You have to laugh ....... comedy from the Great War No.4 Back in Bolton

A short series show casing comic picture postcards from the Great War.

Picture; from the collection of David Harrop

Discovering more of that building on Cambridge Street

Now the Hotspur Press building has attracted more than its fair share of photographs.

I noticed that some sell for over £100 a copy which I suppose reflects its history, which started a cotton mill, became a print shop run by the Percy Brothers and closed in 2011.

Andy Robertson took a trip round the building and discovered some of its more interesting past, like the Medlock which flows past this old mill.

Today it is surrounded by flat conversions which were home to factories and warehouses and which stand beside tall 21st century developments.

There will be someone who has an up to the minute take on the future of his old building, and I should have gone looking at the planning portal for the city but instead I will leave that to someone else.

And who knows we might get a score of stories of those who worked there or just remember tales from its long history.

I hope so.

Either way, Andy's short series of the place is a welcome addition to the collection on the building and of course his own portfolio of images of our industrial past.

Location; Chorltonon Medlock


Picture; from the Hotspur Press series, 2017 from the collection of Andy Robertson

You have to laugh ....... comedy from the Great War No.3 missing the post

A short series show casing comic picture postcards from the Great War.

Picture; from the collection of David Harrop

That building on Cambridge Street

Now the Hotspur Press building has attracted more than its fair share of photographs.

I noticed that some sell for over £100 a copy which I suppose reflects its history, which started as a cotton mill, became a print shop, run by the Percy Brothers and closed in 2011.

I could say more but instead will turn Andy Robertson’s pictures into a short new series.

And despite my entreaties to do so Andy has yet to put a price on his work.

I think he should.

Location; Chorlton0n Medlock









Picture; from the Hotspur Press series, 2017 from the collection of Andy Robertson

You have to laugh ....... comedy from the Great War No.2 the First Post

A short series show casing comic picture postcards from the Great War.

Picture; from the collection of David Harrop

You have to laugh ....... comedy from the Great War No.1 the Drunk

A short series show casing comic picture postcards from the Great War.

Picture; from the collection of David Harrop

The Zero Hour Contract ........... something that sounds familiar

I am old enough to remember being told about the scandal of casual dock labour.It was a system whereby men working in the docks had to turn up everyday and present themselves on the off chance that a ship had arrived, which needed unloading and which the dock employers needed labour to shift the load.

Unloading after casualization had been ended

In 1946 the Labour MP Stan Awberry wrote that dockworkers  “are taken on for short periods varying from a few hours to several days, and paid when the job was completed.......they  are engaged day by day, either for a part of the day, a full day or for the full operation of loading or discharging a ship. 

There is no continuity, and there is always the element of chance about what will be forthcoming on the morrow."

And that sounds very similar to one definition of the Zero Hour Contract I read “where the employer is not obliged to provide any minimum working hours, while the worker is not obliged to accept any work offered.”

Much is made by some of the advantages of flexibility it gives both employees and employer.  In the case of the worker they are freed up so the mantra goes to do all the other things which they may want to do, while for the employer it makes economic sense to be able offer paid employment only when there is a need to do so.

In that respect many employers are only echoing those in the docks in the 19th and early 20th centuries who argued that the “uncontrollable forces in the shipping industry, such as tides, wind and weather, which affect the regularity of the arrival of cargoes by ship and barge, [and] the seasonal trades in tea, timber, cotton, bananas, wool” made casual labour the only realistic way to operate.

All of which seems fine and dandy but doesn’t help the employee budget for a week’s food, rent, and
heating.

Nor does it offer any security.

So in the case of one of our lads who turned up for work as asked at 7 am only to  discover that the situation had changed and he was not required till 11 that morning, leaving him to hang around, unpaid for the four hours.

All of which points to that simple observation that the relationship between employer and employee is not equal and in the absence of trade union representation the worker is pretty much isolated.

And at a time when Zero Hour contracts are becoming the norm in many areas of work it is no more realistic for the employee to go elsewhere than it was for those engaged as dock workers to entertain an alternative career as a brain surgeon.

Picture; unloading on the Thames, 1978, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*The Labour Problem S.S Awberry M.P, The Spectator December 1946, http://archive.spectator.co.uk/article/6th-december-1946/7/the-dock-labour-problem

A lost bridge across the Brook

Now I think it is time for a walk across the meadows in search of Mosley Bridge.

It was a small bridge over the Brook put up by Charles Walker and later washed away.  Charles Walker was the son of Thomas Walker, the radical, and lived at Longford Hall and the bridge connected his land on either side of the brook.

In the 1830s it was destroyed by a flood, and a new one was built where the brook joins the Mersey which makes it easy to find.  It’s there on the old tithe map of 1845 and looks to be roughly where the bridge is today.

But I am not sure that this is our bridge.  Over the last fifty years the banks and the land on either side of where the brook runs into the Mersey have been raised a number of times but from memory the masonry looks old.  And a bridge does show up on the right spot not only the tithe map of 1845 but on the earlier OS for 1841 and the later OS of 1888-93.

So far I have not come across any old photographs of the bridge but there is a painting made by J Montgomery in 1963 looking east along the line of the Brook.  Stand on that exact spot today and to the south there is a dense collection of bushes and small trees which were entirely missing when Montgomery recorded the scene.

But neither his or the modern view are how it was.  Back in the 1840s, to the south of the Brook on what was Charles Walker’s land were water meadows, while away to our left just beyond the field was Walker’s orchard.

Now before I take a walk down to the spot I should really ask my old botanist pal David Bishop whose knowledge of the place goes back to the 1970s and whose blog at http://friendsofchorltonmeadows.blogspot.co.uk/ is a wonderful collection of information about the land and the plant life along this stretch of the Mersey on the edge of our township.

Picture; Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, Junction of Gore Brook [Chorlton Brook] and the River Mersey, J Montgomery 1963, m80140

"The ghost sign with a story ..... “Hello, good evening and welcome.”*

“Not Chorlton or even Manchester but when I saw this ghost sign, Frost I immediately looked closer thinking of Frosts in Chorlton and then saw the plaque next to it.” Suzanne

We have Suzanne to thank for this one, which comes from Halesworth, which is in Suffolk.
Halesworth is according to one source a small market town with a of 4,726, located 15 miles south west of Lowestoft, and stands on a small tributary of the River Blyth, 9 miles .**

The Romans were here, and it has a medieval church which the Victorians added to, and amongst its other bits of history it got its own railway station in 1854 and had one of the only moveable station platforms in the country.

It was also home to Mr William Frost who had an ironmonger’s shop in the town and who was the grandfather of Sir David Frost.

All of which makes it quite a find, so thank you Suzanne.

And not content with having that ghost sign and moveable railway station platform Suzanne added that “another bit of information is all the bollards along the village high street are hand painted by the residents. 

It caused problems initially with the local council and they were told to return them to the original plain black but they refused and the council gave way in the end. All individually decorated.”

Now that I bet David Frost would have turned into a sketch.

Sadly we will never know but here are two links for those who want to know more about the hand painted bollards
http://www.eadt.co.uk/business/halesworth-transforms-boring-old-bollards-into-painted-artworks-1-4759205
http://www.halesworthinbloom.com/news/our-bollards-the-brainwave-of-tony-eden

Location; Suffolk



Picture; ghost sign and green plaque, 2017 from the collection of Suzanne Moorehead

*Sir David Frost

**Halesworth, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halesworth

“Clutter from Albion Street”

I think Andy’s comment on his picture pretty much says it all.

Location Albion Street, Manchester







Picture; Clutter from Albion Street, 2017 from the collection of Andy Robertson

Scenes of Beech Road, ................. circa 1920

Now I often features pictures of my road, and to compliment the paintings by Peter Topping of Beech Road today I thought I would include a few from the inter war years.

Here is Beech Road from sometime in the early 1920s.

 All the buildings are there although the shops are selling different things and compared with the traffic today there is just the one horse drawn delivery van. 

Away in the distance is the terrace of houses built by Scott the builder including of course the one Joe and Mary Ann lived in.

Picture; from the Lloyd collection

On being ten and the magic of that pond at Hough End Hall in the summer of 1953

Now if you were ten on a slow Sunday in August you might have been tempted by the pond at Hough End Hall.

There are some now in their sixties and older who will privately confess it was on their to do list along with a bit of scrumming and sneaking in without paying at the old Palais de Luxe cinema.

Nor were they along for a young Oliver Bailey whose parents were tenants of the Hall and later bought it  remembers that while the pond was not deep it was perfect for testing out the steam driven model boats he and his brother made.

All of which fits nicely with Peter’s painting which is one of a series based on original photographs of the hall in the late 19th and 20th centuries.

And just as I was finishing the story I had a conversation with my old friend Faith who also remembered the hall during the 1950s, and of equally adventurous days playing by the Bumps which was that stretch of land running east alongside the Brook behind the Hall.

Part of the adventure involved riding a bike along the bank and trying not to fall in.

In time perhaps Peter could paint that scene although Faith tells me that the area is now fenced off.

Well perhaps that is just the challenge Peter needs to recreate an adventure.

Painting; Hough End Hall circa 1953,  ©2014 Peter Topping Paintings from Pictures
Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk
facebook: www.facebook.com/paintingsfrompictures

So no more will I travel to places faraway from a platform in Exchange Station

You will have to be of a certain age to remember taking the train from Exchange Railway Station, and soon even the memory of driving up that wide road to the temporary NCP car park will be a fading memory.

Of course for those who spend time in the shinny new glass building at the end of the old entrance, that walk will just be part of a working day.

Location; Manchester





Picture; remembering Exchange Railway Station, 2017, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

On being Billy no mates in Varese ....... watching the buses

Now on a busy Thursday morning in Varese while the family is off shopping there is little to do but sit and watch as the city passes you by.

Location; Varese




Picture; passing on the bus, 2017 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Mrs Gaskell's Baths, under the Imperial Buildings on Oxford Road

Here courtesy of Sally Dervan is an intriguing story. 

No visit to the theatre is complete without buying a programme.

Manchester theatregoers in the 1930s, 40s and 50s would settle into their seats and flick through their programmes before the performance began.

Maybe an advert in the programme would direct them to their next source of entertainment and fun?

The Gaskell family were hoping that would be the case.

Nestled between adverts for Affleck and Browns, Rolls Restaurant and Clifton’s Chocolates there was a regular advert for “Gaskells Baths”

Gaskells were offering swimming and diving lessons and Turkish and medical baths, all under the supervision of Peggy Gaskell.

The watery delights were offered “ under “ something else as well , because Gaskells Baths, including a heated pool , were actually under the Imperial Buildings , just on the other side of the railway bridge from the Refuge Buildings on Oxford Road.

A reporter from The Guardian Newspaper in 1959 experienced a sauna at Gaskells. He spent seven minutes in the sauna and commented that “it sweeps the filth of Manchester out of one’s pores“He also reported that Peggy Gaskell told him that Gaskells was, at that time, the only sauna in the country outside London.

As well as swimming and saunas, Gaskell’s offered treatments for obesity, rheumatism and sciatica

By the 1950s the adverts for Gaskells included a hairdresser on site. Presumably the lethal combination of swimming and steam left the ladies in need of a little help before they stepped back out into the hustle and bustle of Oxford Road.

In  the mid 1960s the adverts for Gaskells on Oxford Road seem to have disappeared.

A newspaper article from the MEN in 2005 might hold the clue to the other venture that may have been keeping Peggy Gaskell busy.

The report marks the death of “Manchester’s First Lady of Business” It told the story of Peggy Gaskell who opened Manchester’s first outdoor swimming pool, The Galleon at Didsbury, in 1936.

The report says that Peggy was running the Galleon until she was well into her 70s and she stayed a picture of health until her death, aged 93.

What are the chances of two people with the same name, both being involved in opening swimming facilities that were remarkably pioneering and ahead of their time?

I can’t find anything to confirm for sure that the two Peggy Gaskells are one and the same- but if they are not, I will eat my swimming hat....!

© Sally Dervan, March 2014

Pictures; from the collection of Sally Dervan

When Miss Peroni came to town ..............

Now the end of that building which finishes at Albert Bridge has had more than a few ibig adverts over the years.

Some like the Morrisons ad in 2014 or the “Do Less Earn More” one from eight years earlier never caught my interest while others like that for I Pad in 2012 were at best ordinary.

But I did like the three camels from 2011 with its caption “Manchester to Dubai and beyond.” 

And more recently I was attracted to the Peroni one which in the June of this year brightened up my day.

Location; Manchester

Picture; Peroni ad, 2017, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Waiting for the ghost sign .........

Now on a bright sunny September day with all the promise of an autumnal adventure to come, I couldn’t resist featuring Ron’s picture.

He says with some truth “Not a ghost sign but the way pubs are closing down, who knows? 

Taken on the main street in Stourport-on-Severn. 

Nice to see that gable ends are still used for advertising.”

And I of course I have to agree with him.

That said I doubt the owners of the pub or the brewery are quite ready for it to be described as a ghost sign given that these are often all that is left of a business or product that has long ceased to exist.

Still I like it and as Ron says it’s good to see that the tradition of painting a sigh on a wall and advertising  is still with us.

And for those with an interest, according to WHAT?UB, it is a "Busy high street pub in the heart of the Georgian town of Stourport, and refurbished in 2017.

It has two rooms known as the Big Bar and the Little Bar. The Little Bar is used for serving Sunday dinners and pub meals during the day.

On Tuesdays and Wednesdays during the Winter into Spring, Bank's bitter and mild are on offer at £1.99/pint. Three real ales from the Marson's list."

Location; Stourport-on-Severn

Picture; The Wheatsheaf, 38-39 High St, Stourport-on-Severn, 2017, from the collection of Ron Stubley

WHAT?UB, https://whatpub.com/pubs/KID/1023/wheatsheaf-stourport-on-severn

It’s the little bits of Chorlton’s history that prove fascinating ...... upstairs in the grandest of our old cinemas.

Now I reckon most people know the story of the cinema on Manchester Road.  

It closed in 1962 as the Gaumont having offered feature films, news reels and Saturday Morning Pictures along with choc ices, Kia-Ora and of course the Bee Gees.

And in the 42 years that it entertained the people of Chorlton it changed its name from the Picture House, to the Savoy and finally ending up as the Gaumont and at one time nearly became The New Magestic Cinema.

But most people will only know it as the Coop Funeral Care and it’s from the staff of the business that I have to thank for this little bit of Chorlton’s history.

For in a conversation with them last night I learnt that for years the upstairs which once formed the circle of the picture house was where the coffins were made.

From that floor they were dispatched by shute to the ground floor.

In the great sweep of history I am the first to admit that this would not warrant even a footnote in most respectable history books but I like it especially as it points up to that simple observation that there is always something new to discover.

And that alone may qualify the Gaumont for an entry in the new book I am writing with Peter Topping which we have called the Quirks of Chorlton.

As the name implies it is a light hearted but a scholarly look at bits of Chorlton whose history may never get into the official accounts of the township.

So with that in mind there is a standing invitation to nominate a place or person to be considered for inclusion.

And if you have a picture all the better, although it does have to be your own and not lifted from elsewhere.
Leaving me just to confess that I am of that age to have referred to the cinema as the “flicks” but there are no prizes for knowing why.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; Coop Funeral Care, 2014 from the collection of Andy Roberston, and the Picture House, circa 1920 from the Lloyd Collection

Recovering from wounds in a Red Cross Hospital during the Great War

Alexandra Park School Red Cross Hospital, date unknown

The story of the voluntary Red Cross Hospitals which were set up during the Great War was not one I knew much about.

Given the huge numbers of casualties I suppose I should have realised that there would be a huge demand for hospital beds to take those recovering from wounds and illnesses.

And even before the war had begun the Red Cross had planned for just such an eventuality.

McLaren Memorial Baptist Church, Edge Lane, circa 1920

What started me off was the discovery of one of these hospitals on Edge Lane in the Sunday School of the old Baptist Church.

Both buildings have long gone but the Sunday School of the Methodist Church on Manchester Road is still there and this was the second of the hospitals in Chorlton.

After that it was just a matter of research to track them down in Whalley Range, Didsbury, Flixton and pretty much everywhere.

Some were in large private homes or like those in Chorlton in public buildings volunteered for the duration of the war.

Alexandra Park School Red Cross Hospital, date unknown

They were quickly established, supported by the local community and with the end of the war closed almost as quickly.

Looking through the newspapers for 1918 and 1919 you can come across plenty of adverts for the sale of the fitments and fixtures, including beds, blankets buckets, typewriters in fact everything which allowed the hospital to function.

And with the sale of all these and the return of the buildings to other uses the presence of the hospitals quickly faded from memory.

Alexandra Park School Red Cross Hospital, date unknown

I suppose it was inevitable having performed their task they receded back from popular thought and within a few generations were pretty much forgotten.

Some of course continued as private hospitals and in time became part of the NHS but many more have been lost to history.

So with that in mind here are three photographs from the Red Cross Hospital at Alexandra Park School, Edgeley in Stockport.

The images pretty much speak for themselves but it is worth drawing attention to the hospital blues which were the uniform worn by men convalescing and the presence of the same wheel chair in all three.

The photographs come from the extensive collection of David Harrop who runs a permanent exhibition in the Remembrance Hall at Southern Cemetery.

Pictures; the Red Cross Hospital at Alexandra Park School, Edgeley in Stockport, date unknown courtesy of David Harrop and the McLaren Memorial Baptist Church, Edge Lane, from the Lloyd Collection,

Home thoughts of Varese

Now I know you can buy LAVAZZA coffee pretty much anywhere here but when I see the original Italian packaging bought from an Esselunga store I think of Simone and Rosa in Varese.

Picture; LAVAZZA, 2017, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Looking out of Salford ....... the Middlewood Locks story

Now Andy’s picture of Hampson Street, taken from Oldfield Road in 2014 is as he says the “common thread” to his new collection.

2014

Over the last few years Andy has been wandering down there and photographing the Middlewood Locks and with that unerring eye to spot future change he marked down the area as one of special interest.

And yesterday he was back and in the space of three years much has begun to change.  The open expanse of land with its mix of wild undergrowth and stunning views across open water has been transformed.

It is of course a development that will be familiar to anyone who has walked around the bits of Salford and Manchester which were once home to bustling industry and the modest homes of those who lived in the inner city.

Over the years Andy has not only chronicled those changes but has taken some mean pictures at the same time.

2017

So with that said, here is one of my favourites of his from that 2014 photo shot.

If like me you have a corny sense for captions, the one that springs to my mind is "the long and winding road," not that  Hampson Street is in anyway winding and if it leads anywhere its towards the Beetham Tower.

But the dramatic image of tall blocks rising in Andy's second picture must bring forth some comments.

Enough said.

Location; Middlewood Locks, 2014

Pictures; Middlewood Locks, 2014, from the collection of Andy Robertson

Down at Sam’s Chop House with a night Mr Sam would have approved of

Now I think Mr Samuel Studd would have approved of the party held in his famous Chop House on Back Pool Fold.

There was a selection of fine food from the new menu, some brilliant musicians and the sort of atmosphere that everyone there will remember with fondness.

It was less a re-launch and more a celebration of the restaraunt’s history which goes back over 140 years.

And as part of that celebration, Sam’s commissioned a special souvenir edition of the book Manchester Pubs, The Stories Behind the Doors, which carries Peter’s painting of the Chop House on the front cover.*

Mr Samuel Studd opened his restaurant under the grander name of Sam’s London Chop House in 1872.

Back then it was situated in Manchester Chambers on the corner of Market Street and Pall Mall and moved to its present location in the 1950s.

We told its story in the book and the entry stretched to four pages and seven images ranging from Peter’s painting to some nice contemporary photographs of the interior with a couple from the past.

And that entry was just one of the 78 which featured many of our most iconic pubs running from the Northern Quarter down to All Saints.  

Most date back to the 19^th century with the odd one which could claim to have been selling pints when King George 111 lost the American colonies and a few that have not yet celebrated their 21^st birthday.

But in writing about them we wanted to tell their story, from the people who worked in them, drank in them, to the houses, factories and warehouses that surrounded them.

In that respect it has become as much a history of our city as it is a record of the 78, and has been seen by many as a celebration of a unique British institution which the owner of Sam’s warned was at risk, with on average twenty-seven closing each week.

All of which made the night at the Chop House even more special, and one to remember.

And for any of the other pubs in the book who want to have their own souvenir edition with their own painting on the front cover it can as they say be arranged, by contacting us on the link or the phone number below.

You can get a copy of the commemorative edition the book from Sam's Chop House or order the original book at www.pubbooks.co.uk or the old fashioned way on 07521 557888 or from Chorlton Bookshop

Location; Sam’s Chop House, Back Pool Fold

Pictures; on the night, 2017 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, cover of the souvenir Sam’s Chop House edition from Peter Topping, Paintings from Pictures, www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk

**A new book on Manchester Pubs, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/A%20new%20book%20on%20Manchester%20Pubs

Looking for Gibraltar and finding the Kippax in Newton Heath

Now we all know those grim figures which tell the story of the demise of the traditional pub.

The Kippax, 2017

According to the Campaign for Real Ale, on average 27 pubs a week call time, throw the spare beer mats in the bin and shut their doors for ever.

And the Kippax on Grimshaw Lane was one of them.

It is not a pub I knew but Andy Robertson, that diligent chronicler of lost buildings, demolished warehouses and vanished factories  recorded the sad end of the Kippax.

I say the end but it has been closed since sometime around 2014 but did continue to sport the Man City emblem on the front and side walls for another year.

But now even they have gone.

The Gibraltar, 1964

Not that it was always the Kippax, indeed its earlier name was the Gibraltar and according to that excellent pub site Pubs of Manchester changed its name when City moved grounds.

All of which just left Andy to unearth one of those historic pictures from 1964 when the beer will have flowed and the Pink Gins, Babychams and pork scratching were all available for anyone who wanted to drop in.

Location; Newton Heath

Pictures; The Kippax, 2017, from the collection of Any Robertson, and the pub as the Gibraltar in 1964, T Brooks, m49659, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*The Pubs of Manchester, http://pubs-of-manchester.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=The+Kippax

SADNESS ON BARLOW MOOR ROAD ........ a story from John Parker

From November 1943 to June 1958 I lived with my parents in their house on Barlow Moor Road, just opposite The Crematorium. 

Barlow Moor Road, 1959

Most of my memories of living there are happy, but one is of a sadness still felt today.

On Thursday February 6th, 1958, the Airspeed Ambassador chartered aircraft carrying the Manchester United team, club officials and sports journalists from several English newspapers, crashed on take off from Munich Airport.

Twenty one people died at the scene. The bodies of the victims were repatriated to England on the evening of February 7th.; four victims were off-loaded from a Vicker's Viscount transport plane in London before the flight continued to Manchester with the remaining seventeen.

My fiancée and I had spent Friday evening at my parents house planning for our wedding in June 1958. She was a Staff Nurse at Withington Hospital and lived in the Nurse's Home there. She had to be back there at 11:00PM, before the doors of the home were secured, and on this particular evening decided to return there a little early.

We got on my motor bike about 9:30 and headed up Barlow Moor Road towards Princess Road, Nell Lane and ultimately Withington Hospital. We had passed the main gates of Southern Cemetery and were approaching The Oaks pub when we saw a motor cycle coming at us on our side of the road. It was a police motorcyclist and he waved us down to stop. Very quietly he said “They're coming”, that was all - “They're coming” - before he rode on very slowly, still on the wrong side of the road.

The Oaks, 1959

We had stopped the bike, a little puzzled, and looked towards the junction with Princess Road.

We saw the first vehicle turning from Princess Road into Barlow Moor Road, coming very, very slowly with dimmed lights.

It was a hearse and was followed by another and another. By now we stood at the side of my bike with our crash helmets in our hands as the cars continued to approach very, very slowly.

Hearse after hearse, after hearse continued their progress on to Barlow Moor Road.

We had heard no announcement of the return of the bodies of the crash victims on television or radio but that was what we were witnessing. As the cortège slowly progressed, patrons came silently out of The Oaks, down the front steps and into the car park to view the passing scene . Down Barlow Moor Road, lights appeared in porches and front rooms and people came out to stand at their front gates, watching the sad procession of hearses in silence. Seventeen vehicles passed in all on their way the United's Old Trafford Ground. The coffins containing the bodies of the victims were held in the gymnasium at the ground before being returned to their grieving relatives over the weekend.

This remains, for me, one of the saddest and most moving sights I have ever witnessed in my life.

John Parker © 2017

Picture; Barlow Moor Road, m17542 1959 and  the Oaks Hotel, 1959, m17565,  by R.E.Stanley, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

In Piccadilly Gardens at the Tree of Remembrance

Now I have passed that metal tree in Piccadilly Gardens countless times and only once wondered about its story.

But in my defence I have always been in a hurry and rarely linger in the gardens, all of which is a shame and a lesson about looking more carefully at what you pass because this is a memorial to all those who died in Manchester during the Second World War.

The first to die were the Andrews’s family on August 30th 1940 in Hulme and the last was Ms Lilly King of Beswick on July 28 1942.*

The heaviest death toll was during the Manchester Blitz in December 1940 when on two nights 680 people were killed and 2,360 were wounded.

Many of these are buried in Southern Cemetery where there is another memorial.

But for now I want to stick with the Tree of Remembrance which stands on the Mosley Street corner of the gardens.

It was commissioned by the City Council and completed to coincide with the anniversary of Victory in Europe Day in May 2005.

The memorial was designed by the artists Wolfgang Buttress and the ten metre high tree has metal rings around the trunk that have engraved upon them the names of the Manchester people who lost their lives.

Now I am sure I will have been aware of its official opening back in 2005 but never made the link with the sculpture that I pass regularly so I have David Harrop to thank for reminding me of its presence.

David also has a permanent exhibition commemorating the lives of those who lived in Greater Manchester during the two world wars.

Fittingly it is in the Remembrance Lodge at Southern Cemetery close to the Blitz memorial and during the next few months running up to December David is mounting a special display of memorabilia focusing on events of 1940-41.

Amongst the items there are letters, postcards and official communications including a leaflet on what to do if your home had been bombed.

These are the very personal sides of what was one of those great events in that war and it is easy sometimes to overlook that fact.

So setting aside the statistics and the cool judgement of historians, those bombs fell on people, and some of them we will have known.

Now Mr Richard Arthur Dunkley of Whitfield Street, Chorlton on Medlock was not known to me, but he appears on the tree and I discovered he was killed during the air raid of December 26th.and was taken to the Mansfield Street Mortuary.  He was 39 and had been born in Hazel Grove.

He was one of twenty people killed that night in Chorlton on Medlock of whom three were unidentified.


Pictures; Tree of Remembrance, 2015 from the collection of David Harrop

*Luftwaffe over Manchester, The Blitz Years 1940-1944, Peter J C Smith, 2003

A little bit of Quebec and native American culture ........ Au delà de la ceinture fléchée / Beyond Arrowhead Sash

Now I continue to like the way I get to discover new things about history and places, often without even trying.

So I was fascinated when a new friend added me to her facebook group Au delà de la ceinture fléchée / Beyond Arrowhead Sash.

It is a study group about Finger Weaving from the North East of the Americas.

The group description which is in both French and English says that “From the Mi'kmaq Culture (2,500 BP) to the French Canadian Culture through the Mississippian Culture (800-900) we are trying to establish links through finger weaving and Quebec culture (1840-1885). 

We rely on facts, period in time and locations. We believe that these cultural exchanges are important.”

Michelle who added me to the group adds that “We teach Fingerweaving from North East of America and the origins of fingerweaving Indian connection.”

So there you have it.

Location; the North East of the Americas

Picture; courtesy of Michelle Beauvais

James Arthur Parkes, from Chorlton, the oldest Manchester soldier to die in the Great War

James Arthur Parkes was the oldest Manchester soldier to die in the Great War.

Your King and Country Thank you, date unknown

He was 64 years of age, had been born in Chorlton on Medlock and his family were living at 9 Meadow Bank in Chorlton when he died on March 29 1917.

Now given the mountain of statistics about the war it would be easy to pass this fact by.

After all in total 10,995 men from the city died during the conflict, the first being Charles Routledge of Andrew Street who died in August of 1914 and Thomas McLean Dunlop of Elvey Street who was killed on the last day of the war.*

And in between there are the depressing list of casualties which include the total killed on the first day of the Battle of the Somme along with the youngest man to perish and much more.

But I was drawn to Mr Parkes because of his age which given that we think of the Great War as a young mans’ war rather marks him out as significant.

And behind that simple record is a fascinating story that begins in Chorlton on Medlock and runs out across Canada, Scotland and northern England and finishes in a family grave in Sourthern Cemetry.

I know that he was born in 1854 in Chorlton on Medlock and that he married Margaret Gowrie in 1878 in New Brunswick in Canada.

This is at least the obvious inference given that five of seven children were born there between 1879 and 1891.

He appears to have settled with his family briefly in Scotland in the April of 1881 and again a decade later in 1891.

From the Daily Mail, 1916

But was also in Canada during most of the 1880s before returning to the UK in the middle of 1891 and moving on again to Barnard Castle in County Durham in 1894 which is where the family were still residing in 1898.

Not that any of this surprises me.  This was after all one of the centuries when people were migrating to the Empire and were coming home again more frequently than we might think.

That said the clue to James’s wandering is there in his occupation.

In 1911 he described himself as a retired army officer, while in 1881 he was a  Sergeant 26th Regt and a ten years later a Quarter Master Army at the Hamilton Barracks.

Now the 26th Regiment of Foot became a Rifle Regiment and adopted the regimental name of the Cameronians in 1881 under the army reforms.**

So his postings in Canada and across Britain make sense. And with a bit more research it should be possible to match the family homes with the movement of the regiment.

All of which brings me to his death in 1917.  I had assumed it was on a battlefield but that would be stretching it given his age.

Greetings from the Front, date unknown

He was by then a Captain in the Durham Light Infantry and was buried in Southern Cemetery on April 3 1917 in a plot which was to include his wife and children.

In time I will fill in the missing bits including where they were in 1901 and his role in the Durham Light Infantry along with a cause and place of death.

All of which is for later except to say that sometimes you can be too clever.

I had thought Mr Parkes served in Canada, given that the 1911 census has his wife and some of his children listed as being  born in Glasgow and Hamiliton NB which I took to be New Brunswick but appears to have been a mistake.

Earlier census returns record Mrs Parkes and the children as being born in Scotland upon which turns a reversal of James Arthur’s time in Canada which I had confidently described in earlier stories.

Ah well not everything is as you think.

Pictures;  from the collection of David Harrop

*The First World War and the price Greater Manchester Paid, Manchester Evening News August 4 2014

**Regiments of Foot, H.L. Wilkes, 1974