Marrying at Gloucester Cathedral (General)

by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Wednesday, February 21, 2024, 19:38 (66 days ago) @ Bradley Tingle

Hi Donna,
thanks for your interesting post, especially your mention of western Canada. Outside of engineering, geography was the only subject I really enjoyed in my 1970s schooldays in the FoD. We spent 2 years studying North America which has subsequently proved to be helpful for family history researches as we often discussed the coal and steel industries in Pennsylvania etc, which this forum has taught me attracted so many Foresters. However it was Canada that really interested me, perhaps due to the similarities of forestry, but also the great expanses of wild and wonderful countryside such as the Great Lakes or the Prairies. Sadly, apart from a short time working near Detroit (interesting climate extremes !), and meeting some folk from Calgary, I've not been lucky enough to visit Canada; but my cousin's son lived in Vancouver for some years and it sounds like a wonderful place to visit. I have researched a friends' family tree into Canada but they were c20th farmers who didnt venture that far east.
Wishing you all the very best in your continued researches, it sounds like a very interesting tale indeed !.

Regards Jeff.

PS a thought - could the wealthy John Jason have been a financial backer or partner to the James Tingle mine business ?.

PPS I've just remembered that some years ago I posted on this forum about some of the more recent Cinderford Tingles and their ironworking and mining. I wondered if they were in your tree at all, perhaps descended from James, don't know if you've seen this ?
See https://forum.forest-of-dean.net/index.php?id=46752

Since writing the above post, I've found that (unsurprisingly) the story of the Bilson Foundry has already been researched in some detail, and is covered by an excellent fully-illustrated article in the Archive Journal Issue 33, produced by our local Lightmoor Press, see https://lightmoor.co.uk/books/archive-issue-33/ARCH33
The article confirms the foundry business was indeed started by Joseph Tingle in 1860, "in a small way at first, and at the time of the 1861 census he still retained a former job as "manager of a coal mine" - members of the Tingle family were connected with three pits quite close by". Joseph was born in Flaxley in 1829, the eldest son of coal miner John Tingle and wife Sophia, who came from Littledean.... etc etc etc... It is from his Foundry premises that a road in Cinderford is still named Foundry Road, only a few hundred yards of my childhood home.
Hope this is of interest, J.