Mum of 17 children elopes to Barrow with her toyboy lover

Samuel Cooper was 22 years younger than the wife of foreman railway navvy William Harding.

The story of broken hearts and a cross-country chase by police and a jilted husband emerged in The Barrow Post of May 16 in 1876.

Mr Harding, who would have been in charge of a gang of railway labourers, returned from work at Melton Mowbray in the Midlands to find her gone from the family home at Batty Wife Green.

This was an encampment, or shanty town, on the route of the new Settle and Carlisle Railway.

It is likely he had been previously working on the Ribblehead viaduct across Batty Moss.

This was completed by 1875 and he would then have looked elsewhere for more railway construction work - leaving his family in the camp of wooden huts.

The camps gained names such as Belgravia and Sebastopol and little remains to show where they stood.

Batty Wife Green gets its name from Batty Wife Hole or Cave - where a stream emerges from the limestone.

It was said that a man named Batty drowned his wife following a drunken row.

These work camps featured in the 2016 TV drama series called Jericho which featured the families involved in building what they called the Culverdale Viaduct.

Our Batty Green navvy got home to find one of his daughters with black eyes after she had challenged her mother’s behaviour with Samuel Cooper the lodger – who was also a railway navvy.

The Barrow Post noted: “The girl had protested to her mother against the connection with this man and the ruffian had not then hesitated to strike her and blacken both her eyes.

“Immediately after this the guilty couple fled, carrying off with them the baby, all the available money, amounting to £30 or £40, and two watches.”

The Yorkshire police tracked his wife down to Barrow and were joined in the search by the deserted husband.

His wife was 48 - her first name was never reported - and her new lover was 26.

Cooper was arrested at Ramsden Dock and a Barrow police officer recognised him as having working on building new docks in the town three or four years earlier.

It noted: “The police discovered that Mrs Harding and the prisoner had been living as man and wife during the preceeding three weeks in John Street.”

The jilted husband recognised items at John Street which the lovers had taken with them.

It said: “He showed not the slightest concern or desire to forgive his wife.”

The wife told police she had been kept short of cash – despite there being up to £40 in the house and having what were described as “10 good dresses”.

The article noted: “The prisoner had a new suit of clothes and a silver lever watch which the husband’s money had paid for.”

The Jericho TV series encouraged many people to find out more about the lives of people in the navvy camp at Ribblehead.

There is a visitor centre at Ribblehead station which is run by the Settle Carlisle Railway Trust.

It is open daily from 10.30am to 3.30pm and features displays on the building of the Ribblehead Viaduct.

There is a regular, free guided walk called The Real Jericho Experience from the visitor centre to the Ribblehead Viaduct and passing the navvy camp.

The first one is on Thursday, June 2 at 12pm and walkers should meet at Ribblehead station.

You can find out more on the website at http//sandctrust.org.uk/jerico