Author: RIDINGS, Elijah
Biography:
RIDINGS, Elijah (1802-72: ancestry.co.uk)
His parents were James and Nancy Ridings and he was born at Failsworth, near Manchester. He was baptised on 25 Dec. 1802. He attended school for only a few years before being set to work at winding bobbins for weaving. He became a keen reader and taught Sunday school. Like his siblings he became a silk loom weaver. In 1819 he was appointed leader of a section of parliamentary reformers in Manchester and narrowly escaped being trampled during the cavalry charge at St Peter’s Field on 16 Aug. He was one of the founders of the Miles Platting Mechanics Institute. On 19 May 1832 he married Julia Fearys; they had at least six children with two or more dying in childhood. He worked at a variety of occupations, including being a compiler for Pigot’s Commercial Directory, running a public house, and selling books. The first of his five applications to the RLF is dated 2 Feb. 1847 and over the years he was granted a total of £40. He lists The Fairy Maid among his works in the first application. The title poem may be identical with “The Wood Nymph” which is printed in his Streams from an Old Fountain (1863) but no copy of The Fairy Maid has been located. Other publications include The Village Muse (1830), The Poetical Works of Elijah Ridings (1840), and The Village Festival and Other Poems (1848). He died at Manchester. (ancestry.co.uk 2 Sept. 2021; Goodridge; RLF file 1160; “Biographical Sketch,” The Village Muse [1854]) SR