Does anyone have any information on records of Ripley Hospital in Lancaster.
I have a relative who went there when she was 11 years old and left when she was 15 in 1899. Her father John Harris had died in 1892 and apparently Eleanor and one of her brothers were sent there from Liverpool being two fatherless children.
A few years ago I got in touch with the present Ripley School who directed me to gentleman who had been a headmaster and had retired. He had kept all the school records from when it was called Ripley Hospital.
He sent me the correct details of Eleanor's parents, marriage and fathers death dates which all tallied. Trouble was he also wrote that Eleanor had left October 1899 to be a laundrymaid at Loughborough.
This is where I have hit a brickwall. Where in Loughborough (if indeed it was Loughborough, could have been Littleborough which is also in Lancashire) Would they have sent children into service outside the Lancashire area?
Eleanor married Robert Edward McGurn in 1913 back in Liverpool and lived there until 1939 when she moved to Huyton which is only 11 miles or so outside. Their house was Liverpool Corporation. So I would say all her adult life after leaving service would have been spent in Liverpool
I am trying to find out how - if she did go to Loughborough which is in Leicstershire - how did she come to met Robert who was also born and lived in Liverpool, his occupation was 'furniture remover' her home town.
There is one other possibility. When I was a little girl she used to go on about me going "in service" In the late 1980@s I was sent a photocopy of a large country house. I found out that it was Leighton Hall but after I wrote to the present owners they informed me they had no records of past servants. So was unable to verify that Eleanor was sent there.
There's no one in the family now who would know. I had got the original information from a relative who had said that Eleanor had been to a Bluecoat school which I found out later to be Ripley Hospital
Thank you
Jean
