2C-4CC6E38FE6A5.jpeg

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thankyou so much this is really useful in helping me build a picture of his early days in england

i have no photos of him in his younger days so could not say for sure if he is in photo but it really gives me an idea of his working life and the area he came to

because of this I am now researching coke ovens in Italy as there were some and this could open up new areas for me as his surname is quite popular in this area so thankyou so much for all your help

regards linda

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