William Short VC (NZ555180 & NZ547210)

William Henry Short was born in Eston, Middlesbrough, on 4^th February 1885, to his (at the time unmarried) parents, James Short and Annie Stephenson.  He spent his early days at 11 William Street with his eight siblings.  In 1900, the family moved to nearby 35 Vaughan Street, Grangetown, and Will became a fairly well-known local footballer, with spells at Grangetown Albion, Saltburn and Lazenby United.

From the age of 16 until the start of the First World War he worked as a craneman at Bolckow, Vaughan & Co. Steelworks in Eston.  At the outbreak of hostilities, he joined the Green Howards and travelled to France in August 1915. 

During the long, drawn-out affair that was the Battle of the Somme (July-Nov 1916), Short saw action at an early stage around Contalmaison on 5^th and 10^th July.  Then on 6^th August, at Munster Alley near Pozieres, he conducted himself with such bravery that he was to be posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross. As the London Gazette officially declared:

For most conspicuous bravery. He was foremost in the attack, bombing the enemy with great gallantry, when he was severely wounded in the foot. He was urged to go back, but refused and continued to throw bombs. Later his leg was shattered by a shell, and he was unable to stand, so he lay in the trench adjusting detonators and straightening the pins of bombs for his comrades. He died before he could be carried out of the trench. For the last eleven months he had always volunteered for dangerous enterprises, and has always set a magnificent example of bravery and devotion to duty.

It seems that he lay in the trench for some time, dying the next day (7^th) before he could be moved.  He was buried at Contalmaison Chateaux Cemetery, though his name is recorded on memorials in both Eston and Grangetown.  The VC itself can be seen in the Green Howards Museum in Richmond, Yorkshire.

Eston’s ‘Bold Venture’ (c.NZ562179)

In the spring of 1850, the fledgeling Cleveland ironmaking industry was floundering.  Established as recently as 1840 by those great speculators Henry Bolckow and John Vaughan, the first iron foundry at Middlesbrough was not shaping up as planned.  Despite the construction, in 1846, of smelting works to aid the operation at Witton Park, 20 miles to the west, the business was struggling to keep its head above water.  Ore quality and quantity, as well as transportation costs, were becoming unmanageable.

In 1847, the ‘Cleveland Main Seam’ of iron ore had been discovered at Skinningrove, and Bolckow and Vaughan soon began shipping it in – but the solution was not ideal.  Then, sensationally, in 1850, Vaughan and his mining engineer, John Marley, fell upon new deposits of iron ore in the Eston Hills.  It was the defining moment in the history of Cleveland, and the point at which Middlesbrough’s looming financial disaster was averted.

In August 1850 – within weeks of the discovery – the first trial quarry was dug in the heights above Eston, and named ‘Bold Venture’ by it’s chief engineers.  By the end of the year, 4,000 tons of ore had been extracted, smelted at Witton Park, and the iron finished and rolled out at the Middlesbrough foundry – all making full use of the new railway network.

On 6^th January 1851, the Eston Mine and its railway branch line were formally opened amid great pomp and ceremony – and production began to boom.  By the mid-1850s, Eston had its own blast furnaces…

And the rest, as they say, is, er, history.