Ernest Bassett was my
Great-great-great uncle – my mother’s father’s mother’s uncle and
due to his interesting career I decided to focus much of my
genealogy / family history research on Ernest and the other Bassetts
of Wolverhampton.
Ernest Bassett was born in 1871 in Wolverhampton. I do not have his birth certificate
or exact date of birth but I presume he was born in Ash Street, St.
Mark's, (now Chapel Ash) as his family had lived there from the
mid-1850s onwards. In the 1881 census he is listed as 9 years
old and living with his parents, Henry (a rifle sight maker) and
Mary and two older sisters, Lucy (a dressmaker) and Sarah (who was
still at school).
The Bassetts were a large,
hard-working, family –
Wolverhampton born and bred.
Henry Bassett, Ernest’s father was
born in 1831 and baptised at
St. Peter's church in December of that year.
Henry’s father was John, a wood-screw manufacturer as shown in local
directories from 1828 – 1851, living and working in Oxford Street
Wolverhampton for the majority of that time and then moving to
Salop Street /Peel Street – the present location of the
indoor market.
Henry married Mary Ann Lloyd in 1852
beginning a long association with St. Mark's church in Chapel Ash
where many of their children, grandchildren and even
great-grandchildren were baptised and married. Henry and Mary had at
least 8 children – John, Selina, Alfred, Henry, Lucy, Sarah,
Winifred and Ernest – the future photographer. However, Winifred
died 6 months after her baptism at St. Marks and maybe the same fate
befell other young children in the family as child mortality in
industrial towns such as Wolverhampton was truly alarming during this period.
By the time of the 1881 census only 3
children remained in
Ash Street (near Great Brickkiln Street) with their parents.
John had married and gone into the lock making industry; Alfred,
from whom I am descended, became a Tin Plate worker and Henry later
followed his father into the gun-making industry. It seems that the
Bassetts had contacts in all these industries through family
connections, giving children the opportunity to apprentice with an
uncle or other relative – Henry Bassett also had an older brother
called William, could this be the William Bassett also listed as a
photographer? Only future research will tell.
 |
A cabinet photo of a young man,
showing the Brickkiln Street address. The back is blank.
The original from which this scan
is taken is in poor condition and has been cropped at the
foot (probably to squeeze it into an album). But the
print is of good quality. |
By the 1891 census Ernest is listed as
a photographer - at the young age of 19. (His father, Henry is
now listed as a locksmith and his sister Sarah is now a
housekeeper). In 1896 Kelly's Directory of Staffordshire lists
"Ernst. Bassett - Photographer - Brickkiln View, Gt. Brickkiln Street, Wolverhampton". The Wolverhampton Red Book of 1897
lists E. Bassett at
Great Brickkiln Street (dropping the
remarkable house name "Brickkiln View").
| Another cabinet photo of a young
man, from the same source as the photo above and to which
the same remarks apply.
The sitters may well be brothers.
|
 |
In 1900 Ernest married Helena Hyde,
probably at St. Mark's church.
The 1901 census shows Ernest Bassett,
photographer, living at 140 Great Brick Kiln Street.
The Wolverhampton Red Book for 1902 has the same information and
Kelly's Directory of Staffordshire, 1904, also lists him as a
photographer and gives the same address.
But Kelly's Directory for 1912 lists
Ernest Bassett, photographer, at 32 Oxford Street,
Bilston.
 |
In this photo the front edge of
the pram is in focus and the rest is not, producing a
pleasantly soft effect on the baby's face. I have a theory
that the quality of the image and the subject matter suggest
that this was not the sort of photo client's would pay for.
It may be some kind of test piece or a freebie for family,
as he had many nieces and nephews born in the 1890s. |
Ernest Bassett seems to have carved
out a career for himself at a very early age, opened his own studio,
expanded with the expansion of his profession and moved to better
premises in the centre of Bilston.
I cannot prove any connection between
Ernest Bassett and the W. Bassett who was also a photographer in
Wolverhampton at the same time. However, it is possible
that W. Bassett was Ernest’s uncle
William and therefore also possible that Ernest was apprenticed to
W. Bassett before starting his own business.
