Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham/J
Jacks.—Roasting Jacks of some kind or other were doubtless used by our great-great-grandmothers, but their kitchen grates were not supplied with "bottle-jacks" till their fellow-townsman. Mr. Fellowes, of Great Hampton Street, made them in 1796.
Jennens.—It is almost certain that the "Great Jennens (or Jennings) Case," has taken up more time in our law courts than any other cause brought before the judges. Charles Dickens is supposed to have had some little knowledge of it, and to have modelled his "Jarndyce v. Jarndyce" in "Bleak House" therefrom. It has a local interest, inasmuch as several members of the family lived, prospered, and died here, and, in addition, a fair proportion of the property so long disputed, is here situated. The first of the name we hear of as residing in Birmingham was William Jennens, who died in 16C2. His son John became a well-to-do ironmonger, dying in 1653. One of John's sons. Humphrey, also waxed rich, and became possessed of considerable estate, having at one time, it is said, no less a personage than Lord Conway as "gamekeeper" over a portion of his Warwickshire property. Probably the meaning was that his lordship rented the shooting. Ultimately, although every branch of the family were tolerably prolific, the bulk of the garnered wealth was concentrated in the hands of William Jennings, bachelor, who died at Acton Place in 1798, at the age of 98, though some have said he was 103. His landed property was calculated to be worth £650.000; in Stock and Shares he held £270,000; at his bankers, in cash and dividends due, there were £247,000; while at his several houses, after his death, they found close upon £20,000 in bank notes, and more than that in gold. Dying intestate, his property was administered to by Lady Andover, and William Lygon. Esq., who claimed to be next of kin descended from Humphrey Jennings, of this town. Greatest part of the properly was claimed by these branches, and several noble families were enriched who, it is said, were never entitled to anything. The Curzon family came in tor a share, and hence the connection of Earl Howe and others with this town. The collaterals and their descendants have, for generations, been fighting for shares, alleging all kinds of fraud and malfeasance on the part of the pre.sent holders and their predecessors, but the claimants have increased and multiplied to such an extent, that if it were possible for them to recover the whole of the twelve million pounds they say the property is now worth, it would, when divided, give but small fortunes to any of them. A meeting of the little army of claimants was held at the Temperance Hall. March 2, 1875, and there have been several attempts, notwithstanding the many previous adverse decisions, to re open the battle for the pelf, no less than a quarter of a million, it is believed, having already been uselessly spent in that way.
Jennen's Row is named after the above family.
Jewellery.—See "Trades."
Jews. The descendants of Israel were allowed to reside in this country in 1079, but if we are to believe history their lot could not have been a very pleasant one, the poorer classes of our countrymen looking upon them with aversion, while the knights and squires of high degree, though willing enough to use them when requiring loans for their fierce forays, were equally ready to plunder and oppress on the slightest chance. Still England must have even then been a kind of sheltering haven, for in 1287, when a sudden anti-Semitic panic occurred to drive the Jews out of the kingdom, it was estimated that 15 660 had to cross the silver streak. Nominally, they were not allowed to return until Cromwell's time, 364 years after. It was in 1723 Jews were permitted to hold lands in this country, and thirty years after an Act was passed to naturalise them, but it was repealed in the following year. Now the Jews are entitled to every right and privilege that a Christian possesses. It is not possible to say when the Jewish community of this town originated, but it must have been considerably more than a hundred and fifty years ago, as when Hutton wrote in 1781, there was a synagogue in the Froggery, "a very questionable part of the town," and an infamous locality. He quaintly says:— "We have also among us a remnant of Israel, a people who, when masters of their own country, were scarcely ever known to travel, and who are now seldom employed in anything else. But though they are ever moving they are ever at home; who once lived the favourites of heaven, and fed upon the cream of the earth, but now are little regarded by either; whose society is entirely confined to themselves, except in the commercial line. In the synagogue, situated in the Froggery, they still preserve the faint resemblance of the ancient worship, their whole apparatus being no more than the drooping ensigns of poverty. The place is rather small, but tolerably filled; where there appears less decorum than in the Christian churches. The proverbial expression, 'as rich as a Jew,' is not altogether verified in Birmingham; but, perhaps, time is transferring it to the Quakers. It is rather singular that the honesty of a Jew is seldom pleaded but by the Jew himself." No modern historian would think of using such language now-a-days, respecting the Jews who now abide with us, whose charitable contributions to our public institutions, &c., may bear comparison with those of their Christian brethren. An instance of this was given so far back as December 5th, 1805, the day of general thanksgiving for the glorious victory of Trafalgar. On that day collections were made in all places of worship in aid of the patriotic fund for the relief of those wounded, and of the relatives of those killed in the war. It is worthy of remark that the parish church. St. Martin's, then raised the sum of £37 7s., and the "Jews' Synagogue" £3 3s. At the yearly collections in aid of the medical charities, now annually held on Hospital Sunday. St. Martin's gives between three and four hundred pounds; the Jewish congregation contributes about one hundred and fifty. If, then, the church has thus increased ten-fold in wealth and benevolence in the last seventy years, the synagogue has increased fifty-fold.
Jews' Board of Guardians.— A committee of resident Jews was appointed in 1869, to look after and relieve poor and destitute families among the Israelites; and though they pay their due quota to the poor rates of their parish, it is much to the credit of the Jewish community that no poor member is permitted to go to the Workhouse or want for food and clothing. The yearly amount expended in relief by this Hebrew Board of Guardians is more than £500, mostly given in cash in comparatively large sums, so as to enable the recipients to become self-supporting, rather than continue them as paupers receiving a small weekly dole. There is an increase in the number of poor latterly, owing to the depression of trade and to the influx of poor families from Poland during the last few years. Another cause of poverty among the Jews is the paucity of artisans among them, very few of them even at the present time choosing to follow any of the staple trades outside those connected with clothing and jewellery.
Jewish Persecutions in Russia.—On Feb. 6, 1882, a town's meeting was called with reference to the gross persecution of the Jews in Russia, and the collection of a fund towards assisting the sufferers was set afoot, £1,800 being promised at the meeting.
John a' Dean's Hole.— A little brook which took the water from the moat round the old Manor House (site of Smithfield) was thus called, from a man named John Dean being drowned there about Henry VIII.'s time. This brook emptied into the river Rea, near the bottom of Floodgate Street, where a hundred and odd years back, there were two poolholes, with a very narrow causeway between them, which was especially dangerous at flood times to chance wayfarers who chose the path as a near cut to their dwellings, several cases of drowning being on record as occurring at this spot.—See "Manor House."
Johnson. Dr. Samuel.—Dr. Johnson's connection with Birmingham has always been a pleasant matter of interest to the local literati, but to the general public we fear it matters naught. His visit to his good friend Dr. Hector in 1733 is historically famous; his translations and writings while here have been often noted; his marriage with the widow Porter duly chronicled; but it is due to the researches of the learned Dr. Langford that attention has been lately drawn to the interesting fact that Johnson, who was born in 1709, actually came to Birmingham in his tenth year, on a visit to his uncle Harrison, who in after years, in his usual plain-speaking style. Johnson described as "a very mean and vulgar man, drunk every night, but drunk with little drink, very peevish, very proud, very ostentatious, but, luckily, not rich." That our local governors have a due appreciation of the genius of the famed lexicographer is shown by the fact of a passage-way from Bull Street to the Upper Priory being named "Dr. Samuel Johnson's Passage!"
Jubilees.—strange as it may appear to the men of the present day, there has never been a National holiday yet kept equal to that known as the Jubilee Day of George the Third. Why it should have been so seems a great puzzle now. The celebration began in this town at midnight of the 24th October, 1809, by the ringers of St. Philip's giving "five times fifty claps, an interim with the same number of rounds, to honour the King. Queen, the Royal Family, the Nation, and the loyal town of Birmingham." At six o'clock next morning the sluggards were aroused with a second peal, and with little rest the bells were kept swinging the whole day long, the finale coming with a performance of "perpetual claps and clashings" that must have made many a head ache. There was a Sunday school jubilee celebrated September 14, 1831. The fiftieth year's pastorate of Rev. John Angell James was kept September 12, 1855, and the Jubilee Day of the Chapel in Carr's Lane, September 27, 1870; of Cannon Street Chapel, July 16, 1856; of the Rev. G. Cheatle's pastorate, at Lombard Street Chapel, January 11, 1860; of the Missionary Society, September 15, 1864; of Pope Pius the Ninth, in 1877, when the Roman Catholics of this town sent him £1,230, being the third largest contribution from England.
Jubilee Singers.—This troupe of coloured minstrels gave their first entertainment here in the Town Hall April 9, 1874.
Jury Lists.—According to the Jury Act, 6 George IV., the churchwardens and overseers of every parish in England are required to make out an alphabetical list before the 1st September in each year of all men residing in their respective parishes and townships qualified to serve on juries, setting forth at length their Christian and surname, &c. Copies of these lists, on the three first Sundays in September, are to be listed on the principal door of every church, chapel, and other public place of religious worship, with a notice subjoined that all appeals will be heard at the Petty Sessions, to be held within the last day of September. The jury list for persons resident in the borough, and for several adjoining parishes, may be seen at the office of Mr Alfred Walter, solicitor, Colmore Row, so that persons exempt may see if their names are included.
Justices of the Peace.—The earliest named local Justices of the Peace (March 8, 1327) are "William of Birmingham" and "John Murdak" the only two then named for the county.—See "Magistrates."