Memories of Barnsley Issue 39

Paul Wilkinson • Editor editor@whmagazines.co.uk

The centre of Barnsley is undergoing its first phase of remodelling with the new temporary market complex. Some of the streets of Barnsley have changed considerably over the last century, although there are usually still old buildings in amongst the new which stand as a reminder of the former days.

In this issue Brian Elliott looks at the changes in New Street. The old photographs show how quaint, from our perspective, it once was back in the early 20th century. You may remember it from the 1960s onwards, perhaps attending the Globe Cinema or the Globe Theatre in the 1980s, or maybe having a swift one in the Globe Hotel next door. If you have any tales to tell then remember to email or write to me and I’ll feature them on the Readers’ Page.

Just before this issue went to press a fire destroyed the former Chicago Rock pub on New Street. The Grade II listed building is now having to be demolished. Below are a couple of photographs showing how it used to look when it was the Co-operative and the building in the process of being demolished. Issue 10 of Memories featured an article about the site and the bones that were discovered under the floor of the building. It was formerly the site of a Wesleyan Chapel.

School days are often the most vivid memories from our childhood. This time we feature a couple of stories from Grove Street schools, the Infants, Juniors and Senior school. The senior school reader’s story comes from the 1940s and really highlights how times have changed.

There’s an unusual photo for the competition this time, the views beyond the foreground are interesting as the area has changed so much. Keep your entries coming in, I’ll feature them if I can, even if you don’t win.

See you in the winter edition ...

This iconic building, formerly Chicago Rock pub, is seen here in the process of being demolished after being gutted by fire.

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Paul Wilkinson

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Email: editor@whmagazines.co.uk

Carolyn Mills

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Brian Elliott

John Goodchild

Peter Grafton

Tracey Hebron

Les Hennel

Linda Hutton

Richard Lawton

Phil Norman

Paul Wilkinson DESIGN

Paul Stebbing

Andrew Taylor

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Co-operative buildings on Island Corner at the junction of New Street and Wellington Street, photographed in the 1950s.

Old Barnsley A view of the past

Has an extensive collection of images of Yorkshire, showing local towns and villages of the early 1900s

Perhaps we have a view you would like mounted in a frame. You may also bring your own picture or postcard that you would like us to enlarge or frame.

WE BUY OLD POSTCARDS, CASH PAID

Contact us at: Unit 14 Upper Market Hall, Barnsley

Tel: 01226 200018 or 07801 976050

www.oldbarnsley.co.uk

THE FRIENDS OF WOMBWELL CEMETERY

Have a new community facility created from a former chapel, thanks to support from the Heritage Lottery Fund, WREN and Barnsley MBC

The Friends are looking for more volunteers to help with a variety of opportunities to support the group which, now in its 14th year, has already transformed the look of the cemetery. To look around the facility or find out more about volunteering call in any Wednesday morning. Contact via Mike Brettom on mike.bretton@gmail.com or 07941318121

ENLARGMENTS & FRAMING FROM £13.99

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6 New Land to New Street

Brian Elliott investigates the history and development of New Street.

14 ‘The Boozers Batch’

Richard Lawton looks at contrasting attitudes towards drink in Barnsley.

16 Darley Main Colliery

John Goodchild gives us an insight into the colliery at Worsbrough.

20 Gem from the Archives

Paul Stebbing, BMBC’s Archives & Local Studies Manager, examines a document of national importance held in Barnsley.

22 Brothers in Arms

Linda Hutton uncovers the story of the Smith family.

26 Cricket at Shaw Lane

Phil Norman records some observations from the 1930s on cricket during the 1800s.

29 Evelyn De Morgan

Tracey Hebron introduces us to a niece of the Spencer Stanhope family.

30 Grove Street Junior and Infants School

Andrew Taylor looks back at his schooldays in the 1950s and ‘60s.

34 Fatal ending to a love affair

A tragic incident at Cawthorne.

37 ‘Dear dirty, delightful little town’

A London girl describes her visit to Barnsley in 1916.

38 Readers’ Pages

44 Reader’s Story

Les Hennel relates his experiences of Grove Street Senior School.

46 Girl Fridays 1973

NEW LAND TO NEW STREET

The evolution of a Barnsley street

Brian Elliott investigates the history and development of New Street.

New Street has seen many changes over the last few generations, perhaps most spectacularly in the late 1980s and early 1990s when much of its south side was redeveloped to make way for the Alhambra Shopping Centre.

The route of the Westway Relief Road also cut across the upper commercial part of New Street, from Pall Mall to Park Row, and even ran across a small corner of the Globe Picture House site, purpose-built as a cinema in the silent-film era in 1914. Vacant apart from ‘bingo’ from 1960, this interesting building was refurbished in the early 1980s and functioned

as a theatre, hosting a variety of professional and amateur productions. Was Barnsley Playgoers’ The Boyfriend the last show prior to demolition of the building in about 1990? It would also be interesting to know if any readers remember attending the Globe when it was still used as a cinema –or maybe you have a family connection regarding someone who worked there.

Do you remember the three shops that were incorporated into the the Globe cinema’s frontage? A look through volume 2 of E G Tasker’s Barnsley Streets shows that, from the 1950s, the first (No.50) was used by dressmakers H H Ellis

(1959-61), succeeded by Vogue Hairdressing (1962-68), A. E. Chapman’s estate agency (196970) and Mario Hairdressing (1971-85). Mario’s also occupied the middle shop (No.52) from 1974, previously used by the Refuge Lending Society (196974), Stocks estate agents (1966), Strand Libraries (1960-61) and as a delicatessen in 1959. The end shop, just below the entrance (No.56), functioned as H Taylor’s toy shop in 1961, by Lodge and Hughes (overalls) between 1962-65, S Christopher’s ‘Motoring School’ in 1969; and from 1970 as the Jax Music Centre.

Staying with this part of New Street, next door to the Globe cinema was the convenient Globe Hotel, a fairly substantial red-brick building erected in about 1930 when it was a Clarkson brewery house. Interestingly, part of the site was previously occupied by

THE TRANSFORMATION of lower and south side New Street became evident following the building and opening the Alhambra Centre. Brian Elliott

a small Barnsley pub with ‘sporting’ associations, at least in its sign: the Dog and Gun.

What about New Street’s early history and development? First, let’s go back more than 120

years. New Street received its first big overhaul, especially on its south side, in the early 1890s, widening the street and helping it become a more integral part of the town centre; though the

project had taken a very long time to start, plans having been drawn up by architect John Whitworth as early as 1826. By Edwardian times, as can be seen on early photographs, the main ‘shopping’ zone of New Street, rising from Cheapside towards the junction of Wellington Street and little beyond, was a bustling and thriving place, containing a variety of shops and services,

THE GLOBE THEATRE shortly before demolition: note the banner advertising The Boyfriend and the closed shops. Brian Elliott

NEXT DOOR to the Globe cinema was the Globe Hotel, a red-brick building erected in about 1930.

LOOKING DOWN NEW Street in c.1890 from Island Corner. The narrow, stone-setted street surface is clearly evident. The Friendship Inn was a popular pub, functioning from the 1840s to 1910. Across the way, as the road widened, Guest’s, clothier and pawnbroker is just in view. Tasker Photographic Trust

some of them extending to one or more storeys. However, these early images show that the street was previously a narrow thoroughfare, a clue as to its earlier history.

When ‘new’ is used as a descriptive prefix to a placename the word can be an awkward one to interpret as some examples are of medieval origin. But in an urban street setting the usage often denoted the late, say 19th century,

expansion of a town from its old centre. This was certainly the case in Barnsley, the creation of New Street taking place in conjunction with the great growth of the town in late Georgian and early Victorian times. Close to May Day Green, New Street became a natural extension to Cheapside, and was also easily reached from the south via ‘Sheffield Road’ (Sheffield-Wakefield Turnpike).

Two 19th century Barnsley

local historians, Burland and Hoyle, were able to combine personal memories of Barnsley’s streets with surviving maps, plans and other records; and we owe much to Eli Hoyle in particular for his detailed series of articles on the ‘streets and byways’ of Barnsley, published in the Barnsley Independent in 1893; and carefully transcribed and presented for modern usage by Phil Norman for Barnsley Archives. Access the four

A WONDERFUL C.1890 view looking across ‘Newlands’ and up New Street, with only pedestrian traffic. I wonder where the boy with the barrel is heading. Chris Sharp/Old Barnsley

sections on New Street and you are able to take almost a virtual tour of old buildings, characters and notable events up to late Victorian times; and just before the Whitworth scheme came into being, referred to above.

John Hugh Burland refers to a local man with a dual occupation, Joseph Lingard, opportunist newspaper-seller and and shoemaker, from his little shop by the Neptune Inn, who first began calling what

was previously a rural lane ‘New Street’, having his delivery parcels marked accordingly. This was in the late 1830s at a time when the Chartist movement was beginning to take a hold in Barnsley’, Lingard taking advantage of the sale of new radical papers such as the Northern Star.

One of Barnsley Archives’ most precious and important records is the enclosure award map of 1777. A glance at this shows that the lower (Cheapside/May Day Green) part of what we now call New Street had a small cluster of properties on either side, about seventeen in all, more or less an extension of the ‘town centre’ rather than the beginning of new development. This was ‘Newlands’. Beyond these few houses ‘New Land Road’ was a narrow lane with an uncertain end, at the northern edge of upland fields that formed part of Barnsley Warren.

The lane or road and this area got its identification from ‘Newland(s)’, a fairly common name used for land brought into cultivation close to a town. A small stream known as Barker’s Brook flowed down the New Land Road (or lane) lane until its confluence with the Sough Dike near Beckett Square; and the

name ‘Barker’s’ appears to have been applied to several properties (and a small pedestrian bridge) near Sheffield Road. Another early but ‘post-Newland’ name for New Street was ‘Dawson’s Lane’, after the Dawson family who had property in the area. Just imagine a ‘mini-railway’, on which a horse-pulled string of ‘corves’ (coal wagons) ran, trundled down New Street, making its way towards a handy coal staithe – via Baker Street. From there the tramway broadened so as take bigger wagons and loads before passing down Pontefract Road to a wharf on the canal below Hoyle Mill, quite a journey. The old tramway served Porter’s Pit, located in High Style Field (Locke Park area) close to the wonderfullynamed Johnny Wander Lane (part of Park Road). In 1840, two lads had an accident here, during the course of the return haulage. After climbing aboard the empties, one of the boys –Cavanagh – was ‘cut to pieces’, when he fell under the wheels, losing his life, according to Hoyle. It appears to have been normal for them to jump on and off the wagons at or near this point, close to the loading area.

Moving back to Victorian times, by the mid 1850s the upper part of New Street, from

DETAIL FROM THE Barnsley Enclosure Award map of 1777, showing a small cluster of properties around ‘Newlands’ and no apparent development along what was to become New Street. Barnsley Archives

‘T’Bairnsla Foaks’ Annual, an POGMOOR OLMENACK’

One of New Street’s most enterprising characters, was a printer, Alfred Whitham, who started in business as a bookseller at number 27 in 1877, with a print works at the rear. Whitham was soon publishing and printing his own ‘Historical Almenack’ and appears to have been so adept and astute as to take over the printing of the ‘world famous’ Pogmoor Olmenack, which had been previously printed in Leeds. Whitham was not slow to praise his products and services, referring to THE CHEAP PRINTING ESTABLISHMENT and PRINTING BY GAS POWER, using THE LATEST IMPROVED FAST-PRINTING MACHINERY. A relative newcomer, he was learning fast, competing with the likes of the Barnsley Chronicle and others.

By 1888 Alfred was promoting the latest LETTER PRESS PRINTING from 25 and 27 New Street, and had established book binding facilities too; and his premises also doubled as a post office. But in the 1890s he had relocated to a prime central site, Church Street, his ‘Victoria Works’ printing the latest Pogmoor Olmenack or ‘Tom Treddlehoyle’s Annual’. Whitham’s old New Street site was later occupied by newsagents J Lodge & Sons and in more recent times by Hi Tan Solarium (1988-1993) and Grove Home Textiles (1993-2001).

TYPICAL ADVERT by Alfred Whitham, when he was based at 25 and 27 New Street. Brian Elliott

AN EARLY issue of the Pogmoor Olmenack, such as this 1858 example, were printed in Leeds. Brian Elliott

the Junction with Wellington Street northwards to Princess Street, cut through a great working-class area of Barnsley, though some tightly-packed bits had rather grand-sounding ‘courts’ and ‘squares’ on the north side; and on the south were similar properties accessed in part by ‘first-name’ streets: John, Thomas and Joseph. The ‘Barebones’ area, so long associated with artisan weavers, was easily reached via New Street and Wood Street.

Some of my maternal ancestors, the Winters, lived

and worked in Copper Street, New Street and Silver Street, their principal trade of boot and shoemaking a very important one in Barnsley. From the 1870s through to the 1950s, at number 26 New Street, by the junction with Baker Street, was ‘Guest’s’, its three-storey frontage proclaiming itself as THE PEOPLE’S CLOTHING STORES where CHEAP BOOTS ‘at wholesale prices’ could be obtained. More discretely, this business also operated as a pawnbroker, the pledge office

A GLIMPSE OF old working-class Barnsley and upper New Street and Newland is evident in this extract from the Public Health map from 1856. Barnsley Archives

at the Baker Street side of the building, as were the tempting ales of the Industry Inn

Located only a short distance from the old town centre, New Street was attractive to many new businesses, and remained a long-time magnet for existing ones, even from prime sites such as Cheapside. When old leases ceased or simply on a basis of more space; or maybe less rates to pay, it is not surprising that there was some movement of old businesses to Barnsley’s newest street. One very late example of ‘transfer’, therefore one that many readers will remember was the re-location (1968-1997) of Bailey’s ‘baby linen’ drapery, along with its iconic ‘WE SUPPLY ALL BUT THE BABY’ rooftop signage, from Cheapside to the bottom north side (number 5) of New Street. Near the top of the incline at the entrance to Wellington Street the Barnsley British Co-operative premises were prominent landmarks and attraction to shoppers; and ‘Island Corner’ was always a busy hub of activity. The presence of a fair sprinkling of

DURING THE 1950s and 1960s, near the Cheapside entrance to New Street, in the shadow of the Duke of York hotel; and in the middle of the road at the busy hub of Pontefract and Sheffield roads, stood one of Barnsley’s most famous characters. In ‘hi-viz’ white coat and helmet, PC Bill Harber will be remembered by many of our readers, his smart and flamboyant directions to traffic made even more stunning by a most impressive handlebar moustache, a facial characteristic that became legendary. I can certainly remember when working for the Barnsley Council’s transport department that several of the drivers would wind their windows down and hand him sweets (and for a prank less savoury items!) as they whizzed by. Standing not far from Albert Hirst’s, I guess a few complimentary pies made his way too. Wonderful footage of Harber (old and more recent) with ‘Stairfoot Rarnabout’ musician Dave Cherry can be seen ‘face to face’ on YouTube.

inns and public houses on and just off the street complemented the scene. The 1950s and 1960s was a period when most towns still had streets consisting mostly of independent shops

and services, and Barnsley’s New Street was no exception. For nostalgic purposes, I wonder how many of the following you can remember, including one or two ‘chain stores’, located

ON THIS Edwardian postcard view of New Street, Whitworth’s old printer’s shop (25) can be seen, now occupied by another well-known stationer, Lodge. Chris Sharp/Old Barnsley

BAILEY’S RELOCATED to New Street in 1968 but it was an emotional day for proprietor Jean Bailey, 74, when she locked up for the last time and the business closed in July 1997. The stork and its logo flew away too, landing at Elsecar Heritage Centre.

Brian Elliott

at the lower end of the street. Let’s start with the south (new ‘Alhambra’) side:

Hadwen & Sons (tailors)

Dobson Radio

Red Arrow Rentals

Rita Children’s Outfitter (and Radio Rentals)

LOOKING ALONG the west side of Wellington Street in the direction of New Street and Island Corner in c.1965.

Barnsley British Co-operative buildings dominated this area: Fish, Poultry and Game; Sportswear and Home Furnishings especially.

Ted Tasker Photographic Trust

THE NEW TASKER photographic shop with its corner location always caught the eye as it was one of the better examples of 1960s architecture in Barnsley. The panoramic-style windows allowed easy and convenient viewing of goods for sale. Ted

Morris Wallpapers

Spiers Fancy Goods

Bielby (tobacconists)

Argo Foods (and Smiths Cleaners)

Alan Bell Radio (and Morrison’s Fashions)

... and then of course ‘the Co-op’: Barnsley British Co-operative Society Butchers/ Confectioners/Electric Goods/ Furnishing departments

John Peters Furniture

... but my favourite place as a young man in the 1960s was the bright new TASKER (photographic) premises, at number 36.

Cross over to the lower north side and the following may promote more memories:

Jacksons (butchers)

Cadman’s (wallpaper)

Wakefield Army Stores

Paragan Jewellers

Robinson Radio Rentals

Schofield (confectioner)

King (fishmonger)

Philips Furnishing

Brighter Homes Wallpaper

Lodge & Son (newsagents)

Blackburns (men’s outfitters)

Millers Bargain Stores

Norah Gowns

Dewhurst (butchers)

… and not forgetting BBCS Wallpaper.

You can see many more examples and more information in E G Tasker’s Barnsley Streets books - and do have a look online via the Tasker Photographic Trust site. n

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My special thanks to:

Barnsley Archives

Barnsley Independent

Chris Sharp and Old Barnsley

The Ted Tasker Photographic Trust

Tasker Photographic Trust

the S OMME

‘Most of [the men] had cigarettes hanging from their lower lips and their conversation consisted of a series of grunts. These fellows are not unfriendly, I thought. They are down and out. No spirit, no cheerfulness. That fellow’s eyes over there. Look at them. He seems half dazed. Those men there. Look how they walk, dragging their feet. These fellows have suffered and their memories are too vivid to be brushed aside, too near to be laughed away. What ghost is it that seems to be haunting them?’

Lance Corporal George Brown, 21st Northumberland Fusiliers (2nd Tyneside Scottish)

‘He told me that he had been shot through the middle of the back and that the bullet had emerged through his left ear. We were lying together [in a shell hole], he wondering whether we would finish up in the same hospital. In this, I could not help feeling that he was being rather optimistic.’

Private Henry Russell, 1/5th London Regiment (London Rifle Brigade)

The Epic Battle in the Soldiers’ own Words and Photographs

‘THE BOOZERS BATCH’

Richard Lawton looks at contrasting attitudes towards drink in Barnsley during the second half of the 19th century.

In much of the work on temperance in the 19th century, attempts to control drinking have been seen as an attempt to control working class morals and behaviour – a fight led by a reforming middle class. Local studies however, like Barnsley, show that attitudes towards drink were often informed more by religious thinking than being simply a method of ‘class control’. A look at Barnsley also demonstrates that official attitudes towards drink did not necessarily follow the worries and concerns of the temperance movement.

The temperance movement in Barnsley demonstrates that negative attitudes towards drink were not the preserve of any one class – temperance gained support from both middle and working class groups. The cocoa and coffee tavern movement, whose aim was to provide alternative premises to the public house but without their intoxicants, was in Barnsley solely a middle class movement. The funding for Barnsley’s first tavern was given by Edward Newman, a local middle class businessman and ‘was an effort largely promoted by the philanthropic middle class’1.

The initial seven subscribers were all middle class consisting of accountants, solicitors a chemist and two gentlemen. The only other two large subscribers, Edith Guest and Thomas Wentworth were both middle class philanthropists who gave generously to other societies. Temperance however

also had a large working class following, particularly working class Methodism which appealed strongly to skilled workers, independent artisans and miners. Working class movements could gain much from advocating temperance and in relation to Barnsley; Chartists strongly supported the local movement. A report which suggests ‘the chartists of Barnsley voted £1 towards defraying the expenses’ of a temperance speaker ‘in uniting themselves to those who had left the drunkard’s ranks’ is indicative of this (Barnsley notices B940).

If not class-based, then more convincingly temperance can be seen as dictated largely by religion. This in many ways is indicated in the names of the different societies. The Barnsley Catholic Total Abstinence Society and Barnsley Temperance Society and Christian Mission for example clearly had a religious basis. The religiosity of the British Women’s Temperance Association (Barnsley Branch) and the Mapplewell and Staincross Temperance Society is not as readily apparent from the name but in a tract written by the secretary of the latter the religious aspect of temperance is writ large with its opening of ‘Intemperance is sin in its worst form’. The ten-page attack on intemperance continues throughout in the same vein declaring that ‘the man who had not a perfect hatred to intemperance, could not be a child of God’, a declaration which is ‘sound scriptural doctrine’. The man who stands aloof from

the temperance cause has hands ‘red with blood’ and ‘cannot have that grace which brings salvation to the soul’ (Saving Grace and Soul-Destroying Drinks, 1865).

The religious nature of temperance is exemplified further if we look momentarily at another area. Sources relating to Sheffield for example are similarly overwhelmingly religious in tone and show a similar trend as in Barnsley with drink as ‘injurious to the Constitution of Man’ and ‘contrary to the commands of God’ indicative assertions of this (The Fate of Youth With Reflections, 1849).

The cocoa and coffee movement may have been middle class but more importantly it was a religious movement. When the first cocoa and coffee tavern opened in Barnsley the formal proceedings in the Temperance Hall were attended, by ‘the great and the good’2, ministers of the Church of England and the Congregational, Baptist and Wesleyan Methodist denominations. It was therefore religious attacks on

TEMPERANCE HALL on Pitt Street which was occupied by the Temperance Society from 1880-1897.

intemperance that had the most extensive influence and from which the most serious minded attacks came from.

What of the impact of these attitudes and attacks? Did the numbers turning to temperance increase? Did the amount of drinking decrease? When assessing the achievements of temperance, in many ways one can suggest that it met with relative success in Barnsley. As discussed above the evidence shows at least four different societies and the existence of the Mapplewell and Staincross Temperance Society implies that other places in the borough may have formed an equivalent.

The Temperance Hall on Pitt Street was the focus of many meetings with guest speakers from around the country addressing audiences. As early as 1840 the Barnsley correspondent of the Northern Star was able to assert that ‘teetotalism…which carries peace and plenty to the poor man’s cottage is making gigantic strides in Barnsley’, suggesting that ‘already there are seventeen beer houses closed, and many of the old established public houses are to be let’ (Barnsley notices B940).

Moreover Barnsley, as a predominantly mining town,

presents a case study which is not explicit to all areas in which the industrial base was different. The culture of drinking, one can suggest, plays a more central role in areas of heavy industry with all its physical and symbolic associations.

As a result it seems that any successes of temperance if only seemingly minimal should be assessed with this in mind.

It does seem however that efforts to repress popular drinking were insistent rather than effective. The evidence in relation to Barnsley is indicative of the national picture. The consumption of drink throughout the century was high and increased throughout reaching a peak in the 1870s with 1875 being the year in which consumption per head of population was at its highest point. Looking at court records does much to substantiate this trend. The records of the Barnsley Bench show an increase in cases of drunk and disorderly and drunk and riotous throughout the period under review from 162 in 1853/4 to 333 in 1873 and 541 in 1893 (The Book of Proceedings of the Barnsley Bench 1852-1857, 18711875, 1890-1895).

The growth was not as steady as these figures suggest with some years having even greater numbers. In 1891 for example the number of drink related cases was 959 (The Book of Proceedings of the Barnsley Bench 1890-1895). In all the sample years such cases constituted the most common heard before the Barnsley Bench. This may be partly a reflection of changes in the law or changes in policing as well as being an indication of any real increases or decreases in the culture of drinking but the latter’s increase must play its part. Furthermore, if we take the cocoa and coffee tavern movement mentioned earlier there is again a clear indication of temperance failings. The primary aim was to provide an alternative to drink but they

failed to draw in an adequate clientele. In December 1898 the company was forced into voluntary liquidation, unable to divert people from the public house.

The lack of success may well stem from the nature of official attitudes. The government was in many ways stuck in an ambivalent situation – alcohol produced large revenue, the brewing interest was an extremely powerful lobby but on the other hand measures had to be taken to prevent disorderly behaviour resulting from drunkenness. The evidence suggests however that official attitudes refrained from being explicitly anti-drink.

The punishment of drinkrelated crimes for example were not particularly punitive with small fines being the punishment in a majority of cases. Indeed the prevalence of leniency is shown in a shock report of a drunk and riotous case headed ‘it’s a scandalous shame’ in which a one month prison term was given as punishment. The reporter commented ‘nobody knows why this extreme course was taken’ and even if he had been in court previously there are ‘lots of customers of the Barnsley Bench (who) come up for treatment before that course is adopted’ (The Barnsley Independent, 28 February 1891). Other features of the court reporting also suggest that it was not taken too seriously. The long list of drink cases, a feature of almost every set of court reports were entitled colloquially and even humorously as ‘The Boozers Batch’, The Boozing Crew’, ‘The Neckers’ and ‘The Revellers’ to name but a few (The Barnsley Independent, 28 February, 4 April, 25 April, 9 May 1891). Such language is in stark contrast to that of religious based commentary on drink and suggests maybe that the prevailing attitudes were maybe a little less pious. n

1. K. Taylor, ‘Buns But No Beer: Barnsley’s Coffee Taverns’, AspectsofBarnsley5

2. K. Taylor, ‘Buns But No Beer: Barnsley’s Coffee Taverns’, AspectsofBarnsley5

DARLEY MAIN COLLIERY

John Goodchild, gives us an insight into the Darley Main colliery at Worsbrough.

The valley of the river Dove at Worsbrough Bridge was described in the trade directory of 1838 as:

There is a branch of the Dearne and Dove Canal; and extensive iron, coal, lime, chemical, and flint glass works, with wharfs, boat-yards, a papermill, and a large assemblage of houses, presenting a scene of bustle not often excelled in market towns.

The Darley Main colliery was the local representative among a number of new, expensive collieries sunk in the vicinity of Barnsley in the 1830s.

The new Darley Main was to be some 130 yards in depth to reach the Barnsley Thick seam which was some 7 feet 8 inches in thickness at that point. An advertisement in the Leeds Intelligence newspaper as early as 1802 had offered a coalfield at Swaithe to let, with a shaft sunk close to the branch canal then under construction. But no major coal development in the locality of Worsbrough Dale appears to have occurred, other

than the modest Edmunds Main which had existed since before the canal days.

It may have been the opening of the new inland canal port of Goole in 1826 which gave a major impetus to connected collieries. The period saw the consequential raising of the bridges on the nearby and connecting Barnsley Canal to take coal boats which were able to carry coal out of the mouth of the Humber. The opening of railways, both utilising the Barnsley Bed coal in its locomotives and carrying it directly to Hull and Liverpool from 1841, and the coming of railways into the Barnsley coalfield from 1850, both increased its sales, especially after through communication was made to London and the south from 1850.

The original Darley Main lease of October 1835 was of 200 acres of the Barnsley seam (only) from John Jeffcock of Cowley in Ecclesfield parish and his wife as land and coal owners, to two Barnsley shopkeepers, George Traviss

a hat manufacturer, known popularly as Radical Traviss, and John Horsfall, an ironmonger on Market Hill in Barnsley. They were subsequently joined by 1838 and presumably as a capital provider, by one Jackson, probably one of the Barnsley Jacksons who were linen manufacturers and bleachers; Henry Jackson of that firm was a partner in Hopwood & Jackson of the Huddersfield Road colliery in Barnsley.

Traviss & Horsfall’s lease of coal was for 21 years and their first rent was to be paid, at £300 an acre minimum for three acres, being a substantial £900 a year, in December 1837. The plan attached to their lease

A BRANCH of the Dearne and Dove canal terminated at Worsbrough Basin, Worsbrough Bridge.

shows the area (of coal) leased, including that of the surface Lob Wood where the colliery was to be developed; the lease also refers to the working of clay and stone and the making of coke. The ‘Lob Wood Colliery’ is shown on the Ordnance Survey, surveyed in 1838 to 1840, and coal was begun to be drawn from its workings in 1839.

Jackson had apparently left the partnership by 1840, when the Worsbrough township valuation lists Traviss & Horsfall with a rateable value of £300 on their colliery alone, plus five coke kilns, unnumbered lime kilns, houses, workshops, stables and canal wharf. In 1840-41 the firm was attempting to undercut the prices recently fixed by the Yorkshire Coal Masters’ Association. As a result, they sold Darley Main soft coal at 7s. 9d, a ton of 20 cwts, and hards at 8s. 9d in Hull.

In reality the partners were in financial difficulties, perhaps as a result of Jackson’s withdrawal. The situation proved disastrous for Horsfall, too, in 1843. The bailiffs were in during 1843 and in December, the colliery, its high pressure steam engine, its 28 corves (a

wagon or large basket formerly used for bringing coal out of a mine) and its limekilns, were advertised as being for sale. The answer was to bring in new capital via John Horsfall, the partner’s brother, George, who was heir and godson of his father’s cousin John Jarratt, who had been a onetime partner in the great Low Moor Iron Works near Bradford until he sold out in 1815. Under this godfather’s will, George Horsfall took the name George Jarratt by royal licence late in 1846. A proposal to assign a new lease of the colliery to him was made in 1846 and signed in 1849-50.

Jarratt, who owned considerable property and lived at Elmfield House, Doncaster, one of that town’s largest houses, took as his managing partner in the colliery business Samuel Sharp, who came to live in Worsbrough Dale at Darley Hall. One of his first preoccupations there was with the Darley Main colliery explosion of January 1849, when 75 of the over 100 men and boys in the pit lost their lives, leaving 31 widows and 55 children. At the coroner’s inquest the verdict

was accidental death. The Barnsley Bed in the vicinity of Worsbrough was peculiarly liable to explosion, and there were other fatalities at Darley Main:

January 1847: 6 killed when gas ignited in blasting coal with gunpowder

August 1847: 2 killed

June 1851: 3 killed The 1849 explosion was a major disaster – the worst to date in the Yorkshire coalfield. A relief fund was established, of which Sharp acted as the secretary. The colliery subscribed £200, John Jeffcock, the minerals owner, £5, the neighbouring magnate and land and coal owner F W T Vernon Wentworth of Wentworth Castle £100, Earl Fitzwilliam £50, and Joseph Locke the railway engineer, £50.

Jarratt’s interest in the colliery may well have been stimulated by its potential for sales via and to the new steam railways and the plan for the new Worsbrough branch, including that of the Sheffield, Rotherham, Barnsley, Wakefield, Huddersfield & Goole Company (later owned by the South Yorkshire Railway) up the Dove Valley to Darley Main. Its plan, deposited later in 1846, shows the single-track line as being intended to run south of the

REMOVING BODIES from Darley Main colliery after the disaster of 1849.

LOCATION OF Darley Main and Edmunds Main collieries.

canal where Darley Main lay to the north, but with a branch to the colliery crossing the canal. As all lay almost at a common level, bridging the canal proved difficult, but a sliding bridge provided the answer and the surviving colliery accounts refer to its pulleys, ropes, etc. (sic). The line was opened up by the colliery in June 1850. With the opening in that year of the direct line to London built by the Great Northern Railway with which the South Yorkshire line connected, and the opening in the 1850s of lines connecting to Grimsby, Sheffield, the industrial West Riding and to the North-West, markets were much increased.

In 1854 Jarratt renewed the coal lease. Now increased to some 232 acres and with a minimum rental of £2,000 for eight acres of Barnsley seam coal – with workings limited to 12 acres a year – plus significantly £150 a year for other owners’ coals carried to the shafts through Jeffcock coal. There was now a farm attached to the colliery to allow horse maintenance in particular, usual in this period, and the main lease was extended to

1875. The area of coal leased now extended northwards to the southern outskirts of the town of Barnsley. In the early 1850s Jarratt was considering a supply of coal for sale to the Great Northern Railway itself, and by 1857 the firm was considering a letter as to the supply of steam coal for Russia from Hull, from a great shipping house.

In 1855, Darley Main missed perhaps its greatest opportunity. It had provisionally leased ‘the Wombwell Coal Field’ from Sir George Wombwell, but after sundry borings and explorations for coal and much expense, abandoned the field as it was not worth prosecuting. But in 1855 the Wombwell coalfield was let to the ultimately financially very successful Wombwell Main Colliery.

But things were about to change once more, as G J Jarratt died in May of 1856, leaving a situation where the value of the investment had to be quantified and a sale again ensued. Darley Main is unusual among West Riding collieries in that the partners’ private ledgers survive

for the two years from May 1856, giving an excellent overall view of the colliery’s financial, output, sales, profitability and costs. Its capital was held in thirds, of which Jarratt owned two (from May 1856 his estate owned them) and Sharp one. In May 1856 the capital, including undivided interest, was probably £20,666.13.7. Miss Mary Winn of nearby Bank End had lent the partners £900 at 5% in 1855 and they banked with the Wakefield & Barnsley Union Bank at Barnsley, where their debit balance in the middle of three successive years varied:

1856 £9,067.13.11

1857 £9638.10.7

1858 £9135.10.7

At this period, losses were being made overall, although not substantial ones:

June 1857 £1774.5.1

June 1858 £1118.5. 9

These were years in which their new King Well pit was being sunk and the Bank was owed for the colliers’ cottages recently built.

FUNERAL OF Darley Main victims, St Mary’s church, Worsbrough.

DARLEY MAIN Disaster Fund poster.

In 1856 an underground breach was made into the coals of William Elmhirst in the Bank Top estate. The theft, almost certainly a conscious one, led to a claim for compensation, initially (naturally) dependent upon an assessment of the value of the coal stolen, which the colliery estimated at some £2,000. An addition claim was made for £212.3.3; the amounts due were paid in 1858. Money passed for the support of a bank, perhaps that of the canal, and coal was left unworked for the support of the River Dove. Another problem was occasioned by the underground movements brought about by the extraction of coal, known as creep. The supporting pillars in the workings were made too small and the space between them rose to close the working area, often the product of ignorance and greed. On the last day of 1859, Sharp wrote of the creep which had recently occurred:

The dreadful calamity that has befallen us at our No1 pit, we hoped day by day that the creep would cease but it is going on still & entirely shuts us out. They (sic) are getting out the plates and pipes and for the present No 1 is shut up... the loss will be very great... the shock to me was so great that my life was despaired for 3 days but matters did soon improve in this secret.

During the period for which detailed accounts survive, 1856 to 1858, the colliery was making annual losses. The death of G J Jarratt and the financial difficulties which included pressure from the bank for repayment of the loan for building the 54 cottages, led to negotiations for its possible sale in mid-1858 to William Shaw of Stanley Hall near Wakefield. A native of Worsbrough Dale, he had made a fortune as a railwaybuilding contractor, but a sale to Shaw proved impossible.

In surviving correspondence

Shaw commented that although

the plant at Darley Main may have cost £18,000 to £20,000, it was worth less, and new works railway engines and shafts, for instance, would be required to do anything worthwhile on these works.

In the August of 1858 Shaw gave up any interest in purchasing the business, pleading the likelihood of having soon to leave for the continent on account of the ill-health of his daughter.

In the event it was not until 1861 that the colliery was disposed of, and by the end of that year Henry and William Croft were owners of Darley Main when they took a lease of 20 additional acres of Barnsley Bed coal from Wentworth. They were significant Hull coal merchants, and took into partnership William Batty, chief clerk of the old company, who no doubt provided some commercial continuity. He was a Doncaster man by birth (in 1823), introduced to Darley Main by G J Jarratt as bookkeeper in 1845, but left a couple of years later when he became involved in the construction of the Blackburn & District Railway (sic).

In 1849 he was again approached by Darley Main and returned to the colliery, with which and with its ‘daughter’ colliery Pindar Oaks he was to be associated until closure in 1885. He was “clerk” at Darley Main in 1854, but rose in status to be for long president of the South Yorkshire Coalowners’ Association of his day, having been active in its formation. He was, for many years, intimately associated with the development of local government facilities and education in Worsbrough, being chairman of both the Local Board and the School Board. For some time he ran a night school there, and for nearly fifty years was associated with the Miners’ Permanent Relief Fund, and the Worsbrough Dale Gas company (and its chairman). For a long

time, he was also president of the Barnsley Chamber of Commerce. He was appointed as a West Riding magistrate in 1897 and died early in 1908, aged 85, being then of Darley Grove and leaving estate of the gross value of nearly £28,000.

In the 1860s the new Darley Main partnership proposed a new sinking at Pindar Oaks, much closer to the town of Barnsley. With a location allowing of a private branch railway from the main line, powers to cross the main road with a railway had been granted to the landowner in the mid1850s and some exploratory sinking had occurred there too. However, it was not until 1864 that formal negotiations were in place with the Darley Main Company and a lease was finalised in 1866 of 52½ acres of the Barnsley Bed coal to Henry and William Croft and William Batty, all of Darley, coalmasters. In 1867 the pit sinkers reached the Barnsley Bed in the number 2 shaft and by 1874 strikers there numbered 250 and at Darley Main 70. The old colliery was kept open, presumably providing some pumping and ventilation facilities for the new. William Croft, described as being of both pits, left Barnsley in 1876, having taken residence in Hull. The Crofts had held office as Brazilian Vice Consul in Hull, Grimsby, and Goole. They were agents for the Royal Exchange Corporation of London and had their offices at 6, Humber Place, Hull. A letterhead of the firm used in 1882 announced their steam coal on the English and French admiralty lists. But the colliery’s life was, by that time, drawing towards its end. Presumably owing to coal exhaustion in the areas where it had leasing rights, and an inability to find suitable alternative local coal resources, and the concern with workings in the Barnsley and the Woodmoor seams of coal, meant its closure in 1885. n

JOSEPH LOCKE was a major contributor to the Darley disaster fund.

Gem from the Archives

The Duke of York’s marriage warrant

Paul Stebbing, BMBC’s Archives & Local Studies Manager, examines a document of national importance held in Barnsley.

THE COLLECTIONS of Barnsley

Archives and Local Studies

which include the Elmhirst family archives, date from the 12th to 21st century and include records detailing everything from local families, to schools, local businesses, the police and councils. Explore the collections in the Discovery Centre, which sits alongside the Experience Barnsley Museum in the Town Hall.

The vaults of Barnsley Archives and Local Studies are filled with thousands of boxes of historic documents. They include records relating to the council, local businesses, families, charities, groups, schools, hospitals and numerous other institutions. The common thread running through all these collections is that the records they contain were created in or relate to the Borough of Barnsley. However, there are many exceptions to the rule. For example, amongst the archives of the Elmhirst family of Worsbrough can be found a 1673 marriage warrant for the Duke of York. It was named as one of Barnsley’s Greatest Treasures in the campaign which ran from 2014-15. But who was the Duke of York and why does his marriage warrant reside here in Barnsley?

Born at St James’s Palace in London on 14 October 1633, the Duke of York referred to in the marriage warrant was James Stuart, the second surviving son of the ill-fated King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria. He was just 16 years old, when in 1649 his father was taken to a makeshift scaffold and beheaded, following the bloody English Civil War. The family were then exiled for over a decade, until James’s brother was restored to the throne as King Charles II, the so-called ‘Merry Monarch’, in 1660. It was in that same year that James married for

the first time, to Anne Hyde, a commoner. They went on to have several children, but only two daughters were to survive childhood. Anne herself was to die from breast cancer, aged only 34. Before her death, Anne and James had both become drawn to Catholicism but were forced to keep it quiet. When James finally and fully converted, his brother opposed the move and ordered that his two surviving daughters be raised as Protestants. He was conscious that he himself had

no heirs and that the crown would eventually pass to James’s line.

Following the early death of Anne, James was allowed by his brother to marry the

King James II.

Mary of Modena.

Catholic Mary of Modena, a 15 year-old Italian princess, and daughter of Alfonso, the Duke of Modena. It is to this marriage that the warrant relates. It gives permission for Henry Mordaunt, the 2nd of Earl of Peterborough, to arrange the marriage of James and Mary. The warrant is addressed to the Earl of Shaftsbury, the High Chancellor. It is signed at the head by King Charles II and reads,

Our Will and Pleasure is that you forthwith cause our great seale of England to bee affixed to a certaine Instrument bearing date With these presents, containing powers to the Earle of Peterborou. to treat of a marriage between our most deare brother the duke of Yorke and princesse of Modena. For which this shall bee y[ou]r Warrant. Given att our Court att Whitehall the 31 day of July 1673. By his Ma[jes]ties com[m] and – Arlington.

Arlington was Henry Bennett, the 1st Earl of Arlington, a prominent English Statesman. James and Mary were married by proxy in a Catholic ceremony on 20 September 1673. When Mary arrived in England, escorted by the Earl of Peterborough, a brief Anglican service was performed by the Bishop of Oxford, which simply recognised the Catholic marriage. James ascended to the throne as King James II over a decade later, following the death of his brother in 1685. He reigned for three years until he was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. He was to be the last Roman Catholic monarch of England, Scotland and Ireland. Exiled once again to France, James died of a brain haemorrhage at Saint-Germainen-Laye in 1701. His wife Mary survived until 1718. The Stuarts were to continue to pursue the throne they had lost for many decades to come.

But why did this document of national importance end up in Barnsley? We have to look back to Walter Pye – the original

collector of this and other accompanying documents. He was an auditor of the Exchequer for many years during the 17th century, and therefore would have taken charge of a number of documents of national importance. It was his descendant, Miss Anne

Hampden Pye of Clifton Hall in Staffordshire, that married James Elmhirst in 1865, thus bringing the Pye and Elmhirst family papers together. That is why this unique document has ended up in a Yorkshire town, hundreds of miles from where it would have originally been created. n

BROTHERS IN ARMS

Linda Hutton uncovers the story of the Smith family whose five sons served in the First World War.

Imagine that a member of your family – a brother, son, father or uncle – is lost in a war, imagine that a neighbour’s son is lost too, imagine that, in your street or village, over half the families have lost someone. Then imagine that in your family three of your six brothers have been killed, and two more have returned home forever changed by their experiences. This is what happened all over Britain during 1914-1918 and this is the story of one family’s experience.

Five of the sons of George Smith of Lister Square, John Street, Barnsley served in the First World War and three of them were remembered on the Oak Memorial Tablet that used to be on display in St John’s Church, Barebones, Barnsley. The church was demolished in the 1960s and sheltered accommodation built on the site on Joseph Street. Fortunately we have a newspaper report from the Barnsley Chronicle on 24 September 1921 which describes the unveiling of the memorial and lists the 140 names of the men remembered there.

When you are doing family history research Smith is a name of dread as, being the most common surname in England, it is by far one of hardest to research. Happily for the Barnsley War Memorials Project, all three of the Smith boys are listed in De Ruvigny’s Roll of Honour which is available to search on Ancestry and Find My Past. This Roll of Honour includes over 26,000 casualties,

so it is only a small sample of the nearly one million men lost from the British Empire during the First World War. Unfortunately it is far from accurate and I would advise cross referencing every detail given in its entries with other sources.

George Smith was from Barnsley but his wife Amelia (nee Powell) was born in Sheffield. They had married in 1874 in St John’s in Barnsley and were still together in 1911 living at number 8 Lister Square, John Street. The census return tells us that they had 12 children ‘born alive’ altogether, although three had died before 1911. Their house had only three rooms and packed into that space were George, Amelia, six of their children and a granddaughter. All bar Amelia and the two youngest children were working, either down the pit or in the bobbin mill.

Amelia had passed away before the war, actually in the same year as the census was taken and she is buried in Barnsley Cemetery in a plot where she was eventually joined by three other members of her family.

George and Amelia had six sons that I am aware of; Jonas b.1877, John Richard b.1882, Thomas b.1887, William b.1889, Charles b.1894 and Baden Powell b.1900 (one of over 400 boys born in 1900, during the Boer War, to be named after the later founder of the Boy Scouts movement).

When John Richard is reported dead in 1916 the

Barnsley Chronicle states that George has four other sons in the Army. Baden would have been too young at that point, so all of George’s other sons must have enlisted.

Jonas Smith, the eldest son, had married Caroline Drake in 1898 and by 1911 when they were living at 24 Wortley Street, they had five children living and three who had already died. Jonas had a couple of minor convictions in the 1900s for stealing, on one occasion, a paraffin cask and on another, beer! This might reflect the poverty of the general area of Barebones at the beginning of the 20th century. Their family steadily increases to a total of thirteen children by 1920, but there is a gap in their births between 1916 and 1919 suggesting that Jonas was away serving in the forces. In 1930 Caroline and Jonas are still living at 24 Wortley Street, but by 1939 they have moved to 70 Priory Road, Lundwood where they remain until their deaths.

We know from De Ruvigny that John Richard Smith, the next son, had been in the regular army before the First World War. He can be found in the 1911 census as a 29 year-

JOHN RICHARD Smith had worked at Barrow Colliery. He was sent to France with the 2nd KOYLI when war broke out and was reported missing after the Battle of Mons in 1914.

old Private in the 1st King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry (KOYLI) in China and Hong Kong. He must have served his time by 1914 because he was called up from the reserve and was sent to France with the KOYLI immediately war broke out. The Barnsley Chronicle tells us that he had worked at Barrow Colliery. He was reported missing in October 1914 but it was not until August 1916 that he was officially presumed dead at the Battle of Mons. He is remembered on Le Touret Memorial in France. He was unmarried.

Thomas Smith, the third son, was also in China and Hong Kong in the 1911 census in the 1st KOYLI with his brother John. He was 24 years of age. He married Elizabeth Ann Cherry at St John’s church in 1914 and his occupation was given as Horse Groom, so he must also have been discharged to the reserve. They went on to have five children, but as the eldest is not born until 1919 this suggests that Thomas was called away to the war very rapidly and left Elizabeth without the consolation of a child until his return. At least he did return.

Elizabeth’s brother Ernest Cherry was another First World War casualty, dying following an appendectomy whilst in service in 1917. Sadly Thomas and Elizabeth’s first two children George and Ada both die very young, but three further girls do survive as far as I can see. Thomas and Elizabeth were living still living at 13 Park Row, just off New Street, in 1930, which is the address that Elizabeth gives on their marriage. Also in the household was Tom Cherry, who was another of Elizabeth’s brothers. They were still there in 1939, but although Thomas and Elizabeth are buried together with their two eldest children in Barnsley Cemetery, they both died in Bradford. I wonder if they moved there for work or

to follow a married daughter maybe?

Willie Smith, the fourth son, had been living at home with his parents in 1911 and was working as a Filler and Trammer in a coal mine. De Ruvigny tells us that he was married to Louise and had a daughter Cora. William Smith married Mary L L Beaumont in the autumn of 1914 and they did indeed have a daughter, born in early 1915. As a member of the 2nd Barnsley Pals he must have enlisted after 9 December 1914, but his low service number, 14/97, suggests he did join up early on the recruitment of the second battalion. Could being newly married and with a child on the way have deterred him from rushing to enlist in the very early days of the war? He will have followed the wellknown path with the rest of the Pals, training at Rugeley, Ripon and Salisbury Plain before embarking for Egypt on 29 December 1915 and arriving in France in April 1916. Willie was reported missing after the first day of the Battle of the Somme on 1st July 1916, along with so many other Barnsley Pals. He is remembered on the Thiepval Memorial. Mary or Louise (maybe one of those Ls stood for Louise?) put an ‘In Memoriam’ message in the Barnsley Chronicle in July 1918, from his ‘loving wife and child’. She remarried in 1921 to an older man, Hamlet Armitage, and had a daughter with him later that year.

Charles Smith, the fifth son, volunteered for service in September 1914 joining the 1st/5th York and Lancaster Regiment, which was a Territorial battalion. As his service records, like those of his brothers, do not appear to have survived the Blitz in the Second World War we can’t tell if he was a ‘weekend soldier’ before September 1914, but with the tradition of army service in his family it seems

likely. He was killed in action 12 Sept 1916 according to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) although De Ruvigny says 1915. I have a cutting from the Barnsley Chronicle of 23 September 1916 which reports his death whilst out with a working party. It also mentions a wife and one child, whereas De Ruvigny says he was unmarried. He is buried in Lonsdale Cemetery, Authuille, France and the newspaper report assures us that ‘a proper service was conducted by the Brigade minister and the grave is marked by a cross with his name on it’. Documents recently released by the CWGC note that he and a number of comrades who had been initially buried the smaller Paisley Cemetery were ‘concentrated’ into the Lonsdale Cemetery after the war and that his grave had indeed been marked with a cross. Further research has given us the name of his wife, Sarah Jane (née Holling). They had married at St Peter’s Church on Doncaster Road in early 1914 and both of them gave their address as 7 Pindar Street, which is off Doncaster Road, and was her parents’ home. When, in 1919, Sarah marries again, to Rowland Blessed from Worsbrough, (who is a distant cousin of Brian Blessed the actor) she gave the same address. Sadly I can find no children to either of Sarah’s marriages. In 1930 the Hollings are still living at number 7 and Sarah and Rowland Blessed are at number 9 Pindar Street.

George Smith must have been quite glad that Baden was too young to be conscripted and that his other children were girls. Losing three boys not long after the loss of his wife must have been a dreadful experience and as we have seen a fair number of his grandchildren did not outlive their infancy. George himself died in 1920 and is buried in Barnsley Cemetery with Amelia and two of his grandchildren. n

THE THIEPVAL memorial was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens. It was built in red brick and limestone between 1928 and 1932.

William Smith. Barnsley Archives

Competition

Can you guess where in Barnsley this photograph was taken?

THE EXTINGUISHED FLAME OLYMPIANS KILLED IN THE GREAT WAR

by Nigel McCrery

Submit your answers by email along with your name and address to editor@whmagazines.co.uk or write to: Paul Wilkinson, Editor, The Drill Hall, Eastgate, Barnsley S70 2EU. Closing date for entries: 30 November 2016.

CRICKET AT SHAW LANE

Phil Norman uncovers some observations from the 1930s on cricket played at Shaw Lane during the 1800s.

Shaw Lane is synonymous with cricket in Barnsley. All the town’s famous cricketers seem to have started their careers there: Boycott, Gough and the most famous umpire in the history of the game, Harold Dennis Bird, known throughout the cricketing world as ‘Dickie’.

In a letter to the Barnsley Chronicle around 1932/33, J.W.R. (full name unknown) reminisces about the ground as it was in the early 1870’s.

Sir, ... It is a pleasure to recall the approach to the ground from Racecommon Road; the gardens, the old garden-house and well, Piggott’s pond and the little plantation, the old Pump and Benny Pearce’s Cottage, the lane amid its

fences of thorn leading to the junction of Dodworth Road, and – object of supreme interest to the juvenile mind –the field-gate entrance to the cricket field.

There was no charge made for entrance to Saturday afternoon matches; but about 5 o’clock a collection was made; adults were expected to contribute tuppence and boys a penny.

Abel Osborne and his deputies did not regard with favour the incursion of too many young boys, and it was not every Saturday afternoon that young enthusiasts could slip in at the proper entrance; so, resourceful youth proceeded by a short lane which formed part of Shaw Street; up the path through the fields leading

to Keresforth, and, squeezing through the cricket field fence, ensconced themselves in the rough; far from a wicket it is true, but almost free from observation.

As the match progressed, surreptitious approach to the neighbourhood of the pavilion was effected, and the Mecca of the enterprising was achieved. This pavilion, the only erection on the field, was a wooden shed of two compartments, which accommodated players, scorer, ground implements, seeds etc. The inner door, marked ‘Players only’ appeared to the juvenile mind as the limit of the unattainable. Yet, some of those boys who stood in admiring gaze at the flannelled occupants of that pavilion have distinguished themselves with the willow at Shaw Lane and elsewhere.

At this period the ground had not been made. There was no defined boundary. The outfield was rough, and cropped by horses and cattle. Seating accommodation was limited and consisted of rough planks. Gates were not considered, the game was everything.

A Saturday afternoon at Shaw Lane was a delight! Real

THE SHAW Lane pumps.

cricket, good sportsmen, a fair pitch, a large grass field encircled by the extensive pastures of the Shaw Lands, no building near, a bracing atmosphere cleared by winds fresh from the westward moorlands – Happy Days!

J W R

An octogenarian from Dodworth who signs himself simply as ‘Eightieth Year’ later added his own memories of a somewhat bizarre game of cricket that took place at Shaw Lane around 1858/59.

Sir, I do not know whether the following reminiscences will be of interest to you, and through you also, of interest to your many readers.

In these days of big cricket with our Sutcliffe, Hobbs, Leyland and others, my mind is carried back to a cricket match I, as a lad, witnessed I should say some 74 years ago or perhaps a little more. I was only then a little stripling and was taken by my dear old dad, by the hand to see this novelty.

It was played in Shaw Lane. Shaw Lane was not then what it is now, but was a lane indeed with meadows on each side. Almost at the junction of Dodworth Road and Shaw Lane a gate gave entrance to a meadow and this was the

venue of this cricket match at which I marvelled much. It was played between ‘One Armed Men’ and ‘Wooden Legged men,’ (the old fashioned peg legs that are now almost out of date). I do not know how the match finished, but I do know that my small brain befogged as to how the wooden legged men were going to run and to field, for alas at least three of them had two peg legs and the meadow was on the soft side. Some of the cripples on the opposite side had lost the whole of one arm and had but a stump for the other. I think, two of them. They had as reserve some men who had lost a leg and an arm, and these could play for either side as occasion demanded. Well my mind was set at rest for those whom had the good leg and the peg could hop it and they did too, in an amazing way, whilst those with two peg legs rolled and I can assure you that it was a comical sight to see the pegs revolving swiftly about the field. It was a most interesting and wonderful sight. I have often asked men older than myself if they had seen this match but have always received a negative reply. I do not know if there are any

records of this match. I have not found any in my researches, and should be glad to know if any such records exist, or if any other reader witnessed this match.

The thing that comes to my mind is, that these men were victims of the Crimean campaign and were bravely endeavouring to eke out an existence by giving these exhibition games, for pensions were very small (contrast this with the outof-work pay of today), and I am sorry to say their efforts in this direction were not too successful, for the spectators were only sparse in Shaw Lane that day. Of course, I know that Barnsley inhabitants had not then got to its tens of thousands (I think then under ten), but it was a meagre attendance. I cannot give the year in which this match was played but I should say about 1858 or 1859 for I remember another occasion on which my father took me to see another sight in Barnsley, racing in High Stile field which is now Locke Park. I find on looking up my records that the last races were run on the 22nd and 23rd of August in 1859. The races before then were in 1855 so that I should say from this data that this cricket match would be played in either 1859 or 1858, and, what is cricket now? A mighty game followed by hundreds of thousands and appreciated much more than the efforts of the humble cricketers of years gone by.

EIGHTIETH YEAR Dodworth

‘Eightieth Year’ need not have worried about finding witnesses to this strange event. Matches of the kind he describes were common place in the 18th and 19th centuries, one match which took place in Peckham Rye, Southwark, in the field behind

ONE ARM v one leg match at Lord’s Cricket Ground as depicted in the Illustrated Sporting News.

the Rosemary Branch Inn being described, amongst other things, in an article by none other than Charles Dickens the author. This article appeared in an issue of his weekly journal All The Year Round (edited by Dickens himself with assistance from his son) dated 5 October 1861.

One armed men playing cricket against one legged men was not a new idea. The first recorded instance of a game of this nature was in 1796 when the teams played for a prize of 1,000 guineas. The match took place in Montpellier Gardens, Cheltenham and was reported in the Times on 10 August.

Under the heading ‘Mismatch of the Day’, Paul Collins, writing in Cabinet magazine of Spring 2003 recorded the event as follows:

Thousands of spectators showed up at nine o'clock to cheer on the two teams of grizzled seadogs – one brandishing hooked arms, the other wielding peg legs. The game was a hotly contested one; the crowd was ‘highly entertained with the exertions of the old veterans of the ocean, who never acted upon their most inveterate enemy with more energy.’ The crowd roared and swelled; soon an unruly mob of 5,000 was pressing at the fence, wanting in. Most eager to gain entry were a multitude of pickpockets, who thereupon descended upon the spectators in pairs, each holding the end of a long rope. They ran through the crowd, sweeping the Londoners' feet from under them, and sending men and powdered wigs flying about like ninepins; in the confusion, the thieves dived into the writhing piles and relieved spectators of their watches and wallets. Fights broke out, the gates gave way, and the riotous crowd

poured over the grounds. Constables swarmed in and knocked the miscreants about, and even caught one or two thieves as well; a full three hours passed before enough order was restored for the game to start again. The game, having stretched through an entire summer day, finally had to be called off on account of darkness. The one-armed team were many runs behind now anyway – because, as one observer dryly noted, they were "less handy" with the ball. Indeed, in the long history of one-armed vs. one-legged games that followed – they were held repeatedly over the next century, often to raise money for wounded sailors –the one armed team almost always gets the worst of it. The one leggers seem to have gotten a bit cocky about this after a while, for in an 1863 Manchester match they fielded a bowler missing both legs. Imaginatively nicknamed ‘No Legs’ by his teammates, he too managed to win.

A similar match was played in 1841 and a further game, probably a rematch, was played in 1848 on the Priory Ground at Lewisham before a crowd of 2,400 spectators. Around the time these two matches were played gambling on matches

had almost ceased, but what little betting there was favoured the men with ‘two living legs’.

The players in both teams were Greenwich Pensioners; navy men who had been injured in service and now lived at the hospital. All the players wore their Greenwich uniforms and were treated to a substantial lunch before each day’s play. After play the teams were treated to dinner which, accompanied by plenty of ale, made them willing participants for the next day’s play.

A report on the match informed its readers that in the first innings the one armed men made 50 and featured a top score of 8 not out. The one legged eleven replied with 32 all out and in their second innings the one arms extended their lead by 41 leaving the one legs to score 60 to win. They were dismissed for 44. Their top scorer was a man named Sears who scored 15. Not surprisingly the largest contributor to both totals was ‘extras’. The one legs conceded 30, the one arms 43, all of which were wides.

Over the whole match

21 players were dismissed without scoring in one innings or another; the one legged eleven fielded five batsmen who made pairs, including their unfortunate number eleven, Baldrick who was run out twice. After the match both teams ‘marched’ to the Bull Inn, headed by a band who had been engaged throughout the match. Each man had free passage to and from the Royal Hospital, a glass of grog to drink to Her Majesty's health and ten shillings for his two days' exertions.

Special matches between unusual teams were often arranged, smokers against nonsmokers being one such game. Perhaps a more important one was authors against actors. The authors included Arthur Conan Doyle, P G Wodehouse and A A Milne who were soundly beaten by the thespians. n

CHARLES DICKENS’ Weekly Journal.

POST FOR a One Arm v One Leg match at Kennington Oval.

EVELYN DE MORGAN

Tracey Hebron introduces us to artist Evelyn de Morgan (1855–1919), a niece of the Spencer Stanhope family

Evelyn De Morgan was one of the most successful and prolific professional female artists of her time. As a niece of the Spencer Stanhope family she spent a great deal of time in her early years at Cannon Hall sketching her surroundings. As a child she visited Cawthorne regularly in order to spend time with her relatives and found it liberating to be allowed to roam the beautiful countryside, feel the fresh air and discover the nature surrounding her.

Born Mary Evelyn Pickering in 1855, she came from a wealthy background as her mother (Roddam Spencer-Stanhope’s sister) was descended from a long line of landowners in Yorkshire and also to the Cokes of Norfolk, Earls of Leicester. She displayed a flair for art from an early age. On the morning of her 17th birthday she wrote: ‘17 today, that is to say 17 years wasted in eating, dawdling and flittering (frittering) time away… Art is eternal, but life is short… I have not a moment to lose’.

In the same year Evelyn drew a study of the male nude from a wooden model, shocking her drawing teacher, who had been employed to instruct her in copying fruit and flowers. In 1873, Evelyn enrolled at the Slade School of Art (which had opened two years earlier) where she was able to develop her abilities with different artistic forms such as drawing, painting and sculpting. She became one of the first women to attend life drawing classes. Her skills in drawing were well respected and she won several prizes including a coveted silver medal. Her uncle, Roddam felt her drawing skills were superior to his own and commented; ‘You can draw infinitely better than I do, I can only envy you!’

Evelyn was particularly close to her uncle Roddam Spencer Stanhope, of Cannon Hall, who was a Pre-Raphaelite and Symbolist painter and encouraged by him, she followed in his footsteps, first by attending art school and later working as a

Love’s Passing, Oil on Canvas, 1883-1884. This painting is an allegory for the passing of time and the life cycle. The lovers in the foreground sit listening to the piping angel, the male figures seems entranced, but the woman is distracted. The book open before them shows a passage from the Latin poet Tibullus’s Elegy. Evelyn painted Love’s Passing shortly after meeting the older William De Morgan and prior to her marriage. She didn’t sell the work and it remained within the family until her younger sister’s death in 1965. Courtesy of the De Morgan Foundation

professional artist. She also visited him frequently during the time he spent in Florence in Italy. These visits were to affect her profoundly and the influence of Renaissance art features heavily in both their work. Evelyn’s works, such as The Garden of Opportunity tended to favour Old Testament or mythological themes, executed in a Pre-Raphaelite or neo-classical style, in oils on canvas. In choosing these techniques and subject matters, Evelyn was positioning herself as a professional artist, during a period when few women succeeded in this field. Evelyn married the ceramic artist William de Morgan in 1887 and their union was a meeting of minds both artistically and politically. Both were concerned with the inequalities that they saw in society around them. They campaigned for prison reform and women’s suffrage. In later life Evelyn used her paintings to express her social and political views. n

A new long-term permanent display of works by both Evelyn and William De Morgan is now housed at Cannon Hall Museum, on loan from the De Morgan Foundation. The De Morgan Foundation Collection was formed by Evelyn’s sister, Wilhelmina Stirling. Her lifetime passion was to preserve and promote the works and reputation of her sister and brother in law. She displayed her collection at her home, Old Battersea House, in London and often gave tours of it to the public. After Mrs Stirling’s death in 1965, the De Morgan Foundation charitable trust was formed in order to care for the Collection. www.demorgan.org.uk

who owned Cannon Hall.

Evelyn De Morgan.

Grove Street Junior & Infants School

Andrew Taylor looks back at his schooldays in the 1950s and ‘60s.

Pupils joined reception class (‘baby class’) aged four and left the school after sitting their Eleven Plus exams. Any absence from school would inevitably bring a visit from the ‘School bobby’. The headmistress during my time at the school (1958-65) was Miss Guest.

Baby class was the domain of Miss Day and Mrs Tingle, whose duties included ringing the bell and releasing boys’ heads from the railings by the main steps. In class we learned to draw with wax crayons as big

Grove Street School

THE LAND FOR Grove Street School was acquired by Barnsley Council in June 1909 from the estate of the late Guy Senior (former chairman of Barnsley Brewery) with a loan of £775. Further loans totalling £12,300 were needed to build and furnish the school, completed in 1910 with the name ‘Grove Street Council School’ proudly engraved above the door. Like many of Britain’s old buildings, it was permanently scarred in 1942 by the removal of its iron railings for scrap, under Lord Beaverbrook’s ‘Defence Regulation 50’.

Strictly speaking, Grove Street consisted of two schools: A single-storey junior & infants school next to the football ground, and a three-storey senior school just above it. Gates and doors were marked GIRLS, BOYS or INFANTS according to location. There was a stone-built outdoor lavatory block adjacent to Belgrave Road, but this was demolished around 1962. There were two sloping playgrounds, one above each school.

The caretaker in the 1950s and 60s was Mr Parkin, usually to be found tending the coke-fired boiler. When the boiler house door was left open, a faint smell of sulphur carried on the breeze. The flat roof of the boiler house and adjacent woodwork room formed a railed-off terrace overlooking the playground.

as candles. On the wall a poster proclaimed ‘Aa is for apple, Bb is for banana’. Another poster matched the numbers 1 to 12 with dots on a pair of dice. (I still see dice whenever I do mental arithmetic). There was a play-house, a water bath, a box of wooden bricks, and an indoor sand pit. The outdoor sand pit would be better described as a gravel pit, and was never used. Miss O’Malley taught us how to do sums and tell the time, and introduced us to Dick and Dora, Milly Molly Mandy and The Tale of Brer Rabbit. She encouraged craft skills with wood, powder paints and grey modelling clay, from which we made aeroplanes, elephants and a lot of mess. She would lick the chalk before peppering the front

row of children with white dots as she spoke.

In morning assembly, we sang There is A Green Hill Far Away and All Things Bright and Beautiful, before reciting the Lord’s Prayer (‘them that trespass against us’). During Harvest Festival, the hymn would be We Plough the Fields and Scatter with a backdrop of fruit baskets made by parents. At the close of each day, we sang Count Your Blessings or Little Drops of Water. At Christmas, it was Oh Little Town of Bethlehem, We Three Kings, and Once in Royal David’s City PT took place in the hall, where we hoped in vain to be allowed to use the climbing frame (there being a limit to the fun you can have with a

bean bag). In summer it was hula-hoops and cane hurdles in the playground. PT kit –which belonged to the school – was black pumps and a pair of dark blue shorts for boys (girls wore dark pants with white vests or blouses). Then there was dancing: ‘Form two lines, smallest at the front’. We squeaked around the hall to the tune of Schubert’s Ballet Music No2, with Mrs Tingle on piano.

Junior sports day was usually held at Shaw Lane, races being announced over the Tannoy, but it was moved to the Queens Ground on one occasion, the track being hastily marked with sawdust and canes. The usual 100, 220 and 440 yard dashes were supplemented by hurdles, sack race and egg & spoon race.

Most children were of local

ancestry, but the school register contained the occasional Krupop, Kowacz, or Korobowicz – the children of Polish émigrés. Around 1963, the school absorbed pupils from Eldon Street primary, which became an admin centre. For short periods each year we were joined by the Tuby children, who gave their address as ‘Caravan, Gas Nook’. Their parents owned the travelling fairground.

In Miss Townsend’s class, we grappled with the mathematics of trains arriving at stations. Rods, poles, perches, chains and furlongs were committed to memory. We were introduced to London Arithmetics, a fearsome tome designed to trip the unwary. In English, we immersed ourselves in nouns

The former Grove Street Junior and Infants School in 2015.

1952 ROY and Ian Platts and friends enjoying the snow outside their junior school on Belgrave Road. The picture was taken by a Barnsley Chronicle photographer who found himself at a loose end when a football match at Oakwell was cancelled due to snow.

and adjectives. In art, we created patterns on card with needle and thread (an activity best suited to those with cowhide fingers) and learned that Richard Of York Gained Battle In Vain. On one occasion, we were asked to write and perform a short sketch on stage. Here I realised I was not cut out to be an actor. Various roles were allocated: including ink monitor, book monitor and milk monitor. Free school milk was

delivered in crates of one-thirdpint bottles. With the arrival of Mr Stanbridge in 1963, work and recreation became more disciplined. His faint aroma of cigarettes, brown brogues, sports jacket and elbow pads identified him as the stereotype male teacher. He asked ‘Which is heavier: a ton of bricks or a ton of feathers?’ Our first task was to learn multiplication tables at home. We were tested

in quick-fire exchanges every morning... Nine sevens are 63, seven sixes are 42. His preferred method of punishment was a pair of rulers across the hand (the one you didn’t write with). Stanbridge rebuilt the school football team, home games being held on the steeply sloping White Bear ground, just above the canal. Weekly practice matches were held behind the Tollgate pub at Old Mill, with kit carried in duffel bags. Being

1964 TRIP TO Manchester airport-control tower, restaurant and observation deck. Grove Street teachers are in a huddle on the right of the photo, including Miss Beaumont, Miss Fletcher and Mr Stanbridge in sports jacket.

GEOMETRIC PATTERNS in coloured thread on card.

next to Oakwell stadium, we were sometimes visited by football celebrities. Medals were presented by Eric Winstanley at the end of the season, and we had a visit from Arthur Holland, the World Cup referee. Swimming was at Raley Baths, but there was a minimum age requirement, resulting in part of the class being unable to take part. When finally allowed to re-join the group (a year later) some found themselves lagging behind, with an unsympathetic Mr Rotherham as instructor.

In the summer of 1964, the adjacent Senior School closed and its pupils moved out. Then came the surprise announcement that our class would be moving in. We now had an entire secondary school to ourselves, including fully equipped gymnasium.

It was my job to keep an eye on the weather, recording conditions before school each morning (I notice the school’s wind vane has recently

disappeared). The window sills were quite high, but by standing on the heating pipes it was possible to watch steam trains chugging along the pit sidings at Hoyle Mill.

In Literature we read The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, including the tale of the wolf turned inside out, and the horse left dangling from a church spire. In art, a brief flirtation with silhouettes was followed by painting, and the chance to build a model harbour in papier mâché, complete with boats and working lighthouse.

Two new subjects were introduced: Geography (including trawling and drift-net fishing) and History (including the birth of canals and railways). We had a visiting French tutor, and a visiting music tutor –Mr Green – who taught us that Every Good Boy Deserves Favour. For treats, there were visits to Manchester Airport and Belle Vue Zoo.

Early in 1965, Miss Fletcher

prepared us for the Schools

Triennial Festival, a series of concerts held across Barnsley starting in mid-May, with afternoon performances for schoolkids and evening performances for the public (admission 1s 6d). Our stage was the newly opened College of Technology, and we marvelled at the size of the theatre, the lighting, and the comfort of the dressing rooms. We sang If I Ruled the World, Inchworm, Surrey with the Fringe, The Ugly Duckling, Edelweiss, and Getting to Know You

In the summer of ’65 came the Eleven Plus exam. My only memory is of writing an essay about the Fire Brigade. In the playground there was much talk of secondary schools, the alternatives being Raley (mixed), Broadway (mixed), Holgate (for boys) and the High School (for girls). Soon we would go our separate ways. n

With thanks to Gillian Parker and Chris Hartley.

THE FOOTBALL pitch behind the Tollgate pub on Old Mill Lane which was used by Grove Street School for practice matches.

GILLIAN WHEWALL and friends capture the moment at Miss Ramskill’s wedding in Barnsley, around 1966.

News from 1916

FATAL ENDING TO A LOVE AFFAIR

Atragic discovery was made at Cawthorne on Tuesday morning when a workman found two young people lying by the road with three empty laudanum* bottles. The young couple were conscious but in serious condition and were immediately taken to Beckett Hospital, Barnsley. The woman soon recovered under treatment but the man died shortly after being found. In his coat pocket were two ‘farewell letters’ which led to the man being identified as John (Jack) Jones, aged 37, a miner at Central Silkstone Colliery, who lived at 48, Racecommon Road, Barnsley. The girl was Nora Helliwell, aged 18, who lived with her parents at the Tom

Treddlehoyle Inn, Pogmoor. The inquest on Jones was held at the Beckett Hospital.

Evidence At The Inquest

The father of the deceased, David Jones, who also lived at 48, Racecommon Road, Barnsley, gave evidence on Thursday morning. He declared that his son was married but had no children and that he had lived with them for some years. He insisted that his son had not been in very good health but when he was well, he was a regular worker. However, he had not seen his regular doctor, Dr Horne this year, as he had been in good health of late. He was a cheerful man and was very stable; the witness having never

In August 1916 the Barnsley Chronicle reported on a tragic incident at Cawthorne.

*An alcoholic solution containing morphine, prepared from opium and formerly used as a narcotic painkiller.

A VIEW OF Pogmoor during the early 1900s. The Tom Treddlehoyle Inn, where Nora Helliwell lived, can be seen on the far right of the photograph.

seen him the worse for drink in his life. He often went to the Tom Teddlehoyle Inn to play the piano, where Nora Helliwell was the daughter of the landlord. David Jones declared he had not noticed any change in his son lately and did not know that he was in contact with Nora.

His father last saw him alive a week last Friday night in the house, with no suspicion of him being unstable or distressed. He said at around 5 o’clock that evening he was going into the fields to read the newspaper. He did not come home that evening, so his father began to make enquiries the following morning. The father of Nora Helliwell, came to see him to tell him that his daughter was missing. On 7 o’clock Tuesday night, he heard that his son had been found and taken to the hospital, but he had been pronounced dead. He also heard that Nora was in the hospital. The Coroner handed Mr Jones a letter which he identified as being his son’s handwriting.

A Startling Discovery

William Batty of Barnby Cottage, Cawthorne, who described himself as a farm horseman, said he found the deceased and the woman about 7:30 on Tuesday morning. He was going into a field on Barnby Hall Farm and in a cart road leading to the field he found them lying on the grass between a wall and the roadway. They had their arms around each other and were close to the gate. The witness saw there was something wrong with them, and on approaching them he discovered three bottles. Both the man and the woman were unconscious and were breathing heavily. Two of the bottles were at the foot of the man and the third at the foot of the woman. The bottles were empty. The bottles were labelled laudanum.

The witness said he gave the man a good shaking, but this did not have any effect. He then shook the woman and roused her and asked her what she was doing there. She replied ‘I wanted to die’. Batty went to the Post Office and telephoned for Dr Rowley at Barnsley, but he couldn’t come so he rang Dr White of Dodworth. Batty and the postmaster, Rowland Wilkinson, administered salt and water to the woman, who told them that Jones had some papers in his pocket which revealed where they came from and who they were. The vicar and Mrs Newman took the woman to the hospital in a motor car. Dr White now arrived at the scene and made two injections into the man’s arm. He was then taken to the hospital in a motor bus. He was still breathing but never recovered.

The father of the girl, Benjamin Helliwell, who was the landlord of the Tom Treddlehoyle Inn, said he had known Jones for seven or eight years. He was a personal friend who was a straight and intelligent man and he would trust him with his life. Helliwell

had come across nothing suspicious between his daughter and Jones. The deceased often went to Helliwell’s house around three or four nights a week, spending most of his time on the bowling green. He had not seen any difference in his daughter lately and described his 18-year-old daughter as being a cheerful girl. The last time he saw her previous to the incident was on Friday evening. She left the house about 5:30pm. Helliwell waited up until morning, but his daughter hadn’t returned. He then went to see his eldest daughter who lived at 80 Summer Lane. She told her father that Nora had called on Friday evening and left some items which she had brought from Mr Senior’s chemist. She said she would return for them but failed to do so. Nora also arranged to meet her little cousin, Emily Richmond, near the Workhouse the same night, so she didn’t think that Nora had premeditated going away.

Helliwell proceeded to Jones’ house, where John was found to be missing. He came to the conclusion that they had gone off together.

Sergeant Roberts, stationed at Barugh, said Cawthorne was in his section, and upon receiving information of the incident he cycled to Cawthorne, arriving about 9:30 am. When he arrived the girl had been taken to hospital and they were moving the deceased to the hospital. They searched the deceased and found in his inside pocket two letters.

‘Farewell’ Letters

One of the letters, which appeared to be signed by Jones read:

To those it may concern. No doubt you have suffered a great deal, but the real sufferers are us two. We could not see any future prospects before us and as we are so attached to each other and nothing but troubles and trials await us we decided on the step we are about to take. When you read this letter you can rest assured that we went happily together and met our fate without any fear of any kind. We fully realise the step we are taking but under the circumstances there is no alternative. So I hope you will not think too unkindly of us as we were only like all human beings; we thought of ourselves first, others afterwards. So we say, ‘good night’ and ‘good

‘I hope you will not think too unkindly of us as we were only like all human beings; we thought of ourselves first, others afterwards ...’

bye’ to you all. That is the last wish of Jack and Nora who loved and died for each other. Jack Jones, 48, Racecommon Road, Barnsley, Nora Helliwell, Tom Treddlehoyle Inn, Pogmoor, Barnsley. The other note was as follows:

Dear Mother, – I am so sorry to cause you all this trouble, but I cannot help it. You will know by now who I came away with. We have had a lovely holiday together, and as we know perfectly well that we cannot always be together we have decided to die together, so don’t bother over me mother, but always remember that I died happy with the man I love. So goodbye and God bless you. – Your loving daughter, Nora. Under this letter were a number of crosses.

Sergeant Roberts said the girl’s letter was in an envelope addressed to Mrs Helliwell, but the other letter was simply folded up. The Coroner also added that the letters were not dated.

The Doctor’s Evidence

Dr Puri, house surgeon at the Beckett Hospital, said the young woman was brought in first at 8:45 on Tuesday morning in a very drowsy state and was apparently suffering from opium poisoning. She gradually recovered under treatment and left the hospital on Wednesday. However, the man was brought in at 9:45 am in a deep coma and they could not resuscitate him. He died around 10.10am. Dr Puri made a post-mortem examination and found no organic disease. There was a powerful smell of laudanum and symptoms of asphyxia. The cause of death was asphyxiation as a result of opium poisoning. One of the bottles would, he thought, have contained 2½ ozs and the other 1½ ozs; a quantity sufficient to kill ten or fifteen men.

The Coroner asked Dr. Puri: ‘Do you think the man probably took a larger dose?’ To which the doctor replied ‘I think the girl was sick just after she took it which got rid of most of it, the man had not been sick’.

Addressing Nora Helliwell, the Cornoner asked if she would like to say anything, but she replied ‘No, I have nothing to say.’

The Coroner replied: ‘I don’t think it is advisable. She does not seem to wish to give evidence, and I don’t think it would be of any benefit to call her to make a statement. We cannot compel her to say anything and it would be rather painful.’

Suicide

Proceeding to sum up the evidence, Mr Maitland said it was a very painful case. The father of the young girl took it very much to heart and felt resentful. However, he hoped these initial feelings would pass as there was evidence to suggest that Nora did not intend to initially plan to attempt suicide, especially as she had made arrangements to meet her cousin later that day. Where the notes

were written he did not know, but one was written by the young woman and the other by the man. After consuming a considerable amount of laudanum, it was clear that the intention of both of them was to commit suicide. The man should not have been carrying on with this girl. She had fallen in love with him and had become very much attached to him, and judging by the letters they did not seem to know any way out of it. It was not clear to them that they could run away together and unfortunately seemed to believe that as they could not be together, their only option was to die together.

As he had committed suicide, questions arose regarding his mental state. Considering the evidence, it was clear that his conduct was very poor indeed. It was a very determined suicide for him but the girl recovered well.

The only thing the jury could do was to return a verdict of suicide. There was no evidence of a distressed mental state. The letter was written very clearly and the intention was plainly shown.

The jury returned a verdict of suicide.

The Coroner, addressing Mr Helliwell said: “It has been a very painful case, especially with regard to your daughter and quite naturally you feel very indignant, but remember she is very young. I don’t like the idea of you casting her out of your heart and home. She may have to be punished in some way by the police, for she has been guilty of a serious crime. Apart from that please relent. I hope you will”. Helliwell replied: ‘I don’t know what to do for the best’. The Coroner replied: ‘Just think it over’.

At the Barnsley Riding Court, on Wednesday, Nora Helliwell was charged with attempting to commit suicide. Supt. McDonald said Nora had received medical attention and at present was in a weak state.

After spending a week in jail Nora Helliwell again appeared in court with her father. He said he had made arrangements for her to go to Sheffield to be looked after. The Chairman said, “Do you promise not to do anything of this sort again?” To which she replied, ‘Yes’. The Chairman said she would be discharged and handed over to her father who was the proper person to look after her as to her future conduct. n

‘The man should not have been carrying on with this girl. She had fallen in love with him and had become very much attached to him ...’

‘DEAR, DIRTY, DELIGHTFUL LITTLE TOWN ...’

Iam not exactly a stranger to Barnsley, having stayed here a short time before this terrible, horrid war came so suddenly upon us. I then knew Barnsley people to be a hard-working people, light hearted, and after the day’s work, always ready to enjoy to the full the ‘fare’ offered, in the shape of amusement. I take pride in telling my friends of the wonderful black-faced miners – roughcut diamonds I call them.

I have read with joy and pride (I get the Chronicle sent to me weekly) the doings of your wonderful little town, the organisation of various relief committees, of the Tobacco Fund for our gallant boys at the Front, the way the people have given to these funds and above all, the way the sons of Barnsley have answered their country’s call, it’s just splendid. And yet, dear Editor, I shall go back to London tomorrow feeling just a wee bit disappointed. You see I came to Barnsley a month ago expecting to see a big alteration, I somehow expected to see a change in the people, as I have seen in London, but there isn’t any change at all – everything is the same, all on pleasure bent, not caring or thinking of other things that really count. That at any rate is how things appear to me.

I will give you an incident or two that I have seen that I know would not happen even in busy London at the present time. I was outside one of the banks in the busiest part of the town and saw a poor wounded soldier at the top of the steps plainly in need of a helping arm. He had only a stick to help him. I saw men, and, I am sorry to say it, women brush past him, all in too big a hurry to notice him. I feel sure had they noticed him, they would have offered him the help that I was glad to do. He remarked that ‘steps were dangerous things, and he was afraid of them’. Fancy afraid of steps, after facing those horrid guns.

Then again, I was in the vestibule of a music hall one night, and watched with interest a young man, who, I am sure had been a soldier, although he had no uniform on, get out of his carriage and walk with the aid of a stick to the top of some steps leading into the stalls. He then paused, looked at the steps, then at the people past him to their seats, but again, all were too busy to notice him. I loved the way he gripped his pipe, set his lips, and slowly but surely negotiated the steps. He too seemed afraid of steps.

These are not the only incidents I have witnessed of this kind, but they will suffice and perhaps you will understand what I meant when I said I expected to see Barnsley altered somewhat. To me, who perhaps has had the war brought ‘home’ with all its cruelty, more than most people of Barnsley, it seems inexplicable that things can remain the same now as they were before the war, as the majority of people in Barnsley seem to think. It seems to me that Barnsley has given, and is giving, of its best in manhood and money, and left it at that. Sympathy, understanding, and the spirit of comradeship, which is so prevalent in London and other southern towns, seems to still be in the background when it ought to be brought forward. The carelessly subdued shops and streets, the amusement places fuller than ever, the people as ‘happy go lucky’ as ever, all go to show that Barnsley people have not yet realised the full significance of this terrible and awful war. If they have, well, they are more wonderful that I thought.

I always thought Yorkshire men truly wonderful fellows, and I have spent some of the most enjoyable times of my life in their company, and hope to have some more of those delightful times in the future for I intend to visit Barnsley again at the very first opportunity, for I just love it. n

The Barnsley Chronicle of 1916 printed a letter from a London girl describing her visit to Barnsley.

Tasker Trust

Readers’ page Readers’ page

Kier Street performance

The photo above was taken in the spring of 1962 at Broadway Technical School as it then was. It shows all of the final year group at Kier Street, i.e. those who had taken their 11 plus exam and would be leaving in the coming July to move on to various secondary schools.

From memory the occasion was an inter-school concert event held at Broadway where various junior schools performed a musical presentation of some sort. As is hopefully clear from the costumes, Kier Street performed ‘folk’ songs and country dances as a wandering gypsy troupe in the true ‘pre PC’ sense of the name. Note some of the cast with recorders and tambourines for the instrumental interlude!

For my sins I am 5th from left middle row and I can remember quite a few but not all of my classmates names:

Back row from left: 2nd Frank Wilson, 3rd Stephen Brailsford, 4th Lydia ??, 8th Lyn Philips, 9th Susan Priest, 10th Kathryn Darn, rest not sure.

Middle Row from left: Linford Guest, Graham Copley, Michael Jackson, Philip Lowry, Myself, David Baron, Philip Hawkins, Robert Archer, rest not sure.

Front Row from left: 2nd Ann Woodhouse, 4th Stephen Medlam, 7th Lyn Bly, 8th Janet Dodd, rest not sure. I remember other names – Denise Green, Susan Shaw, Andrew Brownly, Barbara Hurst, John Kaye, Stephen Adey, Patricia Ibbotson, but unfortunately 54 years on I can’t be certain in matching their faces.

The catchment area for the school was mainly Summer Lane, Stocks Lane and the associated side streets plus old Pogmoor between Farmhouse Lane and Summer Lane. The class teacher for our final year was Mrs Marion

Ramsey whom we had also had as class teacher in our first year at the school when she was Miss Marion Dunk.

As can be seen class sizes were quite large in those baby boomer days but the school had a good success rate as over half the class passed their 11 plus that year and went on to Holgate Grammar, Girls High or Broadway itself, with others going to Longcar or Mark Street schools which were known as central schools in those days of pre comprehensive education. Pupils at these two schools were given a second chance by exams at age 13 to move up to Grammar or High School.

All these children with their futures still to be determined are now in their mid-60s and probably spread far and wide but maybe someone out there is a reader who will be able to add their own memories to this brief recollection.

Correction

May I refer to page 42 of issue 38 of your iconic magazine. I must point out that the gentleman named in the photograph as John Willie Bates is none other than R H ‘Doc’ Andrews, Docteur de l’Université de Paris, avec mention très honorable. Furthermore he was a Tank Commander with the Desert Rats in North Africa which, to the boys in the late 1940s, guaranteed stardom in the classroom. J W Bates is the gentleman behind ‘Doc’.

I would also add that G W ‘Dickie’ Pym took First Class Honours in History and held a Charles Beard Fellowship of Liverpool University, becoming Head of History and later Acting Headmaster.

‘Nan’ Hillary taught me Geography and the musician

Dave Beecroft

Norman Goddard BGS 1945–1988

If you have photographs or memories you would like to share with us, please write to: Paul Wilkinson, Editor, The Drill Hall, Eastgate, Barnsley S70 2EU or email: editor@whmagazines.co.uk.

First World War medals

Noel David Green

In 1966 my older brother, Stewart, was doing a school project on the First World War. A man called Mr J Thompson who then lived at 2 Monsal Crescent, Athersley South, gave him two medals. Mr Thompson told my brother to keep the medals as he said he had no family to pass them on to. My brother Stewart gave the medals to me to add to my coin collection. I was pleased to have these precious medals as a kid but I didn’t appreciate the sentimental value of these items if there are some family of Mr J Thompson still alive who would like them.

who resurrected the choir was surely Wilf Thorpe in 1948, Mr Ashworth having been ‘found’ a post in further education by the Headmaster J W Roche.

I trust you will forgive my intervention, but, once a schoolmaster always a schoolmaster.

If any family members would like to claim the medals please contact the editor of this magazine by email or telephone. Until that time they will be lodged with the Barnsley Archives.

The photograph shows my wife Ray and daughter Megan at the old children’s roundabout in the market in 1971. Today we live in Essex and haven’t been back to Barnsley for some years and wonder if the roundabout is still in existance? The last time I saw it was a long time ago when it was situated in the indoor market. We hope it is still giving pleasure to little children as it has done for generations.

The British War Medal, 1914-18

The silver or bronze medal was awarded to officers and men of the British and Imperial Forces who either entered a theatre of war or entered service overseas between 5 August 1914 and 11 November 1918 inclusive. The recipient’s service number, rank, name and unit was impressed on the rim.

The Allied Victory Medal

It was decided that each of the Allies should each issue their own bronze victory medal with a similar design, similar equivalent wording and identical ribbon. The recipient’s service number, rank, name and unit was impressed on the rim.

‘John Willie’ Bates

R H ‘Doc’ Andrews

Corrected photograph.

Mike and Ray Stringer

Competition Winner

IN THE LAST ISSUE WE offered The Somme by Richard Van Emden as a competition prize. Congratulations to Dave Beecroft who identified the mystery photograph. The photo identity competition in issue 38 did require a little deliberation before I recognised it as Summer Lane looking towards the junction with Victoria Crescent West. The corner house in the foreground is at the bottom of Blackburn Lane and immediately behind the photographer would be St Mary’s Primary School which became the town’s Polish Community Centre some 40 years ago. Dating the photograph is not easy but I would guess at sometime in the 1930’s.

These houses are all still standing today although much modernised. The chimney looming over the rooftops belonged to the foundry that stood at the bottom of Stocks Lane.

Out of shot on the left hand side of the road opposite the terraced houses was a branch of the Barnsley British Co-operative Society where I used to collect groceries using my mother’s share number of 14306. There are a whole generation of us baby boomers who can quote their family co-op share number from 50 odd years ago – it was imprinted on our childhood memory from repeated usage in order to ensure ‘dividend’ was earned on all purchases. The BBCS was one of the largest co-operative societies in the country and most working class families shopped there for everything from groceries through shoes and clothing to furniture and household goods. There was no Tesco, Morrison etc. in those days!

Many readers gave us the correct answer and information regarding some features in the photograph:

The competition photograph is of Summer Lane taken from the bottom of Blackburn Lane and was taken before the war as all the railings are in place, these were taken away for the war effort. I lived at 95 Summer Lane all through the war and most of my family also lived in Summer Lane. It was great to see the photograph as it brought back many happy memories.

H Walker

The photo in issue 38 shows Summer Lane from the bottom of Blackburn Lane going towards town. Also shown are two early electric street lights and in the distance where the road bends to the right at the junction with Victoria Crescent West above the tree can bee seen the outline of Kier Street School.

Iain Allott

I believe that the picture in issue 38 was taken at the bottom of Blackburn Lane looking down Summer Lane towards its junction with Victoria Crescent West, the dutch gables of Kier Street School can be seen in the mist in the distance.

Margaret Cooper née Beaumont

The day the muckcart came

My granddad was a keen angler, a pike specialist and an even keener gardener of the organic kind. Once a year he would have a load of horse manure delivered from the local farm and as an eight-year-old boy I dreaded that day. I was still eating my breakfast as the back door opened up and he shouted ‘Hurry up! Shit’s come’. I had left school before my gran got him to call it manure. A simple but skilful man, he had made me a wheelbarrow one third the size of his, tongued and grooved and glued together with glue made from boiled up horses hooves. On this day I wished it was made from the hooves of the black and white one that had just clopped to a standstill outside granddad’s.

He insisted on scraping the cart clean saying, ‘I’ve paid for it all and anyway the grungy bits grow the best kidney beans’. To a small boy the pile of dung looked like the north face of the Eiger. The farmer had tipped it on the shared drive between granddad’s and Mrs Birkenshaw’s who had managed to scale it on her way back from the bakers. As she slithered to a halt at the bottom of the pile I was glad she had the presence of mind to put a clean tea towel over the still warm breadcakes as enough much had fallen into her basket to grow a pound of kidney beans.

We stood at the base of this mountain of muck, granddad and I, two charioteers ready for battle, my barrow new and shiny, his gnarled and weather-beaten like him. ‘Now lad’, he said ‘main thing to remember about muck

1945 VE Day

shifting is to keep thi barrow well up to t’muck’. Granddad filled the barrows and we wheeled them down the drive past the washhouse and outside toilet down the back garden to a flat piece of ground where we tipped it. ‘This is where I mature it, good muck is like good cheese or a good wine or a good woman, it’s got to be at reight temperature’, said granddad.

Each time he filled my barrow he would bark ‘keep thi barrow well up to t’muck. At about one o’clock my gran shouted ‘yer dinner’s on step use the outside lav and don’t come in till the job’s done you stink!’ On the step were two plates-one with four slices of bread and spam, granddad’s, and one with two, mine. For me there was a cup of dandelion and burdock and for granddad a pint mug of tea. The outside of the mug was gleaming white the inside however was black like an oak whisky barrel. He couldn’t allow it to be cleaned inside as he said it made the tea taste better!

Eight-year-old boys in those days wore short trousers and by four o’clock my wellies had made savage red weal’s on my legs. Gran had left more drinks on the step and we sat down to drink. ‘Two more barrows and a bit of sweeping up’ said granddad with just a hint of a weary smile under his moustache, handing me a half crown piece. ‘You’ll get that when were done’, he said.

I looked at the inscription on the coin ‘Dieu et mon droit’. I asked him what it meant and he look at me with an air of mock bewilderment. ‘It’s Latin, don’t they teach you owt at that school?’ ‘Not Latin’ I replied. He put a weather beaten hand on my shoulder and with a twinkle in his eye he said, ‘It means keep thi barrow well up to t’muck!’

A boy and his granddad

Michael Hellewell sent in this photograph of a children’s tea party to celebrate the end of the war. He is the first child on the left with the hat on. It was held on some spare land off Burton Road, Monk Bretton.

Skeletons in the cupboard

Peter Grafton

Uncle George Willie was, on the face of it, a respectable pillar of society and a regular worshipper at Sheffield Road Baptist Church. He was the only son in a family of five, married the most compliant of my grandmother’s six sisters and gave rise to three daughters. Thus he was a big frog in a little pond of women. But this perceived paragon of virtue had a dark side that compared with Newgate’s knocker. He was a secret drinker, economical with the truth and a fraudster.

By training, George Willie was a glass blower and having served his time with Wood Brothers was regarded, at the time about which I am writing, as Woods’ leading bottle maker for which he was well-paid. He told his longsuffering wife that he was a labourer and the difference between his pay as a skilled bottle maker and that of a labourer went over the counter at the Wood Street Hotel amongst other watering holes. My great aunt was a simple soul and struggling to bring up three daughters on whatever George Willie gave her – she was helped from time to time by members of the family.

The senior bottle maker on any shift occupied the ‘chair’. This was a seat placed in front of the furnace and the occupant was waited on by a bevy of apprentices and labourers. My father was involved with the maintenance of the electrical side of the glass-works and was a frequent visitor. On one occasion he was surprised to find George Willie in the chair. Now my mother always suspected George Willie of duplicity but had difficulty in obtaining proof. When father mentioned that he had seen George in the chair my mother felt that she had the proof she needed and that the time had come to blow the whistle. That evening she went to George’s home and told his wife – my

mother’s aunt – that my father, in the course of doing a job in the glass-works had seen George in the chair. But such was the measure of the man’s deviousness that he beat mother to it and when she arrived at the house her aunt knew all about it. George having told that he had seen Ted – my father – and that he was in the chair at the time deputising for a sick colleague. But Nemesis awaited Uncle George Willie.

He contracted typhoid fever shortly after he had been appointed treasurer of the local branch of the GlassWorkers’ Union and was admitted to hospital. He left strict instructions with his long-suffering wife that under no circumstances should she hand over the books to a third party during his absence. She was, however, a timid soul and when Union officials demanded the books she duly parted with them. This was George Willie’s Nemesis. The books had been cooked and when he was discharged from hospital he was apprehended by the local constabulary and hauled in front of the bench. He was found guilty of theft and fraud and sentenced accordingly unless he could make restitution and – horror of horrors – the Barnsley Chronicle faithfully reported the event. But the eldest of George Willie’s sister came to his rescue. She was a teacher married to a rep and without family and by the standards of the time, well off. She and her husband lived in the respectable area of Park Road and drove a Morris 8. I remember Auntie Clara, as she was known to the family, being with us but not of us (not that I was familiar with the expression at the time). She paid the debt, George Willie was spared a spell inside but his unfortunate wife was consigned to a life of penury and for years she was Auntie Clara’s cleaner – three days a week until the dept was paid off. George Willie brazened it out and still managed to find money from somewhere for his drink.

As a postscript to this unfortunate episode, the circumstances of George Willie’s illness make interesting reading. As might be imagined, glassblowing was thirsty work and the men would bring to work bottles of water. By lunchtime they were empty an the apprentices would be sent to the local pub via the canal towpath to have the bottles filled with beer. On the way back from the pub the boys would have a drink from the bottles and to avoid detection top them up with canal water.

The ravages of typhoid undermined George’s health and he had to leave Wood Bros. During the war he found a labouring job at Fox’s Stocksbridge factory and in retirement spent time pottering about in one of his brother-in-law’s gardens proving that old habits die hard, that he had a ready-made reason for getting away from home. He also scraped together enough money to make regular visits to the Wood Street Hotel. He lived into his 80s and never recovered from injuries he received while attempting to board a moving bus in Barr Lane.

Wood Street Hotel where George used to spend his earnings.

Tasker Trust

Editor’s pick

Above: The Bush Inn, Kingstone. Photographed around 1959. The middle photograph shows the rebuilt pub during the late 1960s/1970s. Inset below is the near derelict condition of the pub today.

Photograph courtesy of Les Nixon

Photograph courtesy of Les Nixon

Photograph courtesy of Tasker Trust

Grove Street Senior School

Les Hennel relates his experiences at the school from 1945.

The experiences of former pupils of the ‘elite’ schools of Barnsley – Holgate Grammar for Boys and the Girls High School feature fairly regularly in Memories of Barnsley. I would like to share my experiences of life at the other end of the educational spectrum – Grove Street Senior Mixed School, the lowest rated of all Barnsley schools; regularly referred to as ‘the graveyard of 11 plus failures’ – in the 1940s anyway.

Having sat and failed the 11plus whilst attending Grove Street Junior and Infant School,

I moved up to the Seniors in September 1945.

On the first day about 90 of the ‘new starters’, boys and girls, were assembled in the ‘hall’ and streamed into classes, 1A, 1B and 1C. The brightest being allocated to 1A. At the end of each term we sat an exam and depending on the results could be promoted or demoted). We didn’t wear a uniform and we weren’t given homework.

Every morning the whole school assembled in the ‘hall’ where we sang a hymn, usually ‘All Creatures Great and Small’ before we dispersed to our respective classes. The only

lessons for which boys and girls were separated were PT (physical training) and crafts, woodwork for boys, Domestic Science for girls).

We had a mixed bag of teachers, some good, some bad, one brilliant and one awful – to me anyway. Mr Skelton was the brilliant one. He introduced me

SCHOOL PHOTOGRAPH of Les aged 12.

GROVE STREET Senior school, mixed.

to the pleasure to be got from reading rather than treating books as a chore to be endured. On discovering that we had no books at home, he took me along to the Public Library and even paid the 3d joining fee, which I couldn’t afford.

The hateful one was the music teacher. Every year during the Barnsley Schools Music Festival, a choir from each school sang a song of their choice and performed on the stage of the Alhambra Cinema. At Grove Street the choir was always the top class of the final year. I couldn’t for the life of me ‘sing in tune’, and rather than help me with this problem Mr B banished me from rehearsals. After a couple of choir practices standing in the corridor outside the classroom, I was detailed to make myself useful by maintaining the sports equipment. On the bid day Mr Skelton remonstrated with Mr B, pointing out the cruelty of leaving me out. Mr B relented on the condition I stood in the back row amongst the bigger boys and just mouthed the words, which I did, well I opened and closed my mouth – I didn’t know the words.

Another troublesome incident I experienced was connected with the school allotment. Mr Dixon’s pride and joy was a large bed of chrysanthemums. George (Gud) Isles; Gordon (Gordy)

Lyons; Brian (Scrubber) Hunter and me were designated the job of de-budding the chrysanths. Mr Dixon demonstrated the method – ‘leaving the top three buds, remove all the remaining buds by pinching them out’. This being a rather tedious exercise, ‘Gud’ came up with the idea of placing the thumb and first finger just underneath the top three buds and sweeping down the stalk removing all buds and leaves. Imagine the sight that greeted that keen gardener, Mr Dixon, on his return – 500 bare stalked chrysanthemums. He immediately whacked each of us, once on each hand, with a garden cane, plucked four bare stalks and marched us back to school. Mr Senior, headmaster, gave the four of us another three whacks on each hand. We were then made to stand in the ‘hall’ holding a ‘chrysanthemum’ each whilst the whole school marched passed. After school we were escorted back to the allotment, and under the supervision of Mr Dixon, correctly de-budded the remaining 200 geraniums.

I received a smack round the ear from my Mam for being late home.

The highlight of my final year was the visit to Grove Street, for the first time, of the Mayor and Mayoress of Barnsley, Alderman Walter Hunt and Mrs Hunt. The school didn’t have a head boy or girl so an election was held to choose a boy and girl to represent the school. Megan Williams was chosen to present a bouquet to the Mayoress and I to lead the cheers. The week prior to the visit, whilst Megan was being taught how to curtsy and how to properly present the bouquet, I attended Mr Senior’s study to learn how to shout Hip Hip Hooray. At the first lesson, my version – Hip Pip Hoorah – was corrected by Mr Senior slowly saying the correct pronunciation, each word accompanied by a knuckle rap on the head.

The great day arrived, Megan performed a perfect curtsy, and, to Mr Senior’s relief, I shouted ‘Three cheers for the Mayor and Mayoress – Hip Hip Hooray.’

I enjoyed my four years at ‘Grovey Seniors’ with a great bunch of mates and teachers (except one), who were truly committed to prising the best out of kids who were thought of, in those days, as a lost cause. n

He immediately whacked each of us, once on each hand, with a garden cane ...

REAR VIEW of the school in 2015 showing its derelict condition.

The Barnsley Chronicle’s Girl Fridays 1973

Captioned as they appeared in the June and July 1973 editions of the Barnsley Chronicle. Captions may have been edited to fit the space available.

Man Friday

Local hairdresser, 18-year-old Linda Thompson of Monk Bretton, works at Elsecar. Linda is at present studying hard for her final examinations and loves football, music and hopes to own her own car shortly.

Miss Julia Broadhurst, aged 20, a display girl at Littlewood’s store in Barnsley has been selected to represent the store in the National Miss Littlewood contest to be held in Liverpool later this year.

Sandra

of Gilroyd is employed at a local tyre centre. Sandra includes among her hobbies, caring for animals, reading and drawing. Her ambition is to go to work in Australia.

Les Nield of Royston took part in the local finals of the Mr United Kingdom competition at Bailey’s Club, Monk Bretton. Married with two sons, Les is employed at a local warehouse.

Susan Claydon of Hoyland is a fulltime nurse at a Barnsley hospital. Married with two children, Susan enjoys the outdoor life, particularly walks in the country. She enjoys listening to good music.

Valerie Hughes is a civil servant and lives and works in Barnsley. She enjoys all types of music and likes to travel. So far Valerie has visted Spain and Switzerland. Her ambition is to see as much of the world as she can in the near future.

Shop assistant Jeanette Rowbottom hails from Worsbrough Bridge. She enjoys reading, music and dancing and likes country walks.

Royds

Hilary Broughton of Darton works in a local solicitor’s office. Hiliary includes in her spare time activities dancing, singing and would like to take up the hard life of a model – photographic of course.

MEMORIES OF

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