There's a valley in Spain called Jarama* ……

I grew up with stories of the International Brigade whose men and women went out to fight alongside the democratically elected Government of Spain against the forces of General Franco, his African army and a rat bag of conservative, ultra-nationalist and Fascist groups.

Spain Fights for Independence, For Peace and Solidarity Among All Peoples, 1936

Their battle honours included the defence of Madrid, the battles of Jarma, Brunete, Aragon, Teruel  and Ebro.

Their units were drawn from Britain, The USA, as well as Italy and Germany and the rest of Europe. 

Between 40,000 and 59,000 members served in the International Brigades with some 10,000 who died in combat

I was lucky enough to have met some of those who participated in the war including the writer Ted Willis who organised and drove food convoys to Spain.**

Later still I wrote about Madge Addy who worked in hospitals on the Republican side and was the last nurse out of Spain before the defeat of the Government and the victory of  Franco’s Nationalist army.***

Aid for the Basque Heroes,

So, I was intrigued by a conversation with my old Facebook chum Tony Flynn on a proposed plan for a lasting memorial to those from Salford who participated in the Spanish Civil War.

 Heading up the story he wrote, “I was speaking to Barrie Eckford an active member of Salford Trades Council and the International Brigade Memorial Trust which keeps alive the memory and spirit of the men and women who volunteered to defend democracy and fight fascism in Spain”.

Tony named the men from Salford who went out to Spain and in a fascinating article made an appeal for more information on the those who went and others who as yet have not been recorded.  

The article can be read by following the link and you can contact him at tony@salford.media or via messenger on Facebook.

Location; Spain and Salford

Pictures; Spain Fights for Independence, For Peace and Solidarity Among All Peoples, G. M. 1936-39,  Aid for the Basque Heroes, S H Prives, from The Palette and the Flame, 1980, and Nurse Madge Addy giving a blood transfusion; Daily Worker, November 11, 1938

 Nurse Madge Addy from Chorlton giving a blood transfusion, 1938

* Jarama Valley, ,Alex McDade, of the British Battalion, XV International Brigade, 1938  

**Whatever Happened to Tom Mix, Ted Willis, 1970

***Madge Addy, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Madge%20Addy

****PROPOSED PLANS FOR A LASTING MEMORIAL TO LOCAL PEOPLE WHO FOUGHT AND DIED IN THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR, Tony Flynn,  https://salford.media/news/local-news/proposed-plans-for-a-lasting-memorial-to-local-people-who-fought-and-died-in-the-spanish-civil-war-r510/?fbclid=IwAR0UbZdnj0U-oWBkqhcgFzKf5rscJHE8vLlHSvXnU4d5ngpuBwC_eBYZ1HY

When the Silk Street Police Station became “Working-Class Flats in Salford”

Now there is nothing new in converting old industrial and civic buildings into residential properties.

From the Manchester Guardian, 1932

And that is how the old Police Station on Silk Street became flats via a spell as a remand centre for young juvenile offenders.

The police had been opened in 1867 on the east side of Silk Street between North Charles Street and North Thomas Street.  Both of these vanished long ago for anyone wanting to find the spot on a modern map the best I can offer is to look for North Hill Street which once ran all the way up to Silk Street, and from that junction moved a little north towards Blackfriars Road and that’s the spot.

It continued as a police station until 1918 when it became “a place of detention for juvenile offenders” and was run by the Watch Committee.

Silk Street Police Station, 1894

But 1932 the new Children and Young Persons Act transferred the responsibility for young offenders from the Watch Committee “to the City Council who delegated their duties to the Education Committee who closed the detention Centre.”*

The Council then sold the police station to Salford Housing Ltd who had deemed that the property could be converted in residential use.

The plan was to “turn the building into working-class self contained flats [with] two on the ground floor, one with one bedroom and other with two.  The upper storey will be made into a flat with three bedrooms.  Each flat will have an electric installation and be provided with a bath and separate convenience.”*

This followed the conversion of “twelve back to back one –room-up-and-down cottages also on Silk Street into six houses, each with Kitchen, and scullery, two bedrooms and a bath."* 

Pictures; extract from the Manchester Guardian, 1934 and part of Silk Street, 1894, from the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1894 courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

* Working Class Flats in Salford Converting an Old Police Station, Manchester Guardian April 7, 1934

1931 on Vine Street Kersal .........with a link to Manchester and Sheffield

Now here is one of those little mysteries which I know we will never quite get to the bottom of.

The picture postcard is entitled Kersal from the Cliff and is a fascinating snap shot of the river and surrounding area.

But as ever it is the message on the back which for me is equally interesting.

It is from Edna writing to Miss Hilda Pursall, c/o The Brightside & Carbrook Co-op Society, City Stores, Exchange Street, Sheffield.

Edna proudly tells her friend that she was “having a great time.  Church marked with a cross is where I am staying.  There are 14 Boys & only 2 girls.”

The card caught the 1.30 post and was sent on June 16, 1931.

Now Edna makes reference to the 1.30 bus so I guess she caught an earlier one and posted it on the way.

The post mark might even give me a clue as to where, so I shall go and ask David Harrop who passed the card over to me from his collection.

In the meantime I went looking for where she lived because most helpfully she added it to the back.  It was “Thorncliffe," Vine Street, Kersal.

Now I am unsure what the property was in 1931 but two decades earlier it was the home of Thomas Crompton Waterhouse who described himself as a “cotton manufacturer” and earlier an importer of “foreign dress goods” with offices at 27 Church Street, Manchester which runs from High Street to Tib Street.

I can’t be sure if the building that occupies the site today is the one he carried on his business from or whether he would approve of its current use as a tattoo parlour.

Now that is bit away from “Thorncliffe” at 18 Vine Street which was a sixteen roomed house and was a tad smaller than the rectory which had 21 rooms but head of its neighbours.

In time I will take a walk down Vine Street.

Sadly a similar trip to City Stores, Exchange Street in Sheffield will draw a blank because it has long gone possibly under a recent development on an unremarkable 1960s shopping precinct called the Castle which itself has all but been knocked down.

This I know because our Josh and Polly live close by and the last time we were there it was a pile of rubble.

And that really is a long way from Kersall.

Location; Salford










Picture; Kersal from the Cliff, circa 1931, from the collection of David Harrop

All the fun of the seaside from a studio in Salford.

Now I like other people’s family pictures and it is a bit of a privilege to be allowed to use them.

So I am grateful to Alan who over the last few weeks has tirelessly dug out, scanned and sent me photographs of his family from the beginning of the last century.

They are a unique collection for not everyone has bothered to save these pictures.  Often they have no date and no name so that within a few generations their meaning is lost and they run the risk of being thrown out.

In the case of this collection Alan knows the people staring back at us and armed with a name and a few brief biographical details it is possible to bring them out of the shadows.

But today rather than concentrate on the person it is the picture that fascinates me.  From the moment the first commercial photographers set up shop they were keen to make their portrait pictures just that bit different.

And so along with varied and often exotic props came the backcloth and of course where better to be photographed than by the seaside.

Now I made that classic mistake and assumed this was Blackpool which by the 1890s was the seaside resort of choice not only for the North West but for all over the North and it could count on upwards of 3 million staying for the full week.
But no, I have been corrected and rightly so by Bill Sumner who points out that the the backdrop is "New Brighton Tower and New Brighton Pier".

That said it is equally possible that the picture was actually taken within sight of the Tower, giving that week away just a permanent reminder of the sun sand and I hope no rain.
To which Alan has commented, "apparently it's New Brighton tower and stood 15m higher than Blackpool's tower but it only stood just over 20 years".

Picture; courtesy of Alan

A pint in the Racecourse Hotel at Kersal before blowing it on the 3.20

Now this is one of the stories I am going to pretty much leave at the pictures.

We are on Littleton Road, Lower Kersal and Andy Robertson had taken himself off down there yesterday.

And this is the Racecourse Hotel which “was built in 1930 to attract the race goers” and I bet there will be a fair few stories of afternoons in the place which effortlessly slid into a night time session.

It is not a pub I ever went in but I recognise the size and style which came to dominate that new wave of pub building in the 1920s and 30s.

They were big, often very impressive looking buildings and built with the motor car in mind.

So what a half century ago might have been a stables and yard now became a car park.

And often they were created in the new estates and out on the bigger roads on the edge of the countryside.

So all memories of the Racecourse Hotel would be most welcome.

Location Salford





Pictures; the Racecourse Hotel, 2016 from Andy Robertson’s Salford collection

A Salford coal merchant and his two daughters who lived on Needham Avenue in Chorlton

This is Jacob Brimelow, coal merchant and I am guessing we will be somewhere in Salford. 

I don’t have a date but as Jacob was 25 in 1901 and a year later the family migrated to Australia where they stayed until the 1920s it is just possible that we are back in Salford just after they returned.

And there is a lot more to the picture because the wagon carried the name of William Perkins who was one of 11 coal merchants who had their offices at the coal depot on Ordsall Lane in 1911.

Jacob’s father had also been a coal merchant but appears to have changed occupations having described himself as a commercial clerk in 1881 but a decade later was selling coal.

And it may be that we can pin point that change to sometime after 1886 because in that year he is absent from the trade directories.

So with a bit more digging we should able to get an exact date for when he began trading and likewise when in the 1920s Jacob was also plying the Salford streets.

All of which brings me back to that picture and a date.

Look closely and at the rear of the wagon is a motor car while the hat and coat of the woman looking on suggest sometime in the 1920s or possibly early 1930s.

And I think we are dealing with something special for neither Jacob or the lad on the wagon are dirty or in their everyday work clothes.

Added to which the horse is decked out in gleaming brasses and head gear which may mean we are at the start of a special parade, but what that was is for now anyone’s guess.

But I have every confidence we shall.

Not that that is the end of the story, for two of Jacob's daughters who were born in Australia were later to settle in Chorlton and live beside each other in Needham Avenue.

Picture; Jacob Brimelow, date unknown, from the collection of Susan Barlow and familly.