I'm not an expert, but if people needed work and there was none available then I suppose they had to look elsewhere. I've read other discussions on here about how people often travelled further than we might expect.
I had a 14-year-old ancestor sent all the way from a tiny farm in Wiltshire to the middle of London in 1715 to do an apprenticeship with a pastry chef. One would think there were chefs closer by but apparently it was family tradition to send the boys off almost 90 miles away to London on their own to learn a trade. Character building!
I do think the Nathan and Isherwood/Usherwood connection is unlikely to be coincidence, but I could be wrong.
Queenie
