Thursday 23 June 2016

Now here is a bit of a detective story for anyone in Whalley Range

Angela emailed me just now to ask “I wonder if your blog could appeal for anyone who can remember where the Quakers met in Whalley Range? 

Alexandra Park, 2014
According to Harold Wilde they met in Alexandra Park- not just at the gates, but in a building.  

It might be a house near St Bedes called something like ‘Edinburgh Court’ or ‘Edinburgh.’ 

There must be someone who remembers the place.”

Harold Wilde was a peace campaigner and conscientious objector during the Great War and refers to meetings he attended in his diary.*

The 1911 directory lists the Friends Meeting Houses on Mount Street, Albert Square, Langworthy Road, Pendleton and the Adult Schools at Byrom Street, Deansgate, Ainsworth Street in Gorton and Pendleton and Didsbury.

But Whalley Range fails to get a mention.  Nor could I find a reference to ‘Edinburgh Court’ or ‘Edinburgh’on Alex Road South.

So there for the moment it rests, but I bet as Angela says there will be someone out there who knows.
Failing that it will have to be the old fashioned way of the sleuth and a visit to the Friends’ Meeting House and Central Ref.

Location; somewhere in Whalley Range

Picture; Alexandra Park, 2014 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

* "my life will be spent in fighting the Christian fight against Militarism in England.”......... stories behind the book nu 19, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/my-life-will-be-spent-in-fighting.html

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