On this day... Marriage of Tabitha Highley and James Naylor

Tabitha Highley and James Naylor were married in Halifax Parish Church on this day 27th February 1781.

Tabitha's parents Mark and Mary (nee Law) were married in St Thomas's Church in Heptonstall on 26th March 1754. Their first two children, John and William, were baptised in Heptonstall and their last three children, Tabitha, James and Hannah were baptised at St Mary's Church in Todmorden.

The post of 2nd November 2020 told how Mark and his brother James moved west away from Warley at some time in the 1750s and thus became the first Hileys to take up residence in the Todmorden area. Tabitha was baptised on 7th February 1760 and was the first member of the family to be baptised in Todmorden.

St Mary's Church, Todmorden

Tabitha and James's marriage record shows that they were both from the township of Warley in the parish of Halifax. James was a Comber - his job was to disentangle and straighten out the wool fibres ready for spinning. The couple had several children and grandchildren, one of whom was called Tabitha after her grandmother.

Warley Poor Rate Assessment 1790

An entry for James Naylor appears in the Ancestry catalogue of West Yorkshire Rate Books, Accounts and Censuses, 1705-1893.

Rates were collected in each parish for support of the sick and poor, maintenance of roads and churches, and other parish expenses. The rate payer was the person responsible for paying the local taxes and could be the owner or occupier of the property. Rates were assessed based on a dwelling’s value. 

The Warley Poor Rate Assessment for 1790 shows that James Naylor owned or occupied a property valued at £7 10sh and was required to pay a poor rate of 2sh 11d in the pound, and so had to pay a sum of £1 1sh 10½d.

(In today's money, £7 10sh = £7.50, 2sh 11d = 14½p, £1 1sh 10½d = £1.09)

Warley First Poor Rate for the year 1790

An Assessment for the necessary relief of the Poor and for the other purposes in the several Acts of Parliament mentioned relative to the Poor for the Township of Warley in the West Riding of the County of York made and Assessed the 21st Day of June being the first rates at 2 Shilling and 11 pence in the Pound for the present year.

We having carefully viewed and valued the above said Township of Warley and have Regulated the same in the following manner as contained in this Rate as Witness our Hands

Thos Forster

Wm Horsfall

Wm Bancroft

Entry for James Naylor in the Poor Rate Assessment

Extracts from the Ancestry catalogue included with the permission of West Yorkshire Archive Service
www.wyjs.org.uk/archives