Joseph [Patrick] and Sarah McDade

 Joseph Patrick McDade (known as Patrick) and Sarah nee Martin were both born into Catholic families in Donegal, Ireland in 1846 at the beginning of the Great Famine (also known as the Irish Potato famine) which lasted from 1845 to 1849. It is estimated that during that time, 1 million people died and a further 1 million emigrated. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)

There had always been regular shipping and movement of workers between Ireland and Scotland, but in the years between 1841 and 1851, the Irish born population of Scotland doubled. Patrick and Sarah’s families among them.

In the 1861 census Sarah was listed as being 18 but was probably more like 15 (from dates of later events). She was a bleachfield worker, living with her parents Charles and Mary Martin and siblings Charles, a laborer and Julia, also a bleachfield worker. All of them were likely to have worked in textile production.

   A bleachfield or croft was an open area of land (usually a field) used for spreading cloth and fabrics on the ground to be bleached by the action of the sun and water. They were usually found in and around mill towns in Great Britain and were an integral part of textile manufacture. Linen production became a major industry in Scotland, second only to agriculture.

 Ten years later, Patrick and Sarah were married at St Peters Catholic Church in Partick, near Glasgow on 2nd January 1871. He was a bricklayer’s labourer aged 25 and she was 24. Both signed the register with an “x”. Of their parents, only Patrick’s mother Margaret was still alive at the time. The census that same year lists the household as: Patrick McDaid 25, Mason’s labourer, Sarah McDaid 25 his wife, Julie Martin 27 (Sarah’s sister) (worker in paper mill) and Charles Martin 40 (her brother) (hammerman in shipbuild yard).

    The village of Partick was situated on the River Clyde, several miles west of Glasgow and closer to Scotland’s West Coast. In the mid 1800s, dredging and widening of the river was done to improve shipping access to the Port of Glasgow. The area all along the river bank developed quickly with the Industrial Revolution. The population growth in Partick went from 5,000 in 1851 to 17,500 in 1871 to 36,500 in 1891. Patrick's work as a labourer in the buiding industry would've contributed to the provision of housing for the expanding population. Tenements were built but unfortunately they became increasingly overcrowded and eventually turned into slums.

 

Shipping on the Clyde 1881

Patrick and Sarah had 3 children and changed address within Partick between each census. Their eldest child, Margaret, died at the age of 8. In 1891 Patrick, 40 was a Plasterer’s labourer, Sarah, 41 his wife, daughter Mary Ann 17, was a fishmonger assistant and son Patrick 15, was a Plumbers apprentice. Patrick died on 21st February 1894 in Saint Hospital, Renfrew of Erysipelas – a bacterial infection, aged 48.

By 1901 Sarah was living with her daughter Mary Ann in Clydebank. Mary Ann worked at the Sewing machine factory and Sarah was housekeeper. I haven’t found Mary Ann in the 1911 census but if she was still working at the Singer sewing machine factory – she would’ve been 37 – she would’ve been caught up in the famous workers strike that also involved her Boyle sisters-in-law. In 1911, Sarah was living her sister Julia Martin. She died in April of that year of Bronchitis and Heart Failure aged 65.