In 1877 there was no tailor in the village but this was soon to change.  One family had followed a typical pattern of in-migration to Bolton Percy and went on to provide the village with a thriving tailoring business which lasted for over 70 years.

The name of William Fisher, the first member of the family in Bolton Percy, is recorded in the 1871 Census.  He was born at Darrington in 1825 and was employed as a groom at Bolton Lodge.  His wife, Emma came from Melton Mowbray and at that time they had three daughters and three sons, four of these children are recorded as born at Bolton Percy.

Frederick set up his business in Bolton Percy and he and Sarah had seven children, Richard, Ida, Thomas, Sydney, Doreen (Dolly), Percy who died in infancy and Edwin, the youngest, was born in 1905.  The 1901 Census shows two other people living in the property, Robert Etty described as a journeyman tailor and Ernest Pears, an 18 year old tailor apprentice.  The business was clearly doing well.

In c1904 Frederick, Sarah and the five children they had then were photographed.  Father and mother were well dressed; the girls in elaborate smock dresses and the boys in smart suits, the youngest, Sydney sports an Eton collar on his jacket.

In 1913 Frederick had the opportunity to buy their tenanted cottage from Lord Holden, the owner of the Nun Appleton Estate, for £200 with legal fees of £5 3s 6d.  It was described in the Estate sale particulars as a ‘capital cottage and garth’, built of brick and stone, with tiled and slate roof.

The children attended the village school, first in the building which is now the Parish Room and after 1903 at the newly built school on the corner of Main Street and School Lane.  In this photograph, Ida is standing in alongside the teacher on the right and Dolly is on the left, in front of the teacher’s assistant.

Sydney and Edwin both went on to become tailors.  Sydney married and lived in Ulleskelf, walking back to Bolton Percy over the railway bridge every day.  Edwin remained a bachelor and stayed at home, working with his father in the tailors’ workshop.  The three men would sit cross-legged on a wooden platform about 3 feet high with a very smooth surface, also used for cutting.  Garments were pressed with a big iron called a ‘tailor’s goose’ – these were heated on the stove.  A ladder led to a room upstairs where the apprentices slept.  They eventually had a sewing machine for straight stitching but a great deal of hand finishing had to be done on the stout breeches for farmers and labourers, the huntsmen’s jackets and the clothing for the gentry.  All this was the daily business of Frederick and his sons.  Fabric was obtained from James Hare Ltd of Leeds and the Otterburn Mills in Northumberland.

After the death of their father in 1934, Sydney and Edwin continued with the tailors’ shop together.  Edwin played cricket and hockey.  Sydney was also a keen cricketer and in winter there was skating on the ponds.  There were entertainments at the Rectory during Bishop Woolcombe’s time as rector and Edwin performed in ‘School for Scandal’ in c1930 in the village school.

This photo is c1940 Edwin is in white in the middle of the back row.  Mrs Woollcombe is in the centre of the front row with daughters Rosamund (l) and Joan (r) at each end.)

Following the death of Mrs Fisher in 1940, Ida opened a Post Office at the house.  Edwin became the postman; he collected mail from the railway station and then delivered it on his bicycle or on foot round the villages, covering long distances. The photograph opposite is of Edwin delivering a Golden Wedding telegram to Mr & Mrs George Harrison of Appleton Roebuck in 1966

Ida and Dolly never married; they, like thousands of women of their generation, lost the men who would have become their husbands in the First World War.  Ida was for a time, an untrained teaching assistant at Bolton Percy school and Dolly eventually worked in Rowntrees grocery and provisions shop on Pavement in York.  Ida ran the home for her brother and sister.

Sydney was a highly skilled cutter and after he died in 1956 the heart went out of the tailoring business.  Times were changing and the days of small village tailors were numbered as ready-to-wear clothing shops expanded.  Edwin still did some tailoring work occasionally and in his later years, when asked as a favour to sew on some buttons - a job his hostess hated - after his regular Sunday lunch with friends, he would sit cross-legged on the floor because he couldn’t do it any other way.

Flooding became an increasing problem, and, until Dolly died in 1972, the three of them would move upstairs when the water rose.  The floods were so severe in 1978 that Ida and Edwin had to leave and were given shelter by Mrs N Bramley.  Although it was clear the floods were becoming worse Ida was adamant she would not move out, so it was not until after her death in 1979 that Edwin moved to a mobile home on a higher part of the grounds.  Willow Dene has now replaced the old house.

Edwin did not survive much longer and died on 6th August 1981; his obituary in the parish magazine describes him as a ‘faithful and regular attender at All Saints Church and he served as a choir member, bell ringer, sidesman, churchwarden and treasurer.’  He was a well-known regular at the Crown renowned for his witty stories and recollections of by- gone days.

The story of the Fisher family serves as a reminder of all the skilled trades which were carried on in villages like Bolton Percy for hundreds of years.
(Jean Richardson, Sydney’s daughter, provided much of the material for this piece.)