Liz’s father Malcolm Hudson (1934-79) enjoyed an idyllic childhood in his grandmother’s village of Great Barugh
The Hudson family of Leeds
The connection
Liz’s maiden name was Hudson. She is the daughter of Malcolm Morton Hudson 1934-79, and the granddaughter of Jack Hudson (1902-53).
The name
Hudson means either the son of Hugh or the son of Richard. Hud was a pet version of both names. The surname is Anglo-Scottish and especially frequent in Yorkshire.
Jack Hudson, Liz’s grandfather, was born in Leeds. He worked in a drapers then a pawnbrokers. We believe he served in the second world war but cannot pin down his record.
Jack married Ada Hoggarth from Great Barugh. Given the distance between their homes, it is not known how they met. They separated after the second world war.
William Hudson b1795, Liz’s 3x great grandfather, was a farmworker in Potternewton, Leeds, then no more than a hamlet surrounded by fields.
Liz’s 2x gt grandfather was George Hudson b1828, who made his living as an army contractor. He lived in Barrack Street and would have seen troops leaving for the Crimean War.
Odds and ends
• Our oldest known Hudson is William b1795 an “ag lab” who married Martha Midgeley at St Peter’s in Leeds in 1818, In 1841 they were living in Potternewton with children Ann, 20, Mary 15, George 13 and Joseph 11
• Our line continues via George, an army contractor who married Susannah Wilkinson, at St Peter’s Leeds, in 1850. They had nine children, including John Wilkinson Hudson b1871.
In 1894 John married Florence Morton and they had five children. In the 1901 census, John was working as a mechanical driller. He is thought to have walked out on the family shortly afterwards.
Highlights
• The parents of Susannah Wilkinson b1829 (George Hudson’s wife) back were John and Nancy, his wife. He was a farmworker from Chapel Allerton. The first name “Susannah” has passed down the family
• This picture of Malcolm on a beach drove us to distraction as we tried to identify the location. We eventually pinpointed it as New Brighton, on the Mersey.
• We can trace the family of Florence Morton b1872 (wife of John Hudson) back to a Christopher Morton b1709 in Pentney, Norfolk. Two Morton brothers headed north to escape the 1870s great agricultural depression in East Anglia. ‘Morton’ is still a middle name in our family.
Odds and ends
Read more about the Hudsons and their twigs – the Morton, Wilkinson Hoggarth, Fletcher, Allin, Jackson and Rhodes families – in the file below.