A story that just keeps on giving…….
We found the story of the Brown Family, who worked in the textile industry in Hawick from the 1840s to the 1870s, to illustrate archives and research to our NVQ local investigations group. Little did we know how much we’d connect together and find out about them!
Postcard of Mid Row in Hawick (late 19th century) - The Brown’s lived in this area and around the west end of Hawick where the Heritage Hub is situated now.
So far we’ve found that Thomas Brown as a serial offender and in and out of prison during this period. From looking for him in the newspapers we found his sisters and the ‘Hawick Yarn Stealing Case’ based at Tower Mill on our campus and surveillance being done from the building that is now our archive centre. We found that two of the sisters were imprisoned in Jedburgh Castle Jail and so last week our investigators went with museums staff to visit and find out what conditions were like.
Now staff here at the hub have found that a descendant of the Agnes Brown or Huggan (one of the sisters convicted for Yarn Stealing) has been in touch with us! The research done for our enquirer tells us more about Agnes and her family. The name Agnes Brown Huggan travels down through the family as descendants are named after her.
We like to imagine her as a formidable woman, who continued through widowhood after her spell in Prison to bring up her family into the 1880s.
It is amazing what comes out of records and research and connects up at convinient times!!
Posted by: Rachel
