Liverpool Coat of Arms
The Walmsleys were (and still are) a populous Lancashire family concentrated in the area from Manchester north to Preston and Blackburn. The name is believed (see A Dictionary of Surnames published by the OUP) to derive from the town of Walmersley near Bury but the origin of that place-name is uncertain: it might be from an Anglo-Saxon personal name or one of several permutations based on wald (= wood). Various Walmsleys moved to Liverpool as its population grew in the 18th century, amongst them Barnard Walmsley, a labourer and the founder of the Liverpool branch whose story we are telling here. The name is sometimes spelled Wamsley, which gives a clue to its local pronunciation.
From his unusual name, we can be fairly confident that Barnard was the person of that name born in 1695 in Accrington in the parish of Altham to Isaac Walmsley, a yeoman, and Ann Ingham. As the second surviving son, Barnard may have been intended to stay on the land but in the event he found his way to Liverpool and had two children in Liverpool by an unnamed wife: Isaac (b 1721) and Ellen (b 1733). In the intervening years Barnard seems to have followed work and changed abode several times: children born to Bernard and Elizabeth Walmsley in Wigan (James, b 1724) and Altham (William, b 1726) are undoubtedly members of the same family.
In heading for Liverpool, Barnard was following the path of two younger brothers but with the crucial difference that they, being surplus to the requirements of a yeoman's smallholding, had been apprenticed by their father Isaac to Liverpool tradesmen. In 1715, at the age of about 13, Edward was apprenticed to Richard Boond, mariner, for the very sizeable sum of £20; and in 1720, at the age of about 14, Ralph was apprenticed to the carpenter Thomas Pusey, also for £20. Nothing more is known of Edward but Ralph is listed as a house carpenter of Ruthin Street in the 1761 election poll book.
Barnard's son Isaac became a stone mason and, in an era of restrictive trade practices, became a burgess and freeman of Liverpool, which allowed him both to pursue his trade freely and to vote in parliamentary elections. This status was highly desirable and was only attained by a small percentage of the male population but it was hereditary and Isaac thus paved the way for subsequent Walmsleys to develop their trade and influence. For someone without means (and, in Isaac’s case, as the son of a labourer) one obvious route was through serving an apprenticeship to an existing freeman, as his uncle Ralph had done. Isaac does not feature in the first (rather selective) editions of Gore’s Liverpool Directory but he is mentioned in the 1761 poll book. He lived in Tythebarn Street, then a narrow and crooked thoroughfare with humble accommodation and shops.
Isaac married Sarah Forshaw in 1746 and had 6 children by her: Nancy (b 1750), Ellen (b 1752), William (b 1754), John (b 1756), Isaac (b 1758) and Joshua (b 1761). In 1762, at the age of 40, he married a second time to Ann Jones and had one more child – Mary (b 1768). Mary’s christening is the last we hear of Isaac. Two of Isaac’s children - John and Joshua - followed him into the stone mason’s trade: their careers and families are described in the following pages. Their brother Isaac was apprenticed in 1769 at the age of about 11 to a Liverpool tailor, Joseph Rea, for the comparatively modest sum of £4 but no more is known of him.