Sunday in a Manchester Park

Now I have always liked this painting, and it perfectly conjures up a Sunday on a warm summer’s day in a Manchester park.

Writing in 1937, J P Priestly observed that, “The Corporation has made great efforts to provide young Manchester with healthy outdoor recreation, and there are now twenty-five parks and forty-eight recreation grounds in the city.

Nearly three quarters of the land in these parks is set aside for games including bowls tennis, cricket, golf, swimming, fishing, model yachting, football and hockey”.*

Of course, the cynical will observe that a few of the recreation grounds were little more than pockets of land, surrounded by factories while some of our parks were fighting a constant battle against pollution which blighted plants and left a smear of soot on the branches of trees.

But in the absence of open fields and clear crystal streams, this was it.

Location; Manchester

Picture; from Manchester ...... heart of the Industrial North

 *Manchester ...... heart of the Industrial North, Manchester Chamber of Commerce, 1937

Chorlton-cum-Hardy does its bit

Now, there is always a story behind a picture, and so it is with this one of a tent carrying the name Chorlton-cum-Hardy.

The tent, 1920s

We are in Birkdale in Southport, and during the late 19th century is the holiday camp for the Manchester and Salford Boys’ and Girls’ Refuges, which had been founded in 1870 to help destitute children.

At first the charity’s work was confined to offering bed for the night and breakfast to a handful of homeless young people.

Within a decade it had expanded to include girls as well as boys, had built permanent homes, established industrial training schools and was engaged in prosecuting neglectful and abusive parents as well as campaigning for legislation to protect young people who made a living from hawking products on the streets.

And amongst all these activities it organised summer holidays.

"The first summer outings were just that and consisted of a day out by the sea but very quickly stretched to a week with the young people living in tents. The holiday season lasted just 3 weeks and in the first year in 1883, 48 boys were taken away to Morecambe. These numbers steadily increased over the years with the camp also visiting Blackpool and Llandudno before a more permanent site in Andsell, near Lytham, was chosen. Lent by John Talbot Clifton, Esquire of Lytham Hall, this site included Byrom Hall, allowing for shelter beyond the tents.  By the end of the 19th century, the camp had moved again, this time to Birkdale, Southport, which was able to accommodate 300 boys. 

The appeal, 1906

The increase of numbers showed just how popular the holidays were. At its height of popularity, children could be seen queuing outside the Children's Shelter on Chatham Street, Manchester for a place at the Summer Camp. 

Poor boys were often recommended by City Missionaries, Ragged School Teachers and other workers amongst the poor. 

The only qualification for attendance was “the need of the rest and change”.

The season now ran from May, through the summer for 20 weeks. Eventually the tents were replaced by corrugated huts which were lined with pitch pine and according to one commentator were “quite impervious to wind and weather” which was all to the good given that many of the annual reports described the summer weather as challenging.

Much of the finance came from voluntary contributions which brings us back to that tent.
The trust made much of what a contribution would pay for, explaining that “six shillings, covers railway fare and maintenance and £60 per week would cover all expenses while £2000 would meet the season’s needs.”*

And in the case of some organizations, like Sunday Schools and the Pleasant Sunday Afternoon Brotherhood this extended to tents.

At present I can’t track the source of the funding for our tent, but it dates from the 1920s.

The picture comes from the archives of the charity which today is called the Together Trust and is based in Cheadle.

And is in the new book on the history of the trust which was been written by me and Liz Sykes to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the charity.


Location; Chorlton and Southport



Picture; The Chorlton-cum-Hardy Tent, circa 1920s, courtesy of the Together Trust**

*A new book on the Together Trust, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/A%20new%20book%20on%20the%20Together%20Trust

** Together Trust, https://www.togethertrust.org.uk/

A wopping big bit of Eltham’s past ........... and the historian who wrote it

Now every place deserves a historian and a good history book and Eltham had R.R.C.Gregory who wrote the Story of Royal Eltham in 1909 which remains a fine account of the area’s history.*

Mr Gregory was a teacher and later the headmaster at Eltham National School from 1901-1920 and the book began as a series of lessons for his students.

He had found the Admission Register for the school for 1814 which formed the inspiration of his teaching of local history, which drew praise from the Inspectors.

"The Headmaster directs the work with sympathy and he has striven to maintain the more helpful characteristics of a village school, more especially in regard to the old customs and associations."

It is available on the internet.

Now this all this I knew, but yesterday my friend Tricia alerted me to a smashing little account of Mr Gregory by Margaret E Taylor which appears in Eltham Records.**

The book was published by the Eltham Society which I would recommend.***

I joined nearly 50 years after it was founded.   In my defence I was 16 when it was established and by 19 was living in Manchester all of which rather negated a membership.  But happily I am now fully paid up and fined their publications very useful.

That said the book doesn’t appear in the present publication list so I shall have to go off and ask if they have a battered old copy.****

Sadly unlike many I have yet to buy Mr Gregory’s book which is now a collector’s item, but who  knows Christmas is coming up.

In the meantime a thank you to Tricia Leslie for sharing Ms Taylor's book with me.

Location; Eltham, London

Picture; of R.R.C Gregory, from The story of Royal Eltham, R.R.C. Gregory, 1909 

*The story of Royal Eltham, R.R.C. Gregory, 1909

**The story of Mr Gregory by Margaret E Taylor from Eltham Records, 1977, Eltham Society

***The Eltham Society, http://theelthamsociety.org.uk/

****Eltham Society Publications, http://theelthamsociety.org.uk/publications.html

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 95 Royton Street ...

 You won’t find Royton Street.

Spinningfields, 2020

It vanished long ago under the Spinneyfields development but for a century and more it lay between Hardman Street and Cumberland Street.

Not that you would have found it that easily, because it was one of those closed streets shut off by two narrow passages which gave off to more closed courts.  The curious or those in the know could access it by one of two streets which ran between Hardman and Cumberland Streets of which only one had been given a name.

Royton Street, 1849

To add to its obscurity, it failed to get into any of the street directories during the 19th century, but it did boast the St Mary’s Roman Catholic Chapel School.

But in 1851 it was home to 399 people who lived in 39 houses, nine of which were one roomed back-to-back properties, and the remainder, consisted of four rooms with weekly rents ranging from 1 shilling [5p] to 5s [25p].

Their occupations included textile workers, laboures, retired soldiers, a sailor, a French polisher and an architect’s assistant.  Added to these there were a number of skilled artisans including a group of “shoe makers” a tailor, a “Gold Beater” and “Cabinet maker”.

The east side of Royton Street, circa 1880-1900

During the course of the 19th century some of houses were replaced by industrial units, including two steam printers and a paper warehouse, so that by 1951, the western side of the street had been swallowed up by another printing press and all the houses along the entire length of the street had gone.

I can’t be sure when Royton Street was cut, but the first reference to it in the Rate Books is 1828, although there is a suggestion that it might have already been there by 1819.

It has yet to pass out of living memory and I am sure I will have known it, but with the passage of over 53 years these narrow streets off the beaten track were places you found by accident and didn’t always return to.

Today the closest I think the inquisitive will get to walking its length will be along the Avenue which runs down from Deansgate, past Spinningfields Square finishing in front of Manchester Crown Court.

The Avenue, 2020

On a pleasant day the shops, bars and restaurants which flank the Avenue on both sides attract plenty of passersby but perhaps not as many as the developers expected.  

Still the swish retail outlets and the swanky eating places are a long way from the Royton Street of the 1850s.

But I am drawn to that earlier place, partly because of the wealth of information about its inhabitants which shed light on how we lived 170 years ago in this part of the city, but also because there is a personal link.  

It is not me, but a Facebook friend whose family were on Royton Street from at least 1851 for two decades, and continued to live in the area up into the middle of the last century.

Royton Street, 1951

Alan Jennings who introduced me to his ancestors has written a vivid account of their lives, and in particular those who served during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars through to the Great War, and Alan’s own service with the Colours.

Now that is the story of personal history I like.

Location; Manchester

Pictures;  Hardman Street, and the Avenue, 2020, from  the collection of Andrew Simpson and Royton Street in 1849, from the OS map of Manchester and Salford, 1844-49, and Royton Street circa 1880-1900 from Goad's Fire Insurance maps, courtesy of Digital Archives, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/and Royton Street 1951, from the OS map of Manchester and Salford

That club on Brookburn Road in Chorlton ....... and a fascinating find

This is the United Services Club on Brookburn Road, just thirty years after it was opened in 1928.

The club in 1958

I have to confess to only ever being inside once, for the birthday of Muriel who ran the greengrocer’s shop on Beech Road, but that as they say is another story.

Instead I am following the story of the club, prompted by a set of documents sent over to me by Steve Casson which include the first two balance sheets of the club from 1928.

The then secretary was the brother of Steve’s grandfather which makes it a bit of personal history.

The club was officially opened on Saturday May 26th, by Councillor Burrows, and had cost £685 and according to a press story was “equipped as a library, with provision for billiards and other games, and a license is attached.

The present membership is 111, [and] it is to be a non-political club, .... and one of its objects is to aid wives and dependents of members in cases of hardship.  The hon. Secretary is Mr. H. Gales, late of the Grenadier Guards”.*

The same report offers an interesting insight into Chorlton at the time, with Councillor Burrows commenting that “Chorlton was the largest ward of any in the municipality in the country, and it had the biggest ratable value of any suburban area under the Manchester Corporation”.

The balance sheet, 1929

And to add just a little bit of colour to the event “The Chorlton Band played selections on the green, before the opening ceremony, and later, in the club, and an evening concert followed”.

Now, I never actually spotted when the club closed, and saw the slow development of the site into residential properties, which are now going through more change.

There will be people with stories of the club, but apart from the two balance sheets, so far the only other story is that of how in 1936 various members were fined for “supplying drink during non-permitted hours”, but in their defence it was pointed out that “the club had been registered for eight years and hitherto had been conducted without complaint against it.”**

Looking at the two statements, what is interesting is that on the first one dated January to December 1928, the bar takings were £1069, compared with the following year when the takings were £2439, so all was well in 1929.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; United Servicemen’s Club, 1958, R.E. Stanley, m17686, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, balance sheet for the British Legion, 1929, courtesy of Steve Casson


*British Legion Club for Chorlton, May 28th, 1928, Manchester Guardian

**Offences at a Club, January 16th, 1936, Manchester Guardian

Discovering Eltham

Cover of the new edition 2000

I am back in Eltham where I grew up in the 1960s on the Progress Estate.

They say you should never go back to the places of your childhood and there is something in that.

Either they look smaller and are just that bit different or whole landscapes have so altered that you begin to question if your memory is serving you well.

Now my bit of Well Hall looks much the same but they have moved the station built a motorway and many of my favourite haunts in the High Street have changed.

All of which is a lead in to Discover Eltham by Darrell Sprugeon.*

It is a “comprehensive guide to Eltham, New Eltham, Mottingham, Kidbrooke and Shooters Hill.”  So it pretty much covers everywhere I went as a child and certainly everywhere I would want to take my own grown children who while they are all Mancunians have a soft spot for where dad lived.

Mr Spurgeon sets out to offer his reader a mix of history, and places to see which are all wrapped up in a series of walks “but only where places of interest are concentrated within an area which makes walking practicable and interesting.”

Tudor Barn, Well Hall, 16th century

So “beside the famous buildings of royal Eltham, the area covered includes Wren’ great almshouse of Morden College, the extraordinary Sevendroog Castle, set amongst the ancient woodland of Shooters Hill, the Tudor remains of Well Hall, many interesting Victorian churches and two striking churches of the 1930s, two remarkable housing estates of the 20th century; sites of industrial archaeology, interesting pubs; many of which remain rural in character, and much more.”

And there is much I didn’t know. So despite living close to the church of St Barnabas on Rochester Way, I had no idea that this red brick Victorian church was originally the chapel of the Royal Naval Dockyard at Woolwich.  It was “built in 1859 and dismantled and re-erected brick by brick on its present site in 1933.”

Nor did I know of the existence of three streams which flow through Kidbrook and feed into  the Quaggy River.  Of course the clue is in the name Kidbrook, which is clearly derived from the Upper, Mid and Lower Kidbrooks.

Now water courses are a particular interest of mine.  Most today are buried underground all but forgotten but they were vital to our rural communities providing water and acting as boundary markers.

Progress Estate, Ross Way, 1915

I have to own up that it is the Eltham walks which fascinate me most.

And here there is plenty to read and see because Mr Spurgeon includes a selection of photographs along with the text and maps.

The first edition came out in 1992 and a second much revised eight years later.  I have both in front of me.  

The earlier version I bought on Amazon and the later one has come courtesy of the author.

And as a historian what I finds particularly interesting are the changes to the area in that eight years. All of which makes the book a fascinating chronicle of how Eltham has developed.

I rather think that I shall take both with me on some of the walks, thereby getting an insight into the Eltham of 1992, 2000 and of course today.

Pictures; courtesy of Darrell Spurgeon

 *Spurgeon, Darrell, Discover Eltham and its Environ, Greenwich Guide Books, 1992, revised and updated  2000

When you make cheap comments about James Fraser ….

So earlier today I was a tad unfair to James Fraser, former Bishop of Manchester.

James Fraser, former Bishop of Manchester, 2026

His statue stands on the northern side of Albert Square hard by the water fountain looking out on Princess Street just yards from where Cross Street enters the square.

From his lofty position he has observed plenty of the changes to the area including the construction of the Second City Crossing which takes trams from St Peter’s Square down to Exchange Square and onto Victoria.

Perhaps happily he also faces outwards and so has never looked down on the several make overs to Albert Square and its eight long years as a construction site during the Town Hall’s refurbishment.

 But as that draws to its conclusion the square is home again to the Manchester Markets, and the Manchester Wheel, and that is where I have been unfair to James Fraser because yesterday, I posted an image of the bishop apparently standing,  aloof from all those seasonal preparations.

Making it worse with the caption “James Fraser turns his back on fun”.

James Fraser with his back turned, 2026

It was cheap and suggested that perhaps he was a party pooper.  Now I have no idea if he was a man devoid of humour, but a little research has thrown up that he was a deeply caring individual who applied his religious conviction in very practical ways.

My Wikipedia tells me he “was a reforming Anglican bishop ….. An able Church administrator and policy leader was active in developing the Church's approach to education and in practical politics and industrial relations. Though his views were ecumenical and he was respected within a wide variety of religions”. *

So much so that he was remembered as the "bishop of all denominations”.

I could go on but that Wikipedia article does it all too well and includes his work on child labour in agriculture, his wider work on education, industrial relations, and commitment to the co-operative movement as well as his defence of a fellow clergy man who fell foul of the establishment.

Moreover, I was intrigued by the comment from the Bishop Fraser Trust, that he “was a figure defined by service, humility, and a deep commitment to the people he served. Appointed in 1870, he quickly earned widespread respect by rejecting the comfort of a traditional bishop’s residence and choosing instead to live in the city centre, close to the community". **

The x marks the former  residence of James Fraser, 1894

And that led me to search out his residence, which in 1881 was at 177 Bury New Road in Broughton. 

His home was a terraced house, close to an Engraving Works a several brickworks and within walking distance of rows of more modest homes.

That said his neighbours in 1881 listed their occupations as merchants, accountants, solicitors, and doctors, as well as a surgeon and an Inspector of Mines.

So, perhaps his afternoon conversations over the garden wall were not with labourers, road sweepers, and washerwomen, but nor was he living in a palace or in the leafy green out suburbs.

And that is where I shall leave it along with an apology for using him in such a cheap and trivial way.

Location; Albert Square

Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson, 2026 and the former residence of Bishop Fraser, from the OS map of  South Lancashire, 1894, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*James Fraser, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Fraser_(bishop)

** Bishop Fraser Trust, https://www.tbft.uk/about-us/welcome-from-the-ceo