This morning, Alfred
(the husband of John's sister Hannah) had a letter from Hannah to say that Father died on Sunday morning at 11am. Conscious to the last.
How fortunate that I went over last week end or I should never have seen him alive. My dear kind father, never more shall I hear his kind voice, never more shall I be able to ask his friendly advice, gone for ever. Why did I not kiss him when I left Buxton a week ago today instead of shaking hands with him. I have lost my greatest friend on earth.
God grant that I may live as good a life as father. Many will miss him. He has many friends but no enemies. Upright and honourable always. We shall meet in heaven.
When I left him last at a few minutes to 5pm on Monday evening last, he was seated at the tea table with Hannah and Mother whilst Mona
(John's sister) was standing. I shook hands with Father and said Good afternoon, not Good bye; poor old chap. I little thought I was looking upon his old familiar form for the very last time on earth.
Father had made up his mind that they would come home on Saturday the 23rd but poor fellow he was too weak. I said on the Monday I left, "Well father, I shall be at Cheadle about 8 tonight". He said "I wish I was going with thee".
Pity that father did not come home again when he found that the Buxton Doctor pronounced him too weak to take baths. At Cheadle he would have had the Club doctor free and a nice garden to walk in as well as a warmer climate.
How mercenary the doctors at Buxton are. 10 shillings and 6 pence a visit charged. 2 shillings and 6 pence would be ample. I hang them and their physic - they can do no good.
I wanted father to have gone into an hydrobath establishment such as Smedley's at Matlock Bridge. Mother could have gone with him and stayed.
It would only have cost them about the same as taking appartments at Buxton and doctoring - namely 5 pounds a week - or 2 pounds 10 shillings for each of them.
Poor old father after a life of long hard work from youth to old age to be so afflicted at last and then to die without having had any leisure to end his days in peace.
Doctors and drugs you have had another victim. I feel ready to curse them and their false system of attempting to cure disease by clogging up the stomach with drugs.
Father had a naturally strong constitution ...
(missing text).. had the strength to pull through. As it is his poor old frame was completely worn out what between battling with his pain and battling against the pernicious effects of the drugs.
It was a case of life and death and father did want to live to come home again. He would have done so too had he selected the water cure.
God grant that the people may soon see thro this false system of medicine and demand rational treatment.
Oh said the Doctor at Buxton, you are too weak to take the baths - it would kill you - but he never said - you can have water treatment without taking baths. I say if dad was too weak to take baths, he was certainly too weak to take drugs.
Father said only let me get to Buxton and I will soon slip into the baths.
Notes:
1) The water cure had become quite popular in the late 19th Century.
2) John's father William Alcock was born in 1814 in Lane End (now called Longton). He was the son of William (a carter and later a brewer) and Ann Alcock. During his life, he was listed as a carpenter and later as an auctioneer. He married Hannah Yardley in 1841 in Stoke and they had the following children:
Sarah Ann Alcock (b.1842-Horton,Staffs) sp: John Yates (b.1838-?;m.1863)
Ursula Alcock (b.1844-Cheadle,Staffs) sp: William Yates (b.1843-?;m.1867) So William and Hannah must have moved to Cheadle around 1843.
William Alcock (b.1846-Cheadle,Staffs,England;d.1924) sp: Susan Shufflebottom (b.1851-Cheadle,Staffs;d.1917)
Hannah Alcock (b.1849-Cheadle,Staffs) sp: Alfred Hordern (b.1848-Cheadle,Staffs;m.1875)
Ralph Alcock (b.1850-Cheadle,Staffs;d.1933) sp: Fanny Chapman (b.1854-Wimpole,Cambridgeshire;d.1920)
John Alcock (b.1853-Cheadle,Staffs;d.1927-Stoke) sp: Alberta Annie Eccles (b.1862-Gloucester;m.1880;d.1939-Staffs)
Mary Alcock (Poppy) (b.1856-Cheadle,Staffs;d.1879-Cheadle,Staffs)
Elizabeth Alcock (b.1859-Cheadle,Staffs) sp: Walter Herbert Almond (b.1853-Middlesex England;m.1881)
Amelia Mona Walton Alcock (b.1864-Cheadle,Staffs) sp: Algernon Tuniclife (b.1865-Rugeley, Staffs England;m.1893)
His death is listed at freebmd: Derbyshire, June 1888, ALCOCK William, 73, Chapel Le F.
