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Trafalgar road moselely

M

morris

master brummie
I have a friend living in yorkshire who was born at 23-25 trafalgar road moseley in 1930.
Just resent he visited birmingham to see his old haunts.
It was a bit disappointing to see his house of birth had been demolished.
He was wondering why nos 23 to 25 had been demolished, when other around it were still standing.
Any answers or clues please
reg morris
 
No 23 was listed in kellys till 1963 and no 25 till 1965, so it is unlikely to be bomb damage.
 
Morris

I think the main problem with Trafalgar Rd was the properties are so large and they have big forecourts with massive rear gardens. Most were much too large for one family occupation and so were converted into several apartments. When property developments firms were able to acquire two or three properties together it paid them to demolish the existing property because they could build about 20 or 30 properties in the same space.

We worked on several properties in the Trafalgar Rd - Alcester Rd area even demolishing 8 large properties on the Alcester Rd but the frontages remained and were incorporated into the new build and from the front today you would never know.
 
Hi all,
I live at number 86 Trafalgar rd, my house was definitely damaged at some point as the front has been rebuilt including losing some of its original features. Spent the last year trying to find an old picture of the road and hopefully the house. This post card is the only picture I've seen of the road. If anyone has any please share. Funnily enough the first family to be listed as living in our house was the Teesdales also from yourshire. Thanks
 
Hi Shah

Looking at your house on Google, what makes you think the frontage has been rebuilt, I can see no new brickwork tied into the gable end. Perhaps what you have is the results of a bad makeover to the front. Another post card of Trafalgar Rd. but it's not much use to you either.
 

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Phil said:
Hi Shah

Looking at your house on Google, what makes you think the frontage has been rebuilt, I can see no new brickwork tied into the gable end. Perhaps what you have is the results of a bad makeover to the front. Another post card of Trafalgar Rd. but it's not much use to you either.
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Hi Phil,

Thanks for your reply.

I have just converted the loft at the property and can tell the front top half and gable end are not original. Also there are walls inside built of breeze block. The house next door 88, retains its original features and is owned by a housing association. My house was owed by the council and is split into 2 flats, I am on the top floor. I appreciate this could be the result of bad makeover but it doesn't explain why the house has been partially rebuilt. Any thoughts? My neighbour below has lived in the house for around 36 years after the council converted it.

Thanks

Shah
 
Shah

Sorry I can't help any further, usually if the frontage of a house is rebuilt you are able to see where the new frontage is tied into the existing gable end. Also the fact that the frontage has ben rendered usually means it's been done to cover up old brickwork problems.
 
Phil said:
Shah

Sorry I can't help any further, usually if the frontage of a house is rebuilt you are able to see where the new frontage is tied into the existing gable end. Also the fact that the frontage has ben rendered usually means it's been done to cover up old brickwork problems.
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Thanks phil,

I will keep looking and keep you posted if I come across anything.

Shah
 
Hello, I`ve just joined and found Shah`s post re no 86 Trafalgar Road. The Teasdale family living there were my 2x gt uncle, his wife and children. The house was called Mostyn Villa, Frederick was a cap merchant--"Teasdale and Co. Hatters" with two premises in Birmingham.
My grandparents lived at 104A Trafalgar Road which from a very old photo-1924?- looks to have been built in the "arts and crafts" style, it was still there in 2010, but looking a bit sad. Would anyone have any idea when the house might have been built?
 
Our first home was a flat in a converted house in Coppice Road this was 1969.
Trafalgar Road was not far from Coppice Road. Actually the house belonged to the Cadbury family, rent to the Bournville Trust if my memory serves me correct.
Most of the houses were in the surrounding area were similar extremely large, and when built were for the more wealthy of society to buy.
Even in 1969 a lot of these houses were converted into flats or bedsits, and some looked rundown even then.
Also Balsall Heath was being knockdown for regeneration which also included houses in the red light district around that time and few of those ladies rented in the local area,and for a while unfortunately a few streets had a red light tag to them.
That problem kind of died out for some reason although occasional kerb crawling did happen.
 
My grandparents certainly weren`t wealthy! Grandpa was one of the Randalls of Randall Bros. and Parsons on Smithfield market. 104A was a fair sized semi with a large garden and orchard, there was a strip of land (track?) at the side leading I think, to a junior school.
Such a shame the original frontage has been "modernised" as I think it`s arts and crafts and am just curious to know when it was built
 
I am quite interested to see whether anyone has any old photographs of Trafalgar Road. I grew up from around 1995-1998 living at 88 Trafalgar Road and currently I live at number 90 (since 2017-present.. im interested to know more about the property I live in now. Thanks!
 
This is my first attempt at uploading a photo, if it works the photo is of 104a Trafalgar Road in (I think) 1924. I`m dating it from the apparent ages of my aunts but it could be slightly earlier. I remember the house being exactly like this in the 1950s but it looks nothing like this now. There were a lot of natural wood features and off-set fireplaces in the house which is what made me wonder if it was "arts and crafts".
I`m not at all sure I`ve got this right but if I click on the 104a below the photo does come up!!104a.pdf.jpg
 

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As it is a pdf file I had to download it to view. If you scan and save as a jpeg file it should show and open on the forum without downloading first.
 
I`ve only just realised that the smaller of the two girls is holding a cricket bat and not as I thought, a stick. The older girl is probably holding the ball and she went on to be a very good cricketer and lifelong Warwickshire fan spending many, many hours at Edgebaston. Morturn`s magic with the photo revealed so much more detail!
 
I will have to 'dig' in my paperwork but there is a Chantry Road History Association. Maybe you can Google it. I contacted them doing my birth search as I was in a Mother and Baby Home nearby. My birth mother lodged in Trafalgar Road. There is an entrance to a school and the Trafalgar pub on the corner. As people say the houses are enormous. They were halved and some halved again and some turned in to flats and re numbered and renumbered. One was bombed near where I was, and rebuilt as a substantial modern block of flats. A Court. And another new one was built but whether it replaced a house or was built in a garden I don't know. One of my Adoptive parents' friends once lived in a divided house there. They told me about the bombed house which was shored up with timbers for years. One day when redecorating they discovered a hidden staircase which led to a 2nd floor they didn't know about. Their children loved it I would have been spooked I think. I can't work out which was which either as I was trying to discern if my parents' friends had lived next door to my birth parents, who rented rooms or next door or further on. My birth parents had the ground floor and there were at least 6 flats in one half of that divided house.
The Chantry Rd Assocation unearthed who lived in the houses at that time in the road where I had been adopted from. A child I think had been working on a school project. And the Forum helped me and others.
 
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Nico said:
I will have to 'dig' in my paperwork but there is a Chantry Road History Association. Maybe you can Google it. I contacted them doing my birth search as I was in a Mother and Baby Home nearby. My birth mother lodged in Trafalgar Road. There is an entrance to a school and the Trafalgar pub on the corner. As people say the houses are enormous. They were halved and some halved again and some turned in to flats and re numbered and renumbered. One was bombed near where I was, and rebuilt as a substantial modern block of flats. A Court. And another new one was built but whether it replaced a house or was built in a garden I don't know. One of my Adoptive parents' friends once lived in a divided house there. They told me about the bombed house which was shored up with timbers for years. One day when redecorating they discovered a hidden staircase which led to a 2nd floor they didn't know about. Their children loved it I would have been spooked I think. I can't work out which was which either as I was trying to discern if my parents' friends had lived next door to my birth parents, who rented rooms or next door or further on. My birth parents had the ground floor and there were at least 6 flats in one half of that divided house.
The Chantry Rd Assocation unearthed who lived in the houses at that time in the road where I had been adopted from. A child I think had been working on a school project. And the Forum helped me and others.
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Really enjoyed reading this. What a lot of info & history. Sadly "The Trafalgar" has been renamed "The Patrick Cavanagh". Not sure why but I can't help but feel another small piece of Moseley's history gone.
 
superdad3 said:
Really enjoyed reading this. What a lot of info & history. Sadly "The Trafalgar" has been renamed "The Patrick Cavanagh". Not sure why but I can't help but feel another small piece of Moseley's history gone.
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Had I still been at work I might have known the answer as our Commissionare, (do they say that now?) drank may still drink in there. I can't remember why, but he discovered I was born in Moseley though I did not disclose why I was there. Oooh that's posh he said. Yowm posh Nico! When we went back exploring and researching, some houses in the tree lines streets were still as they were built, not turned into flats and massive. We parked near one where a little girl with a hair ribbon in her luminous long dark curls in a frilly dress was playing a grand piano in the window. It was like looking back in time.
 
Does anyone know why the house numbers (according to Google Maps) stop at 27 and the restart at 43? This is the site of Trafalgar Road park now, but according to my family research in the late 1800's my relatives lived at number 37 and had done for a few decades. Were a few houses bombed in WW2 perhaps? Another member of my family lived at Trafalgar Cottage, Trafalgar Rd, but I've no idea where that was.
 
Bicko said:
Were a few houses bombed in WW2 perhaps?
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The aerial view below was taken in 1946 and shows Trafalgar Rd running from Woodbridge Rd at the bottom of the view to the top where it turns left towards Alcester Rd. The view is not very high resolution but no houses appear to have been demolished by bombing in WW2.
TrafalgarRdBham1946.jpg

for comparison .... a similar aerial view of the area today.
Trafalgar Rd_2021_iOS.jpg
 
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