James Williams 

Died 5th October 1849 

    

                                                                                  James death certificate, stating cholera as the cause

James Williams was one of the eight people to die on October 5th 1849, in the second week of the cholera outbreak.

James was fifty years old and so born about 1799, but not born in Alnwick. In the Newcastle newspaper report of the deaths in Alnwick it says he was a labourer and we know he lived in Clayport, at the time of his death.

The weather was bright and frosty on the morning of his death and fine the next day when he was buried in a mass grave at the rear of St. Michael’s Church. We know this because Robert Rawlinson paid great attention to the weather in his report. 

We sent for his death certificate, as in one of the records it said that he died in Dispensary Street, and not in Clayport. He did in fact die in the Dispensary on October 5th and was a “pentioner” , rather than saying labourer. He must have been very poorly to have retired at 50, and then he became worse with cholera.