PAST AND PRESENT - SOME FAMILY LINKS - VI (continued)

The Thomas Paget, of Forton Lodge, who died in 1843, had also three daughters, all of whom are now dead. The first of the three to pass away was the youngest, Letitia Paget, at the age of forty-two. Like her young nephew Thomas, of Lancaster, she met with a tragic death. On September 24th, 1857, she started out from Forton Lodge, accompanied by a Lancaster relative, on a journey to London. From Manchester they travelled by a Great Northern express train. A little south of Tuxford station the train ran off the rails on the viaduct which crosses the Newark and Tuxford road, and the carriages were completely wrecked. Five of the passengers were killed, among them Miss Paget and her companion, Mrs Mary Heaton, of 18, Queen-square, Lancaster.Mrs Heaton was Miss L. Paget's cousin, and a widow. Her husband, John Heaton, died at his residence in Queen-square, about the end of 1828; he was a member of the firm of Heaton and Whewell, ironmongers, Market-street, and served as a member of the Town Council. His partner was a kinsman of the famous Dr. William Whewell. Thomas Paget's second daughter, Mary, was the wife of John Herdman Sherson. She was married at Cockerham Church on June 1st, 1847. Her husband was elected Mayor of Lancaster in 1851, being the aforenamed John Hall's immediate predecessor in that office. John Herdman Sherson died at Greenfield on February 29th, 1864, aged sixty-two, and was interred in Lancaster cemetery. The remains of his parents rest in the St. Nicholas-street burial ground. He was a descendant of an old Ellel family. One of his ancestors, Thomas Sherson, a barrister, who resided at Ellel Crag, and died in 1725, was thrice Mayor of Lancaster, and Thomas' son, Alexander, was a solicitor and Town Clerk. Either Thomas or Alexander Sherson held the office of Constable of the Castle. Thomas Sherson's father, Richard, died at Barrow about 1680, and his great-grandfather, John, a yeoman, died at Ellel about 1621. Of the marriage of John Herdman Sherson and Mary Paget there was issue two daughters, the Misses Sherson, one of whom once reminded me that she had been greatly interested in a "mothers' meeting" of which my own mother "was for many years the senior, and very much respected, member." Leaving Greenfield, these estimable ladies lived for a while at Morecambe Lodge, Yealand Conyers, and from there they removed to the Lake District. Thomas Paget's eldest daughter, Elizabeth, left Forton Lodge after the sad death of her sister Letitia, and settled in Lancaster - at Greenfield - and here she died in 1893, aged ninety. She was buried at Shireshead Church, by the side of her sister she had mourned so long.