Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester nu 24 Barton Square .......... all in a name change or two

Barton Square, 2016

Barton Square is that narrow little street that runs from Exchange Street round to St Ann Street and is dominated by Barton Arcade that 19th century shopping mall more glass than wall.

I use it quite a lot and I always let my imagination wander as I follow its twisty route but until recently I had never given much thought to its name.

Barton is obvious given the arcade, but square seemed a little odd, after all this is a street. 

I supposed there might be a connection with St Ann's Square but that seemed remote and the more I thought about it even Barton threw up a puzzle given that the arcade was built in 1870 and the street is there a century before.

So as you do I went looking at the old maps of the area and the story is as complicated as you could expect.

In the 1840s and 50s that first stretch leading to the arcade was Red Lion Street which extended  under what is now the arcade just stopping short of Deansgate with four little side streets around a small square called Barton’s Buildings.  These were accessed via an entry.

Red Lion Street & Back Square, 1851

And that almost offered up the answer, but not quite, because the rest of what we now know as Barton Square had undergone a number of name changes, from Back Square in the first half of the 19th century to Back St Ann’s Square in 1793.

So mystery solved, and with a bit more digging it should be possible using the directories to pinpoint the date it all became Barton Square which it was by 1900.

Leaving me only to record that in 1851 Red Lion was occupied by mix of professional occupation including an accountant, commission agent, stockbroker and consulting engineer while Back Square was full of small manufacturing businesses.

As for Barton's buildings these belonged to a Mr Barton and consisted of four warehouses and an office with a joint annual rental income of £305 which were occupied by George and Edward Wood who dealt in cotton and cotton waste and and Tobler Anschelf & Co listed as merchants.

Location; Manchester

Pictures; Barton Square, 2016, from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and in 1851, from Adshead’s map of Manchester, and in 1900 from Goad's Fire Insurance maps, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/