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Vyse St tragic event 1896

Astoness

Astoness

TRUE BRUMMIE MODERATOR
Staff member
as someone said to me recently.."if we do not discuss/research the negative of our history then we would have nothing to discuss" this very sad story is of 10 year may lewis who was murdered in vyse 120 years ago..this is well documented in 2 books.."hanged in birmingham" and also in "fowl deeds and suspicious deaths" and reported in newspapers up and down the land and was said to be one of birminghams worst crimes of those times...a lot of the newspaper articles i have read go into much more detail which is not really needed here but i am posting a couple of short articles just for reference also posting a photo of the building (2nd from right of the photo) where this most unfortunate incident took place..very sad indeed..
 

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Lyn

A very interesting chapter in the history of the jewellery though I had not heard this sorry tale before, though I read it gets a mention in Barry Van-Asten's Blog "a walk around Birmingham's ghostly past". In the 1890's this must have been when the jewellery quarter was at it's peak.
 
thanks jim and yes phil the jewellery quarter most certainly would have been in full swing during this time...a hive of activity as some of our old photos show.great pity that the buildings from the hockley st corner right down to the rose villa tavern were demolished...but again we do have photos of those as well...of course they were still there when i worked in vyse st many moons ago

lyn
 
I have been trying to find the Taylor family in the 1881 and 1871 censuses, but, giving +/- 2 years for given ages, have been unable to. There only seems on Frank (of that age) in 1881, who is living with his brother Edward in Pope st, but no John married to Maria
 
hi mike...could be a difficult one as we do not know where the taylor family were born..may not have been from birmingham...this incident happened half way through the census so if they were not brummies they could have arrived here anytime between april 1891 and 1895..
 
Frank Taylor baptised Emscote Warks 6th November 1873 parents john Maria
they also had a daughter Florence Maud baptised 1874 Emscote.
Cannot find John ,Maria or Frank on 1881 but Florence Maud is with her grandfather Thomas Reynolds in 1881 at Emscote Road , Warwick
John Taylor married Maria Reynolds in 1866.
 
Lyn
On the 1971 census, when Frank should have been at home, there was listed (though obviously there may be transcribing errors) only 1 Frank of about the right age with mother Martha in whole of england, and that did not have a brother to Frank to fit with the Frank in the 1881 census
 
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Obviously another point of interest to Lyn, being on Villa St . Map showing no 91 in 1881 below
 

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just noticed that mike:rolleyes: but could you just check where 91 was again....the crown pub was either 95 or 97 .....thanks mike..the map is dated 1889 so did the numbering change after 1881

thanks alberta and MWS so much better at this than me as well mike..
 
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Mike was there a renumbering, because the 1950 map shows number 91 was two houses before the Crown on the other side of Nursery Road?
 
no ivor its not in the jewellery quarter... 91 villa st hockley is where frank taylor was living in 1881..in 1891 the taylors are living round the corner at hockley hill minus son frank taylor who may well have been in lodgings
 
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The numbering changed between 1883 and 1884. A lot of the street numbering changed in that short period, usually from consecutive (1,2,3...) to odd one side, even the other
 
morning mike if the numbering changed between 1883/4 then it certainly must have changed again after that because when i lived in villa st 58/72 the house you have marked on the 1889 map as no 91 was no 107 where my friend lived ...another friend lived opposite at no 106 then me at 118:rolleyes: i will check kellys later not awake yet
 
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I think there might be confusion as perhaps I probably did not explain very well.
I used the printed 1889 map (drawn c 1889) because I did not have an earlier one. On it I marked what would have been no 91 in 1881. In 1889 the house would have been 107 after the renumbering. does that make it clearer?
 
yes thanks mike ive just figured it out..looked at the 1880 kellys..eventually the penny dropped:rolleyes:funnily enough i think i have a photo of no 107 (previously no 91)..strange how villa st crops up in my own family research i have 5 addresses in villa st including my own where family lived from 1851 to 1972..thanks mike
 
An angle not for everyone, of course..... but a friend of mine used to have a commercial property around the Vyse St area, in years gone by, and the work force there sometimes reported seeing the ghost of a 'young girl' around the property concerned..... Needless to say, it doesn't really take much of a stretch of the imagination to make associations, given the history mentioned above, eh!?
 
Astoness said:
as someone said to me recently.."if we do not discuss/research the negative of our history then we would have nothing to discuss" this very sad story is of 10 year may lewis who was murdered in vyse 120 years ago..this is well documented in 2 books.."hanged in birmingham" and also in "fowl deeds and suspicious deaths" and reported in newspapers up and down the land and was said to be one of birminghams worst crimes of those times...a lot of the newspaper articles i have read go into much more detail which is not really needed here but i am posting a couple of short articles just for reference also posting a photo of the building (2nd from right of the photo) where this most unfortunate incident took place..very sad indeed..
Click to expand...
Hi Lyn,
Does your research tell us what happened to John and Maria Taylor this villains parents? What part did they play in the crime?

Old Boy
 
I don't think there is much doubt that the parents, or at least one of them, was involved with the attempted cleanup after, but probably not the actual death, but they were not prosecuted
 
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