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Fish Lane, Harborne

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Shortie

Shortie

master brummie
Sorry if this is posted in the wrong place, I could not find the original posting by Jean.

I gave slightly incorrect information with regard to the renaming of Fish Lane, (it's North Road, not Gray's Road) but as five years have passed since I received the email, perhaps I could be forgiven. I am posting this in full, as it may be of help to others.:)

The information came from Phil Stokes of The Harborne Society.

"Fish Lane is now North Road and is off the High Street opposite Marks and Spencer. I don't know the date when the name changed, but it had certain been changed by 1890 and very probably by 1872.

The area around the HighStret/Metchley Lane,/Nursery Road/Harborne Road junction was known as Harborne Heath and was not orignally part of Harborne Town which started further up the High Street from the 'Junction ' pub (now O'Neills) up to Prince's Corner/Lordswood Road junction.

A small house in Fish Lane at the junction with Grays Road became a pub, The Fish, and it is thought that the pub gave rise to the road name. The first Baptists used to meet at the pub and possicly the Christian symbol of a fish could have been used for the pub name, but this is just speculation.

Harborne was originally in Staffordshire and despite becoming part of Birmingham in 1891, it remained Staffordshire until 1911 when it became Warwickshire.

There were few properties in Fish Lane, usually referred to as small cottaes or hovels and I am sure that they have all been dsmolished, but some late Victorian and Edwardian houses remain at the High Street end".

Shortie
 
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Hi Aidan - thanks for that lovely picture.

The text I copied was because I had asked about Fish Lane, and subsequently obtained a map. The hovels Phil referred to were the houses in the lane in 1846, when the map was produced and I have attached part of it here. My gt grandfather was born in Fish Lane in 1848, so the house he was born in is probably amongst these. His father was variously a bricklayer/stonemason, so could have been involved in building some of the late 1840's houses that are still standing in the High Street. I have got the tithe map in full, which is most interesting.

Shortie
 
Just for clarification, from someone who actually lives in North Road, Harborne. The Fish Inn WAS in Grays Road and was two properties away from the corner with North Road - there are now two modern semi-detached houses on the plot that was occupied by the Fish.

Since the redevelopment of that part of Harborne in the mid 1960's (we lost most of our Courts just like everywhere else in Brum) much has changed but the old properties/land boundaries are still visible. When the Fish was there the pavement down Grays Road ended where its frontage ended (there was & still is only a pavement down that side of Grays Road). Today the pavement carries on round the corner into North Road and down the road to the bottom of the hill. The kerb of that pavement is the old properties boundary from when there was a row of cottages from the Fish to the bottom of the hill and round the corner to the junction with Nursery Road. The present, set back, property boundary surrounding Bham CC sheltered housing at Old TokenGates was artificially created when the redevelopment happened. By the way, the sheltered housing is so-called because the Fish Inn at one time was a token-pub for the Nail Makers.

How the Fish came by its name is open to dispute (at present), however there was a Terrace/Courtyard behind the cottages in Grays Road, accessed by the alley at the side of the Fish Inn. The house next to the Fish (going up Grays Road) had a bedroom physically linked to the Fish Inn property over the top of the alley. If you look carefully on the side of that house you can still where the join was.

This terrace was known as Fish Terrace. This alley still exists as a driveway beside the two modern semi-detached houses and gives access to parking spaces behind their rear gardens. By the way, each of these two houses are set back from the pavement just as the Fish Inn was set back.

Of the so-called "hovels" (I think there is quite a bit of snobbery there), most of the housing that was demolished in Grays Road, North Road & Nursery Road would be better described as Cottages. Almost all had a brew-house behind but most also had sizeable rear gardens and some had front gardens too. Many were (historically) occupied by washer women who did laundry for the toffs down in Edgbaston. Quite a lot were Nail Makers cottages, so had small workshops behind them too - Nail Making was once a sizeable industry in Harborne Heath.

The houses that remained are also all terraced, some of which were built in the early Edwardian period (1900 - 1910) but most were built post WW1 (mine was built in 1921). Some modern development has happened on the other side of North Road (from its junction with High St to the bottom of the hill) at various times adding in a block of 3 modern semis and below the Clarence Road junction, a row of semi's. In both Grays Road & North Road there are still a small number of cottages left from the Victorian period - yes they are small, no they aint (and never have been) hovels.

Somewhere I have some other details concerning the Fish and will post them when I find them.

northrd-graysrd.jpg
 
Thanks for the above Austinseven - My first wife worked for a few years in Harborne and I always found the area fascinating down to its history and the mixture of buildings.
 
Well Austinseven, if you look above the information I posted was word for word from Harborne Historical Society. Perhaps if you dispute this, you should speak to Phil Stokes who gave me the information. I am sure he gave me information from records that they have, not because he lives in the road. The email I received, along with the complete tithe map is in my loft, but as I have been very ill, I am not able to get up there at the moment, but will do so when I am fully recovered.
 
Well Austinseven, I still think you should speak to Harborne Historical Society if you believe you are right, as suerly it's in everyone's best interests? I went to what I believed was the best source (and so I imagine, do others) and if you think they are wrong, it's morally right to speak to them, surely? Then, everyone is singing from the same hymn sheet and no-one gets the wrong information. I think that's only fair, to be honsest.
 
Shortie said:
I am quite calm, not in a slightest ruffled, but surely I have a point?
Click to expand...

I have discussed matter with them before now. The disputed word is hovel - I believed then and still do that most of the houses demolished in the 1800's and since through to the mid/late 1960's were more than hovels. The rest of my description of Fish Lane/Grays Road is not far from Mr Stokes version. What is not in dispute is that currently no one knows for sure why the Fish Inn was called that name, although it is believed it pre-dates Fish Terrace.

I attach 2 photos, one of the Fish Inn in 1966 prior to demolition that shows it and one of the 2 houses on the corner of Grays Road/North Road and the other that shows terraced houses (with front gardens) that fronted straight onto North Road (no pavement) that ran from the corner of Grays Road all the way to the bottom of the hill. All these properties were demolished late 60's/early 70's.

I have also included an image showing two of the remaining (still standing) cottages in Grays Road.

None of the photos were taken by me.

Unfortunately I have never been able to find any photographic evidence of Fish Terrace or for that matter St Johns terrace, which was behind the houses that
fronted North Road opposite the junction with Grays Road.

Fish Inn.jpg

lower north road.jpg


grays road cottage.jpg
 
map showing fish inn.jpg
I add to the general knowledge of the location this map. Although it is dated 1970 it does show the properties that were in Fish Lane/Grays Road & North Road prior to the redevelopment. I have marked in green the site of the Fish Inn. This map forms part of the deeds for property I own in the vicinity.
 
Shortie said:
I see, but what has the outcome been? I presume you are not in agreement?
Click to expand...

I found this thread on this forum whilst looking for something else.

I felt I could add something to it because not everyone has lived in the streets under discussion, whereas I have. It was never the bare facts under discussion only the descriptive text that surrounded them.

There is no such thing as definitive history. If there was there would be no point being a historian, genealogist or archaeologist. All history is a combination of knowledge snippets gleaned from many many sources and is continually being added to. The fact that this site has so many people who lived on specific streets in old, pre-development Brum is a benefit. They bring to the party their intimate knowledge of buildings, places & people that flesh out the bare facts.

Despite not meeting total agreement with what I have been saying on this subject I hope to continue to add to existing threads where I feel I have something to add, or may even start threads of my own.
 
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Well Austinseven, firstly, I am not in the slightest bit ruffled. What I am though, is clear. I was NOT looking for the site of the Fish Inn, that was never under question, what I wanted was Fish Lane. I have a photo of the Fish Inn, I am perfectly happy with its location, and one does not need to own any property whatsoever to be in ownership of a map which clearly shows the property that was the Inn. It was simply the lane's name I was interested in. Phil Stokes said it was North Road - and it is quite possible that he is right and perhaps what is now known as Gray's Road (which presumably took its name from the owner of the land or the builder of the houses in the 1880's) was actually unnamed at the time I am speaking about, which was 1847. My gt grandfather was born in Fish Lane - nothing to do with the Inn, his father was a stonemason/builder and I was interested in finding out if the building he was born in still existed, which it does not. This was a long time ago, and I am happy with what Phil Stokes told me - one does not have to live in a street to have knowledge, but what one does have to have done is take time and effort which is what I did.
 
Despite an earlier request by Bernard this thread has continued to be confrontational and as a result is now closed for discussion by the moderating team.
Anyone wishing to comment please feel free to contact me or any other moderator by private message.

Colin
 
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