Nat Gould

Esther Millward 1869-1955

Frank and Esther Austin

Esther Millward was born in 1869 in Alstonefield in Staffordshire, the daughter of George Millward 1844-1895 and his wife nee Elizabeth Palfreyman 1839-1876. She was probably born at Dunge Bottom Farm in Alstonefield parish, where the family were living when the 1871 Census was taken.

Her mother died in 1876 aged only 38 years. Esther Millward was only seven years old.

Her father left Dunge Bottom Farm and moved to a house in Alstonefield village, where he was farming sixteen acres when the 1881 Census was taken (1).

In 1881 Esther Millward was living as a general domestic servant in the household of the widowed Robert Seddon, the Alstonefield shopkeeper.

Her father married Harriet Finney at Ashbourne Wesleyan Methodist Chapel in 1889 (2). He died in 1895 aged 52 years.

In 1902 she was married to Frank Austin 1870-1960. He was born in 1870, the son of Frank Austin and Mahala Berisford of Alstonefield. As her parents were both dead by the time of her marriage, she was evidently living with her uncle William Millward. He was farming at Higher Needham in Earl Sterndale, and the wedding took place in the church there on 5 March 1902.

In 1891 her husband Frank Austin had been a shoemaker's apprentice aged 20. His grandfather George Berisford was the village shoemaker of Hartington in Derbyshire. By 1901 he was a shoemaker working on his own account.

In 1911 they were living at Hope Dale in Alstonefield. "Frank Austin, known as 'Cobbler Frank', started his business from the cobblers shop in Narrowdale ... Cobbler Austin then moved to 'Top of Hope' ... His wife Esther was a lovely person who always wore a bonnet and spotless white apron, apart from when she was doing housework when she wore a hessian apron." (3)

Esther Austin died on 17 May 1955 aged 86 years, and was buried at Alstonefield where there is a gravestone inscribed to her memory, and also to those of her husband and her daughter Ada Wood who died on 11 June 1960 aged 70 years and Frank Wood who died 26 December 1976 aged 78 years (2).

Her husband Frank Austin died in 1960 aged 89 years.

(1) George Millward was succeeded as tenant of Dunge Bottom Farm in Alstonefield by William Smith Gould 1831-1913.
(2) Ada Millward was married to Frank Wood in 1925.
(2) Harriet Finney was a widow with three young children. She was born Harriet Austin in Milldale in 1843, the daughter of Edward and Elizabeth Austin. The stepmother of Esther Austin was therefore the great-aunt of her husband, who was the grandson of Edward and Elizabeth Austin.
(2) Alstonefield Memories Tim Eades, Dorothy Critchlow and Doris Goodwin (2002) page 15.