King of the Cocklers

In the ANNALS OF SOUTHPORT AND DISTRICT –  A CHRONOLOGICAL HISTORY OF NORTH MEOLS, ALFRED THE GREAT TO EDWARD VII, by E. Bland (1903), I recently came across this same entry:

1824 – Richard Aughton, “King of the Cocklers”, died, aged 99. He was so expert at his business that he earned, and for many years bore, the above title. He lived at Marshside, on a small farm of his own.

Marshside Cocklers

And I found these reports as well:

In one of the earliest guide books to Southport when it was gaining popularity for its sea bathing and as a health resort, Thomas Glazebrook wrote:
An extraordinary character died at Church Town in 1824, at the advanced age of ninety-nine years, nearly. His name was Richard Aughton. He lived servant with a person of the name of Wright, fourteen years, and was occasionally employed by him in catching shrimps and cockles. In procuring these he was more expert that any of his competitors, and, on that account, obtained the title ‘King of the Cocklers’. His wife, who was born in the same year and month as he was, attended Preston and Ormskirk market with fish, three or four times a week, regularly. They resided on a small farm of their own in Marshside, and were well known in the surrounding neighbourhood. When about sixty or seventy years old, ‘Cockle Dick’, as he was familiarly called, had a severe rheumatic attack, brought on by carrying heavy burdens of cockles, etc. and had become very crooked. Richard was originally intended for a shoemaker, but this was not to be, and he died at the head of the profession he had chosen.

Whittle, a later writer in the same field, added that in later life when Dick was crippled with the rheumatism he was sometimes called ‘Crooked-back Dick’, and that ‘this used to enrage him very much.’

Marshside is just north of modern Southport on the Lancashire coast. I grew up on the huge beach there. Marshside was always a rum place, as my father used to tell me. Certainly in his day there were still Marshside ‘Cocklers’ on the beach, and I believe there are still one or two.

During the middle ages, sea fishing became an important industry in the area. A colony began to develop in the areas inside the new embankments as fishermen built their cottages closer to the sea. By the 19th century sea fishing had assumed a considerable importance to the economy of the North Meols area, along with the sale of shrimps, cockles and mussels. The district where the fishermen lived became known as Marshside, and many of the shrimpers cottages can still be seen today.

Richard was the brother of my 5x great grandfather, James Aughton (1723-1757).