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davieG

City of Leicester & Leicestershire - The Good and Historical Stuff

By davieG, in General Chat

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davieG

davieG

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May be an image of 2 people, Rijksmuseum and text

History of Leicestershire in Images
Graham Hulme  · 
about an hour ago
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Old postcard of Leicester Market Place from about the early 1910s.  The statue of the 5th Duke of Rutland is seen in the centre of the picture.  The bronze statue was placed on that spot in 1872 (unveiled on 1st October that year) after having been moved from near the market end of Cheapside, where it had originally been unveiled on 28th April 1852, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Duke’s Lord Lieutenancy of the county (the anniversary itself had occurred in 1849).  The statue had stood on the site of an old conduit near Cheapside which covered a large, lead cistern and when the statue was placed there a tap was fitted to its stone pedestal.  The statue was Leicester's first public sculpture, made by the sculptor Edward Davis (1813-78), and was displayed at the Great Exhibition of 1851 in Hyde Park, London, before being brought to Leicester.  The original unveiling in April 1852 had seen great celebrations in Leicester with a grand procession and the Market Place was bedecked with flags and bunting.  The event was marked by a general holiday in the afternoon with shops, factories, warehouses and schools all closed and the Market Place was thronged with thousands of people, some of whom had come in from the surrounding towns and villages.  Following its move to the centre of the Market Place in 1872 (and controversially gilded), the statue was again moved in 1931 to gardens at Everard Place which was situated where St Nicholas Circle now exists and in 1967 it was removed from Everard Place Gardens and put into storage when the new road system was built.  The statue finally came back to the Market Place, after restoration, in 1971 and again it was placed in front of the Corn Exchange, though set facing south rather than east as previously.  
The Corn Exchange, seen on the right of the picture, was a replacement for an older building on this site, which was erected in 1747-48 and was a classical building designed by a Leicester architect called John Westley (1702-69).  This earlier building was known as the New Gainsborough having replaced a Market Hall of 1509 called The Gainsborough.  (The derivation of the name is unknown).  The New Gainsborough was formally known as The Exchange and also contained prisons and law courts.  It was demolished in 1850 and the present building was erected in its place, originally being referred to as a Market House.  At first this was only a single storey rectangular building, completed in 1851.  This building was designed by the Leicester architect William Flint (1801-62) and seems to have been done in collaboration with Flint's business partner at this time Charles Wickes (born in Dover 1828).  Flint and Wickes were in partnership from about 1849 until 1853.  The partnership designed many warehouses in the city around this time and did some charming terraces in the New Walk area.  According to the Victoria County History of 1958, Wickes himself was responsible for the design of the new market building, though the Leicestershire volume of Pevsner’s ‘Buildings of England’ states it to be by William Flint.  Following the dissolution of the partnership Wickes appears to have fallen on hard times, despite having published a book of illustrations on medieval church spires in England.  It was widely reported in 1863 in newspapers nationally that Wickes was wanted by the police for forgery and swindling and committing fraud upon bankers in several parts of the country.  In 1868 it was reported in the Leicester newspapers that Wickes had appeared at the Old Bailey in London and had been sentenced to 15 years penal servitude for fraud.  In the 1871 census he is shown as a prisoner at Parkhurst on the Isle of Wight.
The Corn Exchange had its upper storey added in 1855 to 1856, and this new work included the provision of the central clock tower set above the entrance and the two-flight external arched staircase.  The additions were designed by Frederick Webster Ordish (1821-85) who won the competition which was held for the best design.  The architect had offices in Leicester and much of his work consisted of church building and restoration.  One of Ordish's most notable and extensive church restorations was carried out at the old parish church at Syston which was not far from the architect’s home at Queniborough Old Hall, where he lived with his wife, Isabella.  Mr Ordish was unfortunately killed in an accident at the old Syston railway station in September 1885.  He was returning home from Leicester by train on the evening of Tuesday 22nd September and seems to have alighted at Syston before the train had fully stopped at the station.  Mr Ordish fell on the platform and rolled down between the platform and the carriages onto the tracks, the last carriage passing over his head and body before the train came to a stop.  Death was caused instantaneously.  His body was taken to the nearby Midland Railway Inn where it remained until an inquest was held at the pub by the district Coroner, Henry Deane, on the following Thursday morning, 24th September.  Following the testimony of several witnesses, a verdict of accidental death was given at the inquest and Mr Ordish’s body was subsequently interred in Queniborough churchyard.  
The most distinguishing features of the Corn Exchange are its tall clock tower and the bridged stone steps set in front of the building.   The form of the bridge is inspired by the canal bridges of Venice and has rusticated stonework and balustrades.  The upper storey of the building was initially provided for the magistracy, and Ordish gave outer access to this storey by the external stone steps to avoid any intrusion into the market hall space below.  The steps lead up to an upper central doorway which has a segmental pediment.  Above the pediment is a decorative cartouche.  The tower rising above has a window for its lower stage which is set within an arched recess and has a balustrade.  The tower is capped by a small, curved, leaded roof.  The building itself is constructed of stuccoed brick and has a deep modillion eaves cornice and has quoining at the angles.  The frontage to the Market Place is of seven bays with a central entrance on the ground floor.  The windows for Flint's ground floor elevation are very large and tall, and they are topped by alternating segmental and triangular pediments in the Palladian style.  The side elevations are of three bays with tall doorways topped by pediments.  The building has been a Wetherspoon's pub since 2000, now named the Corn Exchange.  
The old Simpkin & James store, well-known as a high quality grocers for many years, is seen at the far end of the Market Place (the white building beyond the Rutland statue).  The store's origins went back to August 1862 when Joseph Simpkin of Narborough bought the business of the retiring grocer, James Kirby, who was at 41 Market Place.  Kirby had been in business here for nearly 45 years and his premises stretched through from the Market Place to Horsefair Street.  The building included living accommodation as well as the shop, with a kitchen and parlour on the ground floor and two large bedrooms on the second floor.  Below the shop was a bakehouse.  Joseph Simpkin, who was born in 1817, had formerly been a partner in the firm of Sarson & Simpkin, grocers in Hotel Street from the 1840s.  The partnership dissolved a year before Simpkin bought Kirby's business.  This then became Joseph Simpkin & Son.  It appears that the son, Joseph Guy Simpkin, lived at the shop and his father moved back to Narborough.  By the 1870s the shop began to appear solely in the name of Joseph Guy Simpkin and is described in directories as tea merchant, grocer, Italian Warehouseman and wine and spirit merchant.  It is probable that his father left the business to concentrate on his involvement in hosiery manufacture in Hinckley in partnership with his younger son, John Simpkin.  
Mr Simpkin senior died in 1886 and 300 people from his firm attended the funeral in Narborough churchyard.  Meanwhile the grocery business in Leicester became Simpkin & James in 1883, after Mr Simpkin junior took his manager, Henry George James, into partnership with him.  Mr James originated from Staffordshire and had been manager since 1880.  By 1884 Mr Simpkin junior had moved to Narborough and Mr James had taken over the living accommodation at the shop.  Following this, Henry George James was to transform and expand the business establishing Simpkin & James as one of the most successful retailers in the county.  About 1890, premises next door to the shop in the Market Place were acquired, and alterations carried out.  In 1893 Joseph Guy Simpkin withdrew from active involvement in the firm, to concern himself with other business interests, like his father before him.  By the turn of the century Simpkin & James had branches at Loughborough and Ashby de la Zouch and by 1905 one also at Hinckley.  The Leicester premises were expanded again with the acquisition of adjacent offices in the Market Place.  Simpkin & James was renowned for the high quality and range of its goods and for the old-fashioned high standards of personal service.  Although the shop was somewhat cramped inside, there were many special commodities here which could not easily be found elsewhere in the provinces - speciality cheeses from all over Europe, fine hams and bacon, freshly cut for each customer, and an extensive and well-stocked wine department with cellars stretching under the Market Place.  They blended their own teas from India, China, Ceylon and Assam, having secured the entire output of a Ceylon tea plantation.  
After Simpkin & James became a limited company in 1905, Mr James became one of the three original directors.  However, he suffered a mental breakdown in 1908 and died in 1910.  Joseph Simpkin junior returned to the company to become its new chairman, but died in 1913.  This broke the link with the Simpkin family, although members of the James family remained on the board until the end.  For many years the firm continued to prosper and to employ a large number of staff.  The end of rationing and the growth of affluence in society increased profits greatly, and by 1963 three new branches had opened at Oadby, Wigston and Allandale Road in Stoneygate.  Profits peaked in 1965 but subsequently slumped dramatically with universal growth of supermarkets.  In 1970 a voluntary winding up of the company was agreed.  The original shop on the Market Place closed on 6th February 1971 and after that the building was demolished. The remaining branches closed and the company was dissolved in May 1971.  (This information is drawn from an article in 'The Leicestershire Historian', 1976, entitled 'The Story of Simpkin & James' by J. D. Bennett.) 
Adderly & Co's drapery store is seen on the left of the picture.  Alfred Adderly opened a drapers shop in the Market Place in 1856, firstly situated at no. 14, and later moving to this site at no. 59.  He became very successful and as the business prospered, he acquired adjacent properties on the Market Place and also moved into a connecting shop on Gallowtree Gate.  Alfred Adderly was born about 1833 at Mountsorrel and was a younger son of a farmer named Robert Adderly.  In the early years of the business he lived at the shop but with success later mover to a house on London Road and finally to The Grange at Woodhouse Eaves where he died in 1911.  By this time the business had become a limited company with a board of directors.  In 1928 the company was taken over by Marshall & Snelgrove of London, but continued to trade under the name of Adderly & Co.  In 1926 the store had been greatly extended in Gallowtree Gate and given a grand frontage in a Neo-Georgian style, designed by J. Stockdale Harrison of the Leicester firm of architects Stockdale Harrison & Sons.  Adderly's had a reputation as a high-class department store and housed an elegant restaurant with pink decor, where an orchestra played while models displayed the latest fashions.  The cosmetics department was particularly known for its packs of samples, its perfumes and individually blended face powders.  Alas, Adderly's was closed and the building demolished in 1970, except for the Victorian frontages facing the Market Place.  These were retained at great cost as part of a new building.  It had been argued that the loss of the frontages would have greatly damaged the appearance and architectural unity of the Market Place.  The replacement building facing Gallowtree Gate, now housing a WH Smith branch, is unfortunately a very drab affair.  (See 'Leicester and its Suburbs in the 1920s and 30s' by Helen Boynton and Keith Dickens, 2006).

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Free Falling Foxes

Free Falling Foxes

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3 hours ago, Wymsey said:

 Never heard of it, personally, but sad to see.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leicestershire-66222771

 

Memories of my youth.

Me and some mates spent each Saturday morning playing Snooker at Osbournes, which was close by. We then went to Cafe Rialto for ham, eggs and chips.

Lovely.

Edited by Free Falling Foxes
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davieG

davieG

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347645087_3079643102341514_3678469711751

The assembly workshop at Wadkin Ltd - Established in 1897, it was at one time, the largest manufacturer of Woodworking & Metalworking machinery in the world. I was an apprentice engineer here from 1968 -1972! The Company finally went into liquidation in 2010 with the intellectual property rights of the company being acquired by A L Dalton & Company.
Today, they still manufacture & service woodmachinery "old & new"!
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davieG

davieG

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348645120_10159991920271775_815691925005

September 20th 1903 at the junction of Humberstone Gate and Gallowtree Gate during what became known as The Electric Tramway Siege of 1903...There were 3 more junctions around The Clock Tower making it the most complicated system in Britain...The track was supplied by Hadfields of Sheffield and because of the amount of traffic expected in this area the tracks were laid on concrete blocks and elsewhere wooden blocks would be used...It took the men all of 10 days to complete this complicated task...
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