Jorden/Jordan, Richard

Item

Name
Jorden/Jordan, Richard
ADD_K1_001_01Sir Samuel Hellier to John Rogers, 25th December 1766
Description
Iron forge owner, friend and neighbour of Sir Samuel.
Dates
1730?-1778
Biography
A date of birth cannot be found in the Wombourne Parish Records, although it is most likely he was the first of six born to Richard senior and Eleanor Stubbs, who married in 1730. Richard senior died on 25th December 1765 and was buried in Penn. Richard Jorden senior owned a large water-driven forge known as Heath Forge, to the southwest of Wombourne village but it is likely the family lived at Swindon, a small village to the south, within the parish. After his father’s death, Richard Jorden advertised for sale ‘The Houshold Furniture of the late Mr. Richard Jorden’ at Heath Forge, (Aris’s Birmingham Gazette - Monday 1st April 1765) and let out the house ‘with or without Land’ at Swindon ‘in the Midway between Wolverhampton and Stourbidge’, to move back to Heath Forge. The family businesses at Heath Forge and Swindon would have relied on the iron works owned by industrialist, Francis Homfray (1725-1798) which is described by William Pitt in 1817: ‘To the west is the village and hamlet of Swindon, also a light sandy soil: here are an iron-works, some forges, and a blade-mill, where, by a peculiar temperament of the iron, it is formed into scythes, sickles, axes, &c.’ (A Topographical History of Staffordshire, 1817). Two of Richard’s brothers were also in the iron forging trade, having evidently set up business together prior to their bancrupcy being announced in The Gloucester Journal, 20th July 1767. newspaper advert for the sale of property and land ‘The Particulars of the above Premises may be learned by enquiring of Mr. Richard Jorden, at Heath Forge, near Wolverhampton, Staffordshire’and it is clear from an advert placed in 1772 that they owned a number of premises in the Wombourne area: ‘Two undivided Third Parts or Shares of a Freehold Estate, situate at the Grange, within the Parish of Penn and County of Stafford, commonly called the Grange Furnace, consiting of a modern substantial built Dwelling- House, with suitable Out-buildings and Conveniences, and several Closes of Meadow and Arable Land adjoining thereto, in the Holding of Mrs Eleanor Jorden’ was put up for sale along with ‘Several Closes … at Billbrooke in the Parish of Codsall’. It is likely that the two thirds of the estate at Grange, in Penn, were Richard’s brothers, Thomas and Walter Jorden, who put up the advert, and that either Richard’s mother, Eleanor, or Richard himself retained the last third share.

Richard junior married Elizabeth Cox on 12th November 1759 at Wolverhampton, and the couple had four children, according to the Parish Records. He frequently appears in the records as a witness to marriages at the church, and was a member of the village who was respected by Sir Samuel. The letters from 1766 reveal that Jorden supported Hellier’s endeavours to build an organ for the Parish Church and to establish a charity school. He was also a musician, and served as organist of St Peter’s, Wolverhampton.
Sir Samuel asks Rogers what are ‘Jorden’s thoughts of the Organ’. Richard Jordan senior subscribed to Wolverhamton organist, James Lyndon’s Six Solo's for a Violin and Thorough Bass (along with ‘Miss Jordan’, one of Richard juniors sisters). There is no mention of Jorden after the letter of 16th April 1773.
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