Sunday November 18th on Beech Road, stepping back to 1848

Well yesterday the sun shone and made the Sunday on Beech Road very pleasant.

Which was all to the good given that 40 of us had assembled to try and get a flavour of what this end of Chorlton might have been like in 1848.

We assembled at the top of the Row where it meets Barlow Moor Lane* and made our way by degree down past Row Acre** and Sutton’s wattle and daub cottage and on beside Blomely’s fish pond.

Having taken in the grand house of the Holt's the not so grand but picturesque 18th farm houses we looked  in at the smithy, the Wesleyan Chapel and of course the beer shop known as the Travellers' Rest.

And on to the green, which in 1848 would have been Samuel Wilton’s private garden and would not have given us much of a view of the parish church, the old school house or Higginbotham’s farm house.

 So perhaps it was just the right time to take in a meal at the Horse and Jockey.

Thank you to Sue Moores and Charlotte Hogwood who sponsored the event on behalf of Chorlon Book festival to the staff of the Horse and Jockey and not forgetting the 40 people who turned up.

Pictures; from the collection of Tony Walker

*Beech Road and Barlow Moor Lane

**The Recreation Ground