Scholes Square ….. fifty-one of its residents …. and a bit of Manchester’s past

 You won’t find Scholes Square today.

Scholes Square, 1908

I only came across it by accident when looking for pictures of London Road on Manchester’s digital archive.

It was a tiny court off Scholes Street which in turn was off Store Street.

The square survived into the last century, but only just and now the site is covered by a modern warehouse which itself is empty and looking for an occupant.

And added to the difficulty of locating it comes the name change which saw Scholes Street become Stand Street.

All a tad confusing.

To which I can add that as, yet I am unclear when it was built.

It doesn’t appear on Johnson’s map of Manchester for 1818 but is shown on the OS for 1844, and judging by the maps and the picture it didn’t have much going for it.

It backed on to a smithy and was totally enclosed on three sides.

You entered from Store Street by a flight of stairs and were confronted by eight one up one down properties, which just seven years later had been reduced to six.

Scholes Square, 1851

In 1851 the court was home to fifty-one people with most of the residents working for the railways or in the cotton factories. 

And the textile jobs ranged from piecers, to power loom weavers and interestingly one who gave her occupation as “Silk weaver by hand”.

This left a blacksmith, a joiner a servant and charwoman.

All of which made sense for this part of Manchester which was dominated by London Road Railway Station, accompanying railway warehouses and a series of cotton mills.

Nor am I surprised that in 1851 of the fifty-one inhabitants, 37% had been born in Ireland, 47 % from Manchester and the rest from Salford, Wigan and other parts of the northwest.

And there is evidence of serious over crowding with two families living at no. 2 and two at no.6.  

At no. 2 Mr. and Mrs Dowling shared with Hannah Wild who sublet her space to two lodgers, while Daniel and Sarah Finn and there two children shared with the Cass family which consisted of two adults and five children.

In time I will go looking for how the lives of some of these residents panned out, but for now it is enough to know that the picture I found by chance opens up a bit of Manchester’s story.

Location; Scholes Square

Pictures; Stand Street, off Store Street, 1908, m04569, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, and Scholes Square in 1851, 1851 from Adshead’s map of Manchester, Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

Paradise Walk ……… almost a lost and forgotten street of Manchester

Paradise Walk ought to be one of those twisty little byways which to misquote the poem is “half as old as time”.

Store Street, 1920 looking for Paradise Walk

It was a place I had never come across despite many happy hours wandering the area between Ducie Street and Store Street.

It was Sean Kelly who alerted me to its presence today, with “Could I suggest Paradise Walk, off Ducie Street, Andrew? It’s a sort of short cut and I suspect a lot of history......”, adding “it's been well poshed up, relatively, since around 2000. Wonder whether the Central Library archives have a photo”.

On a warm summer’s day with little else to do, I can see its attractions, because it starts as a narrow pathway sandwiched between a tall building,  before joining the towpath of the Ashton Canal and exiting by a set of steps onto Store Street.

But as delightful as the walk can be, you do have to look for it, and it’s easy to miss both starting points.  

The area in 1894

The Ducie Street entrance is almost opposite where Ducie Street joins Aqueduct Street, while access from Store Street is up a flight of stone steps beside the arch of the aqueduct which carries the canal over the road.

Still I thought I was dealing with one of those very old routes, and mused that here could be all that was left of a closed court which long ago had lost its houses.

But not so, it does not appear on the OS map for 1849, Adshead’s map of 1851, or subsequent ordinance survey maps into the 1950s.   

In 1951 at the Ducie Street end there was a Whittles Croft, which sixty years earlier had been Whittles  Croft Wharf.

And yes, once a long time ago that stretch of Ducie Street which twists away up to Pigeon Street was Whittles Croft and Mather Street. 

So I await those in possession of more recent maps to pinpoint when Paradise Walk emerged.

The area in 1851

If I had to guess, I reckon it will be sometime at the turn of the century when work was undertaken on the canal ….. but I could be wrong …… probably am wrong.

Sorry Sean.

Location; Ducie Street/Store Street

Pictures; Store Street, 1920 looking for Paradise Walk, T Brooks, m10640,courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass  Ducie Street/Store Street, 1894, from the OS map of South Lancashire, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/ 

 

Dropping down Stoney Brew …….

I am back with Stoney Brew a place I have written about and regularly visit.*

It’s that dramatic Manchester road with the steep incline.

Catch it from the top going down in a car and it can be scary, and equally so trying to reach the top in an under powered vehicle with a heavy load.

Officially it is Jutland Street and connects Ducie Street with Store Street, and it is where the road  goes over the Ashton Canal.  

Historically it was Junction Street and has claimed many unwary drivers over the centuries.

I first came across it in the summer of 1975 in the company of Norman Parry who had grown up here in the shadow of what is now Piccadilly Railway Station.

And it was Norman who told me of the tragic accident sometime in the late 1920s when a carter tried his luck with a heavily loaded horse drawn wagon descending to Store Street.

He lost control and the wagon its load and the horse crashed into the wall of the timber yard at the bottom.

Outside those who lived or grew up around the road which carried the nickname Stoney Brew, there will be few who know of its existence, unless of course you choose to let the sat nav take you that way.

Location; Store Street/Ducie Street

Pictures; Stoney Brew, 2025, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

* Stoney Brew, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Stoney%20Brew

Looking for the lost Aqueduct Street … and finding Paradise Walk and a canal

I have finally done Paradise Walk.

Following the steps to Paradise, 2025

It’s a rather uninviting set of steps leading from Store Street up an alley which twists a bit and comes out on Ducie Street.

For about half its length part of the walk is bounded by the wall of the Ashton Canal aqueduct which crosses Store Street.

It was Sean Kelly who alerted me to its presence a few years ago, with “Could I suggest Paradise Walk, off Ducie Street, Andrew? It’s a sort of short cut and I suspect a lot of history......”, adding “it's been well poshed up, relatively, since around 2000. Wonder whether the Central Library archives have a photo”.

Aqueduct Street, 1894

And straight away I did a bit of research, wrote a few stories for the blog but never did the walk.*

Central Library’s archive had nothing on Paradise Walk but a succession of OS maps through the 19th century into the 20th show its route, but not as a walk but as Aqueduct Street, replete with 25 houses.

They were there by 1849 and still show up in 1951, but had gone just two decades later, and some time after that had been shifted slightly to the east and reduced to a narrow path.

Still even as such it’s a little bit of our past and one of those walks which are fun to do.

Perhaps a bit claustrophobic, and spoilt by spray paint messages pretending to be art. 

And having done the walk it is possible to access the towpath beside the canal along the aqueduct with fine views of Store Street below.

Location; Paradise Walk, Store Street and a canal

Travelling Paradise Walk, 2025

Pictures; the steps of Aqueduct Street, 2025, from the collection of Andrew Simpson and Store Street, 1894, from the OS map of South Lancashire, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Paradise Walk, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Paradise%20Walk

Serendipity on Store Street …… a story over three centuries

I say serendipity which according to the dictionary is “the fact of finding interesting or valuable things by chance” and it was a bit out of the blue that someone  asked today about Store Street just days after I had written about the place.

Living off Store Street, 1904

Store Street and Fairbairn’s Buildings, 1849

More so because it also features in the new book The History of Greater Manchester By Tram, Piccadilly Gardens to New Islington.*

The request related to the height of buildings along the last stretch where it joins Great Ancoats Street.

And this was in some ways slim pickings.  

The main building after Junction Street was the Vulcan Iron Foundry which was doing the business of bashing metal from 1849, and while the building was still there in 1894, it was disused but later repurposed as an Iron and Steel warehouse.

And most of it still serves a place where metal is worked.

Opposite in 1849 was an open space which over the centuries became a timber yard, a scrap metal business and in the early 2000s a collection of undistinguished red brick workshops, before being swept away in 2019 for a tall development.

Now, as unpromising as the first search seemed to pan out, this was one of those fascinating places which mirrored the swift development of this bit of the city.

The arrival of the Ashton Canal and its neighbour the Rochdale Canal in the 1790s followed by the railway in 1842  turned the area into a thriving industrial and residential area which in turn takes us back to the Vulcan Iron Works and directly behind the Shooter’s Brook Iron Works. 

And it is this later foundry which has drawn me in, because in 1851 it was owned by a William Fairbairn who had a portfolio of properties known as Fairbairn’s Buildings.

Store Street and Fairbairn’s Buildings, 2025

They were off Store Street along a tiny alley facing the side of the Vulcan Foundry.

There were five in all and commanded rents ranging from six shillings and eight pence to two shillings and 9 pence with a charge of just over a shilling for one of the cellars. Not that they got into the street directory but we know who lived in them, through the Rate Books.

That said the resident in 1851 are proving elusively difficult to find on the census record.

Leaving just the site of where they lived which is still there off Store Street and runs up the side of Stockton’s Furniture Store and a car park.

For those who want to walk the walk Fairbairn’s Buildings took up perhaps half that car park.

As for William Fairbarin he is recorded in the street directories and census records as an engineer and lived at “6 Polygon beyond Ardwick Green” in the then fashionable and well healed area, home to merchants, manufacturers and cotton spinners.

And now I am not so sure.  This William Fairbarin  was a notable engineer ending up as a baronet, and I think may not have engaged in muky business and property.

The trouble is the only other possible candidate also gave his occupation as an engineer but lived in Fielden Street which was off Oldham Road in that desnley packed part of the city a far cry from the Polygon. 

And that is it.

Other than to say that the image Living off Store Street, in 1904 was Stand Street, now gone, and it was originally Scholes Square, a place of which I have already written about.**

And here I cheated because it was located at the other end of Store Street, but it is a striking image and deserves to be in.

Location; Store Street

Pictures. Stand Street, No's 26 and 28, formerly Scholes Square Passage off Store Street, 1906, m04571.,courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, Store Street and Fairbairn’s Buildings, from the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1849, courtesy of Digital Archives Association http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/, and the same spot in 2025, courtesy of Google Maps

*A new book on the History of Greater Manchester by Tram, Piccadilly Gardens to New Islington, Andrew Simpson & Peter Topping available in September Buildings, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/A%20new%20book%20on%20the%20History%20of%20Greater%20Manchester%20by%20Tram

**Scholes Square ….. fifty-one of its residents …. and a bit of Manchester’s past, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2025/07/scholes-square-fifty-one-of-its.html

Memories of an ancient accident … one canal …. and that steep incline … Stoney Brew

Nothing quite prepares you for the way Jutland Street just drops away in front of your eyes.

Jutland Street before the drop, 2025

It is the road that runs from Ducie Street down to Store Street and it crosses the Ashton Canal. 

I first came across it in the summer of 1975 in the company of Norman Parry who had grown up close to the canal and still remembered all his childhood haunts.

Looking up Jutland Street, 1966

It had been a conversation one dinner hour about old Manchester that prompted Norman to offer a guided tour of the back streets around Piccadilly Railway Station and the basin of the Aston Canal.

And having told me he had learnt to swim in the canal he mischievously brought me to the summit of Jutland Street and with an impish smile told me to walk ahead of him and was pleased with my stunned reaction.

The road does just fall away, and it is a marvel that in the age of the horse and cart it was not prohibited to travel down the incline.

But I guess carters did take the chance, but with a heavy load and primitive brakes it has always struck me as an accident about to happen.

And looking down, 2025

And some time in the 1930s witnessed by Norman that is what happened.  A fully loaded wagon plummeted down the road smashing into a stone pillar outside what had been a timber yard.  The carter escaped but the horse was crushed.

All of which makes the popular name for the road which was “Stoney Brew” quite apt, but I sometimes wonder whether the present residents in their fine modern apartments on either side of Jutland Street are aware of the nick name, and I certainly don’t think they have come across the accident.

Looking at that incline it makes me think that ascending the road with a full load must have been equally dangerous.

The canal and Junction/Jutland Street 1849

And yet waggons must have done the trip, because the Ashton Canal ran in to a busy basin which back in 1849 was surrounded by the warehouses of various canal companies as well as the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway and the North Staffordshire Railway, assorted coal wharfs and stone yards along with the Store Street Iron Works.

The canal had been completed in 1797 and my Priestly tells me “The Town of Manchester derives considerable advantage by the facility with which this canal and branches supply it with stone and coal at an easy rate”.*

And that for now is it.

Location; Jutland Street, formerly Junction Street

Pictures; Jutland Street from Store Street, 1966, : m02382, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and Jutland Street, 2025, courtesy of Google Maps and the area in 1849, .from the OS for Manchester & Salford, 1842-49, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Historical Account of the Navigable Rivers, Canals, and Railways Throughout The United Kingdom, John Priestly, 1830

Paradise Walk ..... almost a lost Manchester Street .... but not quite

 Paradise Walk ought to be one of those twisty little byways which to misquote the poem is “half as old as time”.

Store Street, 1920 looking for Paradise Walk

It was a place I had never come across despite many happy hours wandering the area between Ducie Street and Store Street.

It was Sean Kelly who alerted me to its presence today, with “Could I suggest Paradise Walk, off Ducie Street, Andrew? It’s a sort of short cut and I suspect a lot of history......”, adding “it's been well poshed up, relatively, since around 2000. Wonder whether the Central Library archives have a photo”.

On a warm summer’s day with little else to do, I can see its attractions, because it starts as a narrow pathway sandwiched between a tall building,  before joining the towpath of the Ashton Canal and exiting by a set of steps onto Store Street.

But as delightful as the walk can be, you do have to look for it, and it’s easy to miss both starting points.  

The area in 1894

The Ducie Street entrance is almost opposite where Ducie Street joins Aqueduct Street, while access from Store Street is up a flight of stone steps beside the arch of the aqueduct which carries the canal over the road.

Still I thought I was dealing with one of those very old routes, and mused that here could be all that was left of a closed court which long ago had lost its houses.

But not so, it does not appear on the OS map for 1849, Adshead’s map of 1851, or subsequent ordinance survey maps into the 1950s.   

In 1951 at the Ducie Street end there was a Whittles Croft, which sixty years earlier had been Whittles  Croft Wharf.

And yes, once a long time ago that stretch of Ducie Street which twists away up to Pigeon Street was Whittles Croft and Mather Street. 

Whittles Croft Wharf, 1939

So I await those in possession of more recent maps to pinpoint when Paradise Walk emerged.

If I had to guess, I reckon it will be sometime at the turn of the century when work was undertaken on the canal ….. but I could be wrong …… probably am wrong.

Sorry Sean.

Location; Ducie Street/Store Street

Pictures; Store Street, 1920 looking for Paradise Walk, T Brooks, m10640,and Whittles Croft, 1939, m53789, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass  Ducie Street/Store Street, 1894, from the OS map of South Lancashire, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/