Now this is one of the best views across to what was Gooldens Buildings, which stood just a short distance from Great Ancoats Street and faced the Ashton Canal.
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| Looking towards Gooldens Buildings, 2022 |
If I wanted to be entirely accurate the buildings were just a little past the lock keepers gate house heading east to the main road.
Sod’s Law dictated that I wasn’t looking for them when I wandered around New Islington on Monday, and the exact spot was occupied by builders on a break, the odd parent with a push chair and heaps of passers-by, making taking pictures a bit difficult.*
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| Gooldens Buildings, 1851 |
Nor had I heard of the eight properties which made up “Gooldens Buildings”, but as you do having decided to investigate what the area was like in the mid-19th century they seemed a perfect starting point.
Three of the eight were back to backs and the remainder seem to have had a backyard.
They formed a rough L shape with the larger houses fronting the canal and the smaller ones running off at right angles, beyond which there were more houses and one of those closed courts of 13 back-to-back one up one down properties looking onto Booth’s Court, where sunlight and fresh air struggled to penetrate.
Gooldens Buildings started as a row of houses but appear to have given its name to the stretch of thoroughfare along side the canal up to Great Ancoats Street. So long after the original houses had vanished or were converted into retail and industrial use, the name Gooldens Buildings remain.
By the 1920s some of the site had become a collection of warehouses and a factory and later still in 1953 the footprint is the same. Tantalizingly there is only one picture of the street dated 1962 showing the corner of Gooldens Buildings and Great Ancoats Street with a hint of one of the warehouses.
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| The canal close to Gooldens Buildings, 2022 |
The first reference to the eight properties of Gooldens Buildings, dates from 1833 and the last from 1890. These come from the Rate Books and offer up the names of various owners and residence over those 57 years.
As to exactly when they were constructed is still in doubt, but I think it will be sometime after 1819 because they do not appear on Johnson’s map of that year.
All of which leads me to burrow down into their history and explore who called them home.
The census returns show that in the spring of 1851 there were 49 people living in the row, whose ages ranged from the newly born to 76, with 42% below the age of 21.
Most were born in Manchester with a few from Cheshire, one from Yorkshire and one from Hertfordshire.
Their occupations were pretty much what we might expect of an area bounded by two canals and surrounded by textile factories.
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| Gooldens Buildings, 1962 |
The largest grew worked in a variety of jobs to do with the manufacture of cotton, four described themselves as
“Canal Boat” men, and the remainder consisted of a Stone Mason, two Hawkers, a salesman, charwoman, launderess, along with a carter, “
"and a house servant.
Their rents ranged from 2/9d to 4/9d, when an average wage might be £1.**
In time I will pursue the life stories of the 49 including tracking them across the city using the Rate Books and census returns, and possibly the street directories, although I doubt any would have been deemed worthy enough to have featured in the lists of residents of Manchester in the mid 19th century.
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| The promise of more residents, Gooldens Buildings, 2022 |
For now, I will reflect that Gooldens Buildings and the surrounding area will have had a density of living only matched again in the 21st century as New Islington continues to be developed as an attractive part of the inner city.
But unlike today with its mix of waterside attraction, a park and interesting bars and restaurants I think this bit of the city would have been less desirable in 1851.
During the day the noise from the textile mills, and foundries and the ever present danger the two canals presented to young children Made New Islington a less attractive place to live.
Location; New Islington
Pictures; walking New Islington, 2022, from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and in 1851 from Adshead’s map of Manchester, Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ and Goolden's Buildings, T Brooks,1962,m11279,courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass
*New Islington, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/New%20Islington
**2/9d was two shillings and 9 pennies. There were twenty shillings to a £ and 12 pennies made up a shilling. Converting these sums to post decimal currency has little meaning and perhaps matching earnings with rents makes more sense, although there are comparison historical sites out there.
