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Mr Brasch, and the ongoing tale of our own brewery

February 18, 2018, 6:30 pm
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Now this is another of those stories which is just about to give up its secrets.

The Bavarian Brewery, 1887
Most will know we had a brewery but my old friend Tricia has uncovered a bit more.

She told me, “I found the following entry in The Post Office Home County Directory for 1887.  Bavarian Brewery Co Ltd  (Moritz Brash Manager) High Street Eltham. 

Apparently it was originally  established under the name of Bavarian Brewing co in 1866 in Covington, Kentucky by Julius Deglow but became known as Bavarian Brewery in the 1870's. It was family owned until it was acquired by International Breweries in 1959. 

I wonder if this was the brewery at Outtrims Yard by Jubilee Cotts? I would love to find out more”.

The page with the clue, 1887
And so would I, and knowing Tricia she will uncover more.

A quick trawl of the records uncovered an entry in another directory for a Moritz Brasch at 6 Grove Terrace in High Road in Tottenham.

The date was 1882 and while there is an inconsistency in the way the name is spelt, I think this is our chap.

And that will allow us to find out more.

Location; Eltham

Pictures; extracts from The Post Office Home County Directory, Kent, 1886, sourced by Tricia Leslie

* The Post Office Home County Directory, Kent, 1886

**Post Office County Directory, Middlesex, 1882

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On Market Street on a summer day sometime before 1908

February 18, 2018, 7:00 pm
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Judging by this postcard from 1908 nothing much has changed on Market Street.

Then as now it was a busy and bustling place which was compounded back then by the presence of traffic which pushed the crowds to the sides.

And it is the sheer detail that fascinates me.  Lewis’s still retains its individual shop fronts and each window is cluttered with advertisements and price notices.  It is the old “pile ‘em high and sell ‘em cheap approach but Lewis’s still had style and so hanging in front of the shop are a series of elegant light globes, which in the late afternoon of a winter’s day must have added to the magic of shopping there.

But this looks to be a warm summers’ morning heading towards lunch time with some of the crowd in shirt sleeves and at least one couple protected by a parasol.

As you would expect there are plenty of horse drawn vehicles and my attention is drawn to the horse drawn carriage at the bottom of the photograph loaded with a large trunk and basket.  Something has caught the driver’s interest but whatever it is has been blotted out by the superimposed coat of arms of the City.

Which is a shame really but whatever it was seems not to have bothered anyone else, they all continue on their way with just a few attracted by the shops.

So just another day on Market Street then.

Picture; from the collection of Rita Bishop, courtesy of David Bishop

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Lost and forgotten Streets of Salford Nu 3 .......... Clowes Street

February 18, 2018, 7:00 pm
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Of the threes streets that stretch from Chapel Street down to the river Clowes Street has fared the worst.

Clowes Street, 2016
True, at the bottom there are some new blocks of flats overlooking the Irk but the rest is at present a plot of open land waiting development on one side and a car park on the other.

Back in 1850 there were a shed load of properties including some closed courts, the Barley Sheaf pub and the Eagle Foundry.

And the occupations of the street included, a book keeper, beer retailers, skewer maker, button turner, hat box maker and engineer along with a smallware manufacture and Stiffener.

That said not everyone seemed worthy of a mention on the street directory, and quite a few houses are not listed.

Added to which there is the fascinating fact that nine people are recorded at number 21.  All of were male and single.

And as I promised yesterday in the fullness of time I will go looking for the census returns to find out more about Peter Pennington, bookkeeper, Thomas Schofield , beer retailer, Henry Sutcliffe, button turner.

Clowes Street, 1849
Of course nothing stays the same, and that open space will be developed. I might even check out the planning applications to see what will take the place of those small back to backs and closed courts.

Location; Salford 3

Pictures; Clowes Street, 2016 from the collection of Andrew Simpson and in 1849 from the OS for Manchester & Salford, 1842-49 courtesy of Digital Archives Association,http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

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A late day in summer on Barlow Moor Road sometime after 1911

February 18, 2018, 7:30 pm
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It is one of those pictures which are easily recognisable.

We are on Barlow Moor Road and just by the tram is the junction with High Land and Sandy Lane.

Now I can’t be sure of the date but it will be after 1911 when the parade of shops on the left had been built.

Just at the edge of our picture is Christopher Wilson who in 1911 was dealing in furniture.

That’s him I think standing in his shirts sleeves underneath the awning displaying his name.

Next to him was Mrs Winifred Blake the tobacconist with William Armstead confectioner at number 90 and on the corner with High Lane was John Gordon, the fruitier.

Judging by the shadows and trees we must be in the late afternoon of a summers’ day and given the number of people about perhaps close to the end of the working day.

In the middle of the road staring back at the camera are the crew of car number 150 who along with a few other bystanders seem to have little else to do.

Not that everyone is over bothered by the presence f the photographer, so much so that the two men by the lamp post seem oblivious to what is going on while in the distance on the benches in front of the church sit a group of people taking in the sunshine.

And what I like is the little details which fix it in another age.

To our left is the ladder and handcart while beside the tram is another cart and just coming out of Holland Road is a waggon.

There will be lots more I could say about the picture but I rather think I will just leave it at that.

Picture; from the Lloyd collection




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In Eltham with the Reverend John Kenward Shaw Brooke and some revealing records

February 18, 2018, 7:31 pm
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John Kenward Shaw Brooke from an engraving in the church
I am sitting looking at a picture of the Reverend John Kenward Shaw Brooke and have been reflecting on what started as a simple piece of research about the man led me off in all sorts of directions.


John Kenward Shaw Brooke was vicar of St John’s in Eltham from the age of 24 in 1783 till his death in 1840.

Such was his reputation in the parish that on the jubilee of his tenure in office the newly built row of cottages owned by John Fry became known as Jubilee Cottages, a name they retained till their demolition in 1957.

He was in the words of the local historian R.R.C. Gregory “a man greatly revered of strong character, and holding the office of Vicar for the long period of fifty-seven years, he has left a mark upon parochial history more indelible, perhaps, than that of any preceding Vicar.”*

So much so that over 70 years after his death in the summer of 1909 there were engravings of the man “in many of the homes of Eltham ...and so impressive were the demonstrations that took place [to commemorate his fifty years on office in 1833] that the children and grandchildren of those who witnessed them find to this day, a congenial theme for conversational purposes.”

Cover of the by Rev Myers, 1841 
Nor was this all for just a year after his death his life and contribution were recorded in a 22 page booklet focusing particularly on his establishment of the National Infant and Sunday Schools, the endowment he left to the school and his other charity work.**

And as I dug deeper I got side tracked and despite serious efforts to return to our man I was led off on different tracks.

All of which began with the poll books which are not only a record of who could vote in Parliamentary elections but also how they voted.

John Kenward Shaw Brooke appears in a number of them from the late 18th century into the 19th and encompassing the great election after the 1832 Reform Act.

The first comes from 1790 and the last in 1838, and what they show is that the Reverend Shaw Brooke consistently voted Tory.

One of thast enteries by the Reverend Shaw Brook in December 1839
Nor is this all for like so many men of the period he voted in more than one place.

So along with Eltham he was registered in the parish of St Dunstan in the West in the City of London and Wickhambreaux which is just five miles from Canterbury.

And like so many clergymen of the period he also managed more than one church.

In his case the second living was at the Rectory of Hurst-Pierpoint, in Sussex, “where respect and esteem ever awaited him; and where, although his residence was limited to a few weeks annually, he lost no opportunity of promoting the well being of his parishioners, by his sanction and liberal support of every means of advancing their temporal and spiritual interests.”***

But it was in Eltham where he was most busy and trawling the parish records there frequently is his name and of course his handwriting which for any historian is an exciting link with both the man and the period.


Here too purely by chance I came across the burial record of Lucy Jeffery who died in her first year in the June of 1841.

Only weeks before I had uncovered her baptismal records along with her siblings and in the course of charting the family through from the 1840s noted she had fallen off the official records.  At the time I assumed she had changed her name on marriage, and thought that I would follow it up in the future.

Not so, she was buried on June 19th in the parish church yard, which led me to ponder on the ages of the others laid to rest during the period. In time I think it will turn into a major piece of research but for now of the 48 buried during 1840, 19 were under the age of 5 of which many were never to see their first birthday.

Burial record for John Kenward Shaw Brook
It is unscientific, lacks at present any details of the causes of death and is confined to that one year but most of us will I suspect reflect on the lost lives and unfilled futures which they represent.

John Kenward Shaw Brooke had died the year before aged 81 and was buried on December 23rd 1840.

Pictures; John Kenward Shaw Brookes from The story of Royal Eltham, R.R.C. Gregory, 1909 and published on The story of Royal Eltham, by Roy Ayers, http://www.gregory.elthamhistory.org.uk/bookpages/i001.htm,

*The story of Royal Eltham, R.R.C. Gregory, 1909

**Rev W.T.Myers, 1841

***ibid R.R.C. Gregory

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Painting Salford ................. nu 3

February 19, 2018, 6:00 pm
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Here is a painting which needs little in the way of words.

When Peter told me he was planning a series of paintings on Salford Quays I was quite excited and here is one he did earlier back in 2011.

I didn’t know the old docks area.

As a student in the late 1960s they were a bit off the beaten track and then as we progressed across east Manchester and on to Ashton-Under-Lyne Salford was  a long way from home.

But there is no denying the way the place has been transformed with the Lowry, the War Museum and Media City.

Painting; Painting Salford, © 2011 Peter Topping, Paintings from Pictures,
Web:www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk


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Lost images of Whalley Range part 3 the Whalley Hotel

February 19, 2018, 6:30 pm
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I only ever once visited the Whalley Hotel which I think was sometime around the summer of 1975.

There was never any particular reason for this other than it was always somewhere I passed on the bus from town home to Chorlton, and once on the bus it always seemed a faff to get off.

That said the place has dominated the corner since the 1890s.

From the outside it doesn’t seem to have changed much.

The hedges have gone as has the large building which is now the rear car park.

And the houses along Withington Road have also been demolished.

Like some of the other Whalley Range pictures I have been featuring I am hoping that these of the Whalley will stir a few memories which might appear as a post.

Of course it has now closed.






Picture; The Whalley Hotel, Whalley Range, Upper Chorlton Road, 1960, A.H.Downes, m40816, m40813, m40814, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council

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Who doesn’t have their own Beech story?

February 19, 2018, 7:00 pm
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I suppose if you stick around a place long enough you will get to clock a fair few different decorative styles that have been applied to our pubs.

The Beech has had greyish walls, white ones, and if memory serves me a sort of creamy yellow.

So this is my story of the Beech, which is less a story and just a reminder of what once was.

Location; Chorlton










Picture, the Beech, 1979 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

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The new Chorlton ........Faces from market day ...... Saturday

February 19, 2018, 7:00 pm
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Saturday was not the most pleasant of days.


True there was a bit of sun and it wasn’t that cold, but the threat of rain or worse hung over the city.

And on a whim after a morning in the Northern Quarter we came home and wandered the local market.

There was the usual range of interesting things to buy, from artisan bread, home cooked pies, to clothes and bespoke, gin, rum and vodka.

And amongst them all was the stall selling tea.*

Tina bought a pot, while I took the pictures.

In the busy afternoon I forgot to ask permission to use the images but I am sure no one will mind.

And after the tea there was the scarf, the lemon drizzle cake and an assortment of crafted pies

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; market day, Chorlton, 2018











*My Tea,www.myteauk.uk

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The grimy ones ........ our River

February 19, 2018, 7:30 pm
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Now here is another of those short series taken from the family archive.

All were taken around 1979 and offer up scenes of the River which we knew but most tourists seldom saw.

Location; the River

Pictures; the River, 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson


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Corporation Tramways Water car No 1 on Brook Bridge 1930, now that's a zippy title

February 19, 2018, 7:30 pm
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You won’t see one of these on the roads of Chorlton, and yes once they would have been a fairly common sight.

It is a water car and this one was Corporation Tramways Water car No.1 on the Brook Bridge on Barlow Moor Road sometime around 1930.

Now they seem to come in all sorts of designs, size and shape, but they all did the same job which was to clean the tracks.

I have a picture of one from South Shields in front of me as I write and water is cascading from the bottom of the car.  I guess ours worked in the same way. 

And I bet there will be someone out there who either corrects me or supplies further information which I am always happy to have.  

I must admit I have wondered on how many there were in the fleet, how regularly they came round and whether we would have seen more of them in the autumn when the leaves were falling or in the hot summer months when the tracks might have needed cooing down, which just goes to show how little I know.

What I also like about the picture is the hint of other things.  So just to the left of the car and behind the fence can just be made out Oak Farm which was there by the beginning of the 19th century and may be even older.

Location; Chorlton-cum-Hardy

Picture; from the Lloyd collection
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One hundred years of one house in Chorlton part 97......... the noises we make ... the stories they tell

February 19, 2018, 7:30 pm
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The continuing story of the house Joe and Mary Ann Scott lived in for over 50 years and the families that have lived here since.*

We are early rises.  The first coffee of the day can be at anytime between 5 and 6 am and the first out of the house will be up by the old tram terminus by half past six.

But some in the family depending on work patterns, will sleep on, vaguely hearing the noises being made but letting it sit as a backdrop before falling asleep again.

Now I have experienced both.  Once a long time ago it would be dad stoking the fire, listening to the early news bulletin on the wireless, and me, being just aware of the start of his day but knowing I didn’t have to do anything, and that fairly soon all would be silent again.

Half a century on it is me, raking the ash, running the radio and just “clumping around”.
I suspect that my noises are almost a replication of Dad’s and probably also Joe and Mary Ann’s who
moved into our house in 1915 and were the first residents to call it home.

Their noises would have been very much the background to the early 20th century, with the sound of fires being cleared, coal collected from the cellar and noise of countless horses, from the milkman to traders calling with the items Mary Ann had ordered up the day before.

The Scott’s were very modern and embraced all the new consumer goods.
So by the early 1920s there would have been the sound of the telephone, followed by the wireless and in the mid 1950s the television, all of them marking the major shifts in the lives of people during the last century.

Against this were the loss of all those rural sounds including the cows being walked up the road, the call of the ploughman working the fields and the voices of the itinerant tradesmen who wandered into Chorlton carrying anything from brass buttons, to silk finery and the unglamorous but essential items from cooking pots to bars of soap.

That said, Joe and Mary Ann would have seen cows on Beech Road, called in at the smithy and perhaps bought the their eggs from Higginbotham’s farm on the green, or Mr Riley just yards away at Ivy Farm.

And the final transformation from a rural community to a suburb of Manchester would linger on across the last century while the memories of being sent to buy fresh milk from farms around the green are only now fading from living memory.

We are lucky in being able to track all four owners of our house and while in some cases what we know is sketchy it is enough to be fairly confident what noises would have been made during the last century and a bit.

Noises, which would have included the first time the music of Tamla Motown was played in the house, and the sound of John building his boat.

For me one of the most significant sounds has been that of children at play, because our kids were the first children in the history of the house.

But that as they say is another story.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; from the collections of Lois Elsden & Andrew Simpson, 1974-2018, and Graham Gill

*The story of a house,  https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/The%20story%20of%20a%20house

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What was lost is found ...... family stories from a war.

February 20, 2018, 1:56 am
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I never expected to see my uncle’s war medals again.

The medals, 2018
They were entrusted to me by my grandmother and long ago I thought I had lost them.

But they have turned up as part of our family history in the possession of our Jillian.

As I write I am looking at the four and what I had never realized before is that only two belonged to Uncle Roger leaving the other two a mystery.*

Now in my defence I was only something like 11 when Nana handed them over, which for me at least was too young to appreciate their significance.

At the time uncle Roger was a name, a handful of pictures and a cause for great sadness.

Nana never talked about him and mother never lost her anger at the decision to send him to the Far East when she believed the Government knew he would be captured.

Uncle Roger, 1938
He had observed the Manchester Blitz, travelled by convoy to South Africa, and then through the Suez Canal where he witnessed the Fall of Greece and after a short spell in Egypt and Iraq was shipped out to the Far East where he was captured by the Japanese and died in one of their prisoner of war camps.

It took me years to piece together the story of his life and the more I learnt, the more I felt uneasy at my negligence at losing the medals.

But what I thought was lost is no longer but has led to a family mystery.

Of the four medals, two are the 1939-45 War Medal, one is the Burma Star and the last is the France and Germany Star.

Of these I can be fairly confident that one of the 1939-45 medals and the Burma Star are his, but the other two will be someone else in the family.

Mother, 1941

Now mother served in the RAF and so I am guessing the other 1939-45 medal will have been awarded to her, but that just leaves the France and Germany Star.

The only relative to have served in France and Germany was my uncle Fergus but his medals will have stayed with his side of the family.

All of which makes for that mystery.

And as these things do, the story points up the fragility of family memorabilia.

What was cherished by one generation becomes just “stuff” for the next and within another few decades is lost or discarded.

Uncle Roger and mother circa 1939
So I am pleased that I have been reunited with the medals, more so because it fulfils the promise I made to Nana.

Leaving me only to reflect on another promise I made to her, which was never to have a tattoo.

And while three of our children have chosen to have tattoos, I have steadfastly refused, less because of what is entailed but simply because of that promise I made sixty years ago.


Location; 1938-45

Pictures; war medals, 1938-45 and pictures of Uncle Roger and mother, 1939-43, from the collection of Andrew Simpson


*Which just leaves the mystery of the ribbons.  Two belong to the War Medals, but the ribbon in RAF colours belongs to the 1939-45 Star which is missing from the collection

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What we did in Alexandra Park in 1906, nu 5 ......... admiring the Clock Tower

February 20, 2018, 7:00 pm
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A short series of how we used Alexandra Park in 1906, from a collection Valentine’s Snapshots of Alexandra Park.

And no sooner had I posted this when Dave Hulson shared this, 

"Hi Andrew, I know the tower clocking Alexandra park was a gift from the market traders of Sheudehill Manchester as they didn't want or need it.

When it was erected at Alexandra Park it's clock faces never kept the correct time

This is where it gets a bit strange it was removed from the park ( date not known) and reappeared at Belle Vue on an island , but I don't know what happened to it after that or the date it was removed."

Well Dave that should set the memories going.

Location; Alexandra Park

Pictures; the Clock Tower, Alexandra Park, from Valentine’s Snapshots of Alexandra Park, date unknown, courtesy of Ann Love


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Lost and forgotten streets of Salford nu 4 ............ Caxton Street

February 20, 2018, 7:00 pm
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Caxton Street is the one that runs from Chapel Street to the railway viaduct but once upon a time ran on as Union Street under the train tracks to Posey Street..


Now I say that but am well prepared to be corrected.

I should have crossed the road and followed Caxton Street up to the brick wall but I didn’t and so may have lost a clue.

Back in 1849 there were76 properties strung out along Union Street

Location, Salford

Picture; Caxton Street, 2016, from the collection of Andrew Simpson
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A little bit of 1930 on a table near you

February 20, 2018, 7:28 pm
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Now I never underestimate the power of a simple object to draw you in and bring you closer to your family.

This is a Rolls Razor which until yesterday I didn’t know existed.

Our Jillian brought it north to join the other bits of family memorabilia.

It will have belonged to Uncle George but with so many things he owned, I am never quite clear whether he used it or just“collected it” at some car boot sale or second hand emporium.

Either way it is a nice object, still with its cardboard box and in pretty good condition given that it will be nearly 90 years old.

The metal case is solid and chunky and came in a variety of finishes from nickel plated, to silver and even gold.

But what makes the razor unique is that it was designed so that the blade could be re-sharpened, using a strip of leather and a honing stone which were contained in the box.

I have to say I have read the description of how it all works, taken the bits out, moved them around but have been defeated as to how the thing did the business of sharpening the blade.

In time I will work it out but for now it is just a nice object, well crafted with functional beauty.

The device was patented in 1927 and was in production until 1953 with our model dating from sometime after 1930.

I can’t recall Uncle George ever using it at our house when he visited, and given that it is still in its cardboard box I suspect it was a casual purchase.

That said it could equally have been Dad who bought it. He too had a habit of buying up objects, with one purchase being sixty copper bars which were fluted with a screw and terminal cap at one end and a sharp point at the other.

They had been manufactured by Frederick Smith in the Anaconda Works in Salford.

It took me a while to  work out what they were and finally discovered after reading the box that were for a wireless, which dated them to a little earlier than our razor.

Such are the things you find knocking around in the family store cupboard.



Pictures; Rolls Razor Imperial No 2, circa 1920 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

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The grimy ones ........ our River

February 20, 2018, 7:30 pm
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Now here is another of those short series taken from the family archive.

All were taken around 1979 and offer up scenes of the River which we knew but most tourists seldom saw.

Location; the River



Pictures; the River, 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson



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Past the Four Banks and up to Redgate Farm in the summer of 1900

February 20, 2018, 7:30 pm
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Looking across the Isles, 1882
This is another one of those walks I would like to have taken if only to set the contrast from what I would have seen just fifty years earlier in the summer of 1853.

Now I have been writing about a series of walks that you could have made along what was then called Barlow Moor Lane north from the junction with Chorlton Row up past Lane End, and on into Martledge.*

We would have seen a few fine houses, a couple of farms, and a mix of more humble dwellings along with a pub and beer shop all surrounded by fields and the meandering Rough Leech Gutter.
But by 1893 the fields had all but gone, as had two of the farm houses, and the old wattle and daub cottages.

There was still a little of that old Chorlton to see.  Up where the Library now stands was Redgate Farm and just before it Renshaws Buildings which dated from the early 1830s and lasted well into the 1920s.

And tucked away in splendid isolation in their own grounds and hidden behind high walls were Beech House and Oak Bank.  These two dated back to the early decades of the 19th century and both in that summer of 1893 would soon also be demolished.

Renshaws Buildings circa 1900
In their place would be the houses that still line Barlow Moor Road and Manchester Road.

These were the product of the housing boom from the 1880s and were the homes of the professional, business and clerical families, many of who used the newly opened Chorlton station to get into the heart of the city in just ten minutes.

Now although I fight it I am an old romantic and I don’t think I would have made much of this stretch of Chorlton in that last decade of the 19th century.

So what would we have seen from what is officially known as Chorlton Cross but is more now popularly called Four Bank Corner, or just the Four Banks?

The simple answer is not that different from today.  What is now the HSBC would soon become Kemps the Chemist and Harry Kemp’s name would be what this corner would be called well into the 1960s.

Sunwick House, circa 1900
Opposite was Sunwick House which is still there but is now the Royal Bank of Scotland and beyond down towards Redgate Farm there was a row of large detached houses set back from the road, while on the north side there were Renshaws Buildings and the old Royal Oak.

This dated back to the beginning of the 19th century and was pretty much just a beer house serving the local population, the thirsty farm labourers and the Manchester trade who had come out from the city for the walk and a drink in the countryside.

The present pub would not be built until the mid 1920s and would replace Renshaws Buildings.  It is still possible to see the kerb and bit of pavement beside the pub which once fronted the old property.

But all of that is a little in the future and so back in 1893 our walk would have taken us north of Sunwick past Warwick and Selbourne Roads up to the farm.

Sedge Lynn, 1885
We probably would not have really noticed the home of Aaron Booth which went by the name of Sedge Lynn.

It stood where Nicholas Road joins Manchester Road. Back.

In the 1890s Nicholas Road had yet to be cut and our little section was still part of Manchester Road which ran off down through what is now the car park of the precinct and over Wilbraham Road. And for those of a tidy mind I might just add that Wilbraham Road was still quite recent having been cut in the 1860s.

Now I have written about Sedge Lynn, Mr Booth and his fascination for amateur photography and it is his pictures which more than anything shows the dramatic transformation of this bit of Chorlton in the decade before our walk.

Looking across Manchester Road towards the station , 1882
In 1882 he took a series of pictures just after he had moved in looking west across the Isles into the area which is now Oswald Road and across Manchester Road towards the station.

Stand on the site of Sedge Lynn today and look towards the station and the view is obscured by the houses of Warwick, Albany and Keppel Roads, which is pretty much what you would have seen in 1893, but a decade earlier this was still open farm land.

Pictures; of Martledge in 1882 courtesy of Miss Booth, Sunwick from the Lloyd Collection and the corner of Barlow Moor Road and Wilbraham Road from the collection of Marjorie Holms

*Chorlton Row is now Beech Road, Lane End is the junction between Sandy Lane, High Lane and Barlow Moor Road, and Martledge was the area north of the Four Banks.

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Who will mourn Sally's place on Turn Moss?

February 21, 2018, 9:09 am
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Once pretty much everyone in Chorlton would have known where Sally died.

Sally's Hole, 1945
It was one of those stories to terrify young children and act as a warning never to play by open water.

And the lesson was equally, young women should never put your trust in a young man who offers the sky but delivers nothing, because as the story went young Sally fell in love but was abandoned and in her utter despair drowned in the large pond on Farm Moss, which was a field of five acres beside the Old Road.*

Just how long ago the tragedy happened is unknown but the pond became known as Sally’s Hole and as such was a popular place for kids to play as late as the 1960s.

The pond in 1845
By then sadly it was also popular as a place to dump old bikes, discarded milk crates and the odd dead cat.

All of which meant that it was eventually filled in, but the hollow can still be seen by anyone who ventures off the lane.

In the 1840s the pond and the field were farmed by William Whitelegg who rented it from the Egerton estate.

Mr Whitelegg was also the landlord of the Bowling Green pub and went onto build those two fine houses on Edge Lane opposite the church.

And now if I have done my geography correctly Sally’s last resting place will be “the Grass Running Rounds” which form part of the master plan for the redevelopment of Turn Moss.

Leaving me just to wonder who will mourn for Sally and the place she died.

Picture; Sally’s Field, J Montgomery, 1958, copied from a 1945 photograph, m80104, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and detail from the Tithe Map for Chorlton, 1847



*Hawthorn Lane
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The bits of Chorlton you don’t always see

February 21, 2018, 6:30 pm
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Now there is nothing rocket science about looking for unusual views of familiar Chorlton buildings.


But as with these two buildings of the back of the old snooker hall and cinema, most people will never get to see them.

The pictures were taken last Saturday from the playground of Oswald Road School during market day.

And in an age of powerful electric lighting it is easy to forget that when the hall was built at the beginning of the last century it was important to find every bit of natural lighting.

So, along with those big windows at the front and the series of roof windows there was another at the back which has now been bricked up.

The design was a common one and similar halls, all built by the same company, can be found across Greater Manchester, although few are still in the same line of business.  True the snooker hall was Temperance and today it is a pub but the place is still a place of entertainment, unlike its big neighbour which was once a cinema but is now the Co-op Funeral Parlour.

Location; Chorlton

Picture, the old snooker hall and cinema, 2018, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

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