Living that "low dishonest decade," an autobiography of London life in the 1930s

Cover of What Happened to Tom Mix? 1969

Now it is not often that you get to read an autobiography of someone you knew.

And when I say knew I mean just that.  Ted Willis was a writer and politician and for just over a year I went out with his daughter.

I was welcomed into the family and even went on holiday with them which was pretty much something given that it was a cruise around the Mediterranean
 on the Canberra.

It was around the time of that holiday that he told me about Tom Mix and his autobiography which I rather think he wrote during that cruise.

Whatever Happened to Tom Mix? covers the first thirty years of his life and is a vivid account of growing up in a poor part of London.

Here are the stories of children’s games including clay marbles, box carts and “knock down ginger” of cheap sweets which were still on offer when I was growing up and of harsh as well as inspiring teachers who offered an exciting window into another world.

It is of course a book of its time and just thirty years later while I was growing up in a similar part of London much had changed to make my childhood less of a struggle.

The post war years were dominated by the Welfare State, full employment and a growing level of prosperity.

That said I grew up with the stories of the Hunger Marches, the Means Test, and the long years of unemployment which dominated the decades between the end of the Great War and the start of that war against Hitler.

They were still bit deep into my mother’s mind, including being sacked at the end of her apprenticeship at the local silk factory along with all the others because to retain them on the pay roll would have been to pay them a full wage.

And also the accounts of my grandfather walking the five miles out of the town because he had heard that a local firm were taking on men only to find a hundred were already at the factory gates.

All of these were here in the autobiography and like my mother’s memories were overlaid with a clear political message of where the blame lay for the social injustice of the period.



Advance, 1938

It is just a clear well written account of one young man’s growing political activity ranging from his first years in the Labour League of Youth to confronting the Black Shirts and above all in organising food supplies for Republican Spain during the Civil War.

And it is this part of the book which fascinates me most for here is a vivid account of the political struggles and his own experiences of Spain which he visited three times during the war.

Even now I do have to sit back and reflect that the first time Ted made his way to Madrid by a long and torturous route he was just 19 the same age as I was when I came to Manchester, but while I had done a series of temporary jobs after school spoke a lot about the injustices of the world he had organised the massive job of coordinating food and medical supplies from a warehouse in London and visited Spain three times.

But he would have been the first to point out that everyone’s contribution is different and mine was to come later, although even now I cannot claim it ranks with his.

So the final words are his

“We did not accept the world as it was, and we put what strength we had to the task of changing it for the better.”

Now you can’t say more than that.  Along the way I was introduced to  London which was familiar but still different, of child hood games I also played and of a world alternating between great hardship and hope.

And as for Tom Mix, well you have to be of a certain generation to know of him.  In my case it was Ted who introduced me.

Picture; from the cover of Whatever Happened to Tom Mix? and Advance, paper of the Labour League of Youth edited by Ted Willis, 1938, courtesy of hayes peoples history, http://ourhistory-hayes.blogspot.co.uk/2008_09_01_archive.html

Revisiting the Great War nu 1 ............ who spoke in favour?

That image of people cheering the news that we were at war in August 1914 and turning out on the streets pretty much sums up what we think was the mood of the country facing its first major continental war in a century.

Men flocked to the Colours, many wanting to do their bit before it was all over and Rupert Brook wrote

"Now, God be thanked Who has matched us with His hour,
And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping.*

And yet it can only have been one aspect of how collectively the country greeted the news.

After all Sir Edward Grey’s famous comment that "The lamps are going out all over Europe” was made by the man closely associated with the decisions which led to our ultimatum with Germany.**

And on that day the Manchester Guardian had been full of letters deploring Britain’s possible involvement while the editor C.P Scott had commented that

“If we rush into war ...it will be both a crime and ruinous madness in which we risk everything of which we are proud and gain nothing.”***

Such feelings were mirrored by resolutions passed by churches and church bodies calling for neutrality, and large meetings held across Greater Manchester including one at the Milton Hall on Deansgate the day after war was declared reaffirming a belief that we should have remained neutral.

Uppermost were the fears for those who would be called to fight, the loss of treasure involved in paying for the conflict and the unease at lining up with countries like Russia and Serbia.

And amongst sections of the Labour Movement there was the a real concern that “wars are of no concern to Labour.  

The only purpose as far as we are concerned, would be to divert attention from social needs, and the only people who would benefit would be the armament firms. 

We never know what financial forces are behind movements which precipitate nations in to wars of this kind.”****

A sentiment which was matched by resolutions from trade unions like that from the Electrical Trades Union,

“strongly protesting against the present war in Europe as a ‘wanton and wilful waste of human life which will be the cause of unparallelled misery and hardship to the workers of all countries.’”*****

That opposition never really went away and as the war deepened it maintained a constant, but the majority of the country swung behind Britain’s involvement.

By September the Labour candidate in the Bolton by-election was unopposed by the other two parties because he “was a whole hearted supporter of the war policy.”******

And a little over a month later the Labour MP for Manchester East,  John Edward Sutton speaking to a meeting in his constituency commented that  “when our ultimatum was sent [the Labour Party was] practically unanimous in deciding to support the war through.  

Our policy as a party was to sink and fall with the Government, as the Opposition had done, and do their best to bring the war to a successful issue.” ******

Although it is interesting that he maintained that “German Socialists like the Socialists of this and other countries were against war... but were out numbered in the German Parliament by the militarist and aristocratic party” concluding that they now “had to do the best they could for their country just as we believed we must fight the war to the finish.”

His speech was met by frequent applause and that I guess brings us back to the image of the cheering crowds complimented by the recurring news of the numbers enlisting in Manchester Pals Battalions  and the report that of the 280 Manchester undergraduate on the Officer Training Corps over 200 had taken commissions in the two months since the war began.

Next, the treatment of enemy aliens, unemployment, distress and the growing role of women in the war effort.

Pictures; selection of picture postcards from the collection of David Harrop

*Peace Rupert Brooke, 1914

** "The lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our life-time."

***To a group of Manchester businessmen and Liberals on August 3 1914

****Councillor W.T.Jackson, Secretary of the Manchester and Salford Labour Representation Committee, Labour Protest in Manchester, Manchester Guardian, August 3 1914

***** The Attitude of Labour, Manchester Evening News, August 3 1914

******Bolton By-election, Manchester Guardian, September 15 1914

******The Labour Party, Manchester Guardian, October 12 1914

Pictures from a past ....... no. 1 the Greek island

It is a sobering thought that the young boy who happened to being walking down the flight of stairs in 1981 will now be well into middle age.

It was my first time in Greece; and everything was bright, fresh and different with everyday a promise of a new experience.

Never underestimate the impact of a foreign country on a lad from south east London, the extent of whose horizons were bounded by Manchester in the north and Brighton in the south.*

It began when the door to the plane opened at the airport and you were hit by that wall of heat, intense sunlight and unfamiliar sounds, carried on with the ferry hoping journey from the Piraeus across the Aegean and ended on a tiny island burnt brown by the summer sun.

I can’t now remember where I was when I took the picture, and for over thirty-five years this image along with countless others sat half forgotten in our cellar.

Location; Poros

Pictures; on the stairs, Poros, 1981 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*This precludes a long weekend in Paris the year before, or the cruise holiday to Istanbul, Athens and Naples in 1969 paid for the parents of my by then girlfriend.  Neither count as they spoil the story.

Inside an 18th century house in Didsbury

It  served as an educational institution of sorts since it became a boarding school around 1812.  

Later it was turned into a theological college and later still into teacher training college.

And before that was a private residence dating back to about 1744.

The stone cladding to what was originally a brick building was added by the Wesleyans when they took it over in 1841.

They also added the wings at either side and that is what generations of people from Didsbury have seen as they pass by.

I remember it as the admin block when it was the Didsbury College of Education and it was where I attended meetings with teaching staff.

And now it has reverted to private use after  the M.M.U. relocated to Birley Fields.

So for all of those who like me have not been inside since they graduated and for all those who just pass by and wonder what the inside is like, here are a few images from my old friend Pierre who worked there and never ceased to enjoy both the place and his role as a teacher.

Something of the grandeur of the building is there still there from when it was a private residence and home to the Broome family during the 18th century.

So there you have it, a bit of the building's history and some fine photographs.









Pictures; of the Pump House courtesy of Pierre Grace.

A little bit of Italy arrived on the doorstep today .......

And with it came more than a bit of culinary history and a reminder of Ancoats in the 19th century.

The vegetarian platter

But first the food, which in our case was a vegetarian platter, but there is also a meat option.

The platters cost £20 which includes delivery to the door and can be ordered by clicking on the link.*

 Much of the food is made on site by the company and each of the two platters include “a selection of Veroni artisan charcuterie including the heavenly fennel salami , Napoli dolce , Proscuitto and a spicy spianata, Continental cheeses including goats cheese , mozzarella ball , provolone piccante , Gorgonzola and Spanish manchejo . 

Along with these there are artisan crackers, homemade pesto and hoummus and  grilled artichokes , Calabrian olives , marinaded sun dried tomatoes and roasted peppers . 

They come on a bed of fresh rocket that tends to absorb these oils and so it acts as a delicious flavoursome dressing”.

Nor is that all because there are also “some garlic croistini and mini picos de pan ( Spanish breadsticks, Ines Rosales - this is an amazing Spanish product - garlic and herb flavour cracker style and all individually hand wrapped” . 

And as an option in the vegetarian platter there is  “Mrs Kirkham’s Lancashire and smoked applewood cheese, some home made sun dried tomato tapannade and some Italian grilled courgettes”.

The meat platter

The platters are supplied by Amato Products, and many people will remember that at one point they owned  “Buonissimo” the very popular deli on Beech Road in Chorlton.

"The company is a family run foodservice company based in Manchester City Centre. The company was founded 30 years ago by Bob and Deloras Amato. 

It was started with them making and selling fresh pasta to restaurants in and around Manchester. 

They then went on to open the Italian Deli, “Buonissimo” which was based in Chorlton, the customer base grew along with the demand for new products which Bob and Deloras would gladly source. 

Their reputation for supplying fine ingredients became well known to chefs and catering establishments in and around the Manchester area and Amato Products Ltd was established. 

Amato Products Ltd not only supplies specialist Mediterranean and oriental products, but we also cater for all ingredients required for the catering industry. 

The company have 18 vehicles distributing to over 700 customers from our 20,000sq ft warehouse based close to Piccadilly in central Manchester. We supply to customers large and small, all equally important to us, new customers are always welcome. We have a development kitchen on site where we can showcase our products, and also work with our customers to develop their menus, using our quality ingredients.

When the Covid-19 pandemic began we opened a pop-up shop at our premises where we sell lots of our quality products in retail size’s. The shop has been a huge success and it will remain open, we now have lots of regular customers enjoying our products at home. We can also offer home deliveries in some areas”.

At present they are offering the platters to customers across south Manchester,  from Chorlton, Didsbury and Altrincham to Hale, Sale,  Timperly and Wythenshawe and soon to Stockton Heath and Knutsford .

Tomorrow; more on the story of Amato Products and the history of the little bits of Ancoats which is home to the company

Location; Manchester

Pictures; courtesy of Amato Products Ltd, 2021

* Amato Products Ltd,  info@amatoproducts.co.uk

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 14 Century Street

Century Street, 2016

This is Century Street which runs from Whitworth Street West to Tariff Street and here are bits of a story I wrote earlier.*

Back in 1911, the Railway Hotel occupied the open space beside the street which now offers up the new stairs up to the metro stop.

It was run by John Bardsley who was 66 years old, single and shared the 16 roomed hotel with three staff.

Now I rather think there may well be some stories here not least that of Mrs Helen Cattermole who was 29 years old had been married for five years and had one child who had died.

But for now I am more intrigued by the two properties just a little further along Whitworth Street, just where it meets Century Street.

Century Street, 1902

In1902 this was Crown Street and the taller of our two houses was listed as number 4 Crown Street.Whitworth Street West  and Crown Street during the canal work, 1902

And in that year they attracted a lot of interest from Mr Bradburn, who was perhaps more interested in the work being done to the canal but came back five years later to record the houses all over again.

The three images he tool perfectly capture both the houses and the Railway Hotel but and there is always a but, number 4 and its companion have so far not yielded up any further information.

Neither is listed in the street directories for 1903 or 1911 and without a name searching the census record is a long complicated process, but I will go looking if only to see how much I can find out about them and the people who lived there.

I have to say that the steps up to the metro are far more impressive than the old ones and go nicely with the new footbridge across Whitworth Street to the railway station.

The corner of Century Street, 2016

The old one was looking quite tired.

And because that canal gets a mention a few times, I thought that I would include the plaque.

Once the tunnel continued some distance further long the canal which for my money remains a pretty good little stretch of water running as it does through the heart of the city.

Location; Manchester

The Gaythorn Tunnel plaque

Pictures; Century Street, 2016 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and the corner of Whitworth Street West and Deansgate, May 1902, m05501, by A Bradburn, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*That metro stop at Deansgate-Castlefield and a hidden story of hotels, canals and vanished houses, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/that-metro-stop-at-deansgate.html

The Worralls of Whalley Range

Having been contacted by a couple of descendants of the Rickards family, the subject of a number of my recent posts on this Blog, I have been taking a fresh look at some wider family members.   

Henry Worrall was the husband of Louisa Rickards; whose divorce was central to one of the posts referred to above.  The Worrall family of Whalley Range owned a substantial dyeing company, with a huge dye-works on Worrall Road, Ordsall Lane, Salford and a smaller one at Midgehole a hamlet in Calderdale, near Hebden Bridge, Yorkshire. 1

 

Crimesworth Dye Works

This factory was renamed “Crimsworth” when acquired by the Worrall family a name also later used by Henry Worrall for his mansion on Upper Chorlton Road, Whalley Range.

Henry Worrall’s father James was a lifelong friend of Charles Hilditch Rickards, (his wife Louisa’s uncle). They were friends from childhood 2 in the Pendleton area of Salford fostered by their attendance at the same school, Manchester Grammar, and in 1857 they shared in joint enterprise to develop property around the Ordsall Dye Works. 3 They were both, also, heavily involved in public affairs, both men served as governors of their Alma Mater. James Worrall was also elected as the Mayor of Salford for 1861/2.

Crimsworth Upper Chorlton Road

Henry’s father and his elder brother, also named James both resided in large houses in Whalley Range. In 1871, James Sr., his wife, Anne (née Leigh), five sons (James Jr., Edward, Henry, George Wyatt, and Charles Francis) all occupied “Woodland” on Whalley Road. The household also included four servants. After his son James’s marriage to Jane Gibbons at St. Paul’s Church, Hastings, Sussex on the 13th December, 1875, James Worrall Sr, moved to “Oldfield” further down Whalley Road to accommodate his eldest son’s growing household. By the time of the 1881 census, this included, besides his wife, three young daughters, (Florence Anne, Katherine Mary, and Edith Jane) and no less than five servants.

James Jr. moved out to West Hall, High Legh, Knutsford, Cheshire 4 and after his father’s death on the Sunday the 13th July, 1890 only his brother, Henry, remained in Whalley Range.

Edward Worrall, James Sr’s second son, moved to Leicestershire and took up farming and in the June quarter of 1876 he married Harriet Adcock, the daughter of Richard, a local farmer, in Gaulby, Leicestershire.

The couples only child, Dorothy Hester, was born on the 6th October, 1889 at Wing, Rutland. In due course she went on to marry, on the 7th November, 1912 at St. Peter’s Church, Wing, her cousin Philip, the eldest son of Henry Worrall and his first wife, Louisa Rickards. Thus, providing a neat point to end as Philip has also appeared in a previous post, here.

Pictures: Crimsworth Dye Works – 11th September, 2000 by David Martin; the geograph project. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license, https://creativecommons.org/license/by-sa/2.0/deed.en and Crimsworth Upper Chorlton Road m 40768 A. H. Downes Courtesy of Manchester Libraries Information and Archives Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

Notes: -

1) The Worrall family’s wealth is best displayed by some of their probate records. On his death, in 1890, James Sr left an estate of £347,465 (£45,502,332 today). James Jr. died on the 10th April, 1930 in Tenterden, Kent leaving an estate of £473,011 (£31,617,914). Henry died on the 10th March, 1939; his estate was valued at £114,351 (£7,643,670 today).

2) The childhood friendship of James Worrall and Charles Hilditch Rickards was described in a book, “Recollections of My Old Homes” written by Anne Rickards; Charles Hilditch’s sister. 

3) The details of this enterprise were disclosed in the Lancaster Gazette, 14th March, 1857 edition.

4) In the 1891 census a son, James, had been added and the four children were all living in the house at High Legh. In the absence of both their parents they were in the care of a governess, Sarah J. Wilson and SEVEN other servants. 

James and his wife, Jane, were visiting his brothers George Whyatt (described as a musician), with whom they were staying, and Edward at Wing, Rutland.

All that remains is for me to thank Peter, one of the descendants of the Rickards for the loan of “Recollections------” book.

The Plague of Justinian …. a Northumbrian saint .... and episode 4 of I Want You To Know We're Still Here ….. on the wireless today

Now with the rain continuing to come down like stair rods, and the prhobiton of travel even further restricted, today is a day to stay in with the wireless.

Which is an introduction to three programmes on Radio 4, two of which come from that excellent In Our Time series, and the third from the continuing serialization of I Want You To Know We're Still Here.

I will start with last week’s The Plague of Justinian in which “Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the plague that broke out in Constantinople 541AD, in the reign of Emperor Justinian. 

According to the historian Procopius, writing in Byzantium at the time, this was a plague by which the whole human race came near to being destroyed, embracing the whole world, and blighting the lives of all mankind. 

The bacterium behind the Black Death has since been found on human remains from that time, and the symptoms described were the same, and evidence of this plague has since been traced around the Mediterranean and from Syria to Britain and Ireland. 

The question of how devastating it truly was, though, is yet to be resolved.

With, John Haldon, Professor of Byzantine History and Hellenic Studies Emeritus at Princeton University, Rebecca Flemming, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge, and Greg Woolf, Director of the Institute of Classical Studies, University of London, Producer: Simon Tillotson”.*

This I will follow up with Saint Cuthbert.

"Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Northumbrian man who, for 500 years, was the pre-eminent English saint, to be matched only by Thomas Becket after his martyrdom in 1170. 

Now at Durham, Cuthbert was buried first on Lindisfarne in 687AD, where monks shared vivid stories of his sanctifying miracles, his healing, and his power over nature, and his final tomb became a major site of pilgrimage. 

In his lifetime he was both hermit and kingmaker, bishop and travelling priest, and the many accounts we have of him, including two by Bede, tell us much of the values of those who venerated him so soon after his death.

With Jane Hawkes, Professor of Medieval Art History at the University of York, Sarah Foot, The Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the University of Oxford and Canon of Christ Church Cathedral, and John Hines, Professor of Archaeology at Cardiff University, Producer: Simon Tillotson”.**

Which will just leave me with Esther Safran Foer the author of I Want You To Know We're Still Here who "makes an emotional journey to the Ukrainian shtetls where her parents once lived, and where so many perished during the Holocaust". ***

Pictures; Detail of a contemporary portrait mosaic in the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna, author, Petar Milošević, author, / CC BY-SA, Wikipedia, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license, the stained glass window in the south aisle of the nave in Durham Cathedral: 'St Cuthbert praying before his cell in the Farne Island' and cover of I Want You To Know We're Still Here, Esther Safran Foer, 2020

*The Plague of Justinian, In Our Time, Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000rc43

**Saint Cuthbert; https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000rll4

***I Want You To Know We're Still Here, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000rll6

Stories from the attic ...... part 6 ........ travelling across Europe with my dad

To be accurate it was our cellar rather than the attic, but the principle remains the same, which is that all sorts of stories can be conjured up from the bits and pieces we carefully store away and then forget.

Glenton Tours circa 1956

In our case, it was two leather suitcases, which had accompanied dad on his travels across the Continent, during his drive as a coach driver, transporting happy passengers on sightseeing tours from Antwerp to Paris, to the Swiss and Italian Lakes and the French and Italian Rivera.

Along the way he picked up lots of luggage labels, form hotels.

Dad being dad, chose instead to collect them, storing them carefully in envelopes, which is how we inherited them.

Over the years I have plundered the collection to write about places as varied as Venice, Paris, Nancy, and Brussels.*

But until yesterday I had missed a group of six identical one’s advertising Glenton Tours, which was the tour company he worked for, for over 40 years.

Venice, cicra 1950s

The firm had begun in the 1920s when an estate agent settled a debt with a customer by accepting a coach and that started “Glenton Motor Coach Holiday Tours.”

Dad worked for them from the very beginning and finally retired in 1987 having driven their coaches around Britain and Europe from the early 1930s.

The tours were all inclusive, offering “first class accommodation” and the “Chauffeur-Couriers have been chosen after exacting tests of their reliability and skill and give every attention to travellers.”***

 The tours lasted for anything between 7 and 15 days.

For £45 Tour C7 in 1965 offered nine days to the Swiss and Italian Lakes, leaving London on the Saturday, staying in Brussels on the Sunday night and travelling on to Lake Lucerne on the Monday, then later in the week to Lake Maggiore and then in to Switzerland and back via Burgundy to London.

Dad and Elizabeth, circa 1959

Of course it is easy today to sneer at an experience where everything was provided and if you failed to look out of the window you might miss a country, but in an age before the internet with television still in its infancy this was a relatively cheap way to see places which would otherwise just be a picture in a book.

And this was value for money given that the national average wage in 1965 was £26.

There are still plenty of travel companies offering this sort of holiday but back in the late 1940’s and ‘50s this was an experience just opening up for thousands who were beginning to enjoy the first taste of consumer prosperity.

St Anton, date unknown

They are as much an indication of that new Britain as the washing machine, television and motor car.

And given the stories that will tumble from these treasures, Peter and I have embarked on the next project which will be to use those objects left in cellars, attics and garages for the new book, which we have called The Lost Stories of Chorlton-cum-Hardy In Our Attics, Cellars, Garages and Sheds.

We are confident that there will be plenty of people with their own treasures and stories which they would like to be included.

Leaving me just to make the appeal for objects.

You can contact us by leaving a comment on the blog or through Facebook, telling us just what you have and its importance to you and your family.

Location; across Europe

Pictures; Luggage labels, 1950-1968, from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and the box of treasures from the book cover, courtesy of Linda Rigby





*Hotel labels, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=hotel+labels&max-results=20&by-date=true


**Glenton Tours, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Glenton%20Tours

***Glenton Tours Brochures, 1951-1968

Pictures with no stories ……. the young married woman

I am looking at an unknown woman whose identity I guess I will never know.

She stares back at me in a studio portrait but offers little in the way of information.

I know she was married and someone will be able to help date the picture by how she is dressed.

And that seems to be that.

For now I know only that the photographic studio was Van Ralty who had premises at 35, and 92 London Road, as well as 91 Oldham Street, as well as in Liverpool, Oldham, Nottingham, Bolton and Sheffield.

The information on the reverse of the photograph proudly announces the addresses of its “Northern Branches”, but I have yet to locate any in London or the south.

Nor can I be sure just exactly which studios took the picture.  

Nether of the Manchester branches were operating in 1909, although both are listed two years later, and one source suggests that trade directories list the firm trading from 1915 through to 1929, while another cites a family photograph taken in Liverpool in 1941.

So, the jury is still out.

Someone I am sure will offer up some information, but until then our woman is pretty much a picture without a story.

Location; somewhere

Picture; unknown woman, from the Van Ralty, date unknown, from the collection of Ron Stubley

 

The Last Car from Manchester ……. the story with a sad ending

I like this picture postcard, but have never thought about writing its story.

I suppose that is because it is one of those general picture postcards, which will have been over printed with the names of towns and cities across the country.

So, as such its connection to Manchester is pretty slim, and it just kept getting passed over.

But yesterday I persevered, that said, with no comment on the back, no address and above all no postmark there seemed little to go on.

There was however the name of the company who marketed it, but I didn’t hold out much hope, given that there were countless companies which flourished and vanished during the decades either side of the last century.

But I was wrong, because The Cynicus Publishing Company Ltd of Tayport in Fife, wasn’t any old postcard company it was established by Martin Anderson, who according to one source was “better known by his pseudonym Cynicus, was a Scottish artist, political illustrator and publisher”.*

His early working life involved producing illustrations for a variety of publications, before setting up in his own business in London in 1891, and from there setting up a postcard company publishing his own designs in 1902.

After a promising start his business like many suffered from a fall in the popularity of such picture postcard and the company went into liquidation with his stocks of prints and original work were sold for a fraction of their real worth.

A further attempt at a similar business also met with failure when the market for seaside picture postcards declined with the outbreak of the Great War.

Mr. Martin produced a series of anti war posters and cards, which got him into trouble with the authorities. 

“In 1924 his Edinburgh shop was destroyed by fire, everything inside it was lost, and he did not have the funds to repair and restock it. He retired to his castle-like mansion in Balmullo to live in increasing poverty. A final edition of The Satires of Cynicus was published in 1926.”*

He died in 1932, and was buried in an unmarked grave, without a tombstone, and the final indignity was that his home was extensively vandalised after his death.

So a sad story for what was a very happy looking picture postcard.

Mr. Martin produced a series of anti war posters and cards, which got him into trouble with the authorities. 

* Cynicus, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynicus

Badges wot I wore ……..

Now I collect badges, which in their way are as much a way of investigating the past as an old photograph, and oral testimony or a history book.

Of course, they don’t tell all the story, but then no individual document ever does.

But they are a start, or in this case a confirmation of that simple fact that for decades certain politicians and political parties have paid lip service to the importance of the NHS but rarely dug deep to fund it adequately when in Government.

This one comes from John King, and could easily have been one I wore back in the 1980s when public services were suffering from Government cutbacks.

And in its way remains a topical badge, because despite the heroic work being done by members of the National Health Service and associated health and care services, there is no doubt that during the last decade as in the 1980s, Governments have not always matched their fulsome praise of the NHS with hard cash.

The badge is also interesting as it offers up a reference to N.U.P.E., which was The National Union of Public Employees, which existed between 1908 and 1993. The union  represented public sector workers in local government, the Health Service, universities, and water authorities.

The union was founded in 1908 as the National Union of Corporation Workers, became NUPE in 1928, and merged with the Confederation of Health Service Employees to form UNISON in 1993.

Location; the 1980s

Pictures; NHS badge, circa 1980, from the collection of John King, and Schools meals badge from the collection of Andrew Simpson

“went down to Jackson’s Boat” ............ Bill's adventure from Altrincham in the March of 1907

Bill's postcard to May, 1907

It is as David Harrop said to me a jolly scene and one that delights me as much as it must have done Bill who sent it to May Campbell in the March of 1907.

The railway line from Altrincham into Manchester was opened in 1849 and its main purpose was to ship agricultural products from Altrincham and stops down the line directly to the Manchester markets.

In this it was a great success, so much so that in the decade after it was opened the amount of produce sent on the Duke’s Canal dropped dramatically.

And on that March day which just happened to be a Sunday Bill and company set off from Altrincham, got off the train at Stretford and “went down to Jackson’s Boat.”

The weather forecast for the day was good, with the Manchester Guardian reporting  there would be “fair, mild weather and light breezes with some mist or fog locally” which was better than Monday when it would be “changeable with some showers.”*

Walking from Cut Hole towards the weir and on to jackson's Boar

Now we will never know their exact route from Stretford to Jackson’s Boat or if they were lucky with the weather.

If I had been them I guess I would have crossed the road from the station and walked along the Duke’s Canal as far as the Cut Hole Aqueduct and then by degree past the old weir picking up the northern bank of the river and continuing till I reached the new bridge that crossed the Mersey at Jackson’s Boat.

Of course that is just speculation and I bet there will be plenty of people with alternative routes.

But while I am on this wave of speculation I would just like to think that when Bill got back to Altrincham he bought the card, wrote the message and posted it the following day.

I had hoped I could find May Campbell but she and her address in Hulme have proved impossible to find either back in 1907 and I think now will have vanished.

All of which just leaves me with the Flyer and that cricket game.

Picture; Our Local Express, 1907, from the collection of David Harrop** and detail of the walk from the OS map of South Lancashire, 1893, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Manchester Guardian, March 3 & 4, 1907

**David Harrop, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/David%20Harrop 

Stories from the cellar ...... part 8 ........ getting around the capital in 1965

It’s odd what you come across while looking for that thing you put away, because you knew that one day it would come in handy.

Of course, I never found the thing, but instead uncovered another folder full of family memories.

This one I guess belonged to dad, after all he was a coach driver, but it might equally have been me.

Although as I was only 14, I doubt I would have been using it for its intended purpose as a road map.

But despite the passage of half a century and more I remember it vividly, not least because of those old red London Transport buses, and the Bank of England in the background,  which was one of those places I would stumble across on a Saturday, when I had taken myself off for a wander around the City.

So, having done the nostalgia bit, I looked more carefully at the map, and marveled at the small number of traffic  signs displayed on the back of the map, and just to what extent the road network is still as it was back in 1965.

As treasures go it still  wouldn’t bring a fortune if I ever wanted to put it for sale.

But it remains a nice piece of history, complete with the old Underground map, and the “Theatres, Concert and Exhibition Halls and Cinemas outside the Area of the West End”.

Not bad for a rummage in the cellar on another lockdown day.

Location; London













Picture; Road Map London, Section 1, Esso, 1966

"We shall be pleased to see you” ……. stories and mysteries from Lewisham

Now I know I will find answers to the mysteries behind this picture post card, but not just yet.

It was sent in the June of 1916 to Miss E. Hibberd who was a nurse at Lewisham Military Hospital.

And by the time it was sent it was already a historical anachronism, because some of the faces of those “Commanders of the Allied Armies, 1914" will have changed by the time it was posted.

Finding their identity will be easy, less easy has been the search for Miss E. Hibbert who has proved illusory in the census record.

Equally the Charity I. S. & S. H. S., at 122 Brompton Road, still sits in the shadows, but it’s success in helping over 200,000 deserving cases as witnessed by its record posted on the reverse of the card should make it easy to track down.

The one certainty is the Lewisham Military Hospital which provided 24 beds for officers and 838 for service men including 190 for prisoners of war.  Before the war this had been the Lewisham Union Workhouse and was situated at 390 High Street in Lewisham.

In 1929 the building became the Lewisham Hospital.  The hospital has been largely rebuilt, though some original buildings are still in use”. *

And despite living my entire childhood close to Lewisham, I never knew of its existence.  But given that Peckham where I spent the early years, and Well Hall where we moved to, were both served by excellent hospitals, there is no reason why I should.

Added to which the hospital is not in that bit of Lewisham I would pass through on the bus from Eltham.

Its existence as a war time hospital is a reminder of just how many official buildings along with church halls and private residences were handed over to the war effort.

The card was been acquired by my old friend David Harrop who has managed to source a wartime picture of the hospital, which will be a nice contrast to its appearance today, leaving me just to appeal for any contemporary copyright free image of the building today, along with any photographs of a memorial to its time caring for the servicemen of the Great War.

Location; Lewisham

Picture; postcard, 1916, from the collection of David Harrop

*Wartime Memories Project, Lewisham Military
Hospital,  https://wartimememoriesproject.com/greatwar/hospitals/hospital.php?pid=13732

I Want You To Know We're Still Here .... on the wireless ... all this week

Today I listened to the first episode of I Want You To Know We're Still Here by Esther Safran Foer.

This first episode was entitled A Revelation,and sets the scene for why and how Ester set out to uncover the truth about what happened to both her parents and their extended families during the brutal years of the Holocaust.

There are four more episodes.

"Esther Safran Foer's haunting memoir tells the story of her quest to uncover how her family endured and survived the Holocaust across four generations. Her determination to remember the lives of those lost takes her from her home in Washington to the sites of the shtetls where her parents lived and worked in Urkraine. Read by Sara Kestelman.

When Esther Safran Foer's mother made an extraordinary revelation about her father, Esther set out to uncover the truth about what happened to both her parents and their extended families during the brutal years of the Holocaust. In the absence of memory, mementos, photos, or even names, Esther must find unique ways to record and remember the past. What emerges is a powerful story about loss, memory and the power of kinship and community.

Esther Safran Foer was the CEO of Sixth and I, a centre for arts, ideas and religion. She lives in Washington D.C with her husband Bert. They are the parents of Franklin, Jonathan, and Joshua, and the grandparents of six.

Abridged by Julian Wilkinson

Produced by Elizabeth Allard"*

Picture; cover of I Want You To Know We're Still Here, 2020

*I Want You To Know We're Still Here by Esther Safran Foer, Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000rll7

Occupants of Bamburgh House .......High Lane ... a story from Tony Goulding

 Bamburgh House on High Lane, Chorlton-cum-Hardy is almost exactly 150 years old and has been the home during that time of a number of interesting individuals. 

Bamburgh House, 2018

Some of them have already had their stories told in Andrew’s recent posts on this Blog, below are a few others. Most were gleaned from instances where Bamburgh House residents featured in press reports I found in “Find My Past’s” newspaper archive. 

The earliest reports are dated 15th & 16th May, 1874 from the Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser which record Henry Marshall winning the first prize (£10 and a silver cup or plate) at the International Horse Show being held in the Royal Pomona Gardens in Cornbrook, Manchester. His victory came courtesy of his black pony “Tommy” in the “pony, under 12 hands, to carry children” class. Henry Marshall seems to have been the house’s first tenant, appearing in both the 1871 census and that year’s Chorlton-cum-Hardy rate book.

 After an interval of a quarter of a century another resident of Bamburgh House shows up in the archive; Will Willis is shown in several issues of “Stage” the journal of the theatre industry. The issue of 10th August, 1899 carried an entry from Mr. Will Willis in which he is touting for work describing himself as a comedy and character (actor). Later editions indicate that he did successfully follow his chosen career path as in January, 1910 at Liverpool, Pavillion, February, 1910 Manchester’s, Queen’s Park Hippodrome, and in the Chorley Hippodrome in January, 1915.

Queens Park Hippodrome, Harpurhey

The 1900 rate book for Chorlton-cum-Hardy township has an entry for the property giving the owner as John S(quire) Diggle,1 who had also occupied the house for the previous decade before moving to Southport. The occupier was recorded as Berth Barcroft, who for the present remains a bit of a mystery. Mr. Diggle was born in 1869 in Radcliffe, Lancashire; intriguingly, none of his census entries show him following any occupation, in 1891, 1901, and 1911 he is shown as “living on own means” He died on 11th March and cremated on Wednesday 13th March, 1940. In the previous year’s register, he is shown as “retired” born on 11th February, 1868 and living at 222, Clarendon Road, Whalley Range, Manchester. John Squire Diggle was a well-known breeder of Collie dogs during the 1890’s. On the 4th October, 1893 at the Scottish Kennel Club’s Dog Show in Edinburgh he won the President’s Challenge Cup in the collie bitch class with his “ Chorlton Precilla”. He also won prizes at the Cheshire Agricultural Show in Stockport in September 1891 and the Oban Dog Show in December 1895 when his tricolour “Ringleader” was placed first in the Collie open dog category.

 One of the residents of Bamburgh House in 1939 was Margaret Heathcote Jack2 whose former occupation was given as a kennel maid. The following year she married George William Kenneth Savage a very colourful individual who appears in the press archives on three or four separate occasions. He was born in London on the 17th December, 1911 as shown in his papers on joining the Merchant Navy ship Helder in September, 1939. (these also record he had brown eyes, fair hair & complexion, a scar on his forehead and stood 5’ 91/2” tall. In February, 1933 several papers carried a Reuters account of an epic 30,000 mile “hike” he had been on for 2 years. His adventures included being attacked on an African river boat, wandering in the desert for 23 days, spending a week in jail in Egypt after entering that country without a permit. Later after returning to Europe he hiked through the Brenner Pass between Austria and Italy in such intense cold that he walked continuously for 16 hours for fear of freezing to death.

  On arriving back in Manchester, he set up in business as “Kenneth Savage Boarding Kennels Riding Master” The business soon got into some financial difficulty and he was made bankrupt. His bankruptcy was finally discharged in August, 1946. 

 The Liverpool Daily Post on the 4th September, 1945 carried a report that he, his wife, and 31/2 -years-old son, David, were rescued, the previous morning, by the coastguard at Cemaes Bay and the Holyhead lifeboat when his small yacht was spotted drifting on to the dangerous Skerries reef of Anglesey. 

 On the 13th October, 1948 Mr. Savage also featured in a story in the Manchester Evening News after appearing in court charged with smuggling 30,000 cigarettes from Switzerland. He said he bought them to “use-up” his winnings from a cassino in the South of France. He was found guilty and fined the not insignificant sum of £400 (which equates to almost £15,000 today)

George William Kenneth Savage died on the 9th September, 1961 at 13, Avenue deo Broursailles, Cannes, Alpes Maritimes, France while he was residing on Avenue Font de Veyre, Cannes Le Bocca.

Pictures; Bamburgh House - 2018 from the collection of Tony Goulding, Queens Park Hippodrome, Harpurhey m06605 courtesy of Manchester Libraries, information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http//images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass 

 Notes: -

1) John S Diggle was married to Harriet Eleanor (née Oakes). The baptismal register of St. Clement’s, Chorlton-cum-Hardy has an entry for the baptism of the couple’s daughter, Violet, on the 27th January, 1892, she was born on the 29th October, 1891. The father’s occupation is recorded as “Gentleman”.

2) Margaret Heathcote Jack was born on the 24th January, 1920 in Cheadle Hulme, Stockport, Cheshire. Her father Thomas Alexander was a ladies’ skirts and costumes manufacturer. Her mother was Elsie (née Heathcote) was born on the 15th November, 1885 in the Sefton Park area of Liverpool.

"Found on the Battlefield" .............. three picture postcards from the Great War

There is always a story behind a picture postcard.

In most cases it is the image which takes you to a place or an event long gone and the interest fastens around matching the scene with a similar one today.

And then there are those family portraits especially popular during the Great War.

If you are lucky the identity of the people will be known and possibly even the fate of the young earnest looking man in his ill fitting uniform.

But equally compelling can be the message on the back revealing much about everyday life at the time the card was sent.

Sometimes both the image and the “sentiment” on the reverse combine like those suggestive seaside postcards with a slightly less but still risqué comment on the reverse.

This one is just a little different.  It was one of thousands which played on those powerful feelings  caused by the separation of loved ones with perhaps also a hint of something else.

It was a popular image and reappears in similar form in two other cards.  All three show the same model in pretty much the same clothes accompanied by a man in uniform.

But what makes all three just a tad different is the message on the back which simply  says “Found on the Battlefield.”

And that sets the imagination going.

They could have just been lost or perhaps thrown away or there might be a more tragic explanation.

Of course we will never know.

They belonged to the grandfather of Bob Jones who may have found them or was given them.

Either way they were never used by the person who purchased them and offer just a hint of mystery.

Picture; La Balance des coeurs, date unknown, from the collection of Bob Jones

Reflecting on the National Health Service .......... in the age of Covid

 Yesterday I was vaccinated.

It was the upshot  of my health and my age.

At which point the story could also reflect on those “anti vacs” who sit out there peddling all sorts of bizarre, misleading, and dangerous assertions.

But I won’t other than to say a recent Radio 4 documentary, offered up a historical perspective and set the correct correct.*

So, instead I shall reflect on my visit to the Jain Community Centre in Levenshulme.

The call from the GP had come at the beginning of the week and after being offered several appointments from the following day onwards I opted for Saturday.

I arrived early, waited my turn, and went through the procedure in less than half an hour, from walking through the door, being checked in, vaccinated, and resting for the obligatory 15 minutes.

Everyone from the volunteers through to the medical teams were helpful, reassuring and above all mindful that some at least of those receiving the jab might be a bit nervous.  There was plenty of humour mixed with the caring professionalism which marks the NHS out.

James Gillray, 1802

So that is it……. for once no great historical piece of research or interesting sets of maps and pictures, just a comment on  how the National Health Service continues to do what it was set up to do …. caring for all of us at the point of need in a way that would not surprise Nye Bevan or all those who advocated and ushered the NHS over 80 years ago.

And of course also a thank you.

Leaving me just to add those cartoons, from the anti vac James Gilray and Cruikshank’s balanced and more accurate comment on vaccination.

 George Cruikshank, 1808

Picture; The Cow-Pock—or—the Wonderful Effects of the New Inoculation!—vide. the Publications of ye Anti-Vaccine Society, James Gillray, published June 12, 1802 by H. Humphrey, St. James's Street, and Jenner and his two colleagues seeing off three anti-vaccination opponents, the dead are littered at their feet. Coloured etching by George Cruikshank, 1808, Welcome Collection, https://wellcomecollection.org/works?query=x7kbxaef&search=images

*The Long View of the Anti-Vaccination Movement, The Long View, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000pffk