Chapter 1
YORKSHIRE ORIGINS
In the quiet village churchyard of St. Michael The Archangel's Church,
in Kirklington, Northern Yorkshire, lie the remains of Leonard
Clark. The headstone to his grave reads:
In Memory of Leonard Clark of Howgrave who died April 23rd 1849 aged
66 years. This stone is erected by his son John Clark, now
in Port Natal, as a tribute in respect of his late father.
Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord.
Leonard Clark was the father of John and William, both of whom left
Yorkshire to establish branches of the Clark family in the
then British Colony of Natal. John Clark was the first of
the brothers to come to Natal, as a Byrne Settler, in 1850.
He initially settled in Durban - then still known as Port
Natal - but soon moved to York, Natal. John was followed
in 1863 by his younger brother William, who also settled
in Durban. William remained in Durban permanently, living
in Clark Road - which was named after him - until his death
in 1903. It is William's family which forms the focus of
this booklet.
Neither John nor William had left Yorkshire for Natal at the time
of their father's death. Subsequent generations can only
speculate why - despite the fact that his father died almost
a year before John left Yorkshire - John delayed until after
he arrived in Natal before having his father's headstone
erected. One suspects that initially neither John nor William,
nor any of Leonard's four other surviving children, had the
money to provide a headstone. This is not surprising. At
the time of Leonard's death Yorkshire was in the midst of
a severe economic depression, as were many other parts of
England.1 Moreover, from what we know of the impoverished
circumstances of William's family - at least after their
abortive first attempt to emigrate to Natal - William was
certainly in no position to foot the bill for his father's
headstone. Because of those circumstances, however, Kirklington's
link with the Clark family in Natal remains memorialised
to this day by the wording etched on Leonard's headstone
in the churchyard of St. Michael's.
The Church of St. Michael The Archangel Kirklington
Leonard's headstone was cleaned and restored by a later generation
of Clarks, in 1987, when the writer's parents George and
Daphne Clark visited Kirklington. As a result the stone should
be readily identifiable by any historically minded trippers
who visit Kirklington in future - as it was when my parents
and I visited Kirklington in October 1990. For the guidance
of any such trippers, the stone can be found in the area
adjacent to the north west corner of the church, about fifteen
yards before the furthest westward row of graves.
As far as can be determined, Leonard had nine children. They were
- in descending order of age - John, Robert, Ellen, Jane,
Mary, James, William, Sarah and Ann. At the time of Leonard's
death in 1849 almost all, if not all, of his surviving children
were apparently living within a radius of about twenty five
miles from Kirklington. John lived at nearby Carthorpe; Ellen
lived in Ripon; James lived in Howgrave (also known as Sutton
Howgrave), as did Leonard himself; and William lived in Melmerby.
Four of Leonard's children later left England as emigrants.
As has already been mentioned, John and William emigrated
to Natal. Sarah and Ann, who married John Walls and George
Pattison repectively, emigrated to the United States. Jane
and Mary both died in their youth. Ellen and James remained
in England, as Robert apparently did too. (See Chapter 10)
The severely depressed state of the United Kingdom economy, and the
mass migration to distant parts of the worl which it spawned,
were attributable to a number of factors. These included
increased unemployment attributable to the repeal of the
Corn Laws, the economic dislocation caused by the collapse
of many companies engaged in railway construction; the downward
drift in earnings of textile workers; and an adverse trade
balance.2 Fueled by this economic adversity, total emigration
from the British Isles averaged more than a quarter of a
million a year from 1846 to 1851.3 It was against this
background that - had he lived - Leonard Clark would have
witnessed the fragmentation of his family, and the departure
of four of his children to South Africa and the United States
respectively.
The last contact between the Clark family in South Africa and what
remained of the family in the United Kingdom appears to have
occurred in the 1930's, when Sylvia Battcock (daughter of
John Frank Clark, great grand daughter of John Clark of York,
Natal, and mother of Hilary Battcock) visited Yorkshire.
John Frank Clark also corresponded with family members in
England, and the United States family of Leonard's daughters.
However, the surname Clark is a common one in Northern Yorkshire,
and with a little digging an eager genealogist could no
doubt track down some distant relatives without too much
effort!
A visitor to North Yorkshire today will be impressed with the beauty
of the countryside, the charm of the villages, and the eerie
feeling that but for the boldness of John and William Clark
the area might well still be "home" to the present generation
of "Clark Road" Clarks! Even more eerie is the fact that,
despite the passage of more than one hundred and forty years
since John left for Natal, the churchyards of places such
as Kirklington, Ripon, Burneston and Osmotherley still bear
silent testimony to the family connections which remained
when our ancestors left for Natal: there are Clark graves
with the familiar family names of William, John, James, George,
Leonard and Robert; and others with the names of the families
into which the Clarks' married - for example the Garbutt's
and Burdon's. No doubt one would find the same in the churchyards
of places like Melmerby, Topcliffe and Skipton. (There is
no churchyard in Howgrave).
As I have mentioned, the focus of this booklet is the emigration
of William Clark's family from Osmotherley, and the establishment
and expansion of that family in Natal. These subjects are
discussed in chapters 2 through 8. The remaining chapters
tell, respectively, something of the family of William's
older brother John, of York, Natal; of what became of Leonard's
other children; and of Leonard's ancestors.
1 Hattersley, The British Settlement of Natal, at 121 et seq. (Cambridge
University Press, 1950).
2 Id., at 122.
3 Id., at 96.
The area of Northern Yorkshire from which
the Clark's Emigrated (click photo to enlarge)
Rugged Coast at Flamborough Head -
Scene of the "Onward" Sinking (click photo to enlarge)
back to top
