Jesse Clement Gray was one of the leaders in the Cooperative movement in the 19th century.
The bust in 2024, with background of a notice board removed . It would have been modelled on the photograph shown here, except that the pin-striped suit is replaced a robe of some kind.
Two contemporary pictures of the bust which would have been commissioned by Cassidy to establish a form of copyright.
The grave in Hebden Bridge.
Edward Ward
The two contemporary photographs of the the bust were the work of the firm of Edward Ward, a Manchester professional whose speciality was microscope slides and other scientific work for the University. Edward died in 1901, but his family continued the business at 249 Oxford Road, Manchester. By 1911 his widow Frances and her daughter Frances Elizabeth were continuing the work.
Website created and compiled by Charlie Hulme with the invaluable assistance of Lis Nicholson and the John Cassidy Commitee, Slane Historical Society.
Jesse Clement Gray (1913)
Jesse Clement Gray can be concisely described as a 'British co-operative activist'. He was born on 12 July 1854 in Ripley, Derbyshire, eldest son of a Baptist Minister, William Gray, born in Gedley, Lincolnshire, and his wife Caroline, born in Nottingham. Baptist Ministers were required to move around, so by 1861 Jesse found himself in Hebden Bridge, Yorkshire where William was minister of Birchcliffe Chapel.
He attended the town's grammar school, leaving at the age of 13 to find work, initially as a clerk for the Lancashire and Manchester Railway which had opened a station at Hebden Bridge in the 1840s. He became interested in the Co-operative movement, especially as operated by the local Fustian Mill run by Joseph Greenwood. Around 1860 he joined the Hebden Bridge Fustian Society as a clerk, and in 1872 became the assistant secretary of the, rising to General Secretary after a few months.
National and International
In 1883, Gray was appointed as assistant secretary of the Co-operative Union, established in 1870 to serve as a central body working on behalf of its member Co-operative societies and mutuals, and was promoted to become its secretary in 1891. The Union, renamed in 2003 as Co-operatives UK operates in 2024, from its offices in Holyoake House where the marble bust modelled by Cassidy, after the photograph seen above, stands today.
In 1906, Gray proposed that the various retail co-operatives in the UK amalgamate; this was finally achieved in some form long after his death. Gray also served as secretary of the International Co-operative Alliance, serving from 1902 until 1908, and as a Magistrate for Manchester.
Last Days
Gray retired in 1910 due to ill health, and was buried in 1912 in the Hebden Bridge Baptist graveyard, Sandy Gate. A book about him and his movement tells us that 'a year later a fine marble monument subscribed to his memory by the Co-operative Movement was formally unveiled in a ceremony in the Graveyard.'He moved away from Hebden Bridge: 'OakThorpe' on Fog Lane was is home from the 1890s. By 1911 he was living in Ladybrook Road, Bramhall; he died in 1912 at his final home, 11 Beech Avenue, Gatley. His body was transported to Hebden Bridge for burial.
Today
Holyoake House, in Hanover Street, Manchester remains the headquarters of Co-operatives UK from 2003, was completed in 1911, and currently is a Listed Building. It is likely that the bust has been there since then; presumably it was commissioned by his staff and colleagues. (Cassidy's exhibition in 1914 included the work in its plaster cast form.)Holyoake House, which is named for George Jacob Holyoake, a co-operative activist who died in 1906. It also houses the National Co-operative Archive, which is open at certain for researchers: their website gives details.
I visited Holyoake House in July 2024, and the receptionist, surprised by the odd-ball enquiry, kindly took me to the bust, which is on the first floor.
Thanks and Sources
Thanks are due to Eric Krieger who inspired this feature by discovering the Ward pictures and set me on the right lines, and the Manchester Academy of Arts for access to their archive. The grave photograph is from Find a Grave.The principal source of our information is the excellent book All Our Own Work, published in 2015 by the Merlin Press. Other sources of his life and work are a paper, Jesse Gray's Role in Development of the British Co-operative Movement 'Journal of Co-operative Studies' 51:3 Winter 2018 p.41-45. Biographical information is from Ancestry.
Compiled by Charlie Hulme, October 2024.
Comments welcome on charlie@johncassidy.org.uk