Civic Art Collection rediscovered: Wakefield

Benjamin Walker, 1784 to 1855

Benjamin Walker was born in Alverthorpe. He was one of ten children.

He studied medicine at the Royal College of Surgeons in London before returning to Wakefield to work as a General Practitioner and apothecary (a person who sold medicines). He had a surgery at Westgate End and trained three of his nephews as apprentices.

He married Mary Nowell in 1822. They didn't have any children, but he was close to his nephews and trained three of them as his apprentices.

He was elected as a councillor in the first ever local elections in Wakefield, after Wakefield had been made a borough in 1848.

He became Mayor of Wakefield in 1851 and later served on the Board of Guardians for the Wakefield Union. He died in June 1855 aged 71.

Edward Green, 1799 to 1865

Edward Green was born in Wakefield in 1799. At the age of 17, he was apprenticed to a millwright on Kirkgate. When the millwright died, Edward took over the business and started making steam boilers, wheels and rails. This was just before the start of commercial steam railways, and business was booming. He later expanded the business and started an iron foundry.

In 1845, he was awarded a patent for his ‘Green’s Economiser’ which revolutionised steam boilers. It recycled waste heat, dramatically reducing the amount of fuel needed.

He also got involved in public life, serving as Commissioner of Wakefield Streets in the 1830s and helping to tackle urban cleanliness. He was involved in bringing clean water to Wakefield and improving the town’s new gaslights.

He married Mary Ann Ironside, part of a well-known Wakefield engineering family. Their first son was also called Edward. Edward senior died in December 1865, aged 67.

Harold Holroyd Holdsworth, 1878 to 1965

Harold Holdsworth was born in Bradford in June 1878. He married Edith Bratley in Pontefract in 1906. By 1911, he had started his own cotton, silk and wool business in Wakefield. He regularly travelled abroad for work, including to America, Canada and Europe.

In 1918, Harold was elected as a Wakefield Councillor for the Liberal Party. He also served as President of the Wakefield Chamber of Commerce and President of Wakefield Musical Evenings.

He became Mayor of Wakefield in 1922. One of his official duties was opening the city’s new museum and art gallery.

After Edith died, Harold married Isabel Pollard, who he met at a musical event at West Parade Wesleyan Chapel. They were married at the same chapel. Harold died on Christmas Eve 1965, aged 87.

George Harrison, 1805 to 1860

George Harrison was born in Driffield in November 1805. Very little is known about his early life.

He moved to Wakefield in September 1822 and became a partner in his father’s wholesale spirit and malting business. He married Martha Gregory in 1830, at St John’s Church in Wakefield. In 1837, he gave up alcohol for religious reasons and withdrew from his father’s business.

That same year he was elected as one of the first Guardians of the Wakefield Union. He became the first Mayor of Wakefield in 1848, eventually serving for two years.

He was a radical activist and a committed Methodist and Sunday School teacher. He was also treasurer of the Wakefield Anti-Slavery Association and was actively involved in educational and civic projects associated with the council and local societies. He died in April 1860, aged 55.

Sir Edmund Stonehouse, 1854 to 1938

Edmund Stonehouse was born in Horbury in 1854. He went to school in Wakefield and finished his education in Germany. 

He returned to England when he was 16 and joined his father’s spinning business, MP Stonehouse. He became head of the business after his father died in 1896.

In 1888, he was elected to Wakefield City Council and served as a councillor for almost 30 years. He served as Mayor of Wakefield four times.

In 1918, he was knighted for his years of public service. He was noted for his personal courage, organisational abilities and cheerfulness. He wrote that his knighthood was really a compliment to the whole City of Wakefield.

He moved to the east coast in 1925 following the death of his wife, Dame Isobella Stonehouse. He died in 1938 aged 84.

Thomas Clayton, 1786 to 1868

Thomas was born in Wakefield in September 1786. His father made and sold candles. Thomas eventually joined the family business.

By 1816, he and his father had moved to St Johns in Wakefield. His mother died when Thomas was twenty and he lived with his father, until his death in 1833.

Thomas was elected Alderman in 1850, and mayor of Wakefield in 1854.

In 1854, in his late sixties, he got married for the first time to Eliza, a widow from Huddersfield. Marriage seems to have suited him. In the following years he became a generous benefactor to the Wakefield General Dispensary, which was renamed the Clayton Hospital in his honour.

He died in October 1868, aged 82. In his will he left almost £30,000 to various charities, almost £3 million in today’s money.

John Tenant, 1878 to 1944

John Tenant was born at Brierley Hill, Staffordshire in March 1878. He started working as a pit boy at the age of 11. Between 1891 and 1901, he moved to Stanley with his parents and siblings.

In 1905, he married his wife, Lucy. In 1906, he became a member of the Eastmoor Working Men’s Club and eventually became club president.

He was the first Labour councillor elected to Wakefield City Council in 1909 and represented Eastmoor Ward. He was appointed a Justice of the Peace in 1912 and made Alderman in 1920. In 1923, he became the first Labour Mayor of Wakefield.

John enjoyed sport and was a committee member of the Wakefield Rugby League Football Club. He was given the freedom of the city in 1937. He was described as having an unusual ability in public administration, an effective speaker with a sense of humour and ready wit. He died in Wakefield on 14 July 1944, aged 66.

Winnifred Ashton, dates unknown

Winnifred Hopkinson was the third generation of her family to serve as a local councillor.

Born in Wakefield, she worked as a radiographer in the NHS and was a member of the National Union of Public Employees. She became Winnifred Ashton after marrying Percy Ashton in 1938.

In November 1946, she was appointed Mayoress of Wakefield, by Wakefield’s second female Mayor, Mrs Effie Crowe. It was highly unusual for two women to serve as Mayor and Mayoress at that time.

During her year as Mayoress, Winifred kept a scrapbook, including photographs of her welcoming the Wakefield Trinity Rugby League team home after they won the Challenge Cup, beating Wigan 13 - 12. She continued to serve as a councillor into the 1950s.

Winifred remarried in 1954, to Paul Alexander, a German teacher who had come to England before World War II.