Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester nu 41 ........ down Bridge Street and off to the left

Turning off Bridge Street ........

Now here is one of those little twisty streets I had never explored.

If I am honest I didn’t even know it existed or the history behind it.

It was Stuart, who runs the Sawyers Arms that first told me about the passageway which navigates the back of the pub, and so as ever an adventurous soul I was off down Bridge Street to find it, and sure enough there it was.

The entry is unnamed and leads down towards Hollins Chambers which was built in 1925, and then as mysterious and intriguing alleys go it takes a left turn and then a right before coming out on Wood Street.

As you would expect it is pretty much like walking through a canyon and with nothing but the walls of the surrounding buildings rising from street level.

Making a left turn ......

But here the history comes into play, because once a little over a century and a bit ago the entry never got as far as Wood Street and so had you walked the walk back in 1851 your journey would have ended in a series of closed courtyards which also gave access to the back of the Sawyers Arms and another pub called the Old Bulls Head.

To be fair you did get close to Wood Street but your journey would have come up against a dead end.

The intriguing question is when was that last section opened up, and it seems to have been sometime before 1894 but why this was so I have yet to discover.

I suppose the answer will be in the rebuilding of properties on Wood Street and that will involve a trawl of the rate books and a look for a series of maps between 1851 and 1894.

Followed by a right ......

In the meantime I shall end with that fine looking building which is Hollins Court.

Before it went up in 1925 this had been the site of yet another pub, which variously went under the name of the Cheshire Tavern, and the Cheshire Cheese but had gone by 1911.

So that will also require a search of the pubs to locate its final entry in the directories.

All good stuff.

And if you want to explore the passage way it can be entered of course from Bridge Street of if you have a mid by plunging down Wood Street and looking for that entrance.

But if you prefer enter from Wood Street

I of course offer up both for you to choose and while down there you can also go through another entry which will tale you into another pub but that is a story for another time.

Location; Manchester










Pictures; the passageway off Bridge Street, 2016 from the collection of Andrew Simpson