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Gosta Green Through Duddeston

Ernie

I can just see the FSA and the HSE standing for that set up today. Its looks as if the slicer is next to the potatoes and could be reached by members of the public. Thats a big no no.

Do you know in Mrs Hardings shop next to our house, she used to have one delivery of sausage and bacon a week. No refrigeration whatsoever. Half way through the week if she hadn't sold it all she used to part cook it and carry on selling it.

Just imagine that today.
 
Trams in their Heyday.

Bloomsbury St, Saltley Viaduct & Gosta Green.
 

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Phil. When I saw what that slicer was doing to that big chunk of meat I stayed clear of it and just watched marveled by it all.
 
GER22VAN said:
Derek. I remember someone selling Newspapers across the road from the Raven, cannot say if it was a man or woman, I thought that years ago it was a good pitch for the Delta Metal Company. There was a man with the nickname of "Blackbat" used to sell around the streets ( Sports newspapers ?) Everyone knew him, I think there was something in the local newspapers years ago when he died.
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Hi there,
I remember "BLACKBAT" he used to come down Cromwell St. shouting Argus, but the way he pronounced it was more like arse cut.
He sat on our front step one evening (must have been summer) and proceeded to unwrap a newspaper package which contained (wait for it) a sheeps head, half a loaf, and a lump of margarine, he then took a bite from the head, a bite from the bread and a bite from the loaf til he'd more or less demolished the lot.
He always looked like a chimney sweep, hence the name Blackbat.
fond memories, regards John.
 
Hi, Ger22Van,
Thanks for your remark about my post.

Sorry. I didn't know anyone from Coleman Street, and I have no memory of a Jimmy Walters, at all.

Regards,

Jim Pedley (pedlarman)
 
Looking at the old drawing of Vauxhall Gardens. Is that the corner of Great Brook Street and Vauxhall Road looking towards the west. The barracks being behind the far trees and the building in the foreground at the top of the drive being the vicarage. Great Brook Street does not quite seem to come through to Vauxhall Road at that time.
On the 1890 survey some of the trees still seem to remain and the drive to the rear of the vicarage from supposedly Vauxhall Street still remains. Do any of the photographs represent any of the buildings in the drawing.
 
Hi, pmc1947,

Yes. Sure thing. "The Raven" stood on the corner of Dartmouth Street and Gt. Lister Street. I know for certain because my Dad, Jim, worked there in the evenings as a BARMan from time to time.

But he used to share his talents between "The Welcome" on the corner of Adams Street and Gt. Lister Street, and "The New Inns", on the corner of Windsor Street and Gt. Lister Street...!

It might interest you to know that I knew the Fletchers when Old man Fletcher started up with his "War Surplus" yard next to the pub (was it "The Sun") on the corner of Heneage Street and Dartmouth Street. Gradually, he bought up all that side of Dartmouth Street until his expansion left him with the big supplies store on the corner of Adams Street and Gt. Lister Street...

There were two sons - twins, Barry and John - who used to wander up and down their Dad's "possessed" side of Dartmouth Street, even as little toddlers, and scare me to death because of traffic on the road, even though there wasn't the traffic then as there is now!

The Old Boy also had two daughters, Barbara and Jean. Barbara, the elder one, was a looker... I used to go to school - Dartmouth Street Junior - with Jeannie; in fact, I used to sit by her. (She had a crush on me and used to buy me chocolate and sweets...!!!)

Hope this enlightens you about "The Raven". I gaurantee it was there long before Fletchers arrived there...

Regards,

Jim Pedley
 
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PEDLARMAN. I QUOTE YOU It might interest you to know that I knew the Fletchers when Old man Fletcher started up with his "War Surplus" yard next to the pub (was it "The Sun") on the corner of Heneage Street and Dartmouth Street.

May I correct you ? The War Surplus yard was across the road from the " Rising Sun " pub on the corner of Windsor Street and Heneage Street.
I cannot recall a pub the corner of Dartmouth Street and Heneage Street although there may well have been one. Kelly's 1904 lists a pub not quite on the corner at 61 Dartmouth Street called the " Dartmouth Arms. "
As far as I know Fletchers was just a War Surplus scrap yard in my day, but of course I could be wrong.
 
I must apologise for earlier saying that Coleman Street went from Dartmouth Street To Bloomsbury Street, this was incorrect.
In 1866 Coleman Street went from Dartmouth Street To Great Francis Street
and Lupin Street doe's not appear to have existed. Rupert Street is also missing.
View attachment 20935
 
John Knight. Sounds as though you knew him far better than what I did, I thank you for your comments. He was well known and I think well liked.
It was a rough and ready quarter in those days but people still helped each other were they could.
 
Phil
was there a shop just at the end of our yard? I vaguely remember a tiny dimly lit shop which sold most things. A bit like Arkwrights in Open all hours!!
 
Carol

That was Mrs Hardings next door to our house. I think she was pushing 80 when we moved in around 1953, and she was still going strong when they got round to demolishing the street some 10 years later.

You are right, it was just like Arkwrights, you would ask for something thinking she'll never have it. She would reach up to one of the cluttered shelves, pull down a box, open it and there it was.

I wonder where she moved to, the story was (isn't it always) that she was loaded.

Phil
 
I was thinking that Vauxhall Gardens was a big place but on examination it seems to have been only about 350 yards long by 105 yards wide, at the time when the Barracks were there anyway. There is stiil a semblance of remains to view I think. By 1890 it was mostly gone. The sketch shows a seemingly pastoral setting but if you zoom in you can see the gradual encroachment of industry in the distance. Maybe the factories of Dartmouth Street with the chimneys smoking. Clearly the gardens days were numbered.
 
Hi, Ger22Van,

I will stand corrected if you quote from (say) Kelly's. However, I lived for some years opposite the pub on the corner of Heneage Street and Dartmouth Street (I think it was called "The Sun"...) and I draw on my memory when I recall seeing the Fletcher twins ambling as toddlers along Dartmouth Street.

It is possible that I am mistaken in believing that had their first scrapyard next to the pub. Maybe this was where they lived rather than ran the business. But the pub was definitely there - smack on the corner of Heneage Street and Dartmouth Street.

In fact, my Mom used to complain about the noise and rowing that went on when the pub "turned out" - especially on Saturday nights...

Regards,

Jim Pedley (pedlarman)
 
I hesitate to intrude on those who know the area, while I do not, but the 1940 Kelly's (below) shows Albert Fletcher car dismantlers at no 53, next to the dartmouth arms at 51. The 1890 OS map shows a pub, presumably the Darmouth arms on the corner of Heneage St. there is also another site in his name at no 89. The same appears in 1950 and 1956, except it is described as "car accessories". The site at no 53 has disappeared in 1964.
Hope this might be helpful
mike


kellys_1940_dartmouth_st.jpg
 
The house shown in post #851 I think may have been at the eastern end of Great Brook street just before it met the end of Vauxhall Road and from the shadows maybe on the north side of the road. From the 1890 survey there seems to be larger dwellings there albeit row housing. In this position they would have been opposite the eastern end of what was Vauxhall Gardens by this time all but gone. If the interpretation of the Vauxhall Garden drawing is correct then the houses on the right of this would have fronted on Ashted Row and the rear gardens of the same would have met the rear gardens of the above houses on Great Brook street separated by an alley. The road on the drawing was built over and Great Brook street was extended to Vauxhall Road just to the right of the Vicarage on the 1890 survey. There is not much to see on Google Earth now but there still appears to be some signs left that date back to 1890 anyway and partly back to the Gardens days.
 
pedlarman. mikejee. I too stand corrected at times, my mind tells me that there was a pub on the corner of Dartmouth Street and Heneage Street but to look at Kelly' even much earlier ( 1904 ) seems to be puzzling by the number changing. When I said about Fletcher's it was off the top of my head so your posts educate me. The pub called the Sun was the name we used years ago but something that I think was posted referred to it as the Rising Sun.
Please accept my apologies.
 
The Darmouth Arms was on the corner of Heneage St, Dartmouth St and I think The Rising Sun known locally as The Sun was on the corner of Heneage St and Windsor St.

Phil
 
It would appear that Duddeston and area was mainly endowed with decrepit houses and sordid junk yards, with a boozer on every corner. The whole thing now seeming to be romantic in some way. It's not so of course. I think that you have to go back well before the late 1800s to mid 1900s to find much that is inspiring. Good luck.
 
Rupert. People whoever they are and from wherever they come from have great links with the place of their birth, I tend to think that people mellow with age and try not to see the negative aspects of life long ago.
With a History Forum you discuss the bad and the good alike.
 
Rupert

I think that back in the times that these pubs were built, a pub on every corner was the rule rather than the exception especially in working class areas.

The reason why there seemed to so many scrap yards in these areas was because they were not wanted in upper class areas, so Birmingham Council used to place them all in areas like Nechells, Duddeston, Saltley and so on.

When our first depot in Balsall Heath was compulsory purchased by the Council we were offered two alternatives Crawford St, Saltley and Cheston Rd, Aston. Neither was suitable and we found our own alternative in the end,

Phil
 
Thinking of a pub in Great Lister Street by the name of the " New Inns " could a pub have been a new version of the Old Inns of years ago ?
Just a thought.
 
Maybe you have to look deeper than the corner boozer to find the things of value. Why post a rendition of a much beloved gardens that were lamentably lost to hell bent industrialisation...and then do nothing more about it...not even to discuss location. Yet you profess to know all about the gardens at Vauxhall. I wonder. If you want to know where I am coming from...well I was born in a back to back in Summer Lane and as far as I am concerned Kandor was right...worst anywhere... should not have been allowed to be built never mind exist untill the 60s. I find that this thread has become a personal conversation about very little. I suppose that conversation between friends is ok.
 
Rupert

I thought that that was exactly what this thread was about, a conversation between friends about childhood memories in their old neighborhood. It is after all located on the Childhood Memories thread.

Obviously many subjects and places will get mentioned whilst people reminisce this doesn't mean they all have to be examined in detail. I'm sorry that the thread is not living up to your expectations, but I think that most of us are happy with it.

Phil
 
Dear PMC1947,

Congrats...! Your memory is obviously better that my 80-year-old one...!

I have just checked with the "verifier" of the pub name (The Sun) and they have apologised profusely and underline your contention that it was "The Dartmouth Arms" that sat on the corner of Dartmouth Street and Heneage Street...

Well done.

Regards,

Jim Pedley (pedlarman)
 
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