Anne-Marie Fawcett July 2021

I have a thing about place names and Jubb’s Yard, just off the Market Place in Ossett town centre, has intrigued me for a few years. I eventually got around to having a look into some of the history of this place. This is what I learned.

Born in Soothill in 1815, Mark Jubb was the son of William (1776–1859) and Mary née Armitage (1786–1855) and he lived with his parents and siblings at Chickenley Lane. 

In August 1842 Mark Jubb and Mary Schorah were married at Wakefield All Saints Church (now the Cathedral). Mary was the daughter of shopkeeper Joseph Scorah and his wife Rachel (née Wilby) who lived and worked at Town End. As a younger man Mark worked as a woollen spinner but when he married Mary he gave his occupation as ‘clothier’; this might imply that he was a self-employed weaver working at home. Later Mark would be employed as a slubber in a woollen mill where he prepared wool for spinning, removing the “slubs” or imperfections in the yarn.

The Jubbs lived at ‘Town, close to the church’. Their first child, a daughter Emma, was born in 1843 and in 1845 they had a son, Edwin. It appears that Mark and Mary may have had at least six children though not all survived infancy. In May 1852 Mary Jubb gave birth to her last child, Joseph Schorah Jubb and died soon after he was born.

In April 1853 Mark Jubb married 33 year old Hannah Jubb (daughter of William Jubb and Mary Lister) a dressmaker of Hanging Heaton. They had two children together – in January 1854 Charles was born, followed a year later by Arthur. In 1861 their address was South Towngate and Mark was now a shopkeeper. Town End, Town, South Towngate or simply ‘near the church’. (This would be the original Trinity Church that once stood in the Market Place). Are they all the same place? Following the enumerators who were responsible for the census returns gives us the answer – yes they were. Could it be that Mark had taken over the business of the parents of his first wife Mary Scorah? 

By 1891 Mark Jubb was widowed again and was still living at Jubb’s Yard with only his eldest child Emma still living at home. In 1881 his son Edwin had married Mary Wilson, the daughter of woollen manufacturer James Wilson and his wife Ann née Megson of Northfield House, Field Lane (now Church Street). Joseph Scorah Jubb had taken advantage of the government funded assistant passage to Australia and set sail for New South Wales in 1884. Also in 1884, Charles Jubb had married Eliza Briggs and they moved to Dewsbury where Charles worked as a clerk for a firm of solicitors. There’s a ‘Jubb’s Arcade’ in Dewsbury. Could there be a connection? The youngest of the family, Arthur Jubb married Maud Elizabeth Nettleton in 1892. They also moved to Dewsbury where Arthur became an accountant. 

Mark Jubb died on January 6 1892. Emma Jubb never married and she continued to live at 8 Jubb’s Yard until her death in 1912. 

I’ve included below the names of those who were resident in Emma’s time. Perhaps your ancestors are among them. 

12 Tom Wilby 44 teamer (highways) Ossett Corporation worker, Mary Eliza 43 née Hampshire, daughter Ethel Josephine 6 b 8 May 1904. 2 rooms 

11 Jane Hannah Tasker 47 née Newsome widow cloth dresser for a rag merchant. Married Charles Herbert Tasker in 1885. Son Joseph White Tasker 24 dyers labourer. Daughter Louisa 18 cloth dresser. Charles Tasker died in 1901. 2 rooms 

10 Joseph Spencer 72 retired wife Selina 69 née White married 23 years. No children. 2 rooms 

9 David Mitchell 58 rag puller, wife Annie 55 née Dixon married 5 years, no children, Annie’s son John Oldroyd 14 trammer below ground, Sarah Harrison 28 boarder milliner. 4 rooms 

8 Emma Jubb 67 no occupation. 2 rooms 

7 Herbert Brown 31 journeyman bricklayer contractor, wife Emily 30 née Dews and two children Ernest 7 and Irene 4. 2 rooms 

6 William Harrison 33 journeyman joiner shopfitter, wife Sarah Hannah 32 née Dews and daughter Nellie 7. 2 rooms 

5 Fred Clayton 47 foreman rag grinder, his wife Ann 46 née Richardson, and their three children: Harry 10, Ethel 9 and Fred 6. 2 rooms

4 Walter Dews 29 journeyman joiner, wife Elizabeth Ann 29, married 3 years, son 7 months old William. 2 rooms 

3 Edward Driver 54 woollen rag merchant, wife Annie 55, son Herman 25 feeble minded at 21. 3 rooms 

2 Emma Acklam née Dawson 36 char woman and taxi driver 34 Fred Marsden. 2 rooms

1 James Smith 44 mill hand, wife Sarah née Spurr 40. Married 13 years. No children. 2 rooms – James filled in this info as ‘house and bedroom’ which I guess would imply a ‘one up, one down’.

The 200 year old terrace in Jubb’s Yard, made up of eleven houses and a shop, was demolished in April 1968. Mark Jubb is long forgotten and his yard is now a car park.