By John Slaughter
This article was originally published in April 2025 in Soul Search, the Journal of The Sole Society
Richard Saul kindly forwarded to me a blog he found online about a Matthias Saul. This article appears on the website of The Garden History Blog under the title of “Mr Saul of Lancaster”. Matthias was a serial inventor of garden implements and the article includes many drawings showing his inventions and some details about his life. Interesting though the article is, what intrigued me more was who was Matthias? For those interested in reading the original blog it can be found on the website of The Garden History Blog.
It is clear from the article that Matthias hailed from the Lancaster area and that he had died in 1860 at the age of 73 years. We have many charts for the Sauls of this area but Matthias did not appear on any of them so, intrigued, I carried out some research. Matthias died on 25th February 1860 and left a Will. The index records the names of his executors as William Richmond and John Birket Mansergh both of Lancaster, on the face of it not relations. The value of his estate was under £20, so it would appear that he did not make much money from his numerous inventions.
I found Matthias on the 1851 census at Garstang, Lancashire where he is recorded as being a widower, aged 63 years, a retired joiner and born in Stodday, Lancashire. He is listed as the head of household but is living in the same house as Robert Singleton and his wife who also have three lodgers. Despite searching I have not found Matthias on the 1841 census even when looking for any Saul born in Stodday of the correct age. Nor have I found a marriage, the only possibility is one in 1806 to Alas Cooks in St Phillips, Birmingham.
However the information on the 1851 census means that he is almost certainly the Matthias Saile (as we know, names are often spelled phonetically in the early days) baptised at St Mary, Lancaster in 1787 to John and Mary of Stodday. This agrees with what Richard Saul found. There were also two other children baptised to John and Mary, namely William in 1780 and John in 1784. The father’s occupation is given as a corn miller. It is highly likely that the parents married at St Helen, Garstang in 1774, names given as John Sale (corn miller of Garstang) and Mary Jackson. If there were any other children born between 1774 and 1780 I have not found them.
Various directories from the 1820s to 1840s including the electoral register, list Matthias Saul over the years. In 1832 he was living in Sulyard Street, Skerton, Lancaster, and owned a shop. He also owned houses in Back Row and King Street as well as living in King Street, Lancaster.
We know from the online article that Matthias was also a resident of Skerton for a long time, a village in the parish of Garstang. The Garstang burial registers records the burials of a John Saul of Skerton on 11 April 1803 aged 57 years and a Mary Saul of Skerton on 6 February 1824 aged 76 years.
A Wills index shows the following:
1803 John Saul of Skerton Fisherman, admin
1804 William Saul of Skerton, admin with will
1824 Mary Saul of Skerton, widow, admin
The admins of John and Mary will not tell us much but the will of William may be interesting, presuming he is the William baptised in 1780.
I have looked for a John Saul baptised circa 1746 but so far not found anything promising. However there is a Mary Jackson, baptised in Garstang in 1747, daughter of William Jackson who may be John’s wife.
The Garstang parish registers and those for the surrounding area contain very many Saul entries. Most have been charted but by no means all, particularly the earlier ones which are very difficult to connect. They go back to 1567 and there were already Sauls there then. How Matthias fits with them is not clear. The biggest chart goes back to a Christopher Saul who married Ellen Porter at Garstang in 1634, but the earliest generations on this chart are little more than guesswork.
In the online article there is a newspaper cutting from the Gardeners Magazine in 1842 in which Matthias says that he “retired into the country to spend the remainder of my days where my forefathers did, in the neighbourhood of Garstang”. I am sure that Matthias will turn out to be part of the Garstang clan, but exactly how he connects is not clear at this stage.
The blog from Garden History says that Matthias Saul is first recorded in the 1810 Lancaster Gazette as a joiner and then by 1814 an undertaker and carpenter. It noted that he had spent three years studying at two ‘eminent architectural academies’ in London.
By 1821 he owned a fruit nursery in Skerton and had started his gardening inventions with an ‘An Apparatus for gathering Fruit; invented by Mr Mathias Saul of Lancaster” as it was described by Matthias in the Repertory of Arts and Manufacturers.
By 1826 he became a regular contributor to the new publication The Gardener’s Magazine, with his first pieces including an account of his experiments with hothouse flues and a way to prevent condensation dripping from greenhouse windows.
Then he invented a ‘Transplanting Instrument for removing plants when in flower’ which he used to lift a tulip, a polyanthus and some wallflowers without any ill effects. He then returned the plants to their place in his garden after the show. The transplanter was, for a time at least, for sale at E Weir’s in Oxford Street, London.
In 1827 Matthias was busy trialling new methods of cultivating early potatoes and was entailed in an argument over the best gooseberries for exhibiting which he regularly wrote to Gardener’s Monthly on the subject.
He was involved in the Lancaster Floral and Horticultural Society and contributed regularly to magazines on the subject of their activities in a very detailed fashion.
But it was the large number of inventions that are truly amazing from three legged ladders for fruit picking, a tree planting machine, a modified watering can, and a tulip transplanter very similar to those used today. He also invented non-gardening objects for instance a device to open estate lodge gates at night and an unusual design for a bookcase.
