Woodway Lane and Potters Green

It is mentioned in the Coventry Herald in the newspaper archives as far back as 1820 as Potters Green Village. It is probably much older than that, pre dating the newspaper

Thanks for that, I'll have a dig around and see if I can find any earlier references. I'd always assumed it was a 20th century name.

I found this on "British History Online": The hamlet of Wood End lay on a turning, later called Potters Lane, off Woodway Lane about a mile north of the village. In the 14th and 15th centuries Wood End consisted of half a dozen cottages and two farmsteads, Attoxhale and Bagots Place, bought by the priory from the Erneys and Bagot families respectively. The tenants of Wood End held land both in virgates in the open fields, and in inclosed fields in the waste. The priory found it necessary to assert that Wood End was in Sowe parish, and was not a vill or hamlet per se. Attoxhale became Moat House Farm, and Wood End hamlet, where there was a green called Erneys Green in the 15th century, may have become Potters Green. 'A place called Potters Green' was first mentioned in 1662. Hawkesbury, a separate holding about two miles north of the village, consisted from its establishment entirely of inclosed fields of arable and pasture.

This old map could show what Potters Green derived from. The top image is the full map, the second image shows Pot House Green enlarged and the bottom image shows Sow village enlarged. The church (Ansty church) can be seen opposite Woodway Lane.

Davey. The name could have come from many sources, but it certainly was the most infamous village in Warwickshire in the twenties as you must know. The church records would be my first point of search, then the mining records, or Foleshill.

Infamous? Never heard of that. Tell me more!

Heathite, St Mary's Church, Walsgrave, was opposite Woodway Lane. Ansty Church was a good mile farther on and on the opposite side of the road and canal.

Davey a long story, but . . . Coal had been found all around that north side of Coventry, as far back as the 18th century, pits were established around Nuneaton, Bedworth and the area around Potters Green. To move the coal they built the Coventry Canal then the Oxford to take coal south. To move the coal from Potters Green they went to great lengths, first an arm called the Wyken Basin, to load the boats, and a railway from Hawkesbury Halt to Potters Green. The railway fed the basin and the boats and the main railway. Three pits were established at Potters Green. Five houses were also built for staff to control the loading of the railway and the loading bay of the basin, so the village was mainly miners and boatmen, some families had sons on the boats and in the pits at the same time. But in 1926 the government subsidy to the mining industry ceased, so the owners cut the wages of the miners and work stopped. The canal boat owners, mostly small family businesses, were in dire trouble, within days they were facing ruin, so brothers were now blaming brothers. Then the trade union bosses pulled everyone out in sympathy, and throughout the country work ceased. No newspapers, no trams, empty milk churns lay for days at the railway stations. The military were called in to help get the food through, police or army guarded the tram depots, and the food supplies. I believe Gosford Green was closed and used by the food people. The whole canal system stopped, there was no coal, about seventy percent of the boat owners went bust. The only people that thrived was the police, they recruited hundreds on a temporary basis. For Potters Green, two pits closed, the Craven pit struggled on till 1927. A line of empty coal wagons from Deedmore Road to Aldermans Green Road stood empty for about ten days. It created fights and arguments, little food got through, shortage of money, there were thousands in the dole queues. But with last pit closing in Potters Green, there was not enough other business for the boats. The Wyken Basin became derelict, and so did the Coventry Canal from Sutton Stop, the two boatyards went bust, boat horses were sold cheaply. The whole area was in complete disaster, but it was friend against friend, brother against brother, that it created that was the real disaster.

Thank you for the information Kaga, I'll follow that up and see what I can see. Regarding "Ansty church", the one opposite Woodway Lane, I have heard many of my relatives refer to it as such, so we aren't so clued up as yourself. It'll be interesting to see if I can see the real Ansty church on a tithe map. Thanks again.

Ansty is north of the M6. The church of St James, Ansty, is adjacent to Ansty Hall and is clearly visible from the M69. St Mary, Walsgrave-on-Sowe, is close to the junction of Ansty Road with Woodway Lane, standing next to the Red Lion public house. Perhaps Heathite's relatives referred to the latter as "the church on Ansty Road", hence the confusion

Davey, A century ago the area from Potters Green up to the Boat pub was called the tramway, because of the lines of rails, used by the surface miners to filter and grade the coal - the trucks were about waist high and 3ft long, easy for men to push along. There where only a dozen or so houses in the area but they had two pubs, but plenty of boats stopped there and miners from all over Foleshill worked there. It was a very busy place but almost overnight it became a dead end. The mining industry around Coventry lasted for about two centuries. That seems to be overlooked these days.

Thanks Kaga, that's really interesting. The two pubs would be the Boat and the Jolly Colliers. The Jolly Colliers was originally an interesting group of 18th century cottages. The pub was a wreck when it closed down but it could have been nicely restored. Instead it had one of those mysterious fires and then got demolished. I've seen a fairly early photo of it which the landlord had behind the bar including a few chaps and a horse and cart. I used to walk there for refreshments when I was renovating my late parents' house a few years ago.

Sifting and grading coal at the mine head. The little trucks and rails were called the tramway.

Davey. No doubt you know the basin, and liked the area but let's go back a century. Jack Bond, about 25 yrs old, applied to the colliery for a job - he was given a job, sort of foreman loading coal into the narrow boats in the basin. He was also given a tied cottage. He was delighted and raised a very happy family in the cottage, so for thirty years he had hundreds of miners pass his door twice a day, the coal train passed by twice a day. The basin had about twenty boats and their families - as one boat moved away another took its place. Thirty years later the pits closed down, the noisy miners stopped coming by, the boats left the basin. He was given an official letter to say he no longer had a job and a date to be out of the cottage, no redundancy pay, no benefits. He moved out of the area. Two or three years later one of his sons moved back into the same house, now owned privately, and he was still there until 1944 when I left the area.

Hi Kaga One Harry Bond was my maternal grandfather, although I never knew him as he died from an illness before I was born. He married May Dyson, whose father Joe lived in one of the cottages along the canal arm off Deedmore Rd. Would Harry be related to Jack, and do you know anything of him?