Pictures from Prestwich

 Now l have my friend Alan Jennings to thank for this picture of Wine and Wallop's on Bury New Road, in Prestwich.

Alan writes an excellent blog on Facebook and I thank him for permission to use his photograph.

Location; Bury New Road

Picture; Wine and Wallop's, Bury New Road, 2024, from the collection of Alan Jennings

A soldier of the Great War ............ George Henry Longstaff, 1879-1917

This is the grave of George Henry Longstaff who died April 29 1917 in Bradford Hospital and was buried in Prestwich Cemetery and given he belonged to the Canadian Expeditionary Force I wondered at the story which led from Canada to Prestwich.

And there was indeed a story which started not in Canada but in Lancashire in 1897 where Private Longstaff was born.

In time I will search out his early life, but I know that by 1901 he was working in the Preswich District Lunatic Asylum as an “attendant upon the in the insane.”  His father has also worked in the same hospital.

He married Margaret Mary Hindley in 1903 and left for Canada three years later where he became a “rancher.”

And in 1915 he enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, and sailed the following year for Britain.

He arrived in France in January 1917, and a month later was “in the Field,” sustained gunshot wounds, and was transferred back to Britain where he died of those wounds in the April of 1917.

We are fortunate in that we have his entire military records which include his will, and a description.

He was 5 feet 9½ tall, with a “fresh complexion, blue eyes and brown hair.”

I would like to think his family which included eight siblings visited his grave, although sadly as Antony’s picture bears witness looks a little forgotten today.

So I am pleased Antony came across the grave and we were able to find out something of Private Longstaff.

Location; Prestwich, & Canada

Picture; the grave of Private George Henry Longstaff, Prestwich Cemetery, 2017 courtesy of Antony Mills

*Library and Archives Canada, http://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/military-heritage/first-world-war/personnel-records/Pages/image.aspx?Image=471147a&URLjpg=http%3a%2f%2fcentral.bac-lac.gc.ca%2f.item%2f%3fop%3dimg%26app%3dCEF%26id%3d471147a&

Where to Live and When to Buy …….. Chorlton or Prestwich 1914?

Now I am not a great fan of that cheap journalism which pits one period against another to make some superficial observations.

St Mary's Prestwich, 1952

But in this case I shall, if only because it arises from an earlier story which picked up on a 1914 newspaper article comparing the relative merits of Chorlton and Sale with Prestwich.

In the course of which the writer referred to Chorlton “as a particularly bright little suburb, [which] has the clean, cheery, holiday aspect of a seaside resort, [and] the favourite suburb of newly married couples, [with] a honeymoon atmosphere”.*

And in direct contrast to Sale which was where newly married couples  went “next when thy get on and prosper in the world”.

All of which may have been the case in 1914, but a full century and a bit later, I wonder if the residents of Chorlton or Sale would recognise themselves in those descriptions.

Or for that matter, just how much of Prestwich still conforms to his view that “the village itself is very plain and uninteresting, but the moment one leaves the main street one plunges into the picturesque and winding lanes, like Rectory Lane, with its magnificent old trees ….. and despite a good deal of building in Prestwich of late years since the tram reached it …. The new building has not impaired the old picturesqueness.

Heaton Cottage Farm, 1945

Ancient farmhouses, smithies, and carters’ inns are still to be found surviving there.  

There are some very delightful old things still to be found on odd corners of Prestwich”.

 So far so good, and as one who chose to first buy on the east of the city after years in student land in south Manchester, I could and still do see the merits of living away from the arc of suburbia which runs from Sale round to Didsbury, taking in Chorlton, Whalley Range, Fallowfield, and Burnage.

But, this was not really the point of the original article which was less about the beauty of Chorlton as opposed to the delightful “lanes and fine trees” of Prestwich, and more about selling houses.

So, having gently pointed out that it cost just 1½d to travel from the city into Chorlton and the same to Prestwich village, the article sweeps all before it arguing the case for owning property.

This was a far more secure investment than “most securities”, but above all as the “period of low house prices is drawing to a close” and with the demand for houses rising, at a time when building costs were also on the way up, the decision to buy “cannot be denied”.

Chorlton Golf course, circa 1930

Concluding with what he took to be the unshakable argument “it is the duty of every man to provide a house for his wife and children”.

But then …….how could it ever be otherwise when the writer was no less than Mr. Robert Clayton, Managing Director, Commercial Estates, Ltd of 176 Deansgate, Manchester? 

A man who “has bought and sold more houses and shop property than any half dozen firms in Lancashire, and is acknowledged by all to be the leading expert in the profession”.

Leaving me just to wonder how a modern estate agent might pitch the relative merits of Chorlton against Prestwich, and refer you to the countless articles about the advantages of life in Chorlton over the rest of the world.

Location; Prestwich and Chorlton

Picture; St Mary's Church, Prestwich, from the clough, 1952, m71008, Prestwich, Heaton Cottage Farm, 1945, m16133, T. Baddeley,courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass Chorlton Golf Club, circa 1930s, courtesy of Jennie Brooks

*Where to Live and when to Buy, The Manchester Guardian, May 10th, 1914

Walking through the church yard of St Mary Prestwich ……. with Alan Jennings

I am a great fan of Alan Jennings’s blog which chronicles his almost daily activity helping maintain the church of St Mary.

Yesterday he gave me permission to repost one of his blog posts.

“This morning I thought that I would not gather any information for my blogs today, because the weather was so poor, but I then thought, how can I disappoint my loyal readers, so I put on my coat and went to the churchyard, it poured down and I got soaked, there was nobody else there and I had the churchyard to myself. 

The grave I had decided to investigate was that of the Slagg family, not so much because of those who lie under this Tombstone but more because of the Architect who designed it.

The Venetian Gothic style of the Slagg family chest tomb with its polished pink granite colonettes dates from the early work of the eminent architect, indeed the most successful Victorian architect Alfred Waterhouse RA, born 19th July 1830 and died 22nd August 1905, he was particularly associated with the Victorian Gothic Revival and is best known for his design of Manchester Town Hall and the Natural History Museum in London, he also designed the Assize courts at Strangeways which were bombed during the Second World War and had to be demolished but we must not stray too far from whose tomb this is, John Slagg who died on February 25th, 1875, was a neighbor of Waterhouse when he lived at Barcombe Cottage Fallowfield and commissioned this Monument in 1863. 

John was a businessman and Justice of the Peace at Manchester and his friend Anti-corn law campaigner Richard Cobden was his sons Godfather. John Slagg Junior followed his father into business, 

He became President of the Manchester chamber of commerce. in 1885 he was appointed as a director of the Suez canal company, he made his home at Hopefield Pendleton, he was elected M.P. for Manchester in 1880, lost his seat in 1885 and then won a by-election in Burnley, he was a Liberal Politician, he was only 47 when he died at his Mayfair London home in 1889. 

Now those of you who are admirers of Alfred Waterhouse do not have to travel to Manchester to see his work, you only have to visit our very own churchyard. 

If you look at the photo of the tomb that I have posted from Ian Pringle's book St Mary Prestwich... A Description of the Churchyard, you will see that it was once surrounded by iron railings like many other of the graves, these were removed during the Second World War".

Alan Jennings ©2019

Location; Prestwich

Pictures; from the collection of Alan Jennings, and Pringle, Ian, St Mary Prestwich... A Description of the Churchyard