Richard Ellis (November 1820 – 21 August 1895) was an English builder, property developer, alderman, mayor, and a public benefactor to his town. The son of a blacksmith, he was a self-made man who started as a joiner and became a rich developer who joined High and Low Harrogate into a single town, helped obtain a Charter of Corporation, and promoted the erection of civic buildings appropriate for a spa town. Thus he became known as the Bismarck of Harrogate, his achievement in joining two villages to create a single town having been wittily compared in the 19th century with Bismarck's unification of Germany.
Ellis was a benefactor to Ashville College and Harrogate Royal Infirmary, and paid for the town's Jubilee Memorial and the land on which it stands. While the present centre of Harrogate was yet under construction, he negotiated with the Duchy of Lancaster to exchange land so that the existing railway line could be diverted to High Harrogate, and Harrogate railway station built. Historian Malcolm Neesam said, "Ellis' devotion to Harrogate must be classed as outstanding".
Background Ellis' was a self-made man, and his modest, artisanal origins were known to the citizens of Harrogate. His parents survived, living locally, until he was 51 years old, and his father shared his name; thus he was known as "Richard Ellis junior" for most of his working life. Richard Ellis senior (1794 – 7 September 1871), the father of Richard Ellis, was a Harrogate-born blacksmith and farrier from High Harrogate. Richard Ellis senior's forge was in Church Square, close to Christ Church, but after retirement from blacksmithing he lived in 3 Montpellier Terrace where he was a lodging house keeper in the 1850s and 1860s. Ellis' mother was Ann Ellis, who was born in Knaresborough around 1792. By 1871, Richard Ellis senior had retired and was living in Albert Terrace with his wife Ann, who died in Harrogate aged 80 on 12 February 1872.
Richard Ellis junior was born in Harrogate in November 1820, and was one of nine siblings. He had a twin brother, John Ellis (1820 – 28 March 1876), who was a smith like their father and their brother Thomas (born ). In 1841 there were three other brothers, joiner Samuel ( – 14 August 1898), James (born ) and George (born ), and a sister Margaret (born ), living with them at Smythy Hill (which no longer exists) next to Strawberry Dale, Harrogate. Richard Ellis junior was a cabinetmaker at that time, possibly in the final year of his apprenticeship.
At Halifax Parish Church on 24 December 1845, when still working as a joiner, Ellis married Mary Jane Bates (1822 – 5 August 1897), daughter of James Bates, a wool sorter of Halifax. They had no children.
The England Census 1841–1891 describes to some extent the arc of Ellis' business career. In 1851, the Census finds Richard Ellis junior as a lodger in London, where he was exhibiting his Harrogate mineral waters display cabinet at the Great Exhibition. At that time he was a master cabinetmaker employing 15 men, and was lodging with a contingent of Yorkshire artists, including Thomas Holroyd. By 1861, Ellis and his wife were living in York Place, Harrogate, and Ellis was describing himself as a joiner and cabinetmaker, and a master employing 33 men and boys. In 1871, Richard and Mary Jane Ellis were living in Southfield House, South Station Parade. At the age of 50, Ellis was describing himself as a retired contractor. In 1881, the couple were still at Southfield House, and Ellis was describing himself as a magistrate. The 1891 Census finds the couple at Southfield House, where Mary Jane has a companion and nurse, and Ellis is still practising as a West Riding magistrate at the age of 70 years.
In spite of what the Census states, Ellis built and lived in Wetherby House, 9 Queen's Parade, Harrogate, facing the east end of Victoria Avenue, for many years, possibly concurrently with Southfield House for some of the time. Southfield house, which Ellis built for himself on the corner of Station Parade and York Place, was demolished, and was replaced with a modern office block, which retains the house name. Wetherby House now displays a brown plaque dedicated to him by Harrogate Civic Society.
Career
Ellis was apprenticed as a cabinetmaker and joiner, working at first as a labourer. During or before 1849 he started his own building firm, as joiner and builder.
"Ellis himself made the wooden display cabinet for the town's mineral waters shown at the Crystal Palace Exhibition in 1851". Ellis had won a design competition for this piece, and the prize was £30 15s (). The piece was described in the Leeds Intelligencer as follows:
From Harrogate – Richard Ellis jun., a mahogany case, French polished, divided into compartments, to hold vases (containing the celebrated local waters), elaborately carved, and surmounted with a representation of the Royal Pump Room. The case is to be lined with crimson silk velvet, and the back to be formed of silvered plate glass. Dimensions [h x w] .
Ellis' first build was The New Inn (later renamed The Dragon) on Skipton Road, Harrogate. His business grew, and in due course he was building "extensively on Queen Parade, York Place, Station Parade and James Street, his buildings being of high structural quality and architectural excellence".In 1860 he founded, with the Carter Brothers, the Victoria Park Company. The purpose of this foundation was "the express purpose of joining the two ancient villages of High and Low Harrogate into a single modern borough", and of course the company profitably developed the land between. Harrogate's historian Malcolm Neesam called this "one of Ellis' great achievements". The former mansion, Belvedere, Victoria Avenue, in Harrogate, was built by Ellis around 1861 for John Smith, as a retirement residence. The house name was originally spelled "Belvidere". After Harrogate railway station was completed in 1862, Ellis resolved a civic "row" over a lack of public access to the station by building East Parade and having his wife open it in 1875. "The show-streets of Victoria Avenue and Station Parade, together with their ancillary streets, created the modern town of Harrogate". Ellis became known as the Bismarck of Harrogate.
Civic contributions As a rich and prolific builder and developer, Ellis was an influential man, and he was a benefactor to the town. Around 1855 he was "elected a representative of the town on the old Local Board, and he continued his connection with the public body on the adoption of the Local Improvement Act, being only defeated once at an election". He "played a key role" in persuading the Duchy of Lancaster, which owned The Stray, to exchange land in order to permit the building of a new replacement railway line. This line would have a station in central Harrogate to be completed in 1862 (now called Harrogate railway station). Lancaster would lose land on the South Stray where the new railway cutting would be made, but it would gain the land whereon the old Brunswick station (Harrogate) previously stood. In this matter, Ellis was "one of the pioneers of Harrogate's prosperity", and a promoter of "long term investment in the town's infrastructure".
As chairman of the Improvement Commissioners, in 1871, Ellis laid the foundation stone for Harrogate's New Victoria Baths, which cost £11,000 () and included baths for visitors, and reservoirs for the storage of mineral waters. The building was to be Harrogate Corporation's "own suite of treatment rooms and bathing pools", for public use, and "constituted the commencement of the history of Harrogate as a first class bathing resort". The public did not approve of the funds spent on it, and Ellis lost his seat as a councillor or alderman. However, "he was soon returned when the public came to realise the value of Ellis's public service and expertise. The great success of the Victoria Baths was testimony to the soundness of Ellis' judgement". The building was later to be redeveloped into Harrogate Borough Council's municipal buildings. "He took a prominent interest in the promotion of the Harrogate Cottage Hospital, also in the erection of the palatial Royal Bath Hospital, and Hospital Convalescent Home", of which latter two he was a governor.
It was Ellis who provided and personally paid for the trees, verges and roundabouts which still exist in Victoria Avenue. He was a key figure in the building of Ashville College. He formally opened it in 1877, and was one of its governors, and a benefactor to it. He was a "liberal subscriber" to various charities, and to "local and philanthropic organisations". He was a benefactor to Harrogate Royal Infirmary (a predecessor to Harrogate District Hospital, and now St Peter's School), having supported the idea of building it, and having laid its foundation stone in 1882. As mayor, in 1887, Ellis paid for the Jubilee Memorial, and donated the land on which it stands. His last major public action was "to support and encourage the building of the Royal Baths" so as to raise the town's social position as a spa – although he did not live to see it opened.
Mayor of Harrogate
Ellis was "one of the greatest supporters of Harrogate's bid for a Charter of incorporation". The Charter was received in 1884, and Ellis was Mayor of Harrogate from 1884 to 1887. (He was not the first mayor: Robert Ackrill was the Charter Mayor, and Nicholas Carter was the first formal mayor). He was one of the first aldermen of Harrogate Corporation, and continued as an alderman until he died. Ellis donated to the town the robes of office for its aldermen and councillors in 1884, and the mayoress's chain in 1902, "to demonstrate that the decorative embellishments of incorporation need not be at public expense".
Institutions Ellis was a "West Riding and Borough Justice of the Peace, and frequently occupied the chair at the Knaresborough Petty Sessions, also on the Harrogate Borough Bench". He supported "a great number of religious, educational and commercial institutions". In April 1855, he was elected onto Harrogate's Improvement Commissioners Board, and in due course became its chairman. As a board member, he promoted the improvement of "long-term investment in the town's infrastructure" and the development of Harrogate's spa.
Ellis supported voting reform and public health institutions. He was a benefactor of Methodist churches, supporting "at no small personal expense" the building of the first James Street Methodist Chapel in 1851, and the church which succeeded it, the Victoria Park Methodist Church of 1854–1865 (demolished, 1954). He was a trustee of, and benefactor of, that church, and a member of its congregation. He was chairman of the Pannal School Board, and for many years and up to his death was chairman of the Knaresborough Board of Guardians. He was an alderman of West Riding County Council (WRCC), and president of Harrogate Liberal Club and Harrogate Horticultural Society.
Death and funeral Ellis died at his home in Southfield House, Harrogate, on 21 August 1895, aged 74 years.