322 Spring View, Lower Ince
This was the home of Edward Harrison, Martha Mason and family for about three years from circa 1880 to 1883. Their son Joseph was born at this home in June 1881. Their first child, Jane, died at this home of meningitis at the age of three years in January 1882. At the time of the 1881 census Martha’s father, John, and siblings William and Elizabeth were also living with the family. Edward Harrison and most of his siblings lived mainly in Poolstock during the 1870s and 1880s. Therefore it is likely that Joseph’s job as a colliery engine worker took him to Spring View. Spring View is about 2km south east of Poolstock as the crow flies. We have not identified the colliery or collieries at which Edward might have worked.
Although this address appears as 322 Warrington Road in both the 1881 census and in Jane’s death certificate it appears as 322 Spring View in Joseph Harrison’s birth certificate. It may be that Warrington Road was also known ad Spring View as it passed through the village of Spring View.
Ironically, Edward and Martha were living within a few hundred metres of the spot where they would be buried, having lived only to 39 years of age, some fifteen years later in 1897.
We do not have any historical maps of Spring View. The houses on Warrington Road appear to have been renumbered since 1881 as the number 322 is located today either further up the road in Lower Ince or further down the road in Abram. From the route taken by the census enumerator in 1881 we can infer that Edward and Martha lived about half way between the railroad bridge at Cemetery Road, and Taylors Lane to the south. It is likely that Spring View was a relatively newly constructed development at the time as it was populated mainly with people who had moved to Wigan from elsewhere.