Making Of Birmingham Robert Dent 1894

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Discovered the above book written in 1894, full of interesting information. The following is an observation of the Jewelry trade at the time...

Around 1780 the jewelers did not concern themselves very seriously as to the quality or artistic merit of their productions, so it became a common saying...

"Give a Birmingham maker a sovereign and a copper kettle and he will make you a hundred pounds worth of jewelry."

...It is said that one man cut and polished some cinders from the calx of the Aston furnace, set them in rings and broaches, calling them fragments of Pompey's Pillar, and sold a large number of them before imposition was detected...

...(value of sweepings) but it had not at that time dawned upon the minds of the manufactures that this was the case, and up to the year 1758 these sweepings (like the worthless refuge of other manufacturers, up to the abolition of the Lamp Act), were thrown into the streets. One man however discovered the value of this precious refuge...he injuced the shopkeepers to allow him to carry away the sweepings from the floors, giving them in return some treat at Christmas. By-and-by another enquiring mind discovered the secret of refining the refuge, and a second "golden dustman" competed for the privilege of carrying away the sweepings...

...when the manufacturers became enlightened it led them to appropriate the proceeds of the sweepings themselves; some of them, such as John Taylor, realising 1000 pounds a year from this source. For many years afterwards manufacturers in other towns, not understanding the process of refining, were in the habit of sending large quantities of sweepings to Birmingham for that purpose. According to Mr J Jaffray "precious metals to the amount of many thousands of pounds lie beneath the streets of Birmingham, some of which may be said to be literary paved with gold and silver."

 

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Don't think I have seen this illustration before from sometime prior to 1893.

 

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The New Post Office

...(The Post Office) It had been moved from the corner of Bennett's Hill to the portion of the building formerly known as the Royal Hotel in New Street in 1842, but after the introduction of the penny postage these premises speedily proved utterly unsuited to the requirements of a central post office.

It was not, however, until 1873 that a more commodious Post Office building was completed, in Paradise Street, and when the work of the department was transferred to this building it was at once felt that before many years elapsed further accommodation would have to be provided for various branches of the postal service.This anticipation have to bring realized, and in less then 15 years from the opening of the post office in Paradise Street, the new building was commenced on the triangular space bounded by Hill Street, Paradise Street, and New Street, which opened on December 23rd 1890.

The New Post office is a handsome edifice in the French Renaissance style, and contains a spacious, lofty hall for the transaction of public business, extensive apartments for carrying on the general work to the department, lifts and subways for the conveyance of letters and parcels direct from the railway platform, and other conveniences.

 

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John Freeth the Birmingham Poet (1731-1808)

A short mention of John Freeth has been made in the Thread "Some great men and women of Birmingham." The Making of Birmingham (Robert Dent, 1894) devotes several pages, but a couple of references could be of interest as they may not be easily found elsewhere. One from the man himself, and the other at the time of his death...

One of the favourite resorts of the men who loved a pleasant chat and a social glass was the tavern in Bell Street, to which reference has been made in an earlier chapter, known as Poet Freeth's Coffee House, otherwise the Leicester Arms. Charles Freeth had been succeeded by his son John, or "Poet Freeth," as host of this well known tavern, and by his good humour and talent for easy versification had gathered around him a goodly company of friends.

In a preface to one of his song books (actually The Political Songster) he says of himself: "My hobby-horse and practice for thirty years past has been to write songs upon the occurrence of remarkable events, and nature having supplied me with a voice somewhat suitable to my stile of composition, to sing them also, while their subjects were fresh upon every man's mind; and being a Publican, this faculty, or rather knack of singing my own songs, has been profitable to me; it has in an evening crowded my house with customers, and led me to friendships which I might not otherwise have experienced. ... If I had no other motives, the requests of travellers in the mercantile line from every county, who pay me such frequent and friendly visits, for copies of my songs, would be a sufficient reason for the publication of this three Shilling and Six-penny Volume, I cannot expect it will please all parties; but I mean offence to none, and liberal minds will not be angry with me for freely expressing my sentiments."


....The following obituary notice of the veteran ballad-maker, which appeared in the Gazette at the time of his death, will interest all who honour one who, albeit no poet in the higher sense of the word, was a true lover of freedom and of his native town...

"On Thursday September 29, 1808, in the seventy-eighth year of his age, Mr. John Freeth, of this town, commonly called the Poet Freeth, a facetious bard of nature, forty-eight years proprietor of Freeth's Coffee-house, Bell Street, a house much frequented by strangers as well as the inhabitants, where the poet used every evening to delight a large company with original songs, composed from subjects of a public nature, replete with with and humour—

"Who when good news is brought to town,
Immediately to work sits down,
And business fairly to go through,
Writes songs, finds tunes, and sings them too."

He was beloved by his friends, courted by strangers, and respected by all. The harmless yet pointed sallies of his muse will be remembered with pleasing pain by thousands who admired his talents, and revered his virtues. He was buried in the ground adjoining the Old Meeting House, and on his tombstone was inscribed an epitaph which was doubtless from his own pen :—

"Free and easy through life 'twas his wish to proceed;
Good men he revered, be whatever their creed:
His pride was a sociable evening to spend,
For no man loved better his pipe and his friend."

[The burial grounds adjoining the Old Meeting House were used for the new station in New Street in 1882. The newspaper at the time said that all vaults and headstones, and of course remains, would be carefully removed and reburied in Witton Cemetery. The biography of the ODNB confirms that Poet Freeth lies in Witton, and maybe the inscription can still be seen!]

 

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William Hutton (1723-1815) has his own Thread, but The Making Of Birmingham (Robert Dent, 1894) gives an interesting observation by the man himself of his first visit to Birmingham. At 18 years of age, in 1741, Hutton had arrived in Birmingham after running away from an apprenticeship in Nottingham and his uncle.

"I sat to rest," he says, "on the north side of the OldCross, near Philip Street; the poorest of all the poor belonging to that great parish, of which, twenty-seven years after, I should be overseer. I sat under that roof, a silent, depressed object, where thirty one years after, I should sit as a judge; when property should be in my decision [and] I should have the pleasure of terminating differences between man and man, and the good fortune to leave, even the loser, satisfied. Why did not some kind agent comfort me with the distant prospect?"

"About ten yards from me, near the corner of Philip Street, I perceived two men in aprons eye me with some attention. They approached near. 'You seem, says one, 'by your melancholy situation, and dusty shoes, a forlorn traveller, without money and without friends.' I assured him it was exactly my case. 'If you choose to accept a pint, it is at your service. I know what it is myself to be distressed.' "I shall receive any favour," said I, "with thankfulness."

"They took me to the Bell in Philip Street, and gave me what drink and bread and cheese I chose.
They also procured a lodging in the neighbourhood, where I slept for three half-pence."

......"The environs of all I had seen," he says, "were composed of wretched dwellings, replete with dirt and poverty; but the buildings in the exterior of Birmingham rose in a style of elegance. Thatch so plentiful in other towns, was not to be met with in this. I was much surprised at the place, but more at the people. They were a species I had never seen; they possessed a vivacity I had never beheld: I had been among dreamers, but now I saw men awake: their very step along the street showed alacrity. I had been taught to consider the whole twenty-four hours as appropriated for sleep, but I found a people satisfied with only half that number....

...I could not avoid remarking that if the people of Birmingham did not suffer themselves to sleep in the streets, they did not suffer others to sleep in their beds; for I was, each morning by three o'clock, saluted with a circle of hammers. Every man seemed to know and prosecute his own affairs: the town was large, and full of inhabitants, and those inhabitants full of industry. I had seen faces elsewhere tinctured with an idle gloom void of meaning, but here, with a pleasing alertness. Their appearance was strongly marked with the modes of civil life : I mixed with a variety of company, chiefly of the lower ranks, and rather as a silent spectator. I was treated with an easy freedom by all, and with marks of favour by some. Hospitality seemed to claim this happy people for her own."

 

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The Hen and Chickens (at least prior to 1741 until 1894)

The Making Of Birmingham (Robert Dent, 1894) provides a nice engraving of the Hen and Chickens, by a Samuel Lines from 1833, but only gives a brief mention. A few lines from the book The Taverns of Old Birmingham by E Edwards written in 1879 may be of interest.

The tavern was originally in High Street, the first record may be around 1741 in Aris's Gazette, and described as stabling 70 horses. In 1798 it was in the ownership of Mrs Sarah Lloyd who sold the old premises and moved over the road into New Street...to increase the hotel accommodation in the town. Soon after she sold out to a Mr Waddell.

As early as 1819 it is said that 30 coaches a day left the Hen and Chickens, and 15 to 20 years later the number had doubled. It also housed the Fire Brigade. In 1830. Mr Waddell bought the freehold an erected the portico....receipts from beds alone was 800 pounds per year

Talking in 1879 Edwards says that within the last few months the whole place has been entirely re-modeled and the frontage would not be recognised, being converted to a commodious restaurant.

Some of the visitors to the Inn are listed....William McCready (theatre), 1829 and 1843 Daniel O'Connell (first Roman Catholic MP since Reformation), 1857 Crown Prince Oude, 1863 Prince Louis of Hesse, as well as Charles Dickens and many great actors. Literary men such as Wordsworth, Southey and Thackery, and musicians aplenty.

"Gillott (of steel pen fame) was a frequent morning visitor into the bar for a half glass, and never had more, of bitter ale; and he had his own glass, which no one else was permitted to drink. He and a few others came every night for about an hour to the little smoking room at the back, from which Gillott regularly adjourned to the Theatre."

"At this time, too, the office-room was the special rendezvous of "Young Birmingham." It was here 20 years ago that the young bloods came in the morning for a "B and S" or a glass of "Divy Shewwy"...they nicknamed the place as "The Fowls." (The young bloods)...when the streets were crowded would heat half pence on a fire shovel and scatter them from the upper windows amongst the people below...great amusement being had at the antics of those who found the coppers hot.

It is interesting that in 1879 he remarks, "Nowadays you are not a guest, you are only a customer."

In December 1894 the Newspaper carried the headline...Hen and Chikens; Last of a Birmingham Hotel.

...will close its doors after Christmas in order that the ground be cleared for the erection of King Edwards High School for Girls...for a few years past it has occupied a very humble, and been a casual, corner of Birmingham life...but now it is about to disappear there are many who will regret the loss of such an important landmark in Birmingham's history

 

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Dent, writing in 1894, briefly mentions the Union Club as a handsome stone building in Colmore Row, and describing it as non-political and being essentially a social club, quiet and comfortable, and eminently respectable, entirely free from the party excitement which characterises the other two great clubs of the Midland metropolis. The club had moved to the new building in 1869, and on the 12 July 1869 the Illustrated London News describes as shown...