Henry and Sarah Aldous migrated from East Anglia to the to the North of England during the time of the Industrial Revolution.  Times were hard in Worlingworth, Suffolk where the family lived in the early 1840's.  Agriculture was on the decline and the population was seeking work in other trades locally, elsewhere in the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.  Sometime between 1845 and 1848 Henry and Sarah moved to the Cheshire town of Tintwistle, bringing with them their sons and daughters; George (b 1837) being the eldest, Charlotte (b 1839),  Edgar (b 1842) and William (b1845).  The first Aldous to be born in the North was Edgar's younger brother Thomas, born in Hadfield in 1848,  he being followed by Mary Ann in 1855 and Alice in 1860.  At this time the family lived at Waterside, Hadfield.

Henry and Sarah were not the first Aldous's to migrate to the region.  This honour goes to Eliza Aldous (b 1819) sister to Henry.  Eliza appears in the 1841 census as a maidservant at Hadfield Lodge, owned by William Platt and his wife Margaret.  The 1851 census shows that Eliza later married an Andrew Shaw.  The couple had living with them, her father James and stepmother Lydia along with two brothers Jonathan and James Aldous - apparently Lydia's sons.