Jeremiah Dimmack

Jeremiah Dimmack was born in Kingswinford in about 1781, the only son of Richard Harper Dimmack and Jane Thomings. He was baptized on 7 Oct 1781 in Brierley Hill. His mother died when he was very young and was buried in Brierley Hill on 9 Sep 1783.  His father promptly remarried his wife’s sister Sarah Thomings on 6 Dec 1784 in Halesowen. His grandfather was Jeremiah Thomings.

Jeremiah was involved in the iron industry and a few records shed light on his activity.

He married Jane Bagnall, the eldest daughter of Edward Bagnall on 27 Jul 1806 at St Philips Birmingham. Jane Bagnall’s grandfather was John Bagnall of Broseley, a coalmaster and engineer, a forebear of the important West Bromwich iron foundry of John Bagnall and Sons. An announcement in the Monthly Magazine and Register (Vol 22) tells of the marriage, “at Birmingham of Mr Dimmock (sic) of Moor Croft Iron Works and Miss Bagnall, daughter of the late Mr Edw B of Wednesbury”

Jeremiah was in a partnership with his brother-in-law, Edward Bagnall and Edward’s uncle Daniel and his brother(?) also Daniel Bagnall, known as Bagnalls and Dimmack. The London Gazette records the dissolution of a number of these partnerships dated 8 Feb 1811. This may mark the passing of various partnerships down a generation to Jeremiah and Daniel Bagnall (jnr) or it could show a break with the main Bagnall family whose iron interests focused on the business of the eldest brother John Bagnall and Sons of West Bromwich. The interests of the descendants of the two younger Bagnall brothers, Edward and Daniel, appear to have been much diminished after the death of Edward Bagnall, Jeremiah’s father-in-law, in 1805.

Jeremiah Dimmack is recorded as being an iron and coal master of the Moor Croft Iron works in Bilston in an 1818 Trade Directory, but it is not clear whether it was he who set this up or not. He, nonetheless, is recorded as filing a patent in 22 Jun 1812 for an improved method of pig iron founding. (Pat 3659 52 Geo III)

In 1822 he went bankrupt together with his partner Elizabeth Thomings. The bankruptcy meeting was called and held at the George Inn, Digbeth on 14 Apr 1822. Elizabeth Thomings was the widow of Jeremiah Thomings (b 1768) his mother’s brother. This event would lead one to suspect that the Moor Croft Iron works were in fact managed as a family concern between Jeremiah’s parents’ families – the Dimmacks and Thomings’s

Jeremiah and Jane Dimmack had at least nine children, seven of which made it to adulthood. Certainly from the 1820’s onwards they attended the Swan Bank Methodist church and both are recorded as being buried by that church. A number of the Bagnall family were Wesleyans and it is probably because of this non-conformism that the record of Jane’s baptism has not survived.

Jeremiah was buried 18 Sep 1848 and his widow eighteen months later on 2 Feb 1850.

Family of Jeremiah DIMMACK and Jane BAGNALL

Husband: Jeremiah DIMMACK

Wife: Jane BAGNALL

Child 1: Mary Ann Bagnall DIMMACK

Child 2: Edward Bagnall DIMMACK

Child 3: William Henry DIMMACK

Child 4: Alonzo DIMMACK

Child 5: Jane Thomings DIMMACK

Child 6: Jeremiah Bagnall DIMMACK

Child 7: George Frederick DIMMACK

Child 8: Emma Selina DIMMACK

Child 9: Richard Harper DIMMACK

Child 10: Theophilus Davies DIMMACK