Other influential proprietors were the Parker family, merchants and exporters. When financial services became more organised, two Parker brothers, Isaac and Seth, developed into Lichfield’s earliest bankers, and Seth was appointed company treasurer.
But it was the Reverend Thomas Ella who became the central character in the story. He was a prominent Lichfield personality, headmaster of a local school, considered ‘a real gentleman and scholar’, well known for his generosity and public spiritedness. He took snuff, gambled at cards and enjoyed brandy and wine. He dressed well, wearing black stockings of superfine cotton, silver buckles on his shoes, and silk handkerchiefs.
Ella was a Cambridge graduate and had wide interests. He was secretary of a circulating library and distributed periodicals like The Universal Magazine to gentlemen of the neighbourhood. In his later years he founded several charitable institutions. He was happily married, but there had been a tragedy in his family with the death of his newborn son, who lived only three weeks. Ella baptised him at a private service, but the child died ten days later.
Much of the early work in getting the canal scheme under way was done by Ella, described by Samuel as a ‘visionary’ whose efforts were tireless in persuading friends and acquaintances to put up the money. Out of their own pockets these men paid for ‘Land for Wharfs and the making the same and also all Collateral Cuts, Basons, Reservoirs, Engines and all other Works and Conveniences.’
The proposed Ogley and Huddlesford Canal was to be seven miles long, with thirty locks. A 1794 Act of Parliament empowered the company to raise £25,000 from the sale of two hundred shares, and a further £20,000 if necessary — money that would be paid back out of charges for tonnage rates.
Then began the actual work. The design of the project fell to the famous engineer William Jessop, who accepted the role of Chief Engineer, though working simultaneously on several other canals. The survey of the route was carried out by one of Jessop’s assistants, who must have impressed the proprietors with his skill, because he was subsequently appointed Resident Engineer.
Samuel quoted a recorded reference for a resident engineer as ‘A person capable of conducting the business of a Canal through, viz, that he is a good Engineer, can carry an Accurate Level, and has a perfect knowledge of Cutting, Banking, etc, and also that he is a compleat Mason.’ But he added that it failed to mention three important qualifications for the job — diplomacy, for dealing with irate or greedy landowners, the authority to handle uncooperative contractors, and an indefatigable taste for travelling.
Once the chief engineer had drawn up his specifications, he left for the next project, and the job of supervising the actual building of the waterway fell to the resident engineer. He worked on one job at a time, which usually lasted many years. By the time most of them finished their first major job, canal mania would be over.
As a result, the resident engineer became neither rich nor famous. He expected to get the blame if things went wrong, but very little credit when the canal was complete.
Samuel described the resident engineer chosen by the Lichfield proprietors as a young man, only thirty-two years old. Like Samuel, he lived in Whittington, where he’d seen the Coventry Canal being constructed as a child. This may have been his very first experience of the problems of theft and dishonesty, which bedevilled some canal projects.
The new resident engineer was a single man when he was appointed, but shortly afterwards he met his future wife, Sarah, a local woman, and they married in 1796. He was able to settle down near Lichfield and start a family.
Four years later, the proprietors of the Ogley and Huddlesford Canal were shocked to receive serious allegations of fraud against their resident engineer. Before they could act, he’d vanished under suspicion of corruption and embezzlement, leaving behind his wife and a young son.
And Samuel’s chapter ended with the most vital information of all. That resident engineer’s name was William Buckley.
18
Late on Monday morning I headed towards Frog Lane to make my statement at the police station. I had to wait for a while in the reception area, kicking my heels until they found someone with time to see me. There were a few other people sitting around on plastic chairs, but they looked more like long-suffering relatives than hardened criminals.
Eventually, I was taken into a tiny room with a view down a corridor along which the occasional police officer walked. A uniformed constable came through clutching a file. His face was pink, and he looked about sixteen. By the time I’d gone through my story again and he’d written it down word for word, the whole tale sounded pathetic, and I was sweating with embarrassment. I desperately wanted to make something up that sounded more convincing and wouldn’t portray me as a cowardly fool. But there was nothing I could do that would make this youth regard me with approval, no words I could say that would restore my self-respect.
By the time I emerged from the police station, I felt as though I’d been subjected to the third degree with bright lights and hosepipes. But there had been nobody torturing me except myself. I’d seen my humiliation written out in black and white, and I’d signed my name to it for posterity.
It was the first time I’d been in the Frog Lane area since Samuel Longden’s death. Part of me wanted to turn away from the scene as a place it was best not to see. But instead I made my way to the corner of Castle Dyke, intent on punishing myself further, seeking the traces of blood stains or fragments of broken glass in the gutter. There were none, of course — the evidence had been cleaned up and tidied away. If only the city council employed someone who could wipe away the shame that was staining my mind and running in the gutters of my thoughts.
Just inside the entrance of the multi-storey car park was a small cabin, and I could see someone moving around inside. The car park was the type where you ‘paid and displayed’ by putting your money into one of the automatic ticket machines on the parking levels. There was no barrier to pass through at the exit, and no need to have any contact with the attendant. He was there merely for security, and to check on vehicles that had overstayed the time on their tickets.
When I knocked on the door of the cabin, a thin, middle-aged man in a uniform appeared, clutching a mug of tea. At first, he didn’t seem to understand what I wanted. I got the impression that people usually came to the cabin because they couldn’t find their car. But at last I got through to him that I wanted to know about the accident in which the old man had been killed the week before. His suspicions cleared when I mentioned I was a relative.
‘Oh yes, terrible,’ he said. ‘Course, I didn’t see it, you know. I told the police that. I was up on the top level at the time. I’m supposed to watch the cars that are in, not the ones that are going out. But I’ll say this — some of them go at a hell of a speed down the exit ramps. It’s like a Grand Prix circuit some nights. There’s one bloke burns so much rubber off his tyres in here, you’d think he was trying to keep the Goodyear factory in work single-handed. And as for the noise—’
‘You must be good at taking notice of people. Do you remember anybody in particular being around that night?’
‘Not really. It wasn’t very busy by that time. The shop and office folk had mostly gone home, and the evening crowd hadn’t arrived yet. The only thing I can remember... well, it doesn’t mean anything.’
‘What?’
‘Well, when I was up on level two, I could tell there was a bloke fetching his car from just below, even before I heard his engine start up. That must have been right before the old chap was killed. Sound carries something terrible inside here, so I could hear it clearly. It made me think of my old dad, who smoked himself to death before anybody even thought to tell him it might be dangerous.’