Dr Mark … and the first Royal Manchester College of Music (Manchester Sounds volume 8: 2010)

(I am greatly indebted to Mr Peter Crummitt, who has personally investigated the story of Dr Mark and his activities, to Mr John Favill and Mrs Kath Conway, who are descendants of one of the ‘Little Men’, and to Mr Peter Harwood and Mrs Helen Manley, respectively great-grandson and great-great-granddaughter of Leila Mark, without whose extensive and generously shared family research this article would not have been complete)

WE are used to regarding the year 1858 as a significant one because it saw the birth of Hallé’s orchestral concerts series in Manchester. But anyone browsing through the musical press of the time cannot help but notice another brave new beginning that year.

It had a brave title, too: ‘the Royal College of Music, Manchester’. Surprisingly similar to the title Hallé himself adopted for his own educational institution nearly 40 years on, it has no direct link with the later Royal Manchester College of Music – but it does stand as an example of mid-Victorian enterprise, its ingenuity in exploiting the opportunities available through the advent of the railway network, and the pioneering spirit which waxed as strong in Manchester then as at any other time.

Its founder was a German, too. He rejoiced in the name of ‘Dr Charles Bertram von der Mark’, and his memorial stone in St Luke’s Church graveyard, Cheetham, proclaimed him as such.[1] But it appears that his original name was Charles Frederick Augustus Schmidt,[2] and the ‘Dr’ title was probably one he invented, also.

He may have had musical training in his homeland, and the first context in which he is reportedly found is that of German army officer – but ‘for some reason he and some brother officers had to leave their country,’ claimed W W Richards, of Oldham, a former pupil, reminiscing in 1891.[3] The 1841 census reveals him as a 25-year-old wine merchant in Marylebone, London, and his marriage certificate of 1844 calls him ‘wine agent’.

The new Mrs Mark was named Eliza, and he became stepfather to her then four-year-old daughter Leila.[4] At some point (probably in 1848[5]) he and Eliza decided to set up what became ‘Dr Mark’s Great National Enterprise’.

It began in Bristol in 1849, where Mark founded a ‘Conservatoire of Music’ which consisted, according to a report in 1860, of evening classes for children[6] – during the day, we should remember, many children would be working. From these it would seem he created a small travelling orchestra of boys, whom he undertook to teach and maintain, financing the project from apprenticeship premiums and the proceeds of performances.[7] W W Richards said that the original band ‘consisted of Germans’ and that the secret of his method was ‘teaching them to play from memory instead of notes … We never had a music score on the platform the whole time we were with him’.[8]

This was the time, according to Richards, when the phrase ‘Dr Mark and his Little Men’ was adopted to describe the touring troupe, and he refers to all tuition being given ‘in the railway carriage and at the hotel where we happened to stay’.

The pattern of Mark’s activities between 1855 and 1858 is clear from the reminiscences of several other former ‘Little Men’ which appeared in the Manchester Weekly Times early in 1891. The band and its conductor travelled constantly, and appeared mainly before audiences of a similar age to the performers. He would give lectures as well as performances,[9] and find further recruits for his project from the youngsters who attended his concerts.

W W Richards says the good doctor travelled and performed ‘with the idea of picking up boys here and there and teaching them music, etc’.  He joined in February 1855, when the band visited Hyde, and found ‘we had to travel every day except Sunday’ (when all had to go to church).

L Saunders of Oldham Road joined in 1856 or 1857, and says: ‘When I joined Dr Mark we had not the advantage of a stationary residence. We changed from town to town almost daily’. He also recalled that ‘he augmented his band during his travels, mainly by selecting lads from among his afternoon audiences (generally given to schoolchildren, and extended to juvenile charities) … I and a schoolmate were so selected in Bolton in 1857, but I was the only one who joined his band …’[10] His father paid a premium of £5 and he was apprenticed to Mark for three years. Richards endorses the figure of £5 as the premium most parents had to pay, though ‘several’ boys were taken on free of charge, he says.

Thomas Colbeck of Huddersfield joined in March, 1857, aged eight, at a time when ‘we almost daily itinerated from town to town’, and ‘the mainstay of the band during my term of apprenticeship was the seven Bristol boys’.[11]

A link with Mark’s former career – as well as of his innate showmanship – can be seen in L Saunders’ recollection that ‘when I joined the doctor and his Little Men were costumed as representing the armies and navies of Europe’ – and the Musical World account of June 1860 mentions that the boys were dressed in ‘English and French military costume’.

Mark’s first appearance on the musical scene in Manchester was at the end of 1856, when he and the ‘Little Men’ took part in the Christmas concerts at the newly-rebuilt Free Trade Hall.[12] In the following year the ‘juvenile orchestra’ was reported to be on tour in Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool and Birmingham,[13] and July 1858 the Manchester Weekly Advertiser reported that a three-day ‘Jubilee of Music’ held by him at the Free Trade Hall drew 28,000 attendances over three days.[14]

Mark had also tried his hand at publishing, and a brochure from 1857[15] offers his The Musician, ‘in which the whole elements of Music are condensed into twelve easy, complete, and progressive studies for the Pianoforte, together with five progressive pieces of Music’, and The Pianist – ‘an entirely new and complete system of Musical Instruction consisting of six systematic and practical studies, in which the principles of Music are simplified and condensed …’

A landmark in the band’s success was an appearance at Buckingham Palace to mark the Queen’s wedding anniversary on 10 February 1858. This was noted in the Musical World,[16] and Mark printed a copy of its programme, which lists the Queen, Prince Consort, Prince of Wales, Duke of Cambridge, Duke of Saxe Coburg, Duke of Argyll and Duchess of Sutherland as among the audience.[17] Thomas Colbeck recalled travelling from York to London for the event, and said that the band had appeared before the Queen on two other occasions during his time, and also before ‘the Prince of Wales, Lord Palmerston and the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland’.

Mark’s ambitions were growing, and, having now seemingly settled in Manchester, in October 1858 he began to advertise his ‘Royal College of Music and Manchester Conservatoire of Music’, as well as issuing a prospectus for a ‘National School for Conservatoires of Music’.[18] It would seem he planned to train young men at a permanent base in Manchester who would then set up music teaching establishments (‘conservatoires’), on the same pattern as his own in Bristol, in other towns and cities. As his advertisement in Musical World of 9 April 1859 explained, his college was ‘especially for the education of masters for conservatories of music who will receive appointments as soon as competent’.

His premises were in Bridge Street, and he announced an inaugural festival for the first week of January, 1859.[19] This consisted of concerts twice daily at the Corn Exchange (now The Triangle), attended, it was said, by a total of 50,000 children, from both National[20] and Sunday Schools, and included a Grand Juvenile Ball[21] at the Free Trade Hall on January 6.[22] He followed it with a series of Saturday ‘Concerts for the People’[23] at the Corn Exchange, running through to March, and the series began again in the autumn, running into the New Year.[24]

The Juvenile Ball briefly became an annual event in Manchester, and left clear memories in the minds of those who took part. The ‘Area’ – the street-level part of the auditorium – was cleared for dancing, and spectators sat in the gallery.[25] Alfred Knight of Oswestry, who played in the orchestra for them, recalled in 1891 that the first item would be a march, during which the children would enter in a procession of couples – ‘marshalled by a few elders’ – before the dancing proper began.[26] (Mark gave similar balls in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Cork, but they were not as successful as that in Manchester, recalled J D Hopkins later).

Locating the first ‘Royal College of Music’ is not difficult. Its address was 42 Bridge Street, and it was formerly the London Hotel, where the ‘Little Men’ had stayed in previous years.[27] As later reminiscences pointed out, after Mark’s occupation ended it was known as the London Amphitheatre[28] and the London Music Hall, and then the Queen’s Theatre, after the demolition of the original Queen’s Theatre in Spring Gardens.[29] A writer in 1891 referred to it as ‘recently burnt down’.[30] Its site is today occupied by the Masonic Hall.

Mark’s project seemed to be prospering greatly. In June 1860 the Musical World (quoting from the Midland and Northern Counties Herald) reviewed his achievements to date, noting that his College was intended for pupils from all parts of the country, while the ‘Manchester Conservatoire’ consisted of evening classes for local children in vocal and instrumental music, in return for ‘moderate subscriptions, voluntary contributions or in consideration of their services being given if required’. He had so far spent £50,000 on the project, it said, though support had not been ‘as liberal as it ought to have been’ – a pointer to its eventual failure, as we can see with hindsight.

In September 1860 Mark advertised that he had two orchestras available for engagements, [31] and the ‘Little Men’ gave their first public concerts in London at the beginning of the following year, in a week of performances at St James’s Hall (12 to 19 January 1861), promoted by the impresario John Mitchell[32] – the man who handled Jenny Lind’s enormously successful ‘comeback’ tour in the autumn of the same year.[33] The Musical World described one of them, claiming that the Queen had previously heard the ‘Little Men’ perform at Windsor Castle, and noting that the band numbered ‘nearly 40’ and included players on violin, flute, piccolo, cornet-à-pistons, saxhorn, concertina, double bass, etc.[34] Other instruments played in the orchestra apparently included the viola da gamba and Sax baritone.[35]

The Manchester, Salford and Suburban Directory of 1861 contains a large advertisement for ‘Dr Mark’s Great National Enterprise … developed at his Royal College of Music, Manchester’ which is the clearest exposition by Mark himself of what his establishment then comprised. It claims patronage by the Queen, Prince Consort, Prince of Wales, etc., and ‘many of the Nobility, Clergy, Gentry and Distinguished Families of the Empire’ and states its objective as ‘To encourage Native Musical Talent and to promote the general advancement of Music upon [Dr Mark’s] New and Effective System: also as a Normal School[36] for the Training of Masters to Conduct Conservatories of Music for little children throughout the United Kingdom’.

It was an ambitious scheme for its time, and if we are tempted to smile at the flowery hyperbole employed, we should remember that it was not long previously that Phineas T Barnum had been touring the country lecturing on the benefits of ‘humbug’[37] – or, as we might put it, marketing and public relations: he visited Manchester, speaking on ‘Making Money’ on 9 October 1859.[38]

The touring activities of the ‘Little Men’ continued alongside the college’s activities. Mark’s Directory advertisement said he was open to engagements with ‘orchestras consisting of 30, 40, 50, 100 and 200’, conducted by himself. These would be composed of ‘the Advanced Pupils of the Royal College of Music, and some of the “Little Men”, who perform Sacred, Classical, Operatic, and Popular Music’. He also offered ‘a Vocalist, Solo Harpist, Solo Pianist, Organist and Solo Instrumentalists’. It is unlikely in fact that he was able to field very large numbers of performers – W W Richards, who was a member of the ‘Little Men’ both before and after the opening of the College, recalled that ‘there were eventually about 40 of us’,[39] and surviving illustrations do not indicate any higher number. Mark’s 1857 brochure refers to ‘upwards of 30 Instrumentalists, and a Chorus of 40 voices’, but it appears from the Buckingham Palace programme that all the boys who played also sang.

Because of the new base for operations, after 1859 the band was composed mainly of Manchester boys.[40] But its travelling schedule was still so intensive that Thomas Colbeck recalled that they only ‘occasionally visited the College’ – most memorably at Christmas, when they were employed for ‘the theatrical performances, the balls given in the Free Trade Hall, and the concerts in the Corn Exchange’.[41]

The training Mark offered was for boys aged five to nine, who would be apprenticed for three, five or seven years ‘by paying a moderate entrance fee to cover the expenses of Instrument and Books’.

‘Orphans of the musical profession, and poor children possessing musical talent’, however, would be admitted free and receive a general and musical education, together with board, lodging and clothing, until the age of 14 – ‘when they are either apprenticed to a trade or trained for the profession’.[42] He also advertised that ‘young Ladies and Gentlemen who are preparing for the profession’ would have opportunities to be introduced to the public by performing at his concerts, and that young gentlemen would be ‘educated for the profession’.

His teaching staff included a Dr Tendall who was General Musical Director as well as teacher of theory, harmony, pianoforte, organ, flute, piccolo, concertina and voice, and – more interestingly – members of Hallé’s orchestra among the tutors. One was Hallé first violinist M. Roguier,[43] and J J E Vieuxtemps (the brother of the composer Henri, and Hallé’s principal cello from 1857 to 1895) taught cello, double bass and viola.[44] Harry Russell (Hallé principal trombone 1857-1871) taught cornet and other brass instruments – his lessons were recalled by Alfred Knight in 1891.[45] ‘Military drill and Calisthenics’ were also on the curriculum, and the General Educational Department was run by ‘Mr Powell, assisted by Junior Masters’.[46]

But the college seems never to have paid its way. By the end of 1861 it was reported that Mark was organizing a national subscription list ‘to provide funds for the erection of an Institution capable of accommodating a large number of children’[47] – even if this was a misunderstanding of his existing publicity material, the implication remains that he was short of funds.[48]

Mark’s Juvenile Balls in January at the Free Trade Hall were repeated until 1862,[49] but the collapse of the Bridge Street enterprise must have come about before, or soon after, that date.[50] The 1863 street directory lists no. 42 Bridge Street as the London Hotel and Music Hall, and so the first ‘Royal College of Music’ in Manchester disappears from history. J D Hopkirk said that Dr Mark ‘tried hard to keep the college on, but it was a great expense for him and he was compelled to give it up. The boys who were there all went home.’[51]

But its founder seems to have persevered with the travelling ‘Little Men’ band until his death on 2 January 1868, at the age of 52. His widow attempted a final farewell tour, but without success.[52] His memorial in Cheetham churchyard (St Luke’s) proclaimed it was erected by Eliza and the Little Men, ‘in affectionate remembrance of a loving and devoted husband, a good and kind master, a generous and sincere friend’.[53]

Eliza persevered as proprietress of a music shop at no. 11 Elizabeth Street, Cheetham, where, according to James A Hall of Manchester Road, Castleton, in 1891, Joseph Sturge (see below) seemed to manage the business for her. Photographs of the former Little Men and their founder were on sale there in the early 1870s.[54] She was still alive in 1891, resident at 111 Stocks Street, Cheetham Hill Road, and wrote to the Manchester Weekly Times to thank those former pupils who had testified to her husband’s life’s work and generosity.[55]

His concerts were long remembered. The band numbered between 30 and 40, according to Philip Wentworth writing in the Middleton Guardian 18 years after Mark died,[56] made up of strings and ‘a few reed and brass instruments’, with Mark as ‘an energetic, but somewhat fussy leader’ [ie conductor]. The taller and older youths wore black frock coats with linen cuffs and collars, and the smaller boys dress coats and matching open waistcoats – which created the image of ‘a great look of men in miniature’, as Wentworth put it.

The repertoire (judging from the programme of the Buckingham Palace concert and confirmed by Wentworth’s memory and other summaries) was mainly operatic selections, often as instrumental solos, with arrangements of popular national songs from England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, and Dr Mark’s own version of the Post Horn Galop – which L Saunders says was done to represent a competition between the steam engine and the stage coach.[57] He points out that Mark had to compose (he probably means ‘arrange’) much of the music himself.[58]

How good were they? Wentworth sagely noted that ‘no doubt the success of their performances was greatly assisted by their juvenility … [and] a willingness [by the public] to be pleased with moderate ability’. He also made the point that the Buckingham Palace appearance ‘was a procured favour, as all such admissions are’, but added that ‘only the distinguished … can pass successfully through the preliminary scrutiny’, and that the subsequent royal appearances counted for something, too.[59]

Actually, it was not all little men. Mark’s stepdaughter Leila was a mainstay of his performances as a solo singer (and a concert programme from February, 1859, at Shrewsbury, offers ‘Miss E. L. Williams, the Welsh Nightingale, from Mons. Jullien’s and the Exeter Hall concerts, London’, on the same bill, while a report of a concert in Glasgow in 1860 notes the Misses Brougham and O’Connor as vocal soloists alongside the boys’ orchestra, and one of a Northampton performance in 1861 a Miss Heywood).[60] L Saunders, reminiscing in 1891, said that Leila had later married an ‘elementary teacher’ called Harwood,[61] and it is Harwood whose signature, writing on behalf of Dr Mark, appears on a letter of 1857 kept by the descendants of one of the ‘Little Men’.[62]

What was life like for members of the juvenile band as they travelled and performed? Their journeys were certainly extensive, including England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and the Channel Islands, according to J D Hopkins in 1891.[63] Newspaper references have been found to performances in Aberdeen, Brighton, Cheltenham, Doncaster, Glasgow, Liverpool, Loughborough, Shrewsbury, Southampton and Worcester,[64] in addition to those mentioned above and below. Memories of members included visits to Inverness, Galway, Jersey and Yarmouth, and L Saunders remembered one to Scotland when the concert was given to an audience of one.[65] L Saunders recalled that a maid travelled with the troupe, ‘to see that we were clean and tidy, to darn, etc., for us’.[66]

Mark certainly obtained a reputation for philanthropy in every respect. His audiences included ‘children of the public and charity schools, the inmates of the Workhouse, and the poor and aged of the public at large’, according to a description from quite late in his career, which claimed that ‘the law of kindness is clearly written on his heart’.[67]

Former member L Saunders remembered Mark as ‘a kind man’ who ‘… ruined himself by his unbounded charity’. Alfred Knight said he was a kind man, too – although ‘he once hit a boy over the head with a violin for persistently making the same mistake at rehearsal’.[68] (Knight said he joined in April 1859 at Rugby and travelled with the troupe for ‘a month’ before being sent to the Manchester college. After 12 months’ tuition he joined the band as a travelling member, having chosen to learn the ophicleide). W W Richards approvingly recalled that he had seen Mark strike a boy ‘a score of times, but not without a cause’.[69]

On the other hand, there was an occasion in 1857 when two brothers called Lamb from Walsall absconded from their indentures and Mark took their father to court over it – and won, according to L Saunders.[70] Thomas Colbeck of Huddersfield (who joined the Little Men in 1857, at the age of eight) was a witness in the case. The absconders’ father’s argument was that the brothers were ‘not properly fed’[71] – rebutted, one guesses, by the testimony of a stout young Master Colbeck. The case was reported in the Musical World, which mentioned that Mark employed ‘a system for making music popular’, taking boys generally at nine years old as apprentices for three years and undertaking to give them a musical education.[72]

Some of Mark’s pupils became successful musicians in later life – though whether his notation-less ‘method’ particularly helped is unclear. Among the performers at his Buckingham Palace concert in 1858 were Joseph Sturge, as solo vocalist and solo violinist – who later joined the Hallé Orchestra as a second violinist[73] – and ‘Jamie Skinner’. Sturge’s brother Edwin was also a member and soloist, playing the cornet, and according to Alfred Knight later became bandmaster at Yarmouth. Knight also cites one Isaas Taylor, who he says became a first violinist under Jacobi[74] at the Alhambra in London.

James Scott Skinner (1843-1927) was known to his fellows as ‘the kilted boy’, according to Thomas Colbeck.[75] He later became celebrated as a dancing-master, fiddler, composer and arranger of Scottish ‘traditional’ music, and there is considerable academic writing on him and his compositions and collections.[76]

Skinner’s memoirs[77] describe his first encounter with Dr Mark’s Little Men (‘the most famous musical combination of its time’, he calls them) when they visited Aberdeen in 1855. After the concert his elder brother and erstwhile violin teacher, Alexander, took him to meet Dr Mark, who heard him play and immediately asked him: ‘Would you like to come with us?’ He said yes, and the six-years indentures were signed and his new life begun the following morning.

He was 12, and while with the Little Men visited, he said, about 600 towns and villages in Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales. He describes their travelling education being provided by the tutor Powell, with ‘sums and dictation while the train was speeding along’ – which he said ‘did not tend to promote either accuracy or beautiful penmanship’.

But Mark he remembered as ‘a very able man’ who ‘while a strict disciplinarian, really loved the boys under his charge, and was very indulgent of their foibles’. He cites the fact that they could take with them pet birds and animals: his was a tame starling, and others had rabbits, white mice and doves.

He gives Mark’s musical training credit for the fact that at the age of 12 (he says it was 10, but must clearly be mistaken) he was already playing the music of the William Tell, Masaniello, Oberon and Zampa overtures. At one point, however, he was sent back to Mark’s ‘headquarters’ in Manchester, as a punishment for fighting while on tour, a twist of fate to which he attributes all his later success. This was because it enabled Roguier,[78] the Hallé Orchestra violinist, to teach him notation and theory as well as a better technique, and in later years he was as capable of playing a Paganini solo as a Scottish air. He rejoined the Little Men and finally found his way home with three months of his apprenticeship still to run. Mark did not pursue him.

It is the Scotsman, Skinner, who alone records that Mark undertook to pay modest amounts to his young charges after their first three years of indenture. Fourth-year boys were to be paid 2s 6d, fifth-years 5s, and sixth-years 7s 6d – presumably as a disincentive to early departure. But ‘truth to tell, we hardly ever saw any money, the condition of the Doctor’s exchequer being generally pretty low’, he gloomily adds. On one occasion, they even tried busking in the street to raise some funds. Mark, whom he calls ‘a great showman’, had clearly instilled the spirit of enterprise in his pupils as well as a love of music.

Skinner mentions another Scots boy in the troupe who made good in the musical profession: G S Mackay, who he says later became leader of the orchestra at Her Majesty’s Theatre, Aberdeen.

What was Mark’s real achievement? At his death, the Musical World published an obituary borrowed from the Edinburgh Courant [79] (it was also quoted by Wentworth in the Middleton Guardian later)[80] which listed statistics which would be impressive even if the numbers were somewhat exaggerated. Over 20 years, it said, he had given 9,586 concerts and 5,250 lectures, to an aggregate audience of 7,645,791 children and 6,255,689 adults. He had travelled 296,690 miles and established ‘several’ conservatoires of music, expending £125,000 in the process, along with £25,000 ‘of his own resources’. His system had been used to teach over 5,500 pupils, and he had received, it was claimed, unsolicited testimonials from Charles Hallé, the opera singer Mlle. Piccolomini, the orchestral conductor Louis Jullien, composer Henry Russell, and others.

We may take such details with a generous pinch of salt, but in considering Mark’s significance we should not forget how much accepted norms in education changed during the 19^th century, quite apart from the contrast between those considered appropriate at its close and the situation today. 

In 1858, the idea of teaching music as a national policy had still to find its proper place: Joseph Mainzer, of earlier Singing for the Million fame, had announced a plan for a ‘Normal Music School of Manchester’ in 1849 and begun holding classes for children and adults in the city in 1850,[81] but died the following year. John Hullah had begun his life’s work of teaching singing by sol-fa in London in 1840, and taught others to propound it in day and Sunday Schools, but it was only in 1872 that he was made Inspector of Training Schools for the United Kingdom.[82] In the field of instrumental teaching, apart from private lessons and the Royal Academy of Music in London (the much-admired Royal College of Music was not founded until 1882), there was almost nothing.

Mark was clearly no Wackford Squeers, and his disciplinary methods probably no different from those of others of his generation, or indeed several later ones. The boys were required to be total abstainers during their apprenticeships, the Cheltenham Examiner reported approvingly in 1858.[83] But they were almost certainly unsupervised to an extent that would be unlikely in today’s world. Richards tells, for instance, how the college dog, Tiger, was acquired by John Beard (a young man who led the orchestra and also taught) near a Manchester market.[84] According to Alfred Knight, Tiger ‘knew God Save the Queen as well as any of us, and would join lustily in it’.[85] All the former ‘Little Men’ who reminisced in 1891, however, looked back on their days with affection.

As an educationist, Mark may have missed his place in the roll of honour of those who brought music to the masses in Britain – but perhaps only by being ahead of his time. According to the Cheltenham Examiner, after his performances in Liverpool in 1858, he was presented with an address by a deputation of teachers from day and Sunday schools which hoped for a time ‘when Her Majesty’s Government will reward your labours, and that the Council of Education will recognise your efforts, and adopt your simple and admirable plan as a branch of national education.’[86]

One view, expressed by his former pupil, W W Richards, in 1891 was that: ‘Had it not been for him I do not think the Royal College of Music in London would have been established, for I believe it was the Doctor who first set the ball rolling.’[87]

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[1] Though damaged, overgrown and inaccessible today, it was illustrated in Axon: Annals of Manchester (1886). He was a ‘Doc. Mus.’ apparently.

[2] I’m indebted to Helen Manley of Chesterton, Warwickshire, for this information. She is Dr Mark’s great-great-great-granddaughter and has unearthed her family tree through heirloom documents and census records.

[3] Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.

[4] Helen Manley, personal communication.

[5] See the advertisement in the Manchester, Salford and Suburban Directory of 1861, described below.

[6] Musical World, 23 June 1860.

[7] See Cheltenham Examiner, 16 June 1858.

[8] Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.

[9] Musical World, 23 June 1860.

[10] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 February 1891 (reference to 1856), and 9 January 1891 (1857 mentioned).

[11] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 March 1891.

[12] Manchester Guardian, 13 December 1856.

[13] Musical World, 14 February 1857.

[14] John Favill, personal communication.

[15] I am grateful to Mr John Favill and his cousin Mrs Kath Conway for copies of this, which is in their possession, with a handwritten letter on one side relating to their great-grandfather, William John Favill, a member of the ‘Little Men’ at the time.

[16] Musical World, 27 February 1858.

[17] A copy survives in Shrewsbury public library.

[18] Musical World, 30 October 1858.

[19] Musical World, 25 December 1858; Manchester Guardian 27 December 1858.

[20] That is, Church of England day schools founded by the National Society for Promoting Religious Education. Non-denominational ‘board schools’ did not appear until after the Elementary Education Act of 1870, which made education possible for all under-13s.

[21] Manchester Guardian 27 December 1858.

[22] All a great success, according to Musical World, 29 January 1859.

[23] The phrase was also used for other, unrelated events, at the time at the Free Trade Hall.

[24] Musical World, 12 March and 5 November 1859; Manchester Guardian 17 December 1859 and 4 February 1860.

[25] J D Hopkins in Manchester Weekly Times, 20 February 1891.

[26] Manchester Weekly Times, 30 January 1891.

[27] W W Richards in Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.

[28] W E Nuttall in Manchester Weekly Times, 20 February 1891.

[29] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 and 13 February 1891.

[30] Manchester Weekly Times, 20 February 1891.

[31] Musical World, 29 September 1860.

[32] Musical World, 5 January 1861.

[33] See Musical World, 14 September 1861, and Robert Beale: Charles Hallé, A Musical Life (Ashgate 2007), p135-7.

[34] Musical World, 2 February 1861.

[35] See the programme printed after the Buckingham Palace concert of February 1858, Shrewsbury public library.

[36] The standard term for an institution providing training for the teaching profession.

[37] See Musical World, 1 January 1859: It reported his message as that ‘honesty, integrity and honour are compatible with humbug, in its most elevated state’.

[38] Manchester Guardian, 6 October 1859.

[39] Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.

[40] See J D Hopkins, Manchester Weekly Times, 20 February 1891.

[41] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 March 1891.

[42] This exit strategy was also described in the Musical World report of 23 June 1860. In W J Favill’s case, the former Little Man was apprenticed to a lithographic printer (John Favill, personal communication).

[43] Credited by James Scott Skinner as having taught him to read music and the source of his success – see below.

[44] Vieuxtemps lived to join the staff of Hallé’s Royal Manchester College of Music in 1893.

[45] Manchester Weekly Times, 30 January 1891.

[46] His earlier advertisement in Musical World (9 April 1859) had claimed staff including Roguier, Vieuxtemps, Richardson (cornet and brass), Cortesi (flute, oboe, clarinet) – the latter two were Hallé Orchestra members – and a Mr Elder (piano, organ, concertina and voice).

[47] Leicester Guardian, 14 December 1861.

[48] James Scott Skinner’s reference to the senior boys being promised payments but rarely receiving them also points to less-than-adequate cashflow in the entire operation (see below).

[49] Manchester Guardian 29 December 1860, 8 January 1862.

[50] Terry Wyke and Nigel Rudyard’s Manchester Theatres (Manchester, 1994) gives 1862 as when the building became a theatre.

[51] Manchester Weekly Times, 20 February 1891.

[52] J D Hopkins in Manchester Weekly Times, 20 February 1891.

[53] Middleton Guardian, article by Philip Wentworth, 19 June and 4 September 1886.

[54] Manchester Weekly Times, 2 January 1891.

[55] Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.

[56] Middleton Guardian, 11 September 1886.

[57] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 February 1891.

[58] Manchester Weekly Times, 9 January 1891.

[59] Middleton Guardian, 11 September 1886.

[60] Shropshire Records and Research Centre, Shrewsbury, ref. 665/3/321. The Era, 9 December 1860; 31 March 1861.

[61] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 February 1891. He says Harwood ‘later became a stationmaster at Accrington’, but this is an inaccuracy, as Mr Peter Harwood, their great-grandson, has pointed out to me. Leila’s husband was William John Harwood, but it was his father, John Hitchcock Harwood, who had the Accrington connection, having been a railway clerk there.

[62] The Favill family – personal communication.

[63] Manchester Weekly Times, 20 February 1891.

[64] My thanks to Mr John Favill for collating most of the sources here.

[65] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 February 1891.

[66] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 February 1891.

[67] Leicester Guardian 14 December 1861.

[68] Manchester Weekly Times, 30 January 1891.

[69] Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.

[70] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 February 1891.

[71] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 March 1891.

[72] Musical World, 18 April 1857.

[73] Serving most seasons from 1869 to 1885: see Thomas Batley: Sir Charles Hallé’s Concerts in Manchester, 1896.

[74] Presumably Charles Jacoby, also for many years a front-desk violinist in Hallé’s and the Liverpool Philharmonic orchestras.

[75] Manchester Weekly Times, 6 March 1891.

[76] See, for instance, the University of Aberdeen website.

[77] My Life and Adventures, City of Aberdeen Arts and Recreation Division, 1994, pp11-16), originally serialized in the People’s Journal, 1923.

[78] The recently published version of his memoirs gives the name as ‘Rougier’, but 19^th century sources, m/s and print, spell it ‘Roguier’.

[79] Musical World, 11 January 1868.

[80] Middleton Guardian, 4 September 1886.

[81] Musical World, 29 September 1849 and 18 May 1850; see Robert Beale: Charles Hallé, A Musical Life, p41n.

[82] See Bernarr Rainbow: ‘The Rise of Popular Music Education in nineteenth-century England’ in Temperley (ed): The Lost Chord: Essays on Victorian Music (Indiana University Press, 1989).

[83] 16 June.

[84] Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.

[85] Manchester Weekly Times, 30 January 1891.

[86] 18 August 1858.

[87] Manchester Weekly Times, 13 February 1891.