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Nechells of the 50's & 60's

Phil

Phil

Gone, but not forgotten.
Having spent a major part of my youth in the Nechells area, and lately after reading through some of the posts on this site it has brought to mind a couple of memories that I need help with.

Therefore I have two enquiries of which I think the first should be easily answered by any one of the forums slightly older than me ex-pats of Nechells. The second I think it will be of no trouble for Cromwell or someone with an interest in canals to answer.

My first enquiry is about a mission / church hall that used to be in Henry Street close to its junction with Francis Street. I think it was just adjacent to some Lucas warehouses and to enter you had to go up a set of steps. Any information about this hall would be appreciated. I seem to remember going there for meals occasionally (you know bring your own plate and mug sort of thing) this would be about 1954.

My second enquiry the one I think Cromwell might be able to help with is, on a 1960’s street map that I have been looking at it shows a spur of canal cutting in to a site where once stood a factory. This site is edged by Ashted Row, Windsor Street, Dartmouth Street and Henage Street. Now I remember playing on this site in the fifties and sixties and there certainly was no canal spur there. Can anybody enlighten me?

Cheers,

Pmc1947
 
The Old Ashted Wharf just above Ashted pumping station was built for the Malt factories in the vicinity making Beer Vinegar etc and was built upon just after the war, the old mission house you are talking about was run by the church but Pom can tell you more about that than I can as that was her stomping ground but map should pinpoint it for you
Pom will be back in New Zealand and on the forum next week
 
Cromwell, thanks so much for the information . Just one further thing I have a hazy recollection of a defunct concrete forming business in about the same location in the mid 50's.

Or it may have been just a pattern and form making business. All I remember was when the business closed the formwork they left behind kept our fire burning for about a month.

I can't thank you enough.

cheers,

pmc1947
 
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pmc1947 said:
Having spent a major part of my youth in the Nechells area, and lately after reading through some of the posts on this site it has brought to mind a couple of memories that I need help with.

Therefore I have two enquiries of which I think the first should be easily answered by any one of the forums slightly older than me ex-pats of Nechells. The second I think it will be of no trouble for Cromwell or someone with an interest in canals to answer.

My first enquiry is about a mission / church hall that used to be in Henry Street close to its junction with Francis Street. I think it was just adjacent to some Lucas warehouses and to enter you had to go up a set of steps. Any information about this hall would be appreciated. I seem to remember going there for meals occasionally (you know bring your own plate and mug sort of thing) this would be about 1954.

My second enquiry the one I think Cromwell might be able to help with is, on a 1960’s street map that I have been looking at it shows a spur of canal cutting in to a site where once stood a factory. This site is edged by Ashted Row, Windsor Street, Dartmouth Street and Henage Street. Now I remember playing on this site in the fifties and sixties and there certainly was no canal spur there. Can anybody enlighten me?

Cheers,

Pmc1947
Click to expand...

pmc1947. I can remember the mission/ church hall at the corner of Henry Street and Francis Street. I have been searching for a write up about it but am not sure if I have the correct place. All I can find in the " History Of Warwickshire " if I have the complete version is Great Francis Street.hall registered for public worship from 1901 to 1915.nm
Now the second part you mentioned the spur of the canal I remember being filled in, at the end of the spur was Fletcher's yard with all the old army trucks in it. If you walked along Heneage Street there was a road passageway that went to the canal spur (this I remember as a canal and later being filled in. On the other side was Holbrooks Pickling Factory this was flanked on Dartmouth Street side by the front walls of the houses that had once stood in Dartmouth Street and the perimeter ran along Ashted Row and Windsor Street.
 
Ernie & Peter,

What I remember most about that site was the tunnel structure that I realise now must have been the cellars to the old vinegar factory. All I remember is that it was huge and very long with a brickwork arched ceiling. I also remember that at the Henage St end of the site there was an old factory with a huge metal chimney. Once when I was about nine or ten I climbed to the top of it up the ladder for a bet. We spent whole days playing on that site and no one ever bothered us.

I don’t remember Fletchers using it as a storage compound, perhaps that was a little before my time. Did they ever have a place in Montague Street next to Birmingham Council Salvage Yard because I can remember a site there alongside the canal being used for storing ex WD gear.

The mission hall in Henry Street, I just remember going there a couple of times and getting a couple of meals there. You know bring your own plate and mug sort of thing.

Phil
 
Nechells

Phil. If my memory serves me correctly then Fletcher's yard was about on the corner of Heneage Street and Windsor Street opposite the "Sun" or was it the "Rising Sun" public house. I did not venture too much around the wharf. I do remember the yard of Holbrooks with row upon row of wooden barrels filled with vinegar and pickled onions. Down at the other end of Heneage Street near to Dartmouth Street where a slip road went to the wharf there was a large building that seemed to do all manner of things, concrete paving slabs ect and next to the wharf at the bottom end was a factory with machinery in it. I think there was a tunnel that went under Dartmouth Street to the main canal but I think that was full of water and would need a boat to get along there. Some of this could have been in the late 1940's.
 
re nechells

Ernie,i thought that wa so funny,we found loverly sweets,and you found pickled onions,i still am laughing. pete
 
Nechells

Ernie,

Now that you mention it that tunnel probably was the remainder of the canal spur, after they filled in the canal and removed the pump house. It was the right type of brickwork for a tunnel.

It would have been in the fifties the period I am talking about.The concrete form factory you mention, I remember playing there and collecting all the wooden moulds for firewood. I think they kept us warm for the whole of one winter.

Phil
 
Nechells Play Ground.

Phil. I guess you remember the yard outside the large building, at the very end was a large pile of sand and the rest all the way along was sectioned off
for different types of grit and gravel. Around by the canal was a dwarf wall with a fence of corrugated tin on top. ( A gap in it so we could poke our head through, until they filled the cut in then we could climb through to the other side.) The large building had cast iron window frames with small panes of glass about 9". There must have been at least 3 to 4 floors in that building.
PETER. I bet them sweets did'nt give you the tummy Ache.
 
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Ernie & Peter

(its like a double act Ernie & Peter)

I do remember the sand and gravel bays and the old fashioned high rise factory, mind you in those days all factories were built along the same lines. Like a prison from the outside and not that much of a difference inside.

Charging the subject can either of you remember the snooker hall in Great Francis St up the alley opposite the Junction public house. It was were I learned to play snooker and how to loose money, but it was all good practise for later years in the Railway Club in Inkerman St.

Or the El-Greco Cafe at the top of Bloomsbury st on the corner. I spent many an hour in there playing on the pin ball machine.

Phil
 
mission hall

Every Sunday we went to the Sally Army at that Mission hall and listened to the old dears shouting "Halleluja", on Mondays cup and spoon at the ready, we went to the club and had a cup of Mushy peas!
The old W.D storage yard was a magnet for us too and we spent many a happy hour swivelling the turrets of the tanks and playing in the ambulances. we edged along the canal and got into the Pickling plant for an explore one day and was chased off by security.
 
Snooker Hall.

pmc1947. Yes I did use the snooker hall across the road from the junction pub back in the early 1960's, was it up a flight of stairs ? Also been in the Railway Club playing Bingo for a short time.
 
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GER22VAN said:
pmc1947. Yes I did use the snooker hall across the road from the junction pub back in the early 1960's, was it up a flight of stairs ? Also been in the Railway Club playing Bingo for a short time.
Click to expand...

Ernie

I can't remember any stairs, but its been so long ago I may be wrong. One of my mates at the time lived down the same alley. I can't remember his name either, but the family name was Evans I think. Its possible his name was Gregory.

The Railway Club was one of my haunts, I went to the bingo on Friday nights or rather the current girlfriend did whilst I played snooker in the snooker room. Then on Saturday night I always went to the dance. It was always live groups in those days no disco's.

Phil
 
Phil. Only just noticed your mention of The Railway Club in Inkerman Street. When we where growing up, some mates and I virtually lived there. We where there most evenings, and a lot of the Sunday lunchtimes ( for the hair of the dog, and a game of bingo ). My Dad was on the committee at one stage, and I worked behind the bar for a couple of years too. The one Steward I can recall was Colin and his wife Babs. I got on well with them. Thanks for bringing that back to mind again. Barry.
 
BazzM

The time I spent at the Railway Club would have been roughly from 1964 to about the time that they demolished Inkerman St. I wasn't what you would call a regular because I used to spread myself a bit thin between the the Brittania, the Midland, the Adelaide, the Ashted Hamlet and the Conservative club as well besides calling at a few well known watering holes in town.

Phil
 
Which one of our resident experts on Nechells is going to tell me where this photo was taken from. My best guess is Henry St or even Willis Street looking towards what is left of Ashted Row.

Phil

NechellsNechellsParkway-1.jpg
 
Tsk..it was taken from the Corner of Great Lister St/Rupert St, to the right the next road is Proctor St and the new block being built would be called 'Chestnut house'
 
Spot on Kandy... My Mom moved into that block from another on the estate, Offenham House in 1968, after we had left home and she needed a small flat. Colin, Myself and our then baby son Dean stayed with her for a week in June 1969 as we were up from London. Later in November 1970 we made another visit there before we left for NZ. The road works were the then new Motorway, that smaller block behind was part of what was known as 'The big block' coz it was very long and the other small one was I think Evesham House.

Pom :angel:
 
Kandor & Pomgolian,

So other than being on the wrong side of Great Lister St I am right in my assumption of it being taken from Henry St looking towards the remains of Ashted Row in the distance. The new road has been built over where Henry St would have met Great Lister St, Thanks for your help.

Phil
 
I was'nt around the area at that particular time and to me it seems changed beyond recognition, having said that and going by what has been said is the building with the chimneys in the distances the pub that still stands on Nechells Parkway near Dartmouth Street.
 
GER22VAN said:
I was'nt around the area at that particular time and to me it seems changed beyond recognition, having said that and going by what has been said is the building with the chimneys in the distances the pub that still stands on Nechells Parkway near Dartmouth Street.
Click to expand...

Ernie,

If you mean the Dog and Partride, I think you may be right. I've just been looking at an old picture of it that seems to have been taken around the same time.

As you can see the pub and the building next door had a row of chimneys that look very similar to those in the original photo.

Phil
Photo replaced, probably the same as the original

dog and partridge..ashted row.windsor st 1961.jpg
 
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Have been on the 66 bus today from Town and thought you would like to know that Bullivents and the remainding shop on Nechells Park Road by Cattells Grove have all been changed, no familar names and all painted blue.Such a shock after all this time I couldn't even remember the names of the new ones.
 
i have read a lot of post's on nechell's thank's to pom but i have yet to read of anyone who used to live in lingarg streetor bloomsbury street in the early 50's i know it would have ben classed as a slum today but i lived in bloomsbury street till i was 12 coming to 13 /1953 was i the only one to remember ?
brian baker :shocked:
 
Brian. Although I did not live in Linguard Street I remember it a little, used to know someone by the name of Holland but cannot remember his first name who lived along there and attended Loxton Street Secondry Modern Boys School.
I loved the Fire Station on the corner, expecting any minute Will Hay and his team to come racing out of those doors. Of coarse the old Bloomsbury Library is still there and I hope that they preserve for years to come.
 
pmc1947. Phil a lovely Photograph of the " Dog and Partridge " still along there I guess. I do hope they keep a few of those old building as so many really nice ones have disappeared in years gone by.
 
Pete, I did have a pic somewhere and I think also one appeared on the forum somewhere. I am never organised so I may have a job finding it.
The Fire Station with Folding part glass wooden red doors was just across on the opposite corner from where Bloomsbury Library is. Another little gem of a place that has long since disappeared. If I do happen to find it ( thats if I do have it ) I shall post it for you.
 
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