Wolverton Past - History before 1970

Wolverton Street Names - IV

2012-01-19T15:36:00.003Z

1870s and 1880s

The streets known as Buckingham Street and Aylesbury Street were the next phase of development. Clearly some thought was given to the provision of a square but no effort was made at this time to build on it. After allowing the Stratford Road and Church Street to be open to private development, the LNWR returned to building its own houses along the north side of Buckingham Street, which is why they all look the same. These terraces were probably finished by 1878. The south side was left to private development. Consequently, builder constructed them a few at a time and you can see different building styles.

The plan below shows the intended layout of the new streets. A small start has been made on the south side of Buckingham Street and the block above the Square has been reserved for the Congregational Church.

The Wolverton Building Society was founded in 1878

The names are clearly a nod to the county's ancient towns.

The three short streets built up to Green Lane were Radcliffe Street, Bedford Street and Oxford Street. Radcliffe Street was obviously named to honour the Radcliffe Trust but the motivation behind Bedford and Oxford is more obscure. If they were choosing neighbouring county towns why, or example did Northampton not get a look in? It is certainly nearer than Oxford and commercial connections with Oxford at that time must have been very tenuous. I can only think that after the parish of Wolverton was transferred from Lincoln (where it had resided for centuries) to Oxford people in Wolverton felt more affinity to Oxford as its episcopal seat.

It's possible too that they were thinking of the cross-country road that linked Bedford with Oxford.

Construction seems to have started on these streets in the late 1870s and by 1885 they were complete. Bedford Street started development in 1880 and Oxford Street followed later in the decade.

Wolverton Street Names - III

2012-01-14T13:56:00.001Z

The 1860s Expansion

The Radcliffe Trust would give up no more land to the Railway Company after 1840. The church and the school on Creed Street and the Royal Engineer were all built on Radcliffe Trust property and they retained title. The reason for the development of New Bradwell in Stantonbury in the 1850s was entirely due to the Radcliffe Trust's unwillingness to expand. In 1860, they relented, and the Stratford Road and Church Street were developed as far as the Cambridge Street back alley. The Drum and Monkey was actually on the edge of town at one time.

No prizes for guessing how these streets got their names.

Part of the reason there was no Church Street that the Church was actually on was because Creed Street was named in 1842 before plans had been drawn up for a church and any decision made about the land allocation. The gate entrance was placed on Creed Street because the other streets didn't exist in 1845. The back entrance on Buckingham Street came later.

Wolverton Street Names - II

2012-01-14T10:46:00.000Z

The "Little Streets"

The streets south of the Stratford Road, later known as the "Little Streets" were built mostly in 1840 and survived for 120 years.

The streets were Creed Street (which still survives) Ledsam Street, Glyn Square and Young Street.

These were the men who gave their names to these streets.

George Carr Glyn was borninto a London banking family and was probably instrumental in securing thecapital for the London and Birmingham Railway venture. In 1837 he becamechairman and continued in that role when the enlarged company became the London& North Western Railway. He was a member of parliament and in 1869 elevated to the House ofLords as Baron Wolverton - the first to hold that title since the Middle Ages,and perhaps a tip of the hat to Wolverton’s importance in those early years.

Richard Creed was thesecretary for the company, at first jointly with Captain Moorsom of Birminghamand after Moorsom’s resignation, the sole office holder. Creed was also awell-connected banker and was a partner in the firm of Fauntleroy and Company.As an interesting side note the head of this firm, Henry Fauntleroy, was foundguilty of forgery at the Old Bailey and sentenced to death! There was nosuggestion that Creed was implicated. From the summary of the trial it appearsthat quite a number of people lost money through Fauntleroy’s misappropriationand I expect that many in those times might have felt that the death penaltywas a proper punishment. However, Henry Fauntleroy was the last man to beexecuted for this particular crime and subsequent generations of bankers wereable to rest easy.

JosephFrederick Ledsam, one of the more influential boardmembers and for many years Deputy Chairman. According to the 1851 Census he was a landed proprietor, DeputyLieutenant of Worcester and a JP. He was living in some comfort on the HarborneRoad in Edgbaston. The Ledsams, like many successful Birmingham families,emerge during the 18th century, likely in some manufacturing enterprise. In the19th century Thomas Ledsam and Sons were button manufacturers and Daniel Ledsamwas a merchant in the mid-century. Joseph was obviously part of the same extendedfamily but his precise place in the family is not apparent from my briefresearch. What we can say is that he had some capital and was probably smartenough to invest it in the new railway. On August 13th 1846 The Times listedthe individuals who had put up money for "Railway Speculation". Anyamount over £20,000 had to be declared to Parliament and therefore becamepublic knowledge. Ledsam put up £186,000 - a serious sum of money.The following account,extracted from "Modern Birmingham and its Institutions 1841-1871", acompilation of local activities, gives a clearer concept of Mr.. Ledsam's rolein the community.

On December 28, (1861) Mr..Joseph Frederick Ledsam died in his 72nd year. Until a short time before hisdecease Mr.. Ledsam occupied a prominent position amongst the leadinginhabitants of the town, but his failing health compelled him to retire frompublic life.

Ledsam was a Magistrate for the three counties of Warwick, Worcester,and Stafford, and a Deputy Lieutenant of Warwick. He was High Sheriff ofWorcestershire, a fund-raiser and benefactor of the General Hospital and anactive member of the Government Board of the Free Grammar School.

He was likewisewell-known as having a prominent share in the management of several importantcommercial undertakings, amongst which may be mentioned the Birmingham BankingCompany, the Birmingham and Staffordshire Gas Company, and last, but by nomeans least, the London and North Western Railway Company, in connection withwhich, for several years, he performed the laborious duties of Deputy Chairmanof the Directors. By those who knew him personally, Mr.. Ledsam was highlyesteemed, both as a public man and in the relationship of his private life; andthe regard generally entertained for him was abundantly justified by hisamiable character and his uniformly courteous and obliging disposition.

Thomas Young remains obscure. He was a director of the L & BR and sat on a number of committees, which suggests that he was a hard working director. Unfortunately there were many Thomas Youngs, quite a number of whom were well-to-do and not one of them stands out as the Thomas Young of the L & BR.

Wolverton's Street Names - I

2012-01-14T10:30:00.002Z

The Northern Streets

1838 not only brought the railway to Wolverton but also the need to address the naming of streets. Wolverton had existed for 1000 years without the need for street names. The row of cottages at Old Wolverton was originally given a description - Slated Row - rather than a street name, and Stony Stratford had functioned with a single street and a few back lanes. New times and a new building program confronted the railway company with a new problem - how to distinguish between these new streets laid out on a grid pattern. At first there was no interest in naming the streets but after a few years, probably due to demands of the new postal service, the directors addressed the issue and on October 14th 1842 directed the Estates Committee to come up with a system of names and numbers. What seems to have happened is that the Estates Committee, which included Garnett, Cooke, Walker and Young, named some of these streets after themselves. Bury, Creed, Glyn and Ledsam wereprominent in the company and were given the names of the larger streets

Here are the northern streets and a little information about the men who gave their names to them.

Bury Street - a long street north of the Stratford Road to the canal, originally Wolverton's principle shopping street.
Garnett Street, Cooke Street, Walker Street - short streets about 6 or 7 cottages in length between the north end of the Engine Shed and the canal.
Gas Street - six cottages parallel to the south side of the Engine Shed and, as the name suggests, the Gas Works.

Garnett Street, Cooke Street, Walker Street and part of Bury Street was cleared in 1856 to make way for new workshop development. The south end of Bury Street and Gas treat survived until the 1890s when they too were consumed by works expansion.

Edward Bury

Edward Bury was the first locomotive engineer for the London &Birmingham Railway. He was born in Salford in 1794 andin 1826 set up his engineering works in Liverpool, under the name of EdwardBury and Company. He employed James Kennedy, who brought the necessaryexperience of locomotive building with Robert Stephenson as his worksforeman. In 1842 Kennedy became a partner when the firm expanded under the nameof Bury, Curtis and Kennedy.

Their first engines werebuilt for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway from 1830. In time they refinedtheir designs to lighter locomotives known as the "Bury type". In1836 Bury contracted to run the trains on the London and Birmingham Railway andin 1839, just after the line through Wolverton had opened, he was appointedLocomotive Superintendent at the rather handsome salary of £1400 a year. Hecontracted the building of engines to other companies as well as his own.

Hecontinued in this role until 1847, when, shortly after the formation of the L &NWR he resigned to jointhe Great Northern Railway as Locomotive Superintendent and GeneralManager. He was married toPriscilla Falkner, an accomplished botanical artist, and her works and printscan still be found for sale in the Art market. According to Hugh Stowell Brown, the renowned 19^thcentury Baptist preacher who worked in Wolverton as a young man, relativelylittle was seen of him in the works - an unsurprising observation consideringthat he had responsibilities at his own works in Liverpool as well as duties upand down the line. Wolverton’s role in these years was maintenance and repairof engines and Bury was probably content to delegate the overseeing of thistask. Sir Frank Markham does mention that he had a residence at Great Linford, whichrather suggests that he was prepared to spend some time in Wolverton. He died in1858.

Robert Garnett

RobertGarnett was a son of a Manchester merchant family who didextremely well in trade in the far-east and as an early speculator in railwaysGarnett probably enhanced his fortune. He then followed the well-worn path ofmany wealthy Victorian industrialists and bought land (and the status itbestowed) in the Wyre Forest area near Lancaster and his descendants thereafterenjoyed the lives of country gentry. Robert Garnett wasonce a candidate for MP, although he did not get elected.

Thomas Cooke

ThomasCooke put a huge amountof money into the railway, £219,000 according to The Times of 1846, so it isperhaps no surprise that his name was honoured in the name of a WolvertonStreet. Curiously, other than he was also a director of the London and SouthWestern Railway, little else brought him to prominence and it is hard to findmuch mention of him in any historical record apart from Committee minutes.

Joseph Walker

JosephWalker, who gave his name to the short-lived Walker Street inWolverton, may be one such. In 1846 he was able to put up £178,500 in sharecapital for the L & NWR so he wasclearly a man of some substance. He was an early director of the London andBirmingham Railway and also of the Birmingham and Derby Railway. Other thanthat there are few clues to his existence.

Thereis one tantalizing reference to a Mr.. Walker in the diary of CecileMendelssohn-Bartholdy, then on tour with her brother, the composer Felix:

Saturday September 16

To anotherlocal worthy, Mr. Walker, for dinner. Rehearsal in the evening, the hallilluminated and splendid.

Theeditor of these diaries suggests that this may be Joseph Walker, proprietor of Joseph Walker and Co., Factors in St Paul'sSquare. This is in part corroborated by an 1841 Census entry, which records a 60 year-oldJoseph Walker and his wife living on The Crescent with a household of fourservants. This address in itself would suggest affluence.

ThisJoseph Walker, born around 1780, is certainly of an age which would havegiven him enough financial clout to become a director of an early railwaycompany. It is possible that he was more active in the 1830s and hence became acandidate for a street name. He died in late 1846, but unlike his fellow Birminghamrailway speculator, J.F. Ledsam, left little to be remembered by. This is a rather sketchy casefor this Joseph Walker being the man whogave his name to Walker Street; it could easily be another man of the samename.

Blogging Directions for 2012

2012-01-08T18:58:00.001Z

I started this blog in September 2008 without any clear idea of where this might lead. Most of my posts were fairly random, although I did develop some consistent themes at times. Until quite recently I was producing 15 to 20 posts a month on average, but since September, for various reasons, this level of activity has fallen off.

Three years ago there were hardly any readers, but gradually various plateaus were achieved - 40 a day, 100 a day and now typically over 300 a day. I put a page counter on after the first 9 months and since then we have logged almost 70,000 page views. Some posts have logged over 500 readers; some only 3. It's difficult to predict what interests people. The piece on Field Names, for example, got 257 page views. I would not have expected that level of interest. On the other hand, a piece about Holy Trinity church only attracted 11 readers. Anyway, there is obviously a lot more interest in Wolverton than I might have imagined three years ago. Thank you for taking an interest..

My last piece on Thomas Harrison and the Copper King took quite a bit of research and time to write and I rather think that this will be typical from now on. Less will mean more, I hope. I will try to put out at least one post per week, but I anticipate that this will be the pattern for 2012.

A new publishing venture

2012-01-08T18:54:00.001Z

I know that some of you are not great fans of Facebook but it can have its positive side. A few years ago a Facebook group started up called I grew up in Wolverton, Milton Keynes where people could share memories. Quite suddenly, towards the end of lat year, the group began to take off and it now has over 600 members. Apart from anything else, it is proving to be an excellent source of photographs which have been scanned from old family albums. So far, so interesting.

Last Friday, I suggested to the group that it might be possible to start pulling this material together in printed form and the suggestion met with enthusiasm from some quarters. At the moment I am inviting interested people to join what will be a not-for-profit company dedicated to publishing Wolverton and area memories.

If you would like to know more, please go to this site for more information.

Thomas Harrison and the Copper King

2012-01-01T12:24:00.000Z

Thomas Harrison and the Copper King

From reading the book on the Radcliffe Trust by Ivor Guest youare presented with the image of Thomas Harrison as a land agent for the trustwho was also a gentleman farmer. He does drop hints that Harrison may have hadother resources and he does describe his involvement in the ill-fated woodenaqueduct, but overall we are left with the impression that these activites weresidelines. In fact the reverse appears to be true; Harrison had his fingers inmany pies, some of them very lucrative indeed. And his administration of theWolverton Estate may have taken up the smallest amount of his time. His incomeof £40 a year for managing the Wolverton Estate was not much better than theannual stipend of the Vicar of Holy Trinity and could not begin to cover thelifestyle he evidently enjoyed. One can only assume that it suited him to liveat Wolverton because of its proximity to the Watling Street, the major highwaythat connected him to his business interests in London, the West Midlands andNorth Wales.

At the time he became land agent for the Radcliffe Trust in 1773 he was already the principalagent for Earl Spencer, who had come into a vast inheritance from hisgrandmother the Duchess of Marlborough. The job of managing the Wolvertonestate would have been a small bolt-on activity for the energetic Harrison butit may be that the opportunity suited him very well. He was living at the timein the old Wittewronge mansion at Stantonbury, part of Spencer’s Marlboroughinheritance. Stantonbury was barely populated at the time but it may have had someadvantage for Harrison being midway between the Spencer lands inNorthamptonshire and those in Hertfordshire. From there he would have been ableto travel where necessary and be no more than a day’s journey away. It is hardto put any other construction on this. The Stantonbury estate by itself, mainlygrazing land, could not have supported a man of Harrison’s calibre. A bailiff,for example, at a fraction of Harrison’s income, would have been sufficient tocollect rents and attend to the needs of the estate. This mansion had beenbuilt in 1662 and was probably brick-built, although we have no way of knowingsince no description of any kind survives, but judging by the complete absenceof any ruin, a brick building seems most likely as bricks, compared to stones,are more easily cleared from a site. Again this is guesswork, but since thismansion disappeared a few years after the Harrisons vacated it one can assume thatthe building was in a poor state of repair and probably too difficult andexpensive to resuscitate. The Radcliffe Trust job gave Harrison the opportunityto move to more habitable accommodation and live close to the Watling Street.

Somehow, possibly through the Spencer association, he cameinto contact with the Paget family, Earls of Uxbridge and later Marquesses ofAnglesey. The Paget family were an old family with their seat at Beaudesert inStaffordshire’ Cannock Chase and Thomas Harrison was first employed to look afterthese interests. Caroline Paget was the last of this line and she had marriedSir Nicholas Bayly, an Anglesey baronet, and it was this connection thatbrought everybody in this story into the new world of the industrialrevolution.

The Baylys owned half of a mountain in Anglesey which, inthis new age that was hungry for metal, was found to have an extremely rich andaccessible seam of copper. However, the seam of copper was no respecter of surfaceland boundaries and inevitably disputes arose with the owner of the other halfof the mountain, the Reverend Edward Hughes. The struggle between them wasfierce and litigious.

At some stage after Hughes had established his own miningcompany he engaged the services of one of the sharpest and most enterprisingminds of the new industrial age, Thomas Williams. Williams was an Angleseylawyer without any great prospects ahead of him until he came to representEdward Hughes in the dispute with the Baylys. From here he was able to use hisagile mind and tough bargaining credentials to build up his own industrialempire. He later became known as the Copper King and rubbed shoulders on equalterms with the likes of Matthew Boulton and James Watt. Williams was easilyable to bring about beneficial deals for Edward Hughes and himself and leaveSir Nicholas Bayly and his agent Hugh price puzzled and discontented, and itwas probably in an attempt to bring the contest to more equal terms that HenryBayly (Sir Nicholas’s son and heir and the future Earl of Uxbridge) brought inThomas Harrison. Harrison was up against a very considerable opponent.

The discovery of the copper seam was dated to March 2^nd1768, long before Harrison became involved, and was initially worked by Roe andCompany, a firm of Chester mining engineers, with Bayly taking a 1/8 share. SirNicholas later had regrets about the arrangement, believing, with somejustification, that he had less than he deserved. Issues were furthercomplicated by interventions by the Reverend Edward Hughes, who owned the otherhalf of Parys mountain and there were several litigious dispute during the1770s.

During this period the Hughes family had engaged theservices of an Anglesey lawyer, Thomas Williams. Williams was an opportunist ofthe first rank and subsequently parlayed his role in this local dispute into avery considerable fortune for himself and an almost monopolistic control of thecopper industry in late 18^th century Britain. At his death in 1802his many companies were valued in total at over £1 million – a huge sum inthose days. Williams was clever and unscrupulous but clearly had thepersonality and charm to convince a number of hard-headed businessmen to enterinto deals and partnerships with him.

One early sign of his method of operating emerged in 1778 whenhe persuaded Sir Nicholas Bayly, by then worn down by years of litigation, tolease his share of the mine to John Dawes, a London banker, for 21 years. Withthe ink scarcely dry on the agreement, Dawes then formed a new mining companywith Hughes and Williams, thereby bringing the Parys Mountain mining enterpriseunder the control of one company. There is little doubt that Williams wasbehind this move and he became the powerful figure in the partnership. SirNicholas Bayly’s share of the lease to Dawes was for 1/3 of the production. Amonth later the terms were changed and agreed as a fixed sum of £4000 perannum. In retrospect, not the best deal for Sir Nicholas.

Thomas Harrison entered the picture in 1782 when he wasasked by Sir Nicholas’s son and heir Henry to compile a report on the miningoperations in Anglesey. Harrison had no background in mining and appears tohave come into the picture as a land agent for the Pagets at Beaudesert inStaffordshire. However, Sir Nicholas’s land agent at Plas Newydd, Hugh Price,was obviously being outfoxed by Williams and a sharper brain, one more attunedto the times, was needed. Henry Bayly was concerned about his inheritance butSir Nicholas was still alive, so by asking Thomas Harrison to compile a reportHenry Bayly hoped to gather intelligence without outflanking his father or hisagent Hugh Price. Price was undoubtedly worried by this intervention and triedto counter any potential criticism by insisting at the outset that he had“repeatedly requested” a copy of the lease between Sir Nicholas and Charles Roe,but that the baronet had kept all negotiations secret. Whether this was true ornot Price was obviously sensitive to the inadequate terms of the agreement withDawes.

Thomas Harrison could not but note the desolate landscape ofthe mining operation:

Not a blade of any sort can livewhere the Smoke reaches as is evident from the burning of Ore which destroysand has destroyed every thing of the Vegetable kind within its reach, and suchis the stench of it, as well as its tendency to suffocation, that no mortalbeing can think of living near such works, but those who are employed in them.[1]

Obviously a startlingly different environment from thegentle Cowperian landscape of the Ouse valley.

Harrison then proceeded to describe the mines and the portof Amlwch together with the smelting works in Lancashire and Swansea, which hepresumably visited, and their operations. It is not until 1784, after the deathof Sir Nicholas, that he is able to report on the accounts. The news was notgood. In a letter dated 19^th January 1784 he sends a warning to the earl of Uxbridge, “to my greatMortification, I have already proceeded enough to put me in a cold Sweat.” Hewarns that expenditure appeared to exceed income (albeit a huge figure of£14,000 for December and January) and he could see no immediate solution to theproblem. He complained to Paget about the amount of time he was spending onthis work. He wrote that his son (presumably John Harrison, then about 24) had “notspent a day in any other Business since the 25^th December” and hehad spent three-quarters of his time on this work, which was a long way frombeing finished.[2]

This work brought him into regular contact with ThomasWilliams who was angling to increase his control of copper production byacquiring the Cerrig y Bledda mine, a smaller mine, still in the hands of Uxbridgewith the lease to Roe and company expiring in 1786. Harrison met with Williamsin August 1784 to discuss irregularities in the accounts for the Parys mine, andat this time Williams broached the subject of taking over the lease for theCerrig y Bledda mine. Harrison wrote to Paget on August 21^st 1784 toask if his lordship wished to work the mine himself or lease it. Paget firmlyreplied firmly that he wished to retain the mine and work it directly.

This determination may have been prompted by Harrison’sinvestigation which revealed that Roe and Company had been taking £15,000 ayear in profit for the previous three years, although he may not have heededthe caveat that because of the poor drafting of the lease “they could take allthe ore they cared to at the least expense and leave the more difficult to alater date,” meaning that the most accessible ore was taken first. Inretrospect these were the most productive and profitable years for the mine.[3]

A deal was concluded that involved the ambitious ThomasWilliams. On 11^th October 1785 Harrison recorded, “We yesterday tookpossession of the Cerrig y Bleiddia Mine being first agreed with Roe and Co.for all their engines, stock of coal, utensils, implements and iron at the sumof £2,013.6.0d.[4]…Thepossession of this work by Lord Uxbridge and Mr. Williams as joint adventurersin the proportion of ¾ to His Lordship and ¼ to Mr. Williams commenced on 10October 1785.”[5]

Something must have happened between September 5^thwhen Uxbridge was minded to take no partners and October 10^th whenthe new company was founded. Whatconvinced Uxbridge to change his mind we do not know, but plainly, Williams hadgot his way.

Williams was nothing if not determined to get a share in thenew mining company and had several meetings with Harrison in London andAnglesey to pursue his case, and one can only conclude that Harrison’srecommendation had some bearing on Uxbridge allowing Williams a quarter sharein the new venture, since as late as September 5^th 1785 the earl wasdetermined to go it alone. One can only conclude that something happened thatmade Harrison more amenable to Williams involvement and that he was able topersuade his lordship..

Harrison could have advanced good reasons for the earl totake Williams into partnership. The best parts of the mine were depleted andRoe and Company had left the mine in a poor state with a lot of clearing up todo. Lord Uxbridge knew very little about mining and with the example of hisfather before him he may have been reluctant to get into a protracted legalbattle with Williams, who was a master of that game. Even so, at least onewriter suggests collusion between Williams and Harrison to achieve an outcomedesirable to Williams.

One need not look too far todiscover Harrison and Williams working together behind the scenes, in partevidenced by Harrison’s inclusion in one of the manufacturing partnerships.[6]

This is difficult territory for the historian because thereis absolutely no proof one way or the other of any impropriety on the part ofThomas Harrison but some of the circumstantial happenings around this timeshould raise some questions.

We can note the following. The Stanley Smelting Company,which had works at St Helens and Swansea, was half owned by Lord Uxbridge and aquarter owned by Thomas Williams. The remaining quarter was shared between theironmaster, John Wilkinson, the works manager, Michael Hughes, the Londonbanker and investor, John Dawes, and Thomas Harrison. Another company, theGreenfield Copper and Brass Company in Flintshire was another Williams companyand Harrison appears about this time as a minor shareholder. And finally therewas the Flint Coal Canal company, founded in 1784, which included all theplayers in the Parys Mountain mining drama, Edward Hughes, Thomas Williams,John Wilkinson, Edward Jones, a lead mine owner at Wepre, Flintshire, andThomas Harrison.

Unfortunately we still do not know enough about ThomasHarrison’s background to properly assess his wealth. He was certainlywell-to-do at his death in 1809 and he was able to make good the damagesassessed against him for the failed Wolverton aqueduct, a sum of over £9,000, withoutsignificant impact on the family. A few years later his son Richard was able tomeet the demands of creditors on the failure of the Stony Stratford Bankwithout falling into bankruptcy. So the Harrisons had resources, althoughnotably not in land, which would lead me to conjecture that Thomas Harrison didnot himself inherit any land and had to make his way in the world withoutsignificant assets. Did he havesufficient cash resources to invest in these companies in the 1780s, and if so,where did the money come from?

Without being able to answer that question one might ask ifthese shareholdings actual investments by Thomas Harrison or did they representcompensation for services rendered? It is tempting to put the latterconstruction on this. As indicated earlier, the business of the mines wastaking up a lot of Thomas Harrison’s time for no other compensation other thanexpenses. As land agent for the Pagets at Beaudesert he was probably paidsomething like £40 a year, a similar sum to that which he drew from theRadcliffe Trust and Earl Spencer. The fee served the function of a retainer forservices which involved some regular duties and occasional periods of activity.From the correspondence of the period 1783-5 it does appear that Harrison was underadditional pressure of work and at one point is employing his son to assisthim. So it is perhaps not surprising that he also looked for other opportunitiesto make some extra money. Certainly during this period he became a shareholderin several associated companies.

In the Stanley Smelting Company the major shareholders areUxbridge and Williams, but the smaller shareholders were all activefunctionaries in the setting up and running of the company, so it is reasonableto infer that they were rewarded with small shares that would one daycompensate them for their extra efforts. The same interpretation can be placedon Harrison’s shares in the Greenfield company, except that here Uxbridge wasnot a shareholder and it can only be deduced that these shares represented areward from Williams for “services rendered”. These services may have been inconflict with his nominal master Lord Uxbridge and therefore may raise a queryabout Harrison’s integrity. In a rather rambling letter dated 11 May 1786,Harrison is full of apology to the Earl of Uxbridge, although the exact causeof the upset is not identified. The earl was annoyed with Harrison and Williamsabout something and one interpretationmay be that he was unhappy with the wayHarrison had represented his interests.

The final company, the Flint Coal Canal Company, is more ofa puzzle. The company was set up in 1784, involving many of the players inthese other companies. They did go as far as obtaining an Act of Parliamentapproving the canal in 1788, but the canal was never built. The onlyconstruction was a bridge over the Wepre river with a plaque bearing the namesof the directors, strangely enough nowhere near the line of the proposed canal.The authorized capital was £20,000. Was this capital actually raised? Didanyone lose money? Did anyone make any money? What was the point?

At the time of his involvement with the Angleseyenterprises, between 1782 – 1786, Thomas Harrison was able to build WolvertonHouse at a cost of £1840. He was able to recover £500 from the Radcliffe Trust,but even so was a large amount of money for the age. And from what we mightguess about his “regular” income this figure represents more than ten timesthat figure – a highly speculative amount in any age, even assuming that hecould borrow the money.

It is tempting to conclude that the house was built from theproceeds of his activity in Anglesey during the period. The modernization ofthe old farmhouse may have begun with modest intentions in 1782, but in thelast two years of the building program he must have realized large tranches ofmoney from his industrial shares that enabled him to build Wolverton’s largesthouse. This is pure speculation on my part but such a conclusion can be drawnfrom the coincidence of the building of Wolverton House and his adventure inthe copper mining industry. One can also observe that the Harrison family livedat Wolverton for almost a decade before attempting a building program.

It is curious that we know so little about the origins of aman who became prominent in his lifetime. His date of birth can be inferred as1734, but his place of birth and parentage is as yet unknown. He had a sisterwho married into a Halifax family, which might suggest Yorkshire origins, althoughhis connection to Earl Spencer would suggest Northamptonshire or Hertfordshireor London origins. He had two marriages, but neither one has turned up inrecords, nor has the burial of his first wife Elizabeth. Any one of these couldprovide useful clues.

We can make some assumptions: he was well connected,belonging to a middle class family of appropriate status and that he must havehad some legal training. There is a record of a Thomas Harrison at the InnerTemple from 1754 to 1757, and this man is recorded as the third son of SirThomas Harrison. He may be a candidate, although the age of 20 seems to be abit late to enter the Inns of Court. Also, if he named his first son John, then,according to the naming conventions of the time, one might look to a JohnHarrison as father. There are many Thomas Harrisons to choose from during theperiod, each from various parts of the country, and none with an obviousstandout claim to be Wolverton’s Thomas Harrison. During the drafting of themining leases he uses the services of a Mr. Harrison, a solicitor fromDaventry. Was he related?

The quest will continue but for the moment I am inclined toassume that he had some money behind him, but probably not a great deal. It ismore likely that he used his brains and ability to take advantage of theopportunities open to him, rather like Thomas Williams, although on a lessextravagant scale.

It is tempting to see Harrison and Williams as men cut fromsimilar cloth. Williams father was a middle class landowner in Anglesey, but byno means rich. His son had legal training and was able to build a respectablepractise in Anglesey. His first involvement in the copper business obviouslyinspired him to develop his deal-making skills in this industry and at one timehe held monopoly control of all copper mining in Cornwall and Wales, as well asthe related processing industries.

By comparison Harrison was a small player but he seems tohave been astute enough to develop some wealth from his contacts. On the wholehe appears to have held his own with Williams and emerged financially betteroff from the experience, and the knowledge gained may have encouraged him toinvest in other industrial enterprises, which he undoubtedly did.

A final comment about Williams may give us some taste of thecharacter of the man he had to deal with:

Let me advise you to be extremelycautious in your dealings with Williams. He is a perfect tyrant and not overtenacious of his word and will screw damned hard when he has got anybody in hisvice.[7]

[1] ThomasHarrison. Mona Mine MS. University of Wales, Bangor: MS3544.

[2] Ibid.

[3] ibid.

[4] ThomasHarrison. Memorandum dated 11 October 1785, Mona Mine MS. University of Wales,Bangor: MS 3485.

[5] ThomasHarrison. Memorandum dated 31 March 1788, Mona Mine MS. University of Wales,Bangor: MS 3046.

[6] DorothyBentley Smith. A Georgian Gent & Co.: The Life and Times of Charles Roe ofMacclesfield. Landmark Publishing Ltd: 2005. P.473.

[7] Letter fromThomas Wilson to James Watt, 15 September 1790.

The Front around 1900

2011-12-20T08:58:00.000Z

The Front at the beginning of the 20th Century

Here's an interesting photograph from Julia Bennett's family album, taken, I would estimate, in the first decade of the 20th century. The view shows the corner of Radcliffe Street and the Stratford Road, later known as Foster's Corner after the Foster Brothers Clothing store that occupied the site.

In this picture the corner shop is the premises of William Hutchinson, a hairdresser and tobacconist. Next to him was a cycle shop, the sign above indicating the Hobart Cycle Company. By 1911 this was the Grafton Cycle Company, who later moved to the premises which still bears the name further down the street.

The shop next door, which is now two shops (as it has been for a long time) numbered 18 and 19 was mainly occupied by John Verney who was originally a shoemaker but was also the Postmaster. So from the 1880s onwards this was Wolverton's Post Office, although it may also have accommodated some other businesses. The Post Office appears to have remained here until the new GPO was built on Church Street in the 1930s.

Next to the east at Number 17 was a Chemist, and had been thus from almost it's first build in the 1860s.
The censuses and Trade Directories show:

George Atkinson
William Barton (from 1891)
Alfred Leeming (from 1911)
Walter Mackerness (from 1939)

In the 1950s the business was taken over by Escott, who then ran it until his retirement. The building showed remarkable continuity for its first century.

Number 16 showed a similar continuity, starting as a butcher with frederick Oxley, continuing through Harry Norman at the time this photo was taken and through to Canvins from about 1924 onwards.

Number 15 was originally a grocery, but from 1911 onwards was a shoe shop - Freeman, Hardy and Willis.

The three storey building next door, now numbered 13 and 14, was mainly a drapery, although the proprietor at this time was also described as a house furnisher. It's not clear whether that meant soft furnishings or furniture, or both. Quite why the awning was thought necessary for this north facing shop front is not clear.

Sigwart's, the watchmaker and jeweller, cannot be seen, but it was there, sandwiched between the two large buildings, one of which was, and still is, the North Western. After the closure of the Royal Engineer, which can be seen at the end of the block, the North western remains Wolverton's oldest public house still practising its original trade.

There are a lot of people standing about in this picture. Most likely they are waiting for the tram which can be seen in the distance. There is a horse and cart but motor cars are completely missing.

Driving Licence

2011-12-11T18:20:00.001Z

I just came across my Father's first Driving licence. He would have been 24 at the time and probably just about in a position to afford a used car, although I have no idea what it was.

The licences were designed as little booklets, about the size of a business card with pages where you could stick the annual licence, which was dated from the anniversary of the date you first held a licence. The fee was 5 shillings - 25p in today's money although there is no real equivalence. 5/- in 1935 night have bought you 10 pints of beer.

The Drum and Monkey

2011-12-08T14:48:00.000Z

At the back of Number 44 Stratford Road was another house which housed one of Wolverton's two off-licences. You could ring a bell in the back alley and the proprietor would open the hatch and serve you. This was Wolverton's "hole in the wall" and it served for quite a long time before the general liberalisation of alcohol purchases made places such as this obsolete.

Before I go on to describe its origins there was another "hole in the wall" at the second station, just off Young Street. It was in fact marked as such on the 1880 OS Map and I presume service was from the side of the old railway Refreshment Rooms.

The house at Number 44 Stratford Road was actually Number 1 Stratford Road until the 1890s when Cambridge and Windsor Streets were built and therefore on the edge of town. The additional building at the back seems to appear in the 1880s and was run by a man named Samuel Sinfield. Sinfield was a labourer in the 1881 census living at Number 3 Stratford Road, now Avenues, estate agents, but in 1881, the about 50 years old, he is recorded in this house as a Beer Seller. It is quite possible that after the other "hole in the wall" closed down Sinfield (or whoever built the house) saw an opportunity.

In the 1950s, when I remember the place, it was possible to take along a jug to be filled with draught beer. They also sold bottled beer, cider, various bottles of pop - including something called "dandelion and burdock", cheap "Emu" sherry and cheap "Ruby" port. If you wanted anything more sophisticated you had to go to the Victoira Wine shop on the corner of Church St and Cambridge st opposite the library.

The origin of the name "Drum and Monkey" is completely obscure. There are lots of Drum and Monkeys across the land and there are various explanations of the origin of the name, none of them completely convincing. The name itself probably came to England in Victorian times when soldiers returning from overseas duty might bring back a tame monkey who could beat a drum. At one time this might have been a feature (albeit an annoying one) for some pubs. Why this should have been applied to this hole in the wall may never be known. It might have been first applied as a joke and then the name just stuck.

Old Railway Carriages

2011-11-27T09:55:00.001Z

Wolverton was justly famous for its carriage building and you could be sure that once they had come to the end of their useful life as carriages they could be "retired" and put to good use somewhere else. In the 40s and 50s you could discover several of these old carriages around the town. In the photo above you can see a carriage used as a club house for the bowling green at the park. Similarly one was used on Osborne Street as a bar and club house for the cricket and tennis clubs. I also recall one used at the old Youth Club at the back of Anson Road. It was attached to the side of the main building and used in part for the club leader's office. You could also find the odd carriage, or part of one, at various allotments. As I remember them, they all had a nice cosy feeling inside.

Here is a really interesting story about the life of one of these old carriages and I am grateful to the telling of it to Kim Pavey. What follows is her narrative, followed by a few additional comments from Jane Bailey. This may be its final resting place after 130 or 140 years, but it has been a great survivor while many brick or concrete built buildings have come and gone during its lifetime.

Bill Elliott's railway carriage on the allotments today. I don't recall its early history other than that it was built at the Works (in the late 1800's I believe) but it ended up in Anson Road in the garden of Bill Elliot's house, where he used it as an office for the Works Union. If anyone has the book "Piano and Herrings" about Bill's life, it is in there and maybe someone else can fill in that bit. Anyway, there it sat for many years until the mid-80's when it was slated for removal as the current owner was going to sell the house and the carriage was considered more of an eyesore than an asset. Due to its already fragile condition, that meant it was almost certainly going to be demolished. My step-dad was particularly saddened to hear of its impending fate and made enquiries about acquiring it. The owner had no problem but the difficulty and expense of moving it was a bar. My mother, however, came up with the money from somewhere and we "gave" the carriage to Tony as a Christmas present. We hadn't actually been able to move it by Christmas morning and as Tony was a big fan of the TV show "Treasure Hunt" we made up a route with clue cards which he had to follow around Wolverton. I had to follow him at a discreet distance to make sure he got all the clues as he would have been completely lost and by about half way round the town I could see he was starting to get very frustrated. However by the time he picked up the last clue taped to the Wyvern railings I think it had dawned on him where he was going lol. Mum had gone on ahead and actually wrapped the carriage in a giant Christmas bow with all the streamers and trimmings, I think it cost almost as much to "wrap" the carriage as it did to move it. We hired a flatbed crane to get the carriage out of the garden and over to our house in Church Street but the narrow alley proved to be so much of a challenge for the truck that all the driver had managed to do by nightfall was get the carriage out to Aylesbury Street, where it sat for a week until we could get another crane to take it to Church Street. We had to keep in constant contact with the police because it was on double yellow lines and since it was technically a vehicle it was parked illegally. Plus it took up half the damn road! Eventually it wound its way to its new home in Church Street where it lived for a couple more decades, and went on public display at my parents annual "Bygones" open weekend. Sadly the vandalism in that area of town in the late 90's did it a lot of damage and eventually my folks decided to take the now very fragile carriage on one last journey to the allotments where it now lives, and I believe Jane Bailey can add to the story from here about its arrival there!

From School to Pub: A tale of two buildings in Stony Stratford

2011-11-24T15:36:00.000Z

I don't think it ever occured to me as I was sitting at my school desk trying to take care that my dip pen didn't leave a blot in my exercise book that I would ever live to enjoy a pint in later life in my old classroom. In Stony Stratford this could have happened and in a curious way the history of pubs and schools is intertwined.

As I have described in another post the old Rose and Crown on the High Street was bequeathed by its owner Michael Hipwell in 1610 to found a school. The inn continued to operate to raise sufficient money for the next 99 years and then was converted into a school. In the 19th century this was taken over by the National School movement and a school operated on this site and adjacent to it until the 20th century.

In the meantime the expansion of Wolverton works led to new building in Stony Stratford and the so-called Wolverton End developed. This enlargement of the Holy Trinity parish necessitated the building of a new church (St Mary's) and in due course another school. This was opened in 1873 on the corner of the Wolverton and London Road and was designed by the distinguished architect, Edward Swinfen Harris.
For part of the 20th century these two schools operated in tandem, with the boys in the High Street and the Girls and Infants at the London Road School. Then in 1936 a new co-educational school was built on King George Crescent and the old schools were redundant.

Fortunately there was a ready tenant for the Swinfen Harris school. The old Plough Inn had been in business next door for many years and the new premises were attractive to them. I imagine the conversion was not too costly and there was probably already a cellar in the school building.

Thus it came to pass that that the building designed by Swinfen Harris was a school for about 60 years and has been a pub for the last 80 - and possibly will continue in that line of business. The bell tower betrays its former use as a school but nowadays I suspect very few people have any inkling of its original purpose.

Telephone Boxes

2011-11-23T12:09:00.001Z

As I mentioned in the last post the telephone was slow to be adopted by individual households in the UK. Wolverton was no exception. Most people relied on strategically placed telephone boxes to make calls and these were usually for rare occasions like telephoning distant relatives (if they had a phone) and calling the doctor. Yes, they still made house calls in those days.

The two photo above show the placement of the telephone box in the Square. There was also a telephone box by the Post Office in Church Street and one by the Station. I imagine this was intended for travellers who needed to call car hire to take them with their luggage to their final destination.

After Furze Way was built in 1947 another box was added at the corner of Windsor Street, and later, in the 1960s when Southern Way was built another box was added at that end of town.

I am not sure that the residents of Jersey Road and Anson Road were as well served. Until the new police station was built along the Stratford Road, circa 1960, and a new telephone kiosk added, I rather think that those residents had to trail all the way to the Square of the Post Office to make a call.

In our present age of mobile phones and instant communication it now seems hard to imagine that only two generations ago most people managed quite happily without making a phone call. Most conversations were face-to-face. Astonishing!

Telephones in Wolverton

2011-11-21T15:48:00.000Z

Telephone exchanges were once very local. Up to 1945, the exchange was not automated and the numbers were very simple. A S Byatt, the grocer on Cambridge Street had the telephone number Wolverton 2. The Co-op was Wolverton 10. One of my grandfather's had the number Wolverton 4. When the automated exchange came in it became 3104.

As improvements came in technology the numbers got longer. Byatt's telephone number of 2, became 3102, then 313102. Now of course it is an 11 digit number.

The Bedford area telephone directory which appeared in our house in the early 1950s was a slim blue volume which covered a large territory - Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, North Bucks and part of Hertfordshire. I have reproduced part of it here.

For most people the telephone was quite new and the directory was full of advice on telephone etiquette. Generally people answered the phone with, for example, the number "Hello, Wolverton Double two, seven, eight!" It seems very quaint today.

Telephones back then used dials. Push button technology was at least 20 years into the future. Dialling was a very slow affair, particularly if you had to wait for an 8 or 9 to click round.

We were all slow to adopt the telephone. There was a gap of between 40 and 60 years between the availability of the telephone and its use in the home. Most were satisfied with the call box - and there were few enough of those. There was one by the station, another by the Post Office on Church Street, one on the Square and there may have been another on Anson Road - I am not sure.

The MK Museum has an excellent exhibit at Stacey Hill of the development of Wolverton telephones and is worth a visit. 60 years ago the telephone engineers came to our house in Windsor Street to install the house's first telephone. The phone itself was quite heavy and the flex connecting the handset to the phone was quite thick. The bakelite box bolted to the wall contained various solenoids and a bell, similar to those on old alarm clocks.

The Co-op

2011-11-20T11:10:00.000Z

I have been trying to discover if anybody has written a history of the Co-op in Wolverton, without success. There are fragments of information that I have turned up, but not enough to write a coherent account. Here at any rate are some notes.

The Co-op movement was more-or-less contemporaneous with the development of Wolverton so it was to be expected that the idea would take hold. Exactly how it was formed and who were the prime movers will require the work of some historian with access to the minute books and papers of the Co-operatove Society - if indeed they still exist. It does strike me as a story worth telling because by the middle of the 20th century the Co-op was a dominant force in retail in Wolverton. After all the small dairies in Wolverton were closed down by the requirements of the Pasteurisation Act, the only source of supply of milk and dairy products was the Co-op Dairy, located on Jersey Road. You could, if you were so minded, buy everything you ever needed in life from the Co-op - bread, milk, meat, groceries, fish, green groceries, drapery, men's clothing, shoes, furniture, toys, and even in death the Co-op could accommodate you and arrange your funeral.

As far as I can piece together the story from Trade Directories the Co-op story began a decade after the establishment of Wolverton. There is a suggestion that the bakery on Bury Street, operated by George Kightley, from a Stony Stratford family of bakers, was a Co-op bakery, but this is only a brief mention in some railway committee minutes that I cannot be sure of this fact. The Kightley bakery ran from the day these shops were erected in 1839 until about 1856 when they were pulled down to make way for workshop expansion. Kightley thereafter moved to Newport Pagnell where he ran a bakery in Silver Street.

The Co-op story certainly begins with the building and opening of the shops in Creed Street and the Co-operative Society is featured in the Kelly's directories of the period. In the 20th century the Creed Street shop was known as a Fish and Chip shop, but until the Co-op began to expand along Church Street this grocery store was the main outlet.

By 1869 the Co-operative Society had also opened a grocery shop in New Bradwell.

In 1887 we see the first mention of the Wolverton Industrial and Provident Society, presumably a re-formed or re-named organisation. It was based in Church Street and I can only conclude that this was the beginning of Co-op expansion. The shop was probably Number 15. The location of this shop is on the right hand side in this 1960s photograph, beside the striped traffic pole.

At about this time or shortly after there was a further expansion to the new Market Square and for many years after the main office was established here. Unfortunately the exact addresses are not given and of many years after the Co-op sought to advertise its presence in the directory by listing itself only as Market Square. It is really not until 1928 that we find a comprehensive listing of addresses of places where the Co-op did business.

1-5 Market Square
15-19 Church Street
60-64 Church Street
159 & 161 Church Street
106 Jersey Road
30 and 47 Aylesbury Street

This is the configuration that most people would recognise in the mid century when the Co-op was at its peak.

I am not sure of the date of the picture below, but I suspect from the architecture and the large plate glass windows that it is late 1890s or early 1900s. This was probably at the time Wolverton's most splendid shop. as you can see from the photo the houses either side, Numbers 3 and 6 are still residential. Did the Co-op own Numbers 1 and 2? Possibly. They certainly did at a later period.

The new Co-op on the Square.

Costcutter today, formerly the Co-op below

Once the west end of the town was developed in the first decade of the 20th century, the Co-op also moved westwards, establishing a grocery, dairy and butcher's shop on Jersey Road.

Former West end Grocery and Dairy

In the late 1920s there was a further expansion as the Co-op bought three houses on Church Street and built a state-of-the-art department store.

And it further expanded along the Square to take up the first five houses from the corner. Behind the grocery was a bakery, and the shop at the corner of Bedford Street was a Co-op butcher and later an outlet for bread and confectionery.

Co-op Bakery

Once the Co-op dominated this corner of the Square

Bedford Street Corner shop

Obviously the co-op has not gone away; it has had to grow to larger superstore outlets with plenty of parking. The Wolverton Co-op shops, as they were, represent an age when shopping could be done on foot, daily, with hand-held wicker baskets. The Wolverton Industrial and Provident Society probably had its weaknesses, but its great virtue was that it was locally owned and operated. You can hardly say that of any retail outlet these days.

Facebook and Wolverton

2011-11-16T18:47:00.001Z

I haven't been doing much blogging of late, partly (but not entirely) because I have been adding to and commenting on the Facebook page "I grew up in Wolverton, Milton Keynes". The group was started by Faye Elizabeth Lloyd from a later generation than mine about two years ago. It started modestly enough as these things do and maintained a steady state for some time. Recently, it has taken off and become a lively board for discussion and reminiscence. I think there are now in excess of 500 members of the group. So if you haven't discovered it I recommend that you do. It's good reading for everyone interested in Wolverton - fun too.

If you have a Facebook account you can find the group easily enough. If not, then I'm afraid you will have to join Facebook.

Moreland Terrace revisited

2011-11-06T13:29:00.001Z

21 Moreland Terrace circa 1900

I am indebted to Julia Bennett for this photograph. It is the house on the corner of Radcliffe Street and Aylesbury Street and is probably a very early photograph. As I wrote before Moreland Terrace was an 1880s expansion, completed in 1884.

The picture shows the rather unique decorative elements around the doors and windows, quite unlike anywhere else in Wolverton. All of these disappeared when the buildings were converted into shops. Today, even the upstairs windows have been modified. It's a large house with two front rooms with probably four bedrooms upstairs. It was clearly designed for a middle class occupant. Somewhat surprisingly the occupants are of more modest occupation.

The head of the family in 1901 was William Bennett (The first letter is obscured, but it looks like Bennett) a horse trainer. He was then 58 and his wife 56. They had their 30 year old unmarried daughter Emily living with them. She was working at home as a dressmaker. The house also accommodated their widowed sister-in-law, a 31 year old nephew working as a clerk in the Railway Offices, and an unmarried 26 year old niece. So the house was full and between them they could probably afford it.

Squares were prestigious addresses in London in the 19th century and I am sure the intention was to do the same in Wolverton. Some of the houses on the Square are quite large, but others are modest in size, so perhaps the grand plan did not quite achieve its objective.

There were commercial considerations too. The 1890s expansion of Wolverton left the residents of Cambridge Street and Windsor Street a long way from the shops on the Front and Church Street and it was not long before shop frontages began to appear along Moreland Terrace. If you look at this photograph taken around 1910, you can see the beginnings of this development.

This picture begins with Number 17 on the right, so we can't tell if Number 21 had been converted by this date. At the far end Number 1 was a drapery from the beginning but gradually a conversion to shops was taking place. Only the shop at Number 9 has preserved its frontage. Note too the wrought iron railings around the Square. They were probably taken up during the 1914-18 war and melted down to make armaments. The Cenotaph was not built until after the war so the Square appears to be nothing more than a green space.

Below is Number 21 Morland Terrace today - hardly recognisable.

Stony Stratford Schools

2011-10-31T19:53:00.000Z

The history of schools in Stony Stratford is much longer and more complicated than that of Wolverton, although it is interesting to note that they were all built on the Wolverton Manor, that is on the east side of the Watling Street.

Schools only emerged where there was a population centre, so there was no demand in the scattered village of Wolverton, which had in any case become depopulated by the land enclosures of the 16th century. In addition, there was no real recognition of the importance of schooling until the intellectual Humanist movement reached the shore of England in the early 16th century.

Stony Stratford's first school (as far as we know) was founded by Michael Hipwell who set aside some of his land and property to found a Grammar School in his will of 1610. The Rose and Crown was to be let for a period of 99 years and at the end of this time the property was bequeathed to Trustees who were directed to use the capital and income to found a school:

“that the rents andprofits may be applied to the maintenance of a schoolmaster from time to timefor ever, to keep a Free Grammar School in the barn behind the said inn, whichbarn he appointed should be applied as the school house, and was then latelybuilt by him, and a chimney, a loft, and a parlour on the one end thereof forthe schoolmaster from time to time to dwell in, and the yard adjoining to thebam for the use of the schoolmaster for the time being : and he appointed thatthe said trustees should nominate the schoolmaster to hold the said free schoolfrom time to time as they should think good; and it is provided, that suchscholars of the town, or any of the next town adjoining, as should be minded tolearn either grammar, or to write, or to cypher, should be taught in theschool, and be taught their principles in religion, or else the said gift to bevoid ; and that the trustees should remove the said schoolmaster, and put inanother, if they should think good cause, or that the school master for thetime being should not duly and orderly behave himself, and teach the scholarsin the said school, as should be thought meet by the said trustees.”

One must assume that this school began to function as such after 1710.

By the 19th century the income from Michael Hipwell's charity was insufficient for the operating costs of the school and the trustees decided to merge their interests with the new National School Society, which was a Church of England movement with access to state funds. This led to the foundation of St Giles School at Number 30 High Street, next door to the old Rose and Crown in the first decade of the 19th century. The school reigned supreme in Stony Stratford (apart from private schools which I will discuss in another post) for about 30 years to the increasing discontent of non-conformists.

The non-conformists were not entirely without support. There was a counter movement in the 19th Century to provide a school curriculum for Non-conformists and almost parallel with the National Schools another sort of school, with more-or-less the same funding arrangements, came into being as British Schools, sometimes known as "Lancastrian Schools" after their founder Joseph Lancaster. While these schools began to make their appearance in England after 1819, the first British School to come to Stony Stratford was built in 1844 at the very south end of the High Street at a cost of £750. You can still get a good view of it at the Corner of the High Street and the Wolverton Road. The curved corner is a nice thought and in more recent times this has been mirrored in a newer building on the opposite side of the street.

This school lasted for about 70 years and then was moved to a new building built by the Council on Russell Street in 1907. This building is still used as an Infants school. The old British School continued in use as a public hall.

In 1858 St Giles school was partly rebuilt and enlarged in the grounds at the back of the Rose and Crown properties at the instigation of the Reverend W T Sankey who spent his private income very liberally in Stony Stratford. And again in 1867, the generosity of another vicar, this time the Rev. William Pitt Trevelyan, at that time Vicar of Holy Trinity, built another school on the corner of the London Road. This one, designed by the architect Edwin Swinfen Harris, is now the Plough Inn, which you can see in the above photograph.

This school was another church school, designed for the expanding population at the "Wolverton End" which in time formed a new parish, known as Wolverton St Mary's. At first it served Boys Girls and Infants, but in the 20th century there was some rationalisation with St Giles on the High Street - St Giles took the boys and the newer school was used for Girls and Infants only.

In 1936 a new school opened on King George's Crescent, and the old schools closed and were converted to private use. The school designed by Swinfen Harris was occupied by The Plough Inn, which for many years had conducted its trade in a building next door. There is a certain symmetry in this. The Rose and Crown became a school and the school on the corner of the London Road became a pub!

The Time Clock

2011-10-21T13:56:00.000+01:00

Thanks to David Weatherhead for this bit of memorabilia.

I don't know when punch card time clocks were introduced but it was probably a 20th century invention. Which I suppose begs the question of how work time was monitored before the introduction of these clocks.

The one shown here must have been of pre-WWII date and was probably a precision timepiece. Each employee had a time card which could be inserted to record time in and time out. You could of course clock in early but if you clocked out early you would lose pay. I think a minute might cost you at least a quarter of an hour's pay - possibly more. Because of this men would leave their work five minutes early and would line up to clock out. Once the minute hand had ticked over men wuld rapidly process their time cards and the exodus from the works gates at lunchtime and at the end of the day would rapidly become a flood.

Time clocks such as this one were in use until 1996, when they were replaced by an electronic version.

Listed Buildings - The Milepost

2011-10-13T07:40:00.000+01:00

The British Heritage reference can be found here.

Milepost

The cast iron milepost dates from 1833 - that much is a fact. However the listing suggests that a mistake was made in the casting - one side reads "Buckingham 9 miles and below it Stratford 1 mile"; the other side reads "Newport Pagnell 5 miles and below Stratford 1 mile." They argue that the casting should show "Wolverton" on one side, and indeed in later years this was painted on.

On thinking about this the mile post would have made perfect sense to a traveller in 1833. You were one mile from the crossroads and you either had 9 miles to go to Buckingham or 5 miles to Newport Pagnell depending on your direction. You were, to all intents and purposes already in Wolverton as it then was and a mile post would be unnecessary. In fact it could not have been placed at the location we all knew in the 20th century because the new road linking Wolverton Station and Stony Stratford was not constructed until many years after.

After the railway was built Wolverton Station was exactly two miles from Stony Stratford when the Stratford Road was built and I would be inclined to assume that the "Wolverton 1 mile" was later painted on to reflect that fact.

There was, in my opinion, no mistake in the original casting.

The milepost, pre-restoration, looked like this.

Listed Buildings - Old Wolverton

2011-10-12T19:42:00.001+01:00

Old Wolverton's buildings obviously pre-date Wolverton, but, surprisingly perhaps, not by much. Wolverton House dates to 1783 and all the other surviving buildings come after that. here is the British Heritage list.

Barn at Wolverton Mill

Barn at Warren Farm

View of the Warren Farm Development showing barn

Holy Trinity Church

This version of the church dates from 1817 when it replaced the medieval church, although it retained the tower.

School House at Old Wolverton

A school was comparatively late coming to Old Wolverton. Stony Stratford had school and New Wolverton had its own school in 1839. New Bradwell even had a school before this one was built in 1856.

Garden Wall, Manor Farm

17th Century Headstone - Holy Trinity Graveyard

The Old Rectory

Manor Farm House and Cottages and Outbuildings

Wolverton Mill

Spinney Cottage

Warren Farm Cottage

Wolverton House

Wolverton Park

Listed Buildings - Wolverton

2011-10-10T20:26:00.000+01:00

Thanks to Andrew Lambert for this idea. I am going to go on a tour of the listed buildings in the area. I'll start with Wolverton, then do Old Wolverton, Stony Stratford and New Bradwell.

I can't help but comment on the arbitrary nature of the listing process. The original Engine Shed did not get listed and was consequently flattened to make a Tesco car park, but the Triangle Building, started in 1845 and much enlarged and adapted over the years, makes the list. The school of 1840 is not listed, nor is the Royal Engineer of 1841. Why is the Aylesbury Street School of 1906 listed and not the Moon Street School of 1908?

The information below is presented as links to the British Heritage site. The information is under crown copyright and cannot be reproduced here. Just as well perhaps, since there are a number of instances where the descriptions are factually wrong.

Area map of listed buildings

Blue Bridge

The Blue Bridge was a farm track from Stacey Hill Farm to the fields sloping down to Bradwell Brook.

Church of St George the Martyr

The building and history of the church has been covered in various posts.

Classroom at Wyvern First School

Former Railway Works Building

In 1845 the LBR used the land on the east side of the line to build a new shed. In time this expanded to fill the whole triangle area between the canal, the Stratford Road and the old railway line. It was henceforward known as the Triangle Building.

Reading Room

I rather think that it would take some serious archaeological work to identify which part of this building was the original Reading Room of 1840. Back then it was certainly a single storey structure and the road and canal bridge were lower. The openings for doors and windows do not resemble anything visible on the surviving planss from the 840s.

Former Royal Train Shed

Funny what the word "Royal" can do. This long shed and workshop was built in the 1880s when the main line was diverted and sat on the embankment above the Park. It was used in the 20th century to store the Royal Train when it was not in use, thus giving the building a significance which it might not otherwise have had.

Church Institute

Park Keeper's lodge

This is the best photo I have at the moment, surrounded by boards, empty and awaiting some fate.

Methodist Church

Railway Bridge over Canal

Stacey Hill Farm Barn

The barn was built in the 1840s when the new farm house was built on top of the hill. (Formerly Stacey Farm had been closer to Bradwell Brook.) It was a large timbered structure and was given a Grade II listing. Unfortunately it burned down in a fire in 1996 so the preservation order didn't help very much!

Stacey Hill Farm House

The farm house, built I understand, by the very young Charles Aveline is now occupied by the Milton Keynes Museum and can be visited during opening hours.

Skew Bridge

Garden Pavilion

I haven't got much idea of what this is. I assume from the description that it was a garden structure in the grounds of the Vicarage.

Viaduct

Wyvern First School

The girls and infants continued to use the 1840 school on Creed Street until 1906 when this was built. At the time it was Wolverton's grandest school until the Secondary School opened at the end of Moon street in 1908. The Creed Street School did service as a Market Hall until the Agora was opened.

Wyvern Nursery

This was in 1896 the new Boys School and remained so until about 1946 when the Secondary Modern came into being. From that time on all the Wolverton schools were co-ed.

Architects and Wolverton

2011-10-10T09:17:00.001+01:00

Wolverton, for the most part, remains an architect-free zone.

At the beginning, the first Engine Shed was designed by an architect, although Edward Bury, the first Locomotive Superintendent, was not inclined to give the architect a free hand. The first houses, in fact all the streets, were laid out and constructed by builders, mostly by Dunkley of Blisworth. Architcets were not involved as they were with Swindon and Crewe, and you could argue that it showed.

The church and vicarage of St George (1844) was designed by an architect, and architects were called in to design the Church Institute in 1908. I don't know about the first school (now the library) on Creed Street (1841) but I imagine an architect was used. This was certainly the case with the Science and Art Institute, which burned down in 1970. The twentieth century schools, Church Street, Aylesbury Street, Moon Street and The Radcliffe School were all designed by architects.

I don't know if the Victoria Hotel, The Craufurd Arms and the Top Club used architects - they may have done.

In more recent times, the modern flats and high rise tower that replaced the "little street" terraces were designed by architects, as was the Agora and presumably the Tesco development.

I suppose the question I might ask, "Is there any architectural heritage in Wolverton?"

The Aylesbuty Street and Moon Street schools have some visual appeal, and the church - well, it is what it is - a 19th century gothic revival church, but too modest in scale or decoration to be impressive. The Craufurd Arms and the Top Club have some decorative appeal but I suspect they would not win prizes. The Church Institute is functional but quite boring. Some of the houses on the Stratford Road, Church Street, Oxford Street and The Square have some embellishments on their frontages. The general impression of 19th century Wolverton is that of red-brick uniformity. You have to look very carefully to see the imaginative detail.

Which leaves us with the Agora, the Gables Tower and associated flats and the Radcliffe School.

All of those concrete and steel and glass buildings of the 1960s were built with function and cost in mind and not much of a nod to the aesthetic. It seems odd to me in retrospect that we once admired the clean functional lines of 1960s architecture. I doubt if they will be much mourned when the time comes for their demolition.

The Agora had possibilities and I think the designers were genuine in their attempt to provide a central architectural feature for Wolverton. They failed in my view. The huge block divides rather than unites the town's commercial areas, and it closed off Radcliffe Street which was one of Wolverton's arterial streets. Inside, accommodating what appears to me to be a flea market, the atmosphere is gloomy. The exterior, although imposing, is unlovely. There is more than a hint of some clever twentieth century brain trying to patronise the practical Victorians who built Wolverton.

That's my opinion. Here is that of Iqbal Alaam, an architect:

Despite the size and bulk of the building, it sits majestically among the Victorian neighbours, with no visual niceties or concessions, without playing second fiddle to anyone.
This building is a hidden gem (not visually exciting – more like an uncut precious stone) and has a lot of lessons to offer to many people of differing disciplines.

To be balanced, the Agora does have (did have?) some potential, but whatever potential it did have was spoiled by the siting of the building. I have discussed this before (here) and had it been built to the west of Radcliffe Street the story might have been a different one. I have not had to live with the Agora but what I gather from Wolverton residents is that it is an unloved building.

My conclusion has to be that Wolverton has been poorly served by architects over 170 years. Will this change?

The Beeches and Yiewsley

2011-10-09T14:35:00.000+01:00

Cambridge Street was developed up to Green Lane in the late 1890s. At the same time two large, south facing houses were built on the vacant block in front of the new tennis courts. They were called The Beeches and Yiewsley. The name Yiewsley may come from a place name in the old county of Middlesex, although I really have no idea where it might come from. The Beeches appears to have stuck with the prevailing fashion in Wolverton of naming larger houses after trees. The inscribed brick tells us that they were erected in 1894.

With The Gables, The Elms, the old Villas, and a few larger terraced houses on the Stratford Road and the new Market Square these two semi-detached houses made up a very small complement of middle-class housing.

The first occupant of The Beeches was William Purslow, who was a senior figure in the Carriage Works. Yiewsley was inhabited by Heber Martin Williams, also a senior works employee. Within a decade Yiewsley became the residence and surgery of a doctor. Edmund Penney was there for about 20 years or so and was succeeded by David Max. After the war Dr Delahunty had a practice there and he in turn was succeed by Dr Hall - probably in the late 50s. In the Milton Keynes era purpose-built clinics became the norm and doctors tended to live away from their place of work.

As housing stock in North Bucks increased and road transportation improved I think senior works managers began to look outside Wolverton for their houses and although The Beeches remained in private hands, it was not occupied by a railway employee. In the 1950s a Major Brooks and his family lived there. I don't know what he did, possibly worked at Hanslope Park. He had two sons who went to a private school somewhere and made brief appearances in Wolverton during their holidays. They were two of a very small handful of children who were privately educated in the 1950s. Most Wolverton families accepted the local schools - and there did not appear to be very much question about their quality.

The Elms: a postscript

2011-09-24T16:55:00.001+01:00

Almost 100 years after The Elms was built, a couple moved into part of it and published this diary on the web. I do not know who they are, so I cannot attribute these remarks, but it is an interesting account of a year or two in the life of a house.

Thisis a web site on The Elms, which hopefully will belong to Andrew and I by April2001. The Elms is an Arts and Crafts house built in the early 1900’s, and isthe most beautiful house in Wolverton.

1stMarch 2001. The damp and woodworm man visited The Elms today and reported thatthere is no problem with either at the house. Brilliant news!

WEMOVE IN ON 12^th APRIL AT 12pm.!!!!!!!!!!

12thApril. When we arrived today Dagmar and Mike opened a bottle of champagne towelcome us to our new home. This was an unexpected and really lovely gesturefrom them both. The Elms feels like coming home, I always knew it would, therewas no "where am I?" on Friday when we woke up after our first nighthere, it is definitely home already, we both feel this.

13thApril. The housewarming went well; everyone seems to love the house. A greatevening, although as always I feel as if I didn’t have time to talk to everyoneenough! We cleared up on Sunday, and then Andrew and Nick started pulling downwalls upstairs to create our new bedroom. They continued on Monday, Barry cameto help after work I supplied the food and drink and heavy-duty plastic bags.Andrew and Nick have continued on Tuesday too, ignoring computers for heavylabour! What Heroes - could soon have the bedroom of our dreams!

14thApril. The garage is now completely cleared out, cleaned up and the new beerchiller, washing machine and tumble dryer are installed.

19thApril. We had Polly’s tree man (a conservation officer) visit to look at thetrees. He has recommended that we have about a fifth cut off of the top of theconifer leylandii (which he says is the largest of it’s kind he has ever seen.)He has also recommended lopping all the dead wood off of the cedar on theright, and unfortunately felling the Thuja on the left as it is not welland may infect the other one. He says that the three laburnhams ought to go toas they won’t grow properly under the cedar and should not have been planted soclose to it. He and his brother have offered to come and deal with all of this.

21^st April. The last false wall is down, this room feelsright – large and airy and full of light. You can see the lovely coving andwhere the architrave should be around the ceiling at the base of the curves. Wehave discovered that all this is in oak not plaster as we first thought, but ithas about 15 layers of paint on top that we have to get rid of to expose thewood. It is all very exciting! My next job is to find a man who can do allthis.

29thApril. Andy from Akibo Joinery visited to have a look at our architrave, heremembers coming here to do some work for the people who Mike and Dagmar boughtthe house from. He says that he can replace the missing architrave and sort outthe fire-charred coving. He will be in touch to give us a quote.

28^th May. Andrew started digging out the chimneybreastwall at last; I have been waiting weeks for this! There is still part of theoriginal fire in there, the main cast iron surround is there and has a lovelyflower in each top corner reminiscent of the Macintosh Glasgow rose and a lovelylittle wavy grate but whoever bricked it up has removed the hood and taken offthe tiles and left only these two bits, so the bottom piece to the grate i.e.the bit where the ashes would land and the front are sadly all gone.

29^th May. Andrew has just phoned this morning to tell methat there is a little door that he has found which pulls in from the side andwas hidden in the wall! This is in cast iron too and highly decorated. It’s soexciting!

5^th June. The floor man came over today, we now want underfloor heating as we will have the fire renovated, so the floor will be the lastthing to be done. We have decided on a birch plank floor, which he will fitwhen the room is ready. Andrew started digging up the old floorboards a fewdays ago, mainly to see what was below them in preparation for the floor manand for the electrician. To our horror he found that there are two sets ofboards one about 8 inches below the other, and in between is the most amazingamount of rubbish! Rubble, old pipes, electric cables, and dust and dirteverywhere. The whole floor space is packed with it the length and breadth ofthe bedroom, this is going to take weeks to clear.

9^th June. Andrew has found a man in Gayton who can sortout the fire; we are taking it over next weekend. We have found four doors butthe bottom two are stuck. He has even got a hood similar to the fire, so willrenovate and fit the hood and come and fit the fire properly too. Apparently itis an Eagle nursery fire. We hope to use the blue pacific granite (which isblack with blue sparkles) for the hearth, and re-tile the fireplace. Maybe wecould use the Rennie Mackintosh design in birch for the fire surround.

16^th June. We took the fire over to Jake who will do therenovating and fit the new hood, then hopefully will bring it back and refit itproperly for us.

15^th June. At around midnight Andrew finally clearedthe last of the debris from under the floor boards. We had an e-mail fromDagmar and Mike telling us that the debris between the boards is called puggingand was used as a form if insulating at the time the house was built. He hasworked on this every evening after work except Wednesdays when I insisted thathe took a break and every weekend other than our weeks holiday for my birthday,probably the hardest manual labour he has ever done, I couldn't lift the heavyduty rubble bags, we lost count of how many!

16^th July. Tony the electrician started work on thesitting room, hall and master bedroom. We have to get all the electricalstuff sorted out downstairs so that we can fit the new floor upstairs and nothave to dig it up again later. There is dust everywhere, but it is beginning tolook the way we are planning. Poor Janet must be wondering if the Elms willever look normal again!

18thJuly. Ian Beazeley-Long the plumbing and heating man came to give us a quotethis evening, after a bad day at work getting concussion whilst fixing a gasfire. Andrew chose the same day to fall over and break his elbow so we lookedlike an episode from Casualty! Ian is going to install the new bathroom for ouren suite and replace the tank and relocate the new mega flow boiler under thestairs.

29thJuly. Stuart Thomson the Tree Surgeon came today to give us a quote on fellingthe Thuja tree, which is diseased. He is also going to cut one fifth off of thetop of the Conifer, and clear the dead wood from the other trees, a kind ofspring clean of the garden. The garden has been a delight to us all summer,almost weekly new flowers appear as if by magic! We have just watched and takenphoto's of the garden to see what is there, other than mowing and keeping theweeds down. Andrew bought a little pot-bellied bar-b-que which is havingfrequent use, I never knew Wolverton could be so peaceful.

23rdAugust. A shameful amount of time since my last entry! Tony the electrician hasfinished rewiring the master bedroom, the living room and the downstairs hall.We now have " star lights" in the ceiling of the en suite and plugsockets and speaker sockets in the bedroom. The hall is lit with three polarwall washers and a row of "peanut" lights hidden behind the beam. Theliving room has four stellar and one slice wall washers, new sockets, speakerand television sockets and the "peanuts" hidden behind the beam tolight up the chimney breast. All of this works by remote control, so that wecan set different moods for the room i.e. working, ambient or romanticlighting, cool huh!! All in all it's looking good, except for the amount ofplaster missing from the walls, the wallpaper appeared to be holding the wallsup in the living room, we are almost finished scraping the paper off and theplaster is blown so the whole room will need to be re-plastered before anydecorating can be thought of. Nothing is easy in old houses is it? Tommy Hainesa plasterer recommended to me by my artex man in Yardley Gobion is hopefullygiving us a quote for this, apparently he recently did a job at Woburn Abbey sohe should be good , we hope!

10thSeptember. Stuart the lovely tree surgeon started work on our trees inthe back garden, as arranged several weeks ago. He and his friend Mick willspend today and tomorrow working here. They have trimmed 15 feet off of the topof the Conifer Leylandii; they have rounded the top nicely. The Limes, theLaburnhams, the Canadian Maple, the Willow and the Crab Apple have been trimmedand dead-wooded. The Elder has been cut out and removed from the Mock Orange.Unfortunately the Thuja, Plum and the small Sycamore tree next to the Plum wereall diseased and had to be removed. All but one of the Laburnhams next to thevariegated Holly have been removed too. We have several other Laburnhams, whichStuart said could happily stay, he sees no reason why Ian wanted to remove themfrom under the Cedar! We have bought a lovely Eucalyptus tree to replace theThuja at the top of the garden, and are planning on replacing the other twowith a Monkey Puzzle and either a Red Maple or a Copper Beech to add a touch ofcolour amongst the greenery.

16thSeptember. Dan Leeson a local builder arrived this morning to brick upthe en suite bathroom door. According to the plans Mike and Dagmar left us thisis not an original door, so we are removing it so that we can utilize this areafor the new bath, which will take up that whole corner.

21stSeptember. Dave Tedder a local chimney sweep came over to sweep bothchimneys. The sitting room chimney is fine. He says that we have a cover overthe bedroom chimney, so we have to find a roofer or some such to replace itwith a cowl, so that we can use the lovely original fire when it is refittedafter renovation.

25thSeptember. Tommy Haines the plasterer arrived with his son Kelly to sortout the sitting room, no mean feat, as it all needs re doing! A good result atthe end of today, Tommy is coming over in the morning to finish off the windowwall as the skirting board is too loose so Andrew needs to tighten it uptonight.

26thSeptember. Tommy arrived bright and early this morning, followed closelyby Stuart our tree man who is going to dead wood the Cedar tree as it needs awhole days work to itself! I made tea and we all sat in the garden chatting fora while, our workers exchanged cards and Tom told me that his son Kelly isfamous, {oops, I didn’t recognise him} He has been in Grange Hill, Bergerac andHoward’s End.

2ndOctober. Our bathroom suite arrived today!! We have a Roca Hawaii bathvery large and very comfortable. {We found this out by going to every bathroomshop we could find, including a very posh one in London, and having a lie downin their baths together, which we thought was the only way to find acomfortable bath, but seemed to amuse some salespeople and totally scandalizeothers!!} An Axor tap for the bath, which has a shower attachment within it andis very groovy! A Roca Dama toilet with a low cistern with push buttonflush, a beautiful blue glass arch shaped sink from Avanti, a wonderfulPhilippe Stark tap which looks like a little ant eater and is so cute that Ireally had to have one! Last but not least a gorgeous Italian arch shapedmirror, which has 8 lights, set in all round the back of the arch, which willgive a lovely soft glow all the way around. The mirror will sit above the sink,which should look great, as hopefully one arch will reflect the other.

9thOctober. The under floor heating for our en suite arrived this morning,Andrew and Nick are going to start laying it tonight after work.

11thOctober. Andrew and Nick continued laying the heating after work againlittle souls must be knackered, as they don’t get home till 7.30pm.

13thOctober. Andrew and Nick put all the insulation and plates down, theyhave worked on all day today so have completed about three quarters of theentire area!

15thOctober. Ian Beazley-Long our heating and plumbing man is starting work today.He and his 3 assistants will be here for a week and will change the heatingsystem from unpressurised to pressurised, and relocate it under the stairs.They will remove the old water tanks from the loft and the cylinder from thespare bedroom leaving us more space in what will be the second bedroomeventually. They will also be fitting our lovely en suite bathroom. They willfit the new radiator in the sitting room. Last but not least they will fit thenew sewage and down pipes needed for the bathroom. Sounds like a busy week, butby this time next week we should be able to try out our new bath.

20thOctober. Ian has finished all the work, except fitting the bathroom. Ican't say that we are really pleased with the work he has done. Everything thathe did fit works, it's just the finishing touches really. He has updated theheating, but left the pump in the guest bedroom, although he knew that wewanted it under the stairs, so that there were no pipes in that room. The radiatorin the sitting room works but the pipes are outside the skirting instead ofhidden inside. The en suite is not fitted at all because we bought designertaps instead of bog standard!!?? Plus he says we need to decorate first. Hecharged very little less too, so we feel we've been ripped off. I'm afraid heis not in my gold star recommendations anymore.

6thNovember. Andrew went to fetch our fire back from Jake this evening, hehas left it too late to come and fit it before he moves, so we need someone toput the fireplace all back together now! Anyone out there know a man who can?Jake has made a wonderful job of the fire, it is all black and shiny andutterly beautiful, and the little doors work now. It's so so cute!

9thNovember. Andrew and Nick have finished fitting the under floor heating,and have laid the temporary loft floor so that the plasterer etc. have asurface to walk on. Andrew has also prepped the whole room ready for replastering.

14thNovember. Tommy Haines and Kelly are back to plaster the bedroom walls.Tom has said that he can replaster the rounded corner so that it looks like therounded walls in the sitting room, which is how it must have been originally.

15thNovember. The bedroom looks wonderful! Tommy has made an excellent job ofthis room. The fire surround is good, and the rounded corner detail is justlike the rounded walls by the fireplace in the drawing room. We are so pleasedwith this result!!

19thNovember. Shane Quentin the painter started the sitting room. Today he isprepping the room.

20thNovember. Disaster again. Andrew announces that the paint we have chosenfor the beams resembles tart's lipstick! So it's off to Colours again in convoyto search for new paint. We think we have the right colours after 40 minutes deliberation.

21stNovember. Yes we've got it right this time the rich burgundy where thebeams were pink and a deep jade green replacing the blue. William Morris chalkmatt emulsion is on order for the walls. Shane is an excellent painter andreally enjoys this challenge. It's Andrew's birthday today so a doublecelebration we'll have one room done for Christmas!!

24thNovember. Went to collect the W.Morris paint, but we don't like it! Itshould look matt white with a tinge of lavender in some lights according to thebrochure, it actually looks world war one khaki. Yuk!! Instead of a relaxingSunday we will have to go on another paint hunting spree, why is nothingsimple?

26thNovember. We have the paint sorted out after many hours of checking matchpots etc. Colours paint shop have mixed the paint for us, using The W.Morrispaint chart - it's perfect!

30thNovember. Shane finished the painting today {as far as he can at presentas we need the skirting around the fireplace done} The room looks wonderful, asyou can see from the pictures on site he is an excellent painter. We aredelighted. We are waiting for an estimate from a tiler/carpenter who{hopefully} is going to re tile the sitting room fireplace in silver blue slatefrom Fired Earth, then will replace the skirting. Shane can then complete thepaintwork.

1stDecember. Andrew and Nick have spend the day working on the plumbing ofthe en suite, the bath is causing problems as the overflow is leaking.

Theelusive Andy re appeared today {remember him from April?} and has taken a chunkof the original ceiling moulding from the en suite and is apparently nowthinking of doing the work for us!

2ndDecember. Andrew fitted a Victorian brass door handle on the sittingroom's back door today, which looks more in keeping with the period of thehouse. We are beginning to see light at the end of the tunnel - we may have 2rooms completed by Christmas yet!

6thDecember. Gerald has been to look at the fireplace and the skirting andsays he can do both.

16thDecember. Andy phoned to say that the wood will have to be done in fourpieces as it is so complicated! This will make it far more expensive thanoriginally expected.

17thDecember. Gerald started work on the fireplace tiles today. They arerough cut and more uneven than we expected, but we like them.

18thDecember. Gerald needs more adhesive so out early to fetch it, let Barrydrive to work in his car, it died at Homebase! I got back eventually tofind that the tile grout is far too light for the tiles, so off to Jewson's forsome black cement dye to mix with grout. We think we've matched it pretty wellnow so Gerald is getting on with it. While we were testing the grout we chattedabout the house and the work needing done and he thinks he may be able to fitthe fire for us too. We intended asking him to do the bedroom skirting oncewe'd seen some of his work, maybe he can do the tiling upstairs too! If he cando all three then we should be moving a pace - can see us having a bedroomsoon!

20thDecember. The fireplace looks brilliant, Gerald has made a wonderful job of it.The joiner has made the skirting too small, Gerald not happy about it, but willsort it out and fit it in the new year. He had a look at the bedroom fire anddecided it looked to much hassle for him to do. He told me there is a placeover at Maids Moreton who specialise in old fireplaces, maybe we can get themto refit the fire.

22ndDecember. Andrew and I chose a companion set for the sitting room, it'sburnished metal and looks silver, gold or black depending on the light.

8thJanuary 2002. Gerald came back and finished the skirting, he's made a reallygood job of it, we are so impressed with his work!

15thJanuary. Shane our lovely decorator man came back to paint the skirting. Theroom looks wonderful now. All we need are curtains and a rug, then room one isfinished!

27thFebruary. Andrew and Nick at last have the bath fitted with no overflowproblems, many frustrating trials with many different overflow pipes from thefirst attempt ! A lovely bathe will follow soon { but no pictures of that toput in diary!}

28thFebruary. The manifold for the under floor heating is installed - we're up andrunning. Lovely warm floor, Sprog the dog is not the only one impressed!

2ndMarch. On the 15th October we expected this event - the room is nicely warmed,the candles are lit, wine has been breathing awhile at room temperature, it'stime to try the long awaited bath. Goodnight!

The Elms

2011-09-24T16:52:00.000+01:00

The rather good-looking house at the bottom of Green Lane (now two houses) was built by the Stony Stratford architect, Edwin Swinfen Harris. (Harris was very active in the area in the late Victorian period and deserves a separate article when I get round to writing it.)

The railway company had built a house and surgery for the company doctor/surgeon in 1844 as one of six villas beside the canal. For various reasons - not least the relative isolation of The Firs - the LNWR decided to build a new house and surgery at this location. In the fashion of the day the house was named after trees. (The remaining four villas were named The Firs, Yew Tree House, The Hawthorns and The Limes, and the large houses beside the tennis courts were called The Beeches and Yiewsley.)

The house was first occupied by Dr. Harvey and when I was a boy by the husband and wife team of Doctors Eric and Marjorie Fildes. Dr. Eric Fildes was our "family doctor" as they were called in those days. In fact, being a family doctor and thus looking after all generations of the family was part of the effectiveness of diagnosis in those days largely free of medical technology. When Dr. Fildes came to visit me as a boy in the 1940s when I contracted one or another of the prevalent illnesses (yes Doctors did make house calls) he would park his black car outside the door, come upstairs to my bedroom, place a thermometer under my tongue and, while that was registering, place a cold stethoscope on my chest. Having made his diagnosis he would give my mother some instructions and scribble out a prescription. And that was basically it. After a few days I recovered with more bed rest and regular spoonfuls of medicine.

The Elms was a little more isolated than it is today. There were grounds extending to Moon Street of more than one acre surrounding the house. The surgery entrance was on the right. This door led to a waiting room where people sat until called into the surgery, a smaller room at the back. There may have been another room behind this for more detailed patient examination, but I never saw it.

The Gables goes under the wrecker's ball

2011-09-23T14:43:00.000+01:00

The Gables in 1890

After 50 years of modestly-built houses for various grades of employees, Wolverton finally got a large house for its most senior employees, the Works Superintendent, It was built at the end of Ledsam Street on an acre or two of unused railway land. The new, ample, but not particularly grand house was to be called The Gables. The picture above if probably the first ever photograph of the newly completed building. Later photographs tended to show walls thickly covered with ivy.

The Gables had a relatively short history and only seventy years later was torn down. In its place the Council erected a tower block with all the inadequacies of 1960s steel and concrete design. It was named The Gables in a nod to its predecessor. Ironically, it seems set fair to outlast the Victorian building in age.

Under demolition

A full history of this building can be found here.

Radcliffe School 1963

2011-09-22T23:28:00.001+01:00

This picture courtesy of Ian Turner, shows the 6th Form at the then very new Radcliffe School at the end of Aylesbury Street.

Junior School 1952

2011-09-21T04:58:00.000+01:00

First Form Wolverton Junior School 1952

Another photo from Ian Turner. Here are some names supplied from Alan Cosford's memory:

Front Row: Christopher Bear, 1?, 2?, 3?, Richard Mynard
Second Row Seated: 4?, Christine Goodridge, 6?, 7?, 8?, Miss Faux, 9?, 10?, 11? 12?, Peggy Marshall
Third Row: 13?, 14?, 15?, 16?, 17? 18? Rita Walker, 19?, 20?, 21?, 22?, Glenda Frisby
Back Row: Alan Cosford, 23?, David Snowden, 24?, Ian Turner, John Bennett, 25?, 26?, Malcolm Goodridge, 27?, Christopher Bull

Names-to-faces are welcome.

The teacher is Miss Faux, who used to travel from Potterspury every day by bus. I did hear a few years back that she was still alive, well into her 90s.

The view looks north. The wall which used to separate the Aylesbury Street and Church Street schools has now gone, as too has the pre-fab behind it which used to be the school canteen.

Little Streets Demolition

2011-09-17T15:22:00.000+01:00

Parts of Young Street and Ledsam Street

Phillip Webb has sent me another photo of the last days of the Little Streets. The vantage point is from a balcony of one of the then new flats.

At the time of this photo much of the east side of Ledsam Street and Young Street has been taken down, leaving that short row on the west side of Ledsam Street. Demolition is just starting. You can also see the roofs of some of the Creed Street shops.

The Science and Art Institute stands proud in its former splendour.

Glyn Square

2011-09-16T15:47:00.000+01:00

Glyn Square - 1950s

Here's a unique photograph of part of Glyn Square. the square originally had houses on three sides. There were two terraces of 6 on the north and south side and a terrace of 20 on the west side - behind the photographer in this photo.

The picture shows the south terrace. The north terrace was pulled down in the 1890s for works expansion and at about the same time these cottages were enlarged to allow for a third bedroom.

The photo was unearthed by Phillip Webb.

The last days of the third station

2011-09-16T00:08:00.000+01:00

Wolverton is now on its fourth set of station buildings, although the site and the platforms remain as they have done since 1881.
Phillip Webb has just sent me these two photos which show the third station buildings in the process of demolition in 1990.

The first photo shows the Booking Hall, mounted on piers, and the second one of the covered flights of stairs which led down to the platforms.

My post on the third station can be found here.

And if you want to go back to the second and first stations, click on the links.

Cambridge Street in the 1950s

2011-09-12T22:44:00.000+01:00

Cambridge Street, looking towards Aylesbury Street

Cambridge Street, looking towards Buckingham Street

These two rather grainy photos show Cambridge Street in the mid 1950s. On the corner of Buckingham Street was a haberdashery known as Mullins. It was bought by a Rowland Hunt a few years later.

On the Aylesbury Street corner you can see Dimmocks, the grocery at 39 and I am not sure about 37. It was a Ladies Outfitter, but it may have become an office at the time this photo was taken - Registrar's Office?

Back Street Kids!

2011-09-08T13:42:00.001+01:00

Back Street Kids!

This photo from Ian Turner's collection dates from 1949 or 1950 and portrays some of the children who lived in houses on the lower section of Cambridge and Windsor Streets and some from Church Street. Back Alleys were favourite (and safe) places for children to play in the 1950s. They were not out of earshot of their parents and all the neighbours knew each other.

I can recognize Annette Turner and Rosemary Marshall, who were my age, and Ian Turner in the middle. The younger ones I am not sure about. There was a boy called Tony Durbin who lived down that way at this time and his family moved away shortly after this. I am not sure if he is the boy in the back row.

More back alleys

2011-09-07T13:56:00.001+01:00

Back Alley between Cambridge Street and Windsor Street c. 1956

This view is looking north towards Church Street. Of interest here is the garages starting to appear on the Windsor Street side. car ownership was just developing in the 1950s and garages were required. Paint quality was not to today's standard and protection from the elements was considered to be essential.

Photo courtesy of Ian Turner.

Are these May Cottages?

2011-08-30T06:59:00.001+01:00

In the 1891 Census, and again in the 1901 Census, three cottages appear in this part of town. They are recorded as May Cottages - numbers 1, 2 and 3. Their placement in the census would suggest that they are in the vicinity of Radcliffe Street.

I had never heard of May Cottages before but it seems to me that these might be likely candidates. They are out of keeping with the Green Lane houses on the other side and just fill in a little triangle of land behind Aylesbury Street and Radcliffe Street. There were actually three cottages there 50 years ago and it looks as if the garage and the room above it is a later addition. I dimly recall a builders yard here at one time.

Later they were numbered as Green Lane and I suppose the May Cottages name was dropped. Why they were called May Cottages in the first place is another mystery.

Parish Markers

2011-08-29T13:14:00.000+01:00

I am grateful to Andy Baxter for pointing out to me the existence of these boundary markers. When he was a boy at Bushfield School he discovered a stone marker in the bushes on the eastern boundary of the school. He describes it thus from memory: 'The stone took the appearance of a miniature headstone with, from memory, a date in the 1840s and some other markings such as "St G" and "No.2"."

Photo courtesy of Chris Gleadell

He asked Ken Speaks, who was at that time a teacher at the school, and he did a little research to discover that there were at least three of them. Andy Baxter then found another on the Old Wolverton Road, near to the Arden Park light industrial units and was led to believe that a third was in the cellar of the house on the corner of Jersey Road and Stratford Road - possibly Number 82. He doesn't say if any dates were associated with these markers, but the location suggest that they were later.

The original parish of Wolverton included the whole manor, from the east side of the Watling Street and bounded by the River Ouse to the north and Bradwell Brook to the east and south and this remained unaffected until the later middle ages when Stony Stratford was large enough to form two parishes - St Mary Magdalen on the east side and St Giles on the Calverton side. Holy Trinity continued to serve the extensive parish of Wolverton quite complacently until the arrival of the railway in 1838.

As I have described elsewhere, the original land purchase by the London and Birmingham Railway was quite small but in 1840 they purchased another 22 acres to the south of the Stratford Road.

As you can see from the plan here, Wolverton Station was quite small, being bounded by the canal to the north and east and a hedgerow bordering the west of Bury Street and including the Creed Street school. I did thin that the southern boundary was Green Lane, but Andy Baxter's discovery of the marker a little further south suggests that the railway portion extended to that point. (They were later to build The Gables and the doctor's house and surgery here.)

St. George's was originally a chapelry and the first incumbent, George Weight, was styled Perpetual Curate. St George's itself and the Vicarage was built on Radcliffe Trust land and the Radcliffe Trust retained a controlling interest for a number of years afterwards.

At about the time the church was completed the Church Commissioners, in recognition of the quite sizeable population, wished to create a new parish. Their first definition, that it would include all houses and buildings on the western side of the railway, met with opposition from the vicar of Holy Trinity, who foresaw that if Wolverton expanded further his parish would be gradually eaten away. In this he was supported by George Bramwell, Secretary to the Trust, who was already at odds with some of the directors of the railway company. Bramwell formulated a definition which was tied to a plan (such as the one above) and this was agreed to. The parish was thus created by Queen in Council on 19 May 1846.

It may be after this that the first marker discovered by Andy Baxter was installed.

The Radcliffe Trust then resisted further expansion and would not sell any land for housing development until 1860. In the meantime, the L&NWR were forced to develop New Bradwell in order to accommodate their workers. When the expansion did come, it went as far west as the back alley before Cambridge Street. Possibly, when the parish thus expanded, a marker was laid down here. Wolverton so remained until the next expansion of the 1890s which saw the development of Cambridge Street and Windsor Street.

At the turn of the century, the Radcliffe Trust itself, bowing finally to the inevitable, developed its own streets to the west of Windsor Street, including Jersey Road and Anson Road.

I don't know the detail as yet, but it sounds to me from Andy Baxter's description, that a new parish boundary was determined at Jersey Road. I do recall that Anson Road residents tended to use Holy Trinity and Jersey Road residents tended to split both ways - some went to Holy Trinity and some to St George's. My grandparents, who lived at 179 Church Street, went to Holy Trinity for example.

Back Alleys

2011-08-28T07:36:00.000+01:00

When Wolverton was built in 1838 the back alley was a new and revolutionary concept in urban sanitation. If you look at the older parts of Stony Stratford and Newport Pagnell you can understand why they were so new in the 19th century. They were there so that the "night soil" men could come round and clean out the earth closets at the end of the back yard. The Water closet was a slightly later invention.

Back Lane between Ledsam St and Young St 1960

You can see here the relative narrowness of the back alley compared with later ones. The outbuildings were outside toilets and those with chimneys were wash houses.

By the time the later parts of Wolverton were built a public sewage disposal system had been installed and the back alleys were no longer required for their original purpose. But they were used for rubbish collection, for the so-called dustbins that were put out every week. If you forgot to put them out the dustmen would open up the back gate and pick them up and then put them back. Of course in those days there was no elf and safety and the dustmen were actually expected to lift the bins - which they did without complaint! The dustcarts would make their progress up and down the back alleys, manned by the council workers who were usually very adaptable. One day they would be working on the dust carts, and on another they would be patching a hole in the road.

Very little household rubbish was thrown away a couple of generations ago. Packaging was not really invented until about 1960. Typically the only things you bought in boxes were cereals and detergent and there were tin cans. Bottles tended to be recycled. So most of what ended up in the dustbin at the end of the week were the ashes from the coal fired grate - hence the name dustbin.

R J Fleming

2011-08-27T11:12:00.000+01:00

Here's a bit of memorabilia. This R J Fleming badge has been kindly sent to me by Nicholas Platt.

Bob Fleming, who was a generation before me, established his business on Stony Stratford High Street, probably about 1930. In the 1950s and 60s this was the place to go if you wanted a motorbike or to get it serviced. I bought a BSA Bantam from him in the 1960s.

You can see the building on the right hand side of this photograph beside the second car. It is still there

What I find astonishing about this photo (probably taken in the early 1960s) is how few cars there are in the picture. This shot was taken before there was a bypass and when the A5 was a major arterial road. Some traffic would have been absorbed by the M1, but even so....

The Arrival of the Motor Garage

2011-08-26T17:57:00.000+01:00

It goes without saying that 19th century Wolverton did not have to consider the motor car, and it was only about 1930 that anyone began to pay attention. Even when I was a boy cars were very few in number but one or to people were beginning to convert their wash houses at the back into garages. Even so, it did not occur to town planners that there was any need to build space for cars. look at Stacey Avenue, Marina Drive and Gloucester Road for example - all built in the 1930s - and now the front gardens have been claimed for the car. Try to drive down any terraced street in Wolverton and you will immediately understand why this town pre-dated the age of the motor car.

Nevertheless, some people were buying cars in the 1930s and they needed to be serviced - probably more frequently than they are today - and garages did emerge.

Charles Gabell at 27 Church Street. This had a conventional shop front but the service entrance was at the back.

27 Church Street on the left in the middle - Sellicks at this time in the 1950s.

William Applin at 53 Stratford Road. The service garage was in the back alley and utilised the old wash house.

R W Pitt at 83 Stratford Road. This was probably the longest lasting of the early service garages and is now a motor cycle dealership.

There were two petrol pumps along the Stratford Road - one at the Grafton Cycle Co and the other at 83 Stratford Road - later Pages. The Grafton pump had the hose on a swing arm so that it could be brought put over the pavement. Pages Garage had the traditional type of pumps on the forecourt. I am not sure about a petrol pump on Church Street. There may have been one but my memory is a bit fuzzy on this.

Stratford Road - late 1950s or early 1960s

The scarcity of cars on the road was quite normal and there was no need for yellow or even double yellow lines. There is one car beside the Grafton Cycle shop - possibly having just been filled.

1960s view down Stratford Road - Michael Page's Garage by the Regent petrol sign

Petrol tanks were a lot smaller in those days so a few gallons would fill the tank.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road 8

2011-08-25T20:15:00.002+01:00

Up to the end of the 20th Century all development was under the auspices of the LNWR. As we have seen from the start of the Stratford Road in 1860 the LNWR purchased the land from the Radcliffe Trust and opened up some of the building lots to private development, particularly along the Stratford Road and Church Street.

After the end of the 19th century the railway company backed away from its paternalistic control and the administration of the town was assumed increasingly by the local council. The Radcliffe Trust, on the advice of their secretary decided to develop the land themselves. From the western back lane of Windsor Street to Anson Road the Trust opened up new building lots to builders and home-owners. This was built in the first decade of the 20th century. In fact my grandparents, who married in 1908, moved into their new house at the western end of Church Street as it was being finished.

The Stratford Road and Church Street retained their names and were extended. The new streets took their names from Radcliffe Trustees: Viscount Peel, the Earl of Jersey, and Sir William Anson.

65 Stratford Road

The house and the attached yard was occupied by a builder, first Wilson & Martin, and later a member of the Gurney family, for the first period in its life.

67-68 Stratford Road

Number 68 was used as a dental surgery from 1911 to 1939.

69-70 Stratford Road

Number 70 was a solicitor's office for about ten years from 1924-1935.

71-72 Stratford Road

These first six houses, built as a block in the same style reflect the newer styles of the early 20th century, with a sheltered porch and a squared bay window offering extra front room space. You can see these styles in Jersey and Anson Road.

73-74 Stratford Road

Number 74 has an interesting history in that it was the house an office of the owner of The English Novelty Company, Wooden Toy manufacturers. I believe the factory was on Church Street, on the site later occupied by the Empire Cinema.

75 Stratford Road

These next three revert to an earlier Victorian style, seen in the 1860 section of the Stratford Road.

76 Stratford Road

77-78 Stratford Road

79-80 Stratford Road

81 Stratford Road

This was originally a house, probably with the same frontage as Number 80, but shows up as a shop in the 1911 directory. In 1924 Joseph Lennon operated as a hairdresser and was succeeded in 1931 by M G Pedley, who practiced his trade as a hairdresser here for well over 30 years. In recent years the shop has become part of the corner shop.

82 Stratford Road

It's interesting that this shop has maintained its identity for all this time. It appears in 1911 under the ownership of Alfred Kilpin, although he is simply described as a shopkeeper. In 1931 Eric Gordon is running a confectionary business here and was succeeded by William Bew in 1939. As I remember the shop from the 50s is was purely a sweet shop and one of the few shops allowed to open on Sunday. Obviously the present owners have continued this tradition.

83 Stratford Road

This corner shop began life as a milliner's, although Mrs. Pitt's husband acted as an insurance agent from here. It appears that the son, R W Pitt, first set up a garage here in 1931 and it went through a succession of owners - Samuel Lott, Ron Page, Michael Page. The business was in the servicing of cars and selling petrol. Now it is a motorcycle dealership.

84-85 Stratford Road

86-89 Stratford Road

90-91 Stratford Road

92-93 Stratford Road

94-95 Stratford Road

Number 94 was a shop from the beginning - a confectioner, lawrence Long. It went through various owners but essentially remained the same type of business for about 50 years.

96-97 Stratford Road

These ornately presented buildings were once the home of Gurney Brothers, Monumental Masons, and the yard, edged by wrought iron railings was filled with graveyard monuments. I think the business went through two or possibly three generations.

98-99 Stratford Road

100-101 Stratford Road=

In 101 houses we have been able to follow the development of Wolverton from 1841. In 1841 The Royal Engineer was the western outpost of the new town. In 1860 a largish tract of land was opened which extended Wolverton to the back alley of Cambridge Street. The next phase began in the 1890s and extended to Windsor Street. The last redbrick phase began in 1907 when the Radcliffe Trustees opened more land for development up to what is now 101 Stratford Road.
In very recent times the McCorquodale building has been converted to residential development and further houses have been built to the weds.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road 7

2011-08-22T07:39:00.000+01:00

The Picture Palace

On Monday 18th December 1911, Barber's Electric Picture Palace opened for business with a French silent film called Zigomar. I don't know anything about the film but I am sure the first audience found it very exciting. In those days the films were very short, initially "one-reel" films and the "two reel films". In between films, or changing reels, the Palace used to offer live variety acts. The pianist accompanying the films was Oliver Thorneycroft.

The Palace could seat up to 650 and in the days before television was a great success. Even in the 1950s I can remember the house being packed for Rock Around the Clock with Bill Haley and the Comets, but shortly after that audiences fell sharply and the cinema closed on January 22nd 1961 - a fifty year life.

Since that time it has been a bingo hall, a dance hall, a night club and a church. The front used to have a canopy over the forecourt area. I don't know when that disappeared.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road 6

2011-08-21T15:31:00.002+01:00

The Craufurd Arms

The Craufurd Arms has a curious history. It was built by an organization known as The People's Refreshment Association, founded by the Bishop of Chester and one Colonel Craufurd, after whom this house was named. The motivation behind the PRA was to encourage teetolalism but theey took a more enlightened and liberal approach. Rather than strict bans they built hotels such as this which would serve alcohol but also provide non-alcoholic beverages nd food. They hoped thereby to wean drinkers off their alcoholic habit.

Their original intention apparently was to built their house on Green lane, but this met with objections from the owner of the Victoria Hotel Tarry, who had designs of his own on a Green Lane site. Applications were made in 1903 and 1905 and both were unsuccessful. However a deal was struck whereby Tarry was allowed to go ahead with his Green Lane development and the PRA were given a licence for the new premises, now to be located on the Stratford Road. The licence was approved in 1906 and the Craufurd Arms opened in 1907.

So with the building of the Craufurd Arms Wolverton's development moves into the 20th century. It was at this time that the Radcliffe Trust, bowing to the inevitable, decided to open up more land for development. This time, however, they decided to do the develoment themselves rather than sell the land to the railway company. Windsor Street marks the end of LNWR development of housing.

A block of land had already been taken at the back of Windsor Street for the Boys School in 1896 and the Girls School was added on Aylesbury Street in 1906. In the first decade of the 20th century Wolverton entered a new building phase.

Wagon Plate

2011-08-20T11:24:00.002+01:00

This photo has been sent to me by Martin Mellon of a wagon plate collected by his father. Does anyone know anything about this?

Obviously the date and place are a giveaway but does anyone know what the numbers mean?

Not having worked behind the wall I have no idea where or how these plates were made. I assume that these were individually cast in sand with the numbers changed in sequence.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road 5

2011-08-17T05:58:00.000+01:00

Wolverton Working Mens' Club

Working Men's Clubs were a product of the industrial age. Most large towns and cities had founded clubs in the 19th century and it is no surprise that Wolverton and New Bradwell followed the trend.

The first Working Men's Social Club was an adapted house at 72 Church Street, founded in 1872. Less than 30 years later the club was able to afford this imposing building on a new lot at the bottom of Cambridge Street. It opened in 1898. The style is quite ornate and continues with the next four houses which are also decorated with a mixture of stone and red tile. I imagine that the attic rooms, which are quite spacious, were originally designed to accommodate the club steward and his family. The club did expand into Number 50 in the 20th century as well as build extensions at the back.

50 and 51 Stratford Road

52 and 53 Stratford Road

These four houses are quite spacious. I know because my grandparents owned one of them. they followed the conventional terraced house plan of three rooms downstairs with a scullery and three bedrooms and a box room above the entrance hall with a bathroom and w. c. Except these terraces were so much wider and larger - perhaps only a few feet, but that made the difference. the entrance hall was wider, the rooms were a foot or two wider. And at the back of the scullery was a pantry, which was later converted into a bathroom. These houses also had a large wash house at the bottom of the garden. When the motor age came along these were converted into garages.

Mostly these houses were residential and most households had a domestic servant in the early years of the 20th century. I presume the servant lived in the attic room.

54 and 55 Stratford Road

The next four houses in this block are also spacious but less ornate in finish. Number 55 was occupied by Frederick Field, a boot and shoe maker who had moved from an earlier address on the Stratford Road an it remained a sho shop until Norman Cosford retired. (I think.)

It's a pity about the frontage. While it was a shop window it was not out of place, but the bricking up of the window and the insertion of a window which is completely out of proportion rather destroys the appearance in my opinion. It would have looked better if the lower bay window and the porch had been retored.

56 and 57 Stratford Road

The final two houses in this block became dental surgeries for much of the 20th century. Sidney Warden had a practice at Number 56 from the early 1920s and next door George Weller established himself in 1911. Both men worked their until their retirement in the 1950s when the practice was sold on.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road 4

2011-08-16T07:50:00.000+01:00

The house at Number 44 was at the outer limit of Wolverton for about 50 years and in the 1880s another house was built at the back which became an off licence, known as The Drum and Monkey.

The building of Cambridge Street, and later Windsor Street in the 1890s expanded Wolverton further to the west. These new terraced houses were more substantial than any of Wolverton's existing stock of houses and all had bay windows and front gardens.

The first set of buildings filled the Stratford Road in between the Cambridge Street back lane and Cambridge Street. These were built as a block of four with two gable-ended "bookends".

45 Stratford Road

It appears that Number 45 was initially a private residence, although a few years later it became a grocery and general store. In 1935 Ewart Dale ran a chemist's shop on one side and his wife Wallace had here hairdressing business on the east side. Ewart Dale was also keen on photography and sold a good range of cameras and photograhic processing equipment. I don't remember the doorway being quite so far set back in the 1950s, but perhps it was.

46 and 47 Stratford Road

Number 46 started off as a drapery with a tailor next door at Number 47. By 1915 the drapery, Fairburn and Heeley, had expanded to include the two shops. I imagine the side porch at Number 46 was replicated at 47, and it is likely that Number 46 started off with two sash windows rather than the single bay.

In 1930 Lloyds Bank moved from its premises on Church Street to this address. The new frontage was added at this time and the manager lived in the flat upstairs, accessible from the side door at Number 46. The building has now been converted into flats.

48 Stratford Road

This corner building started off as a grocer's shop and within a few years became a butcher's. It was in the hands of Green Brothers in 1911, and subsequently under the name of Leonard Green. In 1915, Leonard Green split the shop and let half of it to a hairdresser. Tom Jordan was there for well over 30 years.

In the 1930s, 48a (as it was known) changed hands with some frequency, being a confectioner, a tailor and a radio engineer. The two shops are now reunited as a wine merchant's outlet.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road 3

2011-08-15T08:32:00.000+01:00

The houses between Radcliffe Street and the back lane of Cambridge Street were also built in 1860. They were all residential and vary from quite modest houses to more substantial ones. The relative speed of construction suggest that there was pent-up demand in 1860 as no new houses had been built in Wolverton since 1847. The houses number from 23 to 44; the presbytery, number 22, was added in the 1870s.

22 Stratford Road - The Presbytery

23 Stratford Road

This is still an elegant and well-cared-for house after almost 150 years and from the looks of it has preserved its slate roof and the sash windows. It was may not have been the first house built on this section of the Stratford Road and it is only in the 1871 census that there is an obvious resident. This was George Applin and his family. George Applin was not a railwayman and he appears as a shopkeeper in St Pancras in the 1861 Census. It was possibly this new building boom which brough him to Wolverton where he set himself up as a painter. His grandson, William Applin, entered the motor age as a garage mechanic, operating from the back of 53 Stratford Road.

George Applin died within a few years and his widow moved to a house in Radcliffe Street. The next occupant was Joseph Parker, retired Station Master, who lived here until his death. George Claxton, a foreman in the Carriage Works lived here from 1890 and later set himself up as a builder.

24 Stratford Road

This rather modest house has been modified beyond recognition. It was built for William Harvey and his family. Harvey was one of Wolverton's original workers in 1838 and he came down from Derbyshire. He at first shared lodgings with Hugh Stowell Brown in Old Wolverton and then lived in Young Street after he married. I would guess that he had been saving for a house for 20 years before he was able to buy this one and he lived here until his death in 1904.

It was then occupied by Lloyds Bank for about 15 years until they moved to larger premises at 46-7 Stratford Road. This may explain how the house acquired this particular frontage. Subsequently it was an office for Pearl Assurance.

25 Stratford Road

In the same way the house at 25 has been modified out of all recognition. In the last 20 years of the 19th century and the first decade of the 20th it was inhabited by Robert King and his family. King was manager of the Gas Works which might suggest that it was not a mean residence.

In the early years of the 20th century electricity came to Wolverton and the Northampton Electric Light Company set up an office here in 1907. This may explain why the frontage extended over No 24. After the war an nationalisation this became the offices and showroom for the East Midland Electricity Board.

26 Stratford Road

For the firt fifty years of its life this house was a residence, occupied by various people. In 1911 it experienced its first shop conversion - at first a shop for samuel Hull, a boot and shoe maker, and the Arthur Watts, a furniture dealer. In 1935 it was taken over by Chamberlain and Norman, who were there for over 20 years. In my memory they also sold prams, and were probably the only shop in Wolverton to do so.

27 Stratford Road

This remained in private hands until 1930 when Arthur Watts expanded to include this house. After Chamberlain and Norman took over the business from Watts, No. 27 became a drapery shop.

28 Stratford Road

I have written about the famous Lakes elsewhere, but this house did not become a shop until 1931 when Lewis barwood, who had bought the ironmongery from Samuel Coop &amp; Son at 6 Stratford Road, decided to move to this location. The Lake Brothers

29 and 30 Stratford Road

Number 29 remained a private residence until 1903 when the front room was converted to Refreshment Rooms. This enterprise did not last long and in 1911 it was a cycle shop. In the 1920s the Ministry of Labour was using it for an office (or labour exchange, as it was called in those days) and in 1930 Barclays Bank moved their branch office here. It remained a barclay's Branch until quite recent times.

Number 30 was the home of Arthur Scovell, an electrician, at the turn of the 20th century and by 1911, frederick Clarke, the printer was based here. he later moved to larger premises on Church Street.

31 Stratford Road

This was for a time one of the grander houses in Wolverton and was the home to John Williams, Assistant Superintendent of the Carriage works and in 1901 home for John Appleton, the Manager of Mcorquodales.

It is unclear to me at the moment when the shop frontage was added unless Stobies expanded here. There is no business using this address, even in the 1950s.

32 and 33 Stratford Road

During the WW Frederick Stobie established a furniture dealership at Number 32 and it remained in the family for at least two generations. Number 32 was always a residence although there are signs in this recent photo of a shop conversion.

34 and 35 Stratford Road

Number 34 has been much modified from the original with a new shop frontage and new windows. Number 34 has retained its original frontage, although slate tiles have been replaced

36 and 37 Stratford Road

The house at Number 36 was residential until 1911 when William Airlie, and artificial teeth maker appears in 1911. Since then, and now for 100 years, it has been a dental surgery. The bay window, and the porch over the door may have been added in the 1950s. the wheel chair ramp is recent.

Number 37 became a branch practice for the Stony Stratford physician Arthur Habgood and continued under various partnerships - Habgood and Gooch, Bull, Habgood and Lawrence, Lawrence, Douglas and Witheridge until more modern clinics evolved. It has now reverted to a private hoise.

38 and 39 Stratford Road

These two have stayed as private houses since they were built in 1860. Number 38 concludes the terrace of four with a round arch doorway, although this house has replaced the original sash window with a bow window.

Number 39 begins another series with rounded arch upper windows and faux stone facing. Note how steps appear as the Stratford Road dips and the level of the terrace is maintained.

40 Stratford Road

This larger, double-fronted house, built in the same style and probably by the same builder as No. 39 was a private residence for some years and then became a coffee house. Later he converted it into a "Temperance Hotel", providing accommodation for travellers who did not wish to stay at the licensed hotels - the Royal Engineer, the North Western and the Vic.

41 Stratford Road

This is the last of the three houses with arched upper windows. Like No. 39 it has retained its status as a family residence and the facing on the front wall is presumably original.

42 and 43 Stratford Road

There is no evidence for shop conversions here until 1939, when Archie Day opened his ironmongery at No. 42. As you can see the frontages are a later design from some of the earlier conversions to the east.

44 Stratford Road

This substantial house was, until the development of Cambridge Street in the 1890s, on the western edge of Wolverton. It was Number 1 Stratford Road until 1900, when the local authorities decided on a more logical numbering system for Wolverton house and businesses, and after almost 40 years of being 1, Stratford Road, it was re-numbered as 44.
Each house now has a long history. Some, like the rather fine looking house at Number 23, have maintained their residential status throughout, while others have been converted into commercial premises.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road - 2

2011-08-03T09:53:00.000+01:00

For many years the Radcliffe Trust refused to cede any more land to the new railway town, and this led to the development of New Bradwell in the 1850s, but in 1860 they finally relented and made land to the west available. Events then moved very quickly. Church Street and the Stratford Road were laid out as far as the back alley of Cambridge Street. The LNWR decided to open this up to private initiative - hitherto the company had laid out and built all housing using their own contractors.

This first section of the Stratford Road was of interest to commercial developers. The stretch to the west of Radcliffe Street was residential and was actually completed before this section, but I will come to that in the next post. 8 shops at the north end of Bury Street had been demolished a few years earlier, and although there were shops on Creed Street, the growth of Wolverton meant that there was a pent up demand for shop premises in 1960. Charles Aveline, who had had a furniture shop on Bury Street, took lot number 1 for himself and may even have bought other lots for development because he had at this time reinvented himself as a builder. At any rate, he appears to have been a prime mover in Wolverton's new development. At the time this plan was drawn (December 1861), all the lots had been sold and several already developed. Lot number 9 has Lepper pencilled in and the words built on at the bottom. Since he doesn' appear in the 1861 census taken in March, this may suggest that building was still in progress. John Lepper was a grocer with a shop on the corner of Gas Street. Moving may not have been so urgent for him.

I'll describe the history of each building below. (The images are taken from Google Maps and are a little distorted in places.)

Lot Number 1

6,7 and 8 Stratford Road

These houses are now numbered 6,7 and 8. In 1860 this was a single building encompassing numbers 6 and 7. Number 8 was a later addition as you may tell from the upstairs window, and until the end of the century stood as a detached building with space on either side. It was occupied by Charles Aveline, who started out as a young cabinet maker in Bury Street in 1840. In these premises he sold furniture, ran his building business and also managed the Post Office.

The frontages have much changed over a century and a half.

Aveline continued his business here until he retired to Bedford in the 1880s, whereupon it was sold to Samuel Coop who was a house furnisher. The addition which later became Number 8 was built in the late 1890s. Coop and his son expanded the business from the sale of furniture to include ironmongery and a stationery shop.

Lot Number 2

9a and b Stratford Road

This was probsably built about the same time as the first building and judging by the style was likely built by Charle Aveline. This was a grocery run by Abraham Culverhouse. It was possibly a double-fronted shop from the outset, although the plate glass windows must have arrived later in the 19th century or early 20th century.

Culverhouse was here until the late 1880s, although curiously he is listed as a Baker and Confectioner in the Trade Directories. He had a large family, including two sons, but there does not appear to have been much interest in the Wolverton business and by 1891, he was living with his family in Stony Stratford selling insurance.

The shop was empty for a while and then taken over by Richard Stapley, a tailor and outfitter and then run by his wife for a few years after his death. Tailoring continued with Herbert Jennison until about 1930, when Muscutt and Tompkins took over the left hand side for their Stationery shop and the right hand side was a betting shop (or Turf Accountant in the euphemistic language of the day).

Lot Number 3

The North western Hotel

The North Western opened in 1864 and has continuously traded ever since. The main entrance used to be in the middle but in recent times this door has been closed off and two side entrances introduced. Originally the building was open on either side.

In the late 1860s the space on the west side of the hotel was filled by a small house, now number 12.

Originally occupied by Thomas Robinson, a carpenter, it became a Fancy Repository a decade later run by Annie Clayton. A few years later, and certainly by 1887, William Sach was practising here as a watchmaker. He was quite a young man and may have moved to another town because he was then succeeded by the German immigrant, Emil Sigwart, also a watchmaker and jeweller. His association with this shop lasted a good part of the 20th century and after he died the shop was run by his son. Today it appears to be a lock-up shop on the ground floor with a first floor flat reached by the entrance on the left.

The other "in-fill" came at the end of the 19th century when the narrow house now known as Number 10 was built. The first occupant was Alfred Davis, a hairdresser, but he later expanded into furniture sales. His sons then operated a furniture removal business from here in the mid century.

Lot Number 4 and 5

The next building was possibly the most impressive on this new section of the Stratford Road, next to the North Western. I have seen references to it as Bellevue House so the expectation may have been grandiose.

13 and 14 Stratford Rd.

But large as it is it does not appear to have enjoyed long-term continuous occupancy and it was often vacant.

The building dates from 1861. One side was occupied by John Rowland, a butcher, and the west side (No 14) by Thomas Burchall, a coppersmith, with his family and three lodgers. In 1871, Number 13 is occupied by Symingtons, draper, and they were to remain here for the next twenty years and were then succeeded by Frank Braggins, also a draper. Curiously, there is another draper next door at 14, William Bannion, in 1871; it is not clear if he a part of the Symington operation. At any event the shop is a grocery in 1881 and then it is unoccupied in two successive censuses after that.

From about 1924 the unit on the left was occupied by Eva Herbert, a music seller, until the war. She would have sold sheet music and possibly instruments. In those years before recording people had to make their own music and sheet music sales were high. Incidentally, I have never seen evidence of a piano shop in Wolverton, yet by mid-century almost every front room had a piano. I suppose they were purchased from Northampton.

The Grafton Cycle Company moved to Number 14 in 1915, after a brief spell at Number 19, so the company in one form or another is now approaching its centenary.

Lot number 6 and 7

These two houses appear to have been built as a pair and are more modest than the preceding three storey buildings.

Number 15, now occupied by a bookie, was a grocery from the beginning until 1911, when it became a shoe shop _ Freeman, Hardy and Willis for about 50 years. Number 16 started out a a butcher and appears to have continued as such for at least a century. Most of those years were shared between Harry Norman and later the Canvin family.

Lot number 8

17 Stratford Road

Number 17 was established as a chemist with George Atkinson. He was succeeded by William Barton about 1890 and then by Alfred Leeming in 1911 who ran the shop until the late 1930s when Walter Mackerness took over. In the middle of the 1950s R J Escott bought the business and I assume he continued until his own retirement. Now I do recall the Escotts living on Cambridge Street so by this time the shop was separate from the flat above. There are a few shops in Wolverton which established their function early and continued in this line for over a century. This is one of them.

Lot number 9

This was the lot marked on the plan for John Lepper, the Gas Street Grocer but there is no evidence in the censuses or trade directories for his occupancy. I can only conclude that he built the larger building on the corner and added these two for rental purposes. There are two shops now, as there have been for many years, but it was probably one originally. As you can tell from the upper windows and thechimnety placement, this was conceived as a single building.

18, 19 Stratford Road

Number 18 started out in 1871 as a hair dresser, Charles Barker. he was succeeded 20 years later by William Hutchinson - also in the same trade. From 1911 to 1931 it was an outlet for the Wood family, millers. here they sold corn and flour. After this it was known as the Maypole Dairy, a grocery that operated until the 1960s.

Number 19 was first occupied in 1871 by Richard Smith, a tailor, who was succeded a decade later by John verney, a bootmaker. After Charles Aveline retired Verney got the post office franchise and the post office was probably here until the GPO was built on Church Street in the 1930s. I say probably, because the trade directories are not clear on this; after 1915 he is listed as a Stationer only.

In 1935, Edmund Grice, moved his confectionery here and it was henceforth known as Grices.

Lot Number 10

This is the famous corner building at the bottom of Radcliffe Street. You can see that it was conceived as a large building from the outset, although for many years it housed two shops.

20 and 21 Stratford Road

It was a large grocery store from the outset but after a decade it was divided into two units. Jacob Holliday appears as a draper in 1871 and he was succeeded by James McCubbin in the same trade. In the 2oth centruy Number 20 became G.E. Neale, Provender Dealer. followed by Pearks, who were also Grocers.

The corner shop, later known as Foster's Corner was a men's clothing shop run by Foster Brothers from 1924.

A Historical Tour along the Stratford Road - 1

2011-07-28T07:19:00.001+01:00

When New Wolverton, or Wolverton Station as it was first called, was built in 1838, the Stratford Road as we later knew it did not exist. The road from Newport Pagnell to Stony Stratford skirted the hill and followed the line of the Old Wolverton Road. The new railway housing filled a narrow strip of land that was bordered on the west side by Creed Street. The rest of the land was farm land still under the control of the Radcliffe Trust.

It is possible to walk along the Stratford Road, from east to west and see the progress of building the town from 1840 to the present day. Let me take you on this tour.

There were three early encroachments on this farm land: the school on the corner of Creed Street, built in 1840; the Royal Engineer, a little beyond that built in 1841, and the Church of St George's, built in 1846. The Royal Engineer became the start of the Stratford Road, but its construction was more-or-less accidental.

When the Radcliffe Trust sold land to the London and Birmingham Railway it was subject to the condition that they built no inns or hotels. I suspect they were primed by some of their Stony Stratford tenants in this regard and shortly after the line opened Joseph Clare, proprietor of the Cock Inn at Stony Stratford in partnership with John Congreve, a Stony Stratford solicitor built the Radcliffe Arms in 1839 on land they had leased from the Radcliffe Trust on the site of Wolverton Park Recreation Ground. It was opposite the first station and no doubt Messers Congreve and Clare expected to make a killing. They were taken by surprise when the railway company two years later dismantled the first station and built a new one to the south of the canal. The Radcliffe Arms was isolated and became progressively more so as the railway works developed. The shocked pair of entrepreneurs made representations to the Radcliffe Trust who reduced the rent on the land occupied by the Radcliffe Arms and leased an acre of their own land on the western edge of Wolverton Station. Thus the Royal Engineer came into being in 1841.

This plan here, drawn in December 1861, shows the Royal Engineer buildings and yard at that date. The block on the right, marked "1", is the site for Number 6 Stratford Road, which I will come to tomorrow. The space in between, now filled with four lock-up shops, was not built until the end of the 19th century.

So this building, which has been a restaurant for a number of years, is the oldest building on the Stratford Road and one of the few surviving from the 1840s. For 20 years it stood on the edge of a field and there was no Stratford Road in existence.

Dope

2011-07-24T06:49:00.000+01:00

Shop Window Display from Hobbies, 28 Stratford Road

One of the great boyhood pleasures from the 1950s was building model aeroplanes from balsa wood, thin plywood and tissue paper. Usually this was an activity for a cold and wet winter's day. Inevitably this meant taking over the kitchen table.

Lake Brothers, at 28 Stratford Road, as Wolverton's retailer of such kits, was therefore a favourite destination during my early teens when I was interested in such things. Lakes covered quite a range. It was an ironmongery and you could buy paint, wallpaper, tools and wood. They also sold shotguns and I think the rather fine glass cabinet in the window was used to keep shotgun cartridges under lock and key. It was probably because they sold guns that the entrance had a wrought iron locking gate. Of more interest to me as a boy was the range of models kits.

Keil Kraft (and you can see a box in the picture) were the premier company for this kind of model building. The kits were designed by stamping out sheets of balsa wood with the necessary struts. These could be easily cut using a Swann-Morton or Xacto knife. If plywood reinforcing sections were required in the model they were pre-cut shapes. The balsa struts were glued together with Balsa cement - a transparent glue made from plastic dissolved in acetone. It's probably not on the market today in this form.

Once the frame had been assembled, it was covered with tissue paper, held in place with wallpaper paste, I think. What followed was the dramatic part. A cellulose product, which came in small jars, was painted onto the tissue paper, which immediately became transparent. It dried quickly leaving a reasonably tough skin on the fragile tissue paper. It was known as "dope"

I am set to wondering today if these products are still available to children. You know, Health and Safety and all that. They were certainly highly aromatic and I think there were instructions about using in a well-ventilated area, but nobody back then bothered too much about potential health risks. These things we took in our stride, and I am, after all, still alive to tell the tale.

In some respects the times were more innocent. A friend and I decided one day to try our hands at making gunpowder, so we went off to Dales the Chemist and bought a few ounces of salt petre, flowers of sulphur and scraped some soot out of the chimney for the carbon component. Then we set about making gunpowder in the garden shed at my friend's house. I have to tell you that we were unsuccessful. We got the salt petre to burn, but we never got the ingredients in quite the right proportions to produce a satisfactory explosion. Probably just as well.

Well, we were kids and we were curious, but what amazes me, looking back, is that we were able to get the chemicals we needed from our local chemist with no questions asked!

I'm pleased to see that Lake Brothers shop has survived in some form and the present owners are to be commended for respecting tradition with their window display. After the Lake Brothers retired, their long term employee, Vic Old, took over the shop and ran it until his own retirement.

Keil Kraft closed as a factory around 1980. I don't know why, but perhaps they did not change with the times. In the late 1950s Airfix made their appearance in the market place with cast plastic model kits that could satisfy the model building urge and provide more detail and possibly more authenticity. The Keil Kraft models reflected the first half of the 20th century. Some of the Keil Kraft aeroplanes were powered with a twisted rubber band which would allow the plane to fly from a hand launch for a few yards. Inevitably they crashed and needed repair and maintenance. More satisfactory, were the little 1 cc petrol engines that powered the craft.. These were controlled with two wires held by hand which allowed the model plane to fly around in a circle, while the controller could move the ailerons and make it soar and swoop. I think radio controlled model planes were beyond most people in those days.

Liverpool Connections

2011-07-23T11:00:00.000+01:00

When I was writing about McCorquodales it occured to me that there was more than one Liverpool connection with Wolverton.

Brabazon Smyth Stafford, the Works first chief accountant, came to new Wolverton in 1838 and stayed until his retirement, whereupon he went to Liverpool.
http://wolvertonpast.blogspot.com/2010/05/villas-full-account.html

Hugh Stowell Brown worked in Wolverton as a boy and young man from 1840 to 1843. He then went on to some fame as a Baptist preacher in Liverpool, where a statue was erected in his honour. His autobiography gives us several very interesting insights into the early Wolverton.
http://wolvertonpast.blogspot.com/2010/10/hugh-stowell-brown-and-wolverton.html

Edward Bury, Wolverton's first Locomotive Superintendent established his locomotive building works in Liverpool.
http://wolvertonpast.blogspot.com/2010/10/edward-bury.html

George McCorquodale, as I wrote the other day, was also a Liverpool man.
http://wolvertonpast.blogspot.com/2011/07/wolverton-envelope-town.html

Changes in the Stratford Road

2011-07-22T12:21:00.000+01:00

The first photo was probably taken mid-1960s with a telephoto lens - hence the foreshortening. McCorquodale buildings are on the left and of course the wall continues endlessly throughout Wolverton.

On the right you can see the Regent petrol sign at Michael Pages Garage at the corner of Jersey Road. Beyond is the old sign for the Craufurd Arms.

In the 1960s there was a huge increase in the volume of traffic on the Stratford Road as freight moved from the railways to the road and large trucks, known as "juggernauts" thundered down the road, shaking the house foundations.

Post Milton Keynes, new by-pass roads left the Stratford Road more-or-less open to local traffic only.

Some of the roof lines on these Stratford Road houses have changed and the lamp standards are newer. The north side has undergone a complete transformation with steel and glass buildings replacing the Victorian redbrick.

What is this box?

2011-07-21T06:30:00.000+01:00

In this picture (which I featured yesterday) there is a big box standing in the middle of the pavement behind the foreground figures. What could it be?

If I tae the lamp post as a fixed reference point, the box may be opposite the old Post Office. (I am assuming here that lamp posts will always stay in roughly the same position even if they are replaced.) If this photo was taken before the Post office moved to Church Street, this box may have something to do with that.

I'd be interested in any ideas or suggestions.

A Street photographer in Wolverton?

2011-07-20T10:34:00.000+01:00

Years ago when film was expensive and cameras were a luxury item there was phenomenon known as Street Photographers. They were enterprising chancers who would snap passers by and give them a ticket. If they wished, they could pick up their photo a couple of hours later from a booth somewhere. Usually you found these types at seaside resorts or in London's tourist areas.

I was reminded of this by Lee Proudfoot who has kindly shared some photos with me. They were probably taken in the 1930s. The first one here of my grandmother walking past Sigwarts and the North Western, probably on her way to the London Central Meat butchers, next to Muscutt and Tompkins. You can see the number written on the negative as the photographer's reference. The size of each image is 2 3/4 x 3 1/4, so probably taken on a 120 roll film.

Now I can't imagine my grandmother bothering with any of this. They had a camera which was used for holiday photos etc and there are a number of studio portraits in the box of old photographs. This one is a bit of an anomaly. I would therefore suspect that the photos were snapped on the offchance of a sale, sample images, such as this were done as contact prints in the hope of the sale of an enlargement. I don't know if there was a cost to the customer of picking up the sample, but there is no evidence that my grandmother ordered a photograph.

Annie Moore walking past North Western

The same may be true of these photographs from Lee Proudfoot's collection, as you can see the number marking on the right hand corner of one of them. These photos were obviously taken on different days, so whoever was taking the photos was there for more than one day. Possibly he (I asuume "he") was a local photographer trying to drum up some business, although the photo in my possession has no name or address markings on the back. It strikes me that as a business enterprise this activity was doomed. The London and Seaside street photographers had some advantages in that they were picking out tourists who might want a memento of the occasion. Photographing residents of Wolverton in their familiar surroundings doesn't appear to me to have a lot of business potential.

Gertrude Old and Renee Moore beside North Western

Renee Moore walking along the Front

The photographs are valuable as a record of "The Front" in the 1930s. You can note the wicker shopping baskets, the old-style push chairs and the fact that people dressed up to go shopping.

You can also get a glimpse of the "Little Streets" in the distance and the frontage of the North Western is different from its present appearance. Cars were scarce.

The McCorquodale's Strike of 1915

2011-07-19T14:21:00.000+01:00

I watched a film a while back based upon the efforts of Dagenham women workers to get equal pay with men. It was a good story and it was well told but you would come away from this film believing that this was the first time women had taken industrial action. This was the 1960s but in 1915 the women of McCrquodales at Wolverton were out on strike for better pay and conditions.

This was the period of the Great War of 1914-18 or World War I as it is sometimes known. Many men signed up and many unfortunately did not come back. The war changed Wolverton as many of its railway workshops were diverted to war production. The work load increased at McCorquodales because increased government activity resulted in increased demand for printing services.

These pressures were put upon the work force, which would have been fair enough, except that it was not fair enough. Women had traditionally been paid less than men, the argument being that the man was the breadwinner and his higher pay took account of these responsibilities. But 1914 brought about a huge social change. The traditional bread winner was at the war front risking life and limb and their wives were left at home with the responsibility of making ends meet.

Ends could not meet. Living costs were rapidly rising and wages were - not for the first time - not keeping pace. The first representations by the women were largely ignored but the trigger for the strike came when it was learned that the relatively few men working at McCorquodales were being paid a 'war bonus". The women mobilised. Over 500 of them joined the Paper Workers Union.

The Wolverton Express reported:

The work girls and men at Messrs McCorquodale’s works were locked out on Thursday the 20th May, in consequence of a demand for a war bonus which it was alleged had been given to some of the men. Some 800 to 900 workers have been affected.

This photograph from the Living Archive collection shows the strikers on the Stratford Road. they appear to be very orderly and there are women with prams and push chairs and other children in the picture.

The "lock-out" was a favoured tactic of management at that time, believing that by punishing everybody the troublemakers would be quickly brought to heel. They eventually discovered that such tactics only served to unite the workforce against them. Sir George Askwith who had been appointed Chief Industrial Comissioner by the government was called in. He appears to have patted the girls on the head (metaphorically) and assured them that everything would be alright. On this assurance some went back to work only to find that management was not prepared to honour anything. They rejoined their colleagues on the picket.

I have looked in the archive of The Times to see if the strike got any national attention. It did not, and obviously The Times reporters had more interesting work to do than focus on a protest by women workers.

The National Union of Paper Workers was formed in 1914 and in 1921 it merged with another union. Apparently very few records survive from those war years.

Thus the McCorquodale's strike has been buried in history. We know from the Wolverton Express that there was a strike and that it was eventually settled by offering the women a 7.5% increase for the duration of the war.

The practice of paying women less money than men continued for many years after this but the strike of 1915 must be some sort of milestone in the march to equality.

Wolverton: The Envelope Town

2011-07-18T06:38:00.001+01:00

Wolverton was a railway town. It was founded on railways. Steam trains punctuated the day as they rushed past on the main line. Thousands of workers filled the Stratford Road three times a day. Those of us who grew up there knew it was a railway town. We knew of housing built by the railways, recreation grounds built by the railways, churches built by the railways, our fathers worked behind the wall for the railways. How could it be anything else?

Yet, as I mentioned yesterday, after McCorquodales arrived in 1878, Wolverton had a second important industry and the McCorquodale plant at Wolverton was as well known and respected in the envelope manufacture and printing industry as the Carriage Works was in the railway industry.

But it was the fate of Wolverton's second industry to never quite gain the respect of Wolverton's first industry. Part of this was of course due to the relative size difference between the industries but other social factors were at play. Work at McCorquodales was only a career choice for a few - and these would be men. Women entered McCorquodales at a young age and mostly only stayed a few years. Marriage brought their paid careers to an abrupt end as they happily embarked on a future of child-raising and home-making. And I should add here, however much the present generation thinks that this strains credulity, that this was a contract that was willingly entered. The majority of women were happy to be Mrs Smith rather than Miss Smith. In fact McCorquodales at one time offered £10 as a wedding grant to those who stayed ten years and there is no doubt that this financial incentive caused some women to put off marriage for a few years. £10 was a deposit on a £100 house.

Colonel George McCorquodale started his stationery and printing business in Liverpool in 1841. His first expansion was to Newton le Willowsin 1846 where he built a large factory.

McCorquodales at Newton le Willows

There is a curious parallel with Wolverton. Newton le Willows was also an early railway town and at Earlestown they built locomotives and later wagons. Clearly George McCorquodale had an affinity with railway towns and it may well be that his successful experience at Newton gave him the confidence to set up at Wolverton.

The Wolverton factory opened in a building more-or-less at the bottom of where Jersey Road starts. At this time the western edge of the town was the back alley to the east of Cambridge Street, so McCorquodales at this time was a little way out in the country. The plant expanded westwards to the limits of railway property and even crossed the road with buildings at the end of Church Street. These have been demolished in recent years to make way for new housing development.

McCorquodales grew from printing for big industries like the L&NWR and in the 20th century worked on large government contracts - stationery, forms, postage stamps, postal orders, pension books and the like.

The Wolverton plant finally closed in the last decade.

Enter McCorquodale's

2011-07-17T06:38:00.000+01:00

For the first 40 years the L&NWR was the principal employer for Wolverton and District, and a successful and expanding one too. But the expansion was naturally accompanied by population growth and with it an emerging social problem. There was always work for men, but what about young, unmarried women who were living in Wolverton in increasing numbers with little to do?

Women did not have the choices in Victorian times that they do today. After school ended at 13 there were a few years to wait for marriage. Domestic work was socially acceptable, as was dress-making, lace-making and straw-plaiting, and they could also work as shop assistants. School-teaching was an occupation for a very few. Women were not allowed into offices until the twentieth century. Girls were a burden on the household until they married.

Smaller rural communities could absorb their girls in some of the activities noted above, and larger towns also had opportunities, but Wolverton was a working class town. There were no big houses or a sizeable middle class in need of domestic servants and in fact the censuses of the period show very few domestic servants employed in Wolverton. The Refreshment Rooms, which in its heyday employed almost 30 girls, was by this time on its last legs. Wolverton presented a unique circumstance in this regard.

Sir Richard Moon, whom I wrote about yesterday, had an idea. He approached his fellow Liverpudlian, George McCorquodale, with a view to establishing a stationery factory at Wolverton. Girls and young women could be employed in a socially acceptable environment. McCorquodale, who had been actively printing for the L&NWR since 1846, took up the idea and in 1878 opened his envelope factory at the western end of Wolverton. The new venture worked and in the 1880s 120 women worked in the factory. The men numbered 20 in total.

Sir Richard Moon

2011-07-16T07:33:00.000+01:00

Following from yesterday's blog, here is an account of Richard Moon's life from the DNB. Sir Richard Moon gave his name to Moon Street in Wolverton.

Moon, Sir Richard, first baronet (1814–1899), railway company chairman, was born on 23 September 1814, the elder son of Richard Moon (1783–1842), of Liverpool, merchant, and his wife, Elizabeth, who was the daughter of William Frodsham. The family of Moon was settled at Newsham, in Woodplumpton, Lancashire, before the end of the sixteenth century.

Richard was educated at St Andrews University, but left without taking a degree. He intended when a young man to take holy orders, but his father opposed this, and so he entered his father's firm. He married Eleanor (1820–1891) daughter of the major shipowner, John Brocklebank, of Hazelholm, Cumberland on 27 August 1840. They had six children, of whom two died in infancy. Little is known of Moon's early adult life, but he appears to have withdrawn from the family firm by 1851. However, his family had invested early in railway shares, and in 1847 Richard Moon was elected a director of the London and North Western Railway Company (LNWR). He became chairman in June 1861, holding that position until he retired in February 1891.

The London and North Western Railway Company came into being on 16 July 1846 by the amalgamation of the Grand Junction, the London and Birmingham, and the Manchester and Birmingham railway companies. The chairman of the new company was George Carr Glyn. The marquess of Chandos became chairman in 1853. He was forced to resign in 1861, and was briefly succeeded by Admiral Moorsom, who died in May of that year, and Moon was elected chairman. Since joining the board in 1847 he had established a reputation as an outstandingly able administrator with little time for the senior executives of the company. He brought about the resignation in 1858 of Captain Mark Huish, the first general manager of the new company.

Moon was essentially conservative in his outlook, but could be innovative when he thought it in the best interests of the company. He certainly ran it very tightly, constantly looking for means of cutting costs, but he could also spend lavishly if this appeared to him to be justified—for example, on the expansion of the works at Crewe. Annual receipts of the company rose from £4.3 million in 1841 to £11.8 million in 1891, and the dividend from 4.25 per cent to 7 per cent, while the network grew from 1030 miles to 1830 miles. The company was employing 55,000 men in 1885, and was, at that stage, the largest joint-stock company in the world. Under Moon's guidance it became famous for the punctuality of its trains, the courtesy of its staff, and the creation of two new towns, Crewe and Wolverton; and in all of this he took a close personal interest.

Both the Grand Junction and the Manchester and Birmingham Railway Co. had reached Crewe before the amalgamation. The town began as a wayside station in the parish of Church Coppenhall, in Cheshire, in 1837. It was the Grand Junction that opened railway works there in 1843. The company set about building a new town, and this was continued after the amalgamation. It was administered at first from Euston, but the Crewe local board was formed in 1860, and the town was incorporated in 1877. The company provided everything: housing, water, gas, churches, and schools. It presented the municipal park to the town in 1887, the year of Queen Victoria's golden jubilee, when Moon was created baronet and became the first freeman of the town. Bessemer steel works were opened in 1864 and four years later the Siemens–Martin open-hearth furnaces were added. After 1864 carriage building was concentrated in Wolverton and locomotive building at Crewe, where locomotives were manufactured from raw materials, everything being made on site.

The London and Birmingham Railway Company had acquired 8 acres of land at Wolverton, a small village and parish in Buckinghamshire, in 1837. It began to build houses in 1839. Further land was bought in 1840, and by 1847 a new station had been built, and new streets laid out. As at Crewe, the company provided everything: housing, gas, a building society, a savings bank, market house, shops, and church, and opened a park in 1885. The company itself withdrew from building houses in 1860, preferring to lay out the plots and control the type and standard of those built.

Richard Moon retired from the board of the LNWR on 22 February 1891, his wife having died on 31 January. He died at his home, Copsewood Grange, Stoke, Warwickshire, on 17 November 1899. His eldest son, Edward, had died in 1893, and so he was succeeded in the baronetcy by his grandson, Cecil Ernest Moon, born in 1867.

Sir Richard Moon was described by his obituarist in The Times as ‘the hardest of hard workers and the sternest of stern disciplinarians’. He was said to combine ‘an assured confidence in the correctness of his own judgement with an autocratic spirit which hardly recognized the possibility of that judgement being criticized by others’. At the same time he was of ‘a singularly retiring disposition’ (The Times, 18 Nov 1899). He was Conservative in his politics, and remained a devout Anglican throughout his life.

Michael Reed

Moon's Folly

2011-07-15T07:41:00.000+01:00

The original railway line followed the course of what is now McConnell Drive. The first engine shed was built to the west of the line and later workshops were built to fill the triangle of land between the railway line, the Stratford Road and the canal. The shell of these later buildings survive and have been converted to residential use in recent years.

By the 1870s railway traffic had grown to the level that four tracks were needed and there was little room on either side of the existing tracks for development without demolishing buildings. This would have been possible but it would have divided the two sides of the works in an impractical way. Wolverton was by this time no longer an important stop for all trains and express trains needed a clear run through Wolverton.

The chairman was the energetic and forceful Sir Richard Moon and he determined that the works would be united and the best solution was to build a loop line which skirted Wolverton to the east. This necessitated building a new embankment, a new canal bridge and a second bridge over the Old Wolverton Road. Plans were drawn up in 1878 and the work was finished in 1882.

Old railway hands were dismissive of the project. They felt that the curve and the camber of the line would lead to derailment at high speed and dubbed the project "Moon's Folly". In the event there was no known incident of derailment and the loop line appears to have been well-engineered.

This was an enterprise undertaken at some cost but the consequences were benign. The station was slightly further away for Wolverton residents but nearer for New Bradwell. The rather splendid second station was lost, together with the famous refreshment room, but by this time, as I have already said, Wolverton had lost its importance as a compulsory stop for all trains.

Blog Reorganization

2011-07-13T07:51:00.000+01:00

After almost three years and over 400 posts I felt the blog needed a bit of straightening out. I've added some pages with photo collections under straightforward headings. There is still some work to do here with captions etc. I also need to reorganize the labels.
The blog is now in three columns.

The Radcliffe Trustees - Later Members

2011-07-11T06:29:00.000+01:00

Viscount Peel

After the original four trustees, who all died in the 1730s within a few years of each other, the number was increased to five. In most cases these men served until their deaths, and then new appointments were made. Many of them therefore served for about twenty years before they were replaced.

Mos of the 18th and 19th century trustees were titled men - dukes, earls, viscounts, baronets and there was even one son of Queen Victoria, Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany. Two Prime Ministers, Robert Peel and William Gladstone also served. Peel put in 22 years and Gladstone 33.

When Wolverton was expanded westwards in the early 1900s, some of the trustees gave their names to Wolverton Streets - Jersey Road, named after the 7th Earl of Jersey, Anson Road after Sir William Reynell Anson, Peel Road, after Viscount Peel, and Woburn Avenue after the 11th Duke of Bedford.

The practice of appointing trustee from the titled and their relatives seems to have continued. The only exception can find is the appointment of the distinguished astronomer Fred Hoyle who came from relatively humble origins. He served as a trustee from 1960 to 1973.

The Radcliffe Trustees; The Original Four

2011-07-10T15:57:00.001+01:00

Sir William Bromley

As I have remarked before, the Radcliffe Trust has an important influence on the history of Wolverton. It was the controlling influence from 1714 to 1838 when the railways arrived and an uneasy partner with the railway company in the 19th century. In the 20th century, with the growing importance of local and county councils, the power of the Trust receded, although they were able to block further industrial development until 1960. After 1970 the Trust was left in possession of Wolverton House and Wolverton Mill. These were later sold.

The Wolverton Manor produced the income which funded three important Oxford institutions - The Radcliffe Library, The Radcliffe Infirmary and the Radcliffe Observatory. The trustees were all men (and they were all men) of some importance. Nowadays we might describe them as "the great and good". They probably had no direct dealings with Wolverton or even visited the manor. They were only concerned that the manor was well managed and the expected revenue was produced.

The original Trustees were: The Right Honourable William Bromley, Sir George Beaumont, Thomas Bacon and Anthony Keck. They were all Tories, politically and they were also Oxford men, more importantly, they were all good friends and drinking companions of John Radcliffe

Anthony Keck had worked for Dr Radcliffe for many years as his financial advisor and it was appropriate that he continued in ths role. He was probably instrumental in organizing, or at least ensuring continuity of management, of the Wolverton estate. Both he and Bromley did come to Stony Stratford once to meet Thomas Battison, the incumbent estate manager.

Thomas Sclater was a successful lawyer and MP for Cambridge from 1722 to his death in 1736. He added the name Bacon when he married Elizabeth Bacon, thirty years his junior, and inherited her estates. When he died he was worth over £200,000. He mixed with many of the leading lights of the day and like Radcliffe he was a Tory. He is principally remembered today for the sale of his vast library in 1736.

Sir William Bromley was also a Tory MP and became Speaker of the House of Commons. He lived from 1663 to 1732 and was descended from an old Staffordshire family whose ancestry extended back to King John's reign.

Bromley's political career began in 1690, when, as a tory, he was elected knight of the shire for his county. Though he took little part in proceedings during his first years in the Commons, he aligned himself with the ‘country’ opponents of the ministry. He became respected for his great personal integrity.

During the early years of Queen Anne's reign Bromley played an increasingly conspicuous role in the tory-dominated House of Commons, but did not endear himself to the ministry. During the years 1702–5 he held the chair of the committee of privileges and elections, and he was a commissioner of public accounts from 1702 until 1704.

Bromley remained MP for Oxford University up to his death, and in 1714 became a trustee of the considerable bequest to the university made by his friend Dr John Radcliffe.

Sir George Beaumont was MP for Leicester and also educated at Oxford. He practised law and during his parliamentary career held office as Commissioner of the Privy Seal and a Lord of the Admiralty. He died in 1737

Latin

2011-07-07T16:09:00.000+01:00

A former student at Wolverton Grammar School reminded me recently about Latin and its place in the curriculum. He didn't do very well at it (few of us did) and fifty years later he still regarded it as a waste of his time.

Many would agree. It was a difficult sell even in the 1950s and various rationalizations were put forward -

it was a common European language

it would help with your vocabulary

you needed it if you were a doctor or chemist

you needed it to get into some universities and particular university courses.

The last arguments were the ones which may have had some resonance. Universities at that time required Latin for some courses and I think Oxbridge required it for university admission. The so-called Redbrick Universities were a little more relaxed about it.

Looking back (although I didn't consider this at the time) Latin may have been quite new at WGS. I don't see Latin appearing on my Mother's School certificate from the 1930s so it certainly wasn't general. Somehow, Latin must have been acquired by those who got scholarships to Oxford. I am not sure how this was done. Miss Lidster, our Latin teacher, looked as if she had been there for some time but may have arrived after the war when Wolverton County School became a Grammar School. Latin for us began in the second year and continued to O Level. Miss Lidster was the only Latin teacher and taught up to and including 6th Form.

The difficulty we had with Latin was that it didn't appear to relate to anything in our world. We had young open minds and could, for example, relate to learning the Periodic Table or Ohms Law. These things had some modern relevance, but the Latin we were taught was a language frozen in time. There were declensions to learn, verb conjugations and tenses, gerunds and gerundives. There were imperfect, perfect and pluperfect tenses. Nouns had different endings for the nominative, accusative, genitive, dative and ablative cases. It appeared to be a very complex way of organising a language. There was no common agreement on pronunciation after 2,000 years. Miss Lidster favoured the convention of pronouncing "v" as "w" and the "c" was always hard. Thus "victor ludorum" was pronounced wictor ludorum.

Of course English had travelled over the centuries by dropping inflexions. Words in English were at one time modified according to how they were used in a sentence, but over 2000 years the language had adapted to a more modern, more practical expression, where word order, rather than word ending established the meaning.

So this was the challenge, even to quite bright, receptive minds. We could have made sense of it, with effort, but without seeing the point, many of us remained unmotivated. Today, Latin is scarcely taught in schools anywhere.

Was it useful? If I see an inscription or phrase in Latin today I can more or less work out the meaning., At an academic level the knowledge is of some interest and I can tell the Latin roots of words used in the English language. I discovered once, when I was in Caracas, Venezuela, that I could read the newspaper in Spanish and make sense of it. But it hasn't much entered my daily life. I would slot it in with quadratic equations, the use of logarithms and differential calculus - all of which I learned at school, but have never used since.

Class sizes and School sizes

2011-07-06T07:29:00.001+01:00

I was reminded about this while I was talking to someone the other day. Up to 1960 classes were large and schools were small. Now the reverse is true. You can see here what was typical from two of my class photos from the 1950s. The first one is my Primary School, taken circa 1952 and the next is from the Grammar School taken in 1954. This was the only year we did not have one of those all school panoramic photos so this one provides a useful measure.

1952 Wolverton Junior School 4a - 29 pupils

1954 Wolverton Grammar School 2M - 36 pupils

Schools were typically small. The Grammar School was by far the largest school in the whole of North Bucks with about 300-400. All of the secondary schools were smaller. The reason was plain: secondary schools covered only four years from 11 to 14 and the Grammar School accommodated pupils up to 18. The school leaving age up to 1973 was 15 and most were able to find work at that age.

The Wolverton Grammar School covered a large territory - from Lavendon and Olney in the north east, to Bletchley and Whaddon in the south west. Once the new Grammar School was built at Bletchley in 1956 to accomodate its expanding population, those in the Bletchley environs stopped coming to Wolverton and the spare capacity at Wolverton was used by amalgamating the Wolverton Grammar School and the Wolverton technical School. Thus The Radcliffe Shool was born.

The Impact of Wolverton on North Bucks

2011-07-05T19:29:00.000+01:00

Until 1838 North Bucks and South Northants was almost entirely agricultural. Wolverton's railway depot changed that in obvious ways. To look at this I have a population table which illustrates the change between 1831 and 1851.

Wolverton itself had grown from 1801 to 1831 from 238 to 417 - almost doubling the population. This was due to the new canal which brought with it some new occupations at the wharf and in cartage.

After an Act of Parliament in 1834, which organized parishes into Poor Law districts, Wolverton and Stony Stratford became part of the Potterspury Poor law Union and a workhouse was built in Potterspury. For this reason the figures have been grouped for comparison even though they straddle county boundaries.

Potterspury Poor Law Union

Parish	1831	1851	Change
Paulerspury	1,092	1,162	70
Potterspury	950	1,061	111
Yardley Gobion	594	673	79
Wicken	536	487	-49
Passenham	828	969	141
Calverton	425	505	80
W Stony Stratford	1,053	1,256	203
E Stony Stratford	566	501	-65
Cosgrove	624	641	17
Furtho	16	15	-1
Grafton Regis	241	247	6
Alderton	162	139	-23
Ashton	380	383	3
Hartwell	531	542	11
Wolverton	417	2,070	1,653
Total	10,246	12,502	2,236

As you can see the significant increase comes from the creation of Wolverton Station and it probably helped to maintain the rural population which might otherwise have declined.

East Stony Stratford was essentially the string of houses along the High Street - there being no development on the Wolverton side apart from inn courtyards. The bulk of Stony Stratford's population lived on the Calverton side. The drop in population from 1831 to 1851 on the Wolverton side of Stony Stratford was probably due to tenements being pulled down.

Of interest is the increase in the population of Passenham. Passenham included Deanshanger which in 1831 was a tiny hamlet. In the 1840s the Roberts family established an iron foundry which was obviously employing many hands in 1851. This iron works eventually grew and became the Deanshanger Oxide Works after WW II. Before the Clean Air Act Deanshanger was generally covered with red dust.

Getting away with murder, and not!

2011-06-30T19:45:00.000+01:00

One of the interesting stories to come out of the Stantonbury-Wittewronge connection was that of the third baronet, also Sir John Wittewronge. At the Saracen's Head in Newport Pagnell he murdered a man called Joseph Griffiths. The facts are obscure. Griffiths is described as a mountebank. Mountebanks in the 18th century were variously imposters or swindlers. These days we would call them "con-men".

Elsewhere Griffiths is described as a surgeon and appears to have originated in Kent.

What is not in dispute is that Wittewronge murdered Griffiths. It may have been the outcome of a quarrel or perhaps the unlucky Griffiths had tried to swindle him. At any rate, Wittewronge quickly skipped out of the country to be beyond the reach of the law. he probably went to Flanders where the Wittewronges originated.

Some years later, he returned, probably believing he was safe after the hue and cry had died down - probably about 1727 when he sold Stantonbury and some other properties to Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough. He seems to have been at liberty for some years but he could not keep his head down and was cast into the Fleet Prison in London on the original charges. The story does not end happily for Sir John Wittewronge. While in prison he got into a quarrel with another man and was severely beaten. A few days later, on March 28th 1743, he died of his wounds.

The Stantonbury estate descended to his brother, William, who died without issue in 1761.

Sir John Wittewronge's behaviour does suggest that he was of a violent disposition and one may suspect that the mountebank story about Griffiths was put about to mitigate Wittewronge's behaviour. We really don't know, but Wittewronge did get away with murder - almost.

More on Stantonbury

2011-06-29T07:09:00.000+01:00

On Sunday I paid my first visit to the ruin of St Peter's Church at Stanton Low since 1955. In 1955 it was not a ruin, although it had been disused for a number of years. In 1956 the roof fell in and since then much of the interior has been dismantled and placed elsewhere. My companion wondered why anyone would live in such a remote place. Good question! All I could answer was that in those times people could comfortably live in relatively remote locations. There was no electrical grid to connect to or a gas pipeline. All you needed was a water supply. You could build a house anywhere and be self sufficient.

The ruined Church from the East. The Mansion probably stood beyond this.

After the 16th and 17th century land enclosures Stantonbury had become quite depopulated and remained so until Milton Keynes started to develop.The Stantonbury Manor extended from the river to the highlands beside Linford Wood, almost into Milton Keynes Centre. What remains in the meadowland below the canal is typical of what you might have found in the Stantonbury landscape even as little as 40 years ago.

George Lipscomb in his 19th century history of Buckinghamshire writes this about Stantonbury.

Sir John Wittewrong was created a Baronet 2 May 1662; and having made a purchase of this estate (certainly before 1667), he built a mansion-house, and settled it on his eldest son, John Wittewrong Esq. (p347).

This is very much the only evidence we have of the mansion on this property. It would appear (again from Lipscomb) that it was sited to the west of the church.

The whole fabric (of the church)has been much contracted, and part of the west end of the church yard taken into the court of the Mansion-house. (p.349)

This does make some sense because there is some more-or-less level ground to the west of the church which could have been a site for a big house. However there has not been evidence for it since the late 18th century when it was probably pulled down, most likely after Thomas Harrison has completed Wolverton House in 1786. There are no surviving drawings of the house so it is anyone's guess as to its appearance. I would guess that it was brick-built, which would explain why it was easy to dismantle.It is possible that Wittewrong's building succeeded a medieval building on the same site.

When Thomas Harrison came to manage the Spencer estate I imagine that he and his family moved into this mansion and certainly regarded it as suitable for a middle-class family, but after he became land agent for the Radcliffe Trust in 1773 (in addition to his other activities) he turned his attention to Wolverton. The 90 year old Wittewrong house at Stantonbury may have been in a decaying condition, and although Harrison could have afforded the cost of restoration he may have felt that Wolverton, near to Stony Stratford was a better location. Thomas Harrison had a growing portfolio of interests and Stony Stratford, with its better communications may have presented him with a better base for his business than Stantonbury. In addition, Wolverton was on better arable land and he quickly assembled a farm of 400 acres which he was able to put under the management of a bailiff who probably lived at what later became Warren Farm.

So it was through Thomas Harrison that Wolverton and Stantonbury had a connection. Thomas Harrison was an enthusiastic promoter of the Grand Junction canal and saw to it that the canal proceeded through both the Wolverton and the neighbouring Bradwell and Stantonbury estates. He built the wharf at Stantonbury and the first viaduct over the River Ouse. He also had interest in other canal companies.

Richard Harrison: A correction

2011-06-27T11:27:00.001+01:00

Dr. Ivor Guest, in his thoroughly researched book Dr. John Radcliffe and His Trust makes the following observation:

The death of the Trustees' agent, Richard Harrison, in 1858, at the age of ninety-seven, marked the end of an era. (p.421) (my underlining)

This gave him a birth date of 1761, which, although there is no apparent record of a birth at this date, was plausible since it fitted in with the birth datres of other brothers and sisters born at this time. This birth date did not square with other evidence, namely the 1841 Census (not always a reliable document) and, more spectacularly, the notion of his fathering five children in his eighties.

June Watson, who has done some excellent research on Old Wolverton families, did point out to me some months ago that she thought his age might read 77 at death, and I was able to confirm that yesterday. The inscription is very clear and reads that he died aged LXXVII - 77.

Richard Harrison's grave at Holy Trinity

I don't know where Dr.Guest found this attribution of 98 years to Richard Harrison's life, but I have seen it elsewhere and on balance, although it did stretch probability, I accepted this date. However, this inscription establishes his year of birth around 1780 or 1781.

Richard Harrison's first wife Agnes died in 1809. There was apparently no issue of the marriage. He remained a bachelor for the next 30 years until he married Grace Hall Nibbs, the daughter of a Tortuga plantation owner in 1840. In the next decade they had five children, three of whom, Spencer, Isabella and Thomas survived infancy.

Armed with this clue it is now possible to make better sense of Richard harrison's life. He was baptised on June 3rd. 1780 at St. Mary Magdalene, Stony Stratford, (I didn't know that it was still functioning as a church at the time.) to Thomas and Catherine Harryson.

There is a lesson here for historians at all levels to be scrupulous with the facts. Dr. Guest's error was probably inadvertent, but the danger of committing something to print often means that it gets re-printed on the assumption that the original was correct. I puzzled about Richard Harrison reaching the very advanced age of 97, but assumed that Dr. Guest had access to information that I did not, and in the absence of concrete supporting evidence took it at face value. Once I had confirmed the age on his tomb it was easy enough to find the baptismal record, which, in the end, made more sense, albeit a less spectacular story.

My original post on the Harrison family is here.