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Aldridge School for Young Ladies AKA Cedar Court

By 1989 various parts of Cedar Court were up for sale, so presumably before this time, the house and associated buildings had undergone conversion into various units. There have been a number of planning applications for alterations/conversions on the site up to the 1990s. So the building's must have undergone considerable change (at least internally and to some extent externally) during the last century

Source : British Newspaper Archive
 

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Vivienne14 said:
Was Martha Betts sister called Bertha ? If so, she married an Allport.

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Source : British Newspaper Archive
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Hi Viv,
Sorry you are absolutely correct her name was Bertha and Henry was brother to Joseph. He was a good painter but terrible business man and went backrupt loosing lots of his fathers money. He ran off to NSW but left some wonderful painting now in NSW art gallery
 
Dear Friends,
Thankyou so much for all your wonderful contributions. It has certainly added greatly to my work and will allow me to make some important coreections. The name Cedar Court remains a mystery though. It was certainly in the family folk law because Mary's gg grandson named his house Cedar Court in Hobart.
This is a link to Mary's Bio and as you can see she left a wonderful legacy of paintings and poetry and hence my interest in her
Biography of Mary Morton Allport

If you would like to see more of her paintings go to the link below. Go into SEARCH and then SEARCH EVERYTHING and type in "Mary Morton Allport" with inverted commas. The select online. There are some wonderful sketches of Aldrige she did while at school.

Allport Library

Ian
 
Ian, I've just looked through the Allport Library link you've given in post #34. What a wonderful collection under Mary Morton Allport. Her story is fascinating. The 1830s journey when they emigrated wouldn't have been easy, not only in the sense of the physical journey to Australia, but in uprooting and starting a totally new life so far away (albeit made a little easier as they had money).

Mary's paintings and her drawings (and her son's photographs) are a valuable record. Great to see the various works being well cared for. Mary must have taken some of her early drawings and paintings of English views with her on that journey. These would have been a lovely reminder of her early roots and where she had come from.

For other members reference, the collection contains, to name a few, drawings of Handsworth Church, Aldridge Church, Aldridge Rectory, Moseley Wake Green, and a painting of Perry Barr Mill. Aldridge Rectory may have been associated with the Allport's house site we've discussed earlier. (Shall have to check that).The Mill at Perry Barr painting may be quite a rare view. Can't recall ever having seen one before.

Thank you.
 
hi viv i cant seem to find any drawings by mary on that link ian posted...what do i click on to view them please..

in the meantime we have a thread here about the mills at perry barr but not sure if it it the one mary painted

Perry Barr Mills

Two great minds think a like, I was just researching the Handsworth and Perry Barr mills to put in my research, because they are so close to Birmingham. I know of possibly 4 mills those areas, Mr Harveys Mill, Upper and Lower paper mill (2 seperate ones), Perry Barr Mill and a windmill. That is...
birminghamhistory.co.uk birminghamhistory.co.uk
 
Not sure about copyright on this, so won't post it Lyn. But the Mill is a water mill, and I think it might be the Perry Village Mill, near the Church Tavern - you remember we discussed it on the Perry Village thread a few year ago.
 
Vivienne14 said:
Not sure about copyright on this, so won't post it Lyn. But the Mill is a water mill, and I think it might be the Perry Village Mill, near the Church Tavern - you remember we discussed it on the Perry Village thread a few year ago.
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thanks viv yes i recall us talking about that mill

lyn
 
There were so many mills around Perry Barr, it can be difficult to pinpoint which one it was. But this might be the one. Lyn you said at the time of Two's posts below, and referring to Two's map, that it might have been around where the One Stop Shop used to be. A relatively straightforward journey from Aldridge at the time for Mary Morton Allport in the early 1800s, but would expect she wouldn't have done it on foot, so maybe she was visiting.

Screenshot_20240124_120658_Chrome.jpgScreenshot_20240124_120711_Chrome.jpg
 
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Hopefully this link works for members to show you the Perry Barr Mill painting created by Mary Morton Allport. It looks like a fairly sprawling water mill with leaded light windows and tall chimneys. Someone may be able to identify the large 'buckets' in use sitting outside.

Using the info from other threads (and if it is the same mill identified in Two's posts) it would be located at the end of Regina Drive and to the west of Harrier Way.


Mill. Perry Barr.

librariestas.ent.sirsidynix.net.au librariestas.ent.sirsidynix.net.au


If you could continue along the path beyond the warehousing in the Streetview image below, you'd come to the mill. If you study the satellite view and follow the arrow at end of Regina Drive, just below that is a dark strip of ground, very thin running north east to south west. That's where I believe the mill once stood. Hard to detect as there's no longer any evidence of water/stream and the River Tame must have been diverted in the past. So to put it simply, Perry Mill would have been a little way behind One Stop Shop see second image with red marker

Screenshot_20240124_172022_Maps.jpg
 

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That's what I used to pinpoint it Lyn.combined with Google Streetview and satellite But thanks. The wonders of technology !
 
Vivienne14 said:
That's what I used to pinpoint it Lyn.combined with Google Streetview and satellite But thanks. The wonders of technology !
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i love that map site viv...really helps with locations amazing to see what used to be around there and i like to flag it up from time to time for members who do not know of it

lyn
 
I've been looking at this thread out of interest and being originally from Perry Barr I've been trying to place where the Mill might have been.
I was thinking it may have been somewhere in the vicinity of the far end of the playing fields of Perry Hall Park, where the railway line runs along and the Mill Race must have run off the river Tame at the far corner of the playing field.
I guess too that it would be somewhere near the end of Regina Drive. I may be imagining this but, going back to the 50s, there was a very little stream which ran out of the park and down Regina Drive - could have been a tiny trace of the Race?

Edit: I'm thinking now that the little stream I remember probably ran off what was originally the Moat to Perry Hall.
 
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Vivienne14 said:
Ian, I've just looked through the Allport Library link you've given in post #34. What a wonderful collection under Mary Morton Allport. Her story is fascinating. The 1830s journey when they emigrated wouldn't have been easy, not only in the sense of the physical journey to Australia, but in uprooting and starting a totally new life so far away (albeit made a little easier as they had money).

Mary's paintings and her drawings (and her son's photographs) are a valuable record. Great to see the various works being well cared for. Mary must have taken some of her early drawings and paintings of English views with her on that journey. These would have been a lovely reminder of her early roots and where she had come from.

For other members reference, the collection contains, to name a few, drawings of Handsworth Church, Aldridge Church, Aldridge Rectory, Moseley Wake Green, and a painting of Perry Barr Mill. Aldridge Rectory may have been associated with the Allport's house site we've discussed earlier. (Shall have to check that).The Mill at Perry Barr painting may be quite a rare view. Can't recall ever having seen one before.

Thank you.
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Dear Viv,
I am so pleased you had a look at Mary's work in Hobart. It is quite extroadinary and makes you realise just how important her schooling had been to her. It ceratinly opened up the world of literature, art and music for her.
 
Astoness said:
hi viv i cant seem to find any drawings by mary on that link ian posted...what do i click on to view them please..

in the meantime we have a thread here about the mills at perry barr but not sure if it it the one mary painted

Perry Barr Mills

Two great minds think a like, I was just researching the Handsworth and Perry Barr mills to put in my research, because they are so close to Birmingham. I know of possibly 4 mills those areas, Mr Harveys Mill, Upper and Lower paper mill (2 seperate ones), Perry Barr Mill and a windmill. That is...
birminghamhistory.co.uk birminghamhistory.co.uk
Click to expand...
Hi
Astoness said:
hi viv i cant seem to find any drawings by mary on that link ian posted...what do i click on to view them please..

in the meantime we have a thread here about the mills at perry barr but not sure if it it the one mary painted

Perry Barr Mills

Two great minds think a like, I was just researching the Handsworth and Perry Barr mills to put in my research, because they are so close to Birmingham. I know of possibly 4 mills those areas, Mr Harveys Mill, Upper and Lower paper mill (2 seperate ones), Perry Barr Mill and a windmill. That is...
birminghamhistory.co.uk birminghamhistory.co.uk
Click to expand...
Hi Brumie,
I have given you a link below which may help. Let me know if its still a problem

Mary
 
Vivienne14 said:
There were so many mills around Perry Barr, it can be difficult to pinpoint which one it was. But this might be the one. Lyn you said at the time of Two's posts below, and referring to Two's map, that it might have been around where the One Stop Shop used to be. A relatively straightforward journey from Aldridge at the time for Mary Morton Allport in the early 1800s, but would expect she wouldn't have done it on foot, so maybe she was visiting.

View attachment 188454View attachment 188453
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What an amzing find! Thankyou
 
Its great to know the location. The painting looks like a young artist to me but I am no expert. It is 3 miles from Aldridge so getting there would have been easy in a Gig but like everyone else she was used to walking.

The penny dropped to day and I realised that the name of the place is Cedar Court while the school they ran there was Aldridge Boarding School for young ladies

Ian
 
Hi everyone,
I thought this might tempt you as well. This is sketch by Mary of a cottage at the croft which remains there today. If by any chance you might live close by I would love to get a picture of the cottage as it is today from the same angle. The one attached is from a real esate company.

The Croft cottage

Also from reading your posts it seem clear that Mary Ann Allport continued running the school for many years after her parents. Which make me wonder if there are any descendents from all those children. Does anyone know of an historical society which might be interested?

Ian
 

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