Joseph Buckley Photographer

A Memory of Daisy Nook.

Joseph Buckley my great great grandfather, was a photographer, known as Owd Ab from the Ben Brierley character. ​In Volume 1 of Ben Brierley's “Lancashire Stories”, is another short tale “A "Strike" Adventure or The "Revolution" of Daisy Nook”. Set in 1842, it portrays a group of weavers discussing whether to return to work or continue the “fruitless” strike. As they make their way home to Waterhouses they talk about the fighting in the streets of nearby Ashton. In a footnote the publishers of this 1882 edition refer to “Waterhouses” as Daisy Nook.
​Joseph clearly saw the commercial possibilities of the area and he set about converting three cottages in Daisy Nook into refreshment rooms and a photography business. According to his son Walter Buckley, writing some years later in the Ashton Reporter, Joseph rented the cottages at 5s 6d a week converting them into one, naming them “Owd Abs Cottage” after Brierley's pen name “Abo'th'Yate”. The row of houses became known locally as Ben Brierley Terrace and such was the success of the business that Joseph became known as “Owd Ab”.
Owd Abs Cottage
​Joseph was a very practical man and set about transforming the three storey cottages and adjacent land into a popular tourist attraction. He whitewashed the cottages and erected a sign “J Buckley Photographer” to advertise his studios. Members of his family and customers had their portraits taken sitting in a small rowing boat in front of backcloths depicting scenes from the Isle of Man. One such photograph features my great grandfather, Wilfred Schofield Buckley taken when he was a small boy.. The photography business was also advertised on the gable end of the cottages with the splendid slogan “Secure Your Shadow Ere The Substance Fades”.
​Joseph sold his postcard views of the locality and some of these photographs survive to this day. The photographs in my possession are backed on to stiff card with the name “J Buckley & Sons, photographic artist of Daisy Nook” on the reverse. Several of the photographs are reproduced in the Appendices. The Owd Ab’s Cottage in Daisy Nook is shown here. The wooden sign at the right of the photograph advertises BUCKLEY PHOTOGRAPHER.

More views are in Appendices 9 and 10 together with the reverse of one of the photographs. A general view of Daisy Nook is shown in Appendix 11, the picture taken from behind Red Bill's public house. Joseph apparently had also been a contributor to the Ashton Reporter submitting anonymous articles on local tales entitled “Daisy Nook Sketches”. I have not yet found any of the articles.
​Winifred M Bowman, in her 1948 book “Five Thousand Acres of Old Ashton”, refers to Waterhouses and Daisy Nook with some affection. At the time she is friends with surviving Buckleys through her role on the local councils and adds “you can tell a Buckley anywhere by the fair hair and apple-blossom complexion”.
​One particular photograph was reproduced in an Ashton Reporter of 1953 depicting Joseph's sons and the Taunton football team. The reverse of the picture apparently carried an advertisement for Daisy Nook and “Owd Abs Cottage”:
“Owd Abs Cottage, Daisy Nook. A most Interesting and Pleasant Place of Resort for Pic-Nics and Private Parties. Miles of lovely walks with Rustic and Romantic Scenery. Visitors will meet with every accommodation at Owd Abs. Tea, Hot Water &c., provided. Schools, &c., liberally treated on application to the proprietor Joseph Buckley, Photographic Artist. A complete gymnasium is provided for visitors, Swings, See-Saws, &c.”
Several more of these family group photographs have survived. Wife Mary features on one such family gathering stood third from the left with her son Walter on her right. Walter's wife Annis is seated at the right of the middle row.
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​To attract visitors Joseph constructed an aviary, monkey house, shooting gallery and seven swings in the gardens behind the cottages. People came from miles around to visit “Owd Abs Cottage” and to sample breakfast of Lancashire cheese and muffins. In 1887 Joseph and several local subscribers contributed towards the cost of £175 for the building of the first cart bridge over the Medlock. Other subscribers included Jeffrey Andrew licensee of Red Bills and John Andrew of the Hen Cote, a neighbouring refreshment room. Floods had washed the original footbridge away on Wakes Sunday in 1886. A local Woodhouses wheelwright and blacksmith Benjamin Ashworth completed the ironwork on the bridge.
In later years one of Benjamin's grandchildren, Alice Ashworth, was to marry a grandchild of Joseph's, Wilfred Schofield Buckley (my grandfather). The current concrete bridge was constructed in 1927 though it appears to have collapsed six years later when the Reporter Pictorial of 1933 published a photograph of a van nose down in the river after the bridge gave way. The photograph reported that the driver and passenger were unhurt.
The animals
​Joseph kept three monkeys, Sally, Jenny and Frank. Frank was the children's favourite, sitting on their shoulders, whilst a donkey, also called Jenny, gave rides along the riverbank up to the bridge near Medlock Hall Farm. The donkey is photographed along with one of Joseph's sons. The Ashton Reporter of 26.2.1898 carried an article about the death of Sally whose burial was attended by the local children:
We have in the past noticed the demise of more than one of the monkeys belonging to Mr. Joseph Buckley, of Daisy Nook, a place celebrated for one particular stuffed of the simian family that will go down to posterity in the literature of Lancashire. Another of Mr Buckley’s monkeys died on Friday last, and was honoured with a decent burial on Saturday. As usual all the young children of the hamlet, good staunch friends of poor “Sally” came out and walked in procession from its last abode to the little meadow adjoining Mr. Buckley’s place. There a nice new grave had been made alongside others of her kin. Owd Ab’s bell was toiled whilst the mournful cortege proceeded to the graveside. A solemn ceremony was gone through, the sad children placing flowers on the coffin lid, which bore the following:-“Sally. Died February 19th, 1898: age not known; interred February 19th. May she rest in peace.” All the children were afterwards regaled with monkey nuts, &c., and were evidently very sorry to lose such a merry little friend.
The article reveals that Joseph had a stuffed monkey on display that must have been referred to in some literature preserving its memory! It was also mentioned that the cottage had a bell known as “Owd Ab’s bell”. Mrs Jessie Ratcliffe, the daughter of John Arthur Buckley told me in 1994 that the children that cried the most were rewarded with more sweets, or perhaps more monkey nuts. The unmarked grave of one of the monkeys could still be seen in 1994 on the hillside immediately behind the site where “Owd Ab’s” cottages once stood, marked by a rough rectangle of large stones.
The demolition of the Cottages
​The buildings were eventually demolished in 1930’s and an article lamenting the passing appeared in the Ashton Reporter of 19.11.1937 when Joseph's son Walter recalled his childhood there. Walter was then 66 years old, living at 151 Curzon Road Ashton. The first mention of the impending destruction was in the Reporter of 29.10.1937 under the heading “Daisy Nook Cottages to be Demolished?” The owner of the four cottages at that time was a Mr James Winterbottom, whose father, grandfather and great grandfather had all been born in Daisy Nook. The 1881 census does refer to a Samuel Winterbottom aged 48, wife Ann and their six children. By the 1891 census, Ann Winterbottom had been widowed and lived with four of her children next door but one to the Buckleys. At number 12 there lived Samuel Winterbottom (Samuel’s son?) and his wife Margaret.
​The demolition debate raged on the following week with a letter from Councillor W. H. Flowers for whom the news made “sorry reading”. Councillor Flowers mentioned that “Owd Ab” the venerable Mr Buckley, was “a great pal of the boys and that our half-pennies often changed hands over the counter for sweets and open sesame to the aviary, monkey house and swings behind”.
Neill Buckley

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