Wyken Slough

Kaga. With a little help from Google.

20A Manor House, hi! The photo was taken from just near the top of Co-op Street. Now, although it's in the right area and you have reduced the pool to more like a canal, would it reduce the distance, the farmhouse looks nearer than AG Rd on the photo above this one - the field on the other side only came two thirds of the way up to the farm, and there was another field beyond that to the rail track. And the chimney looks all wrong, there's no sign of the steel dutch barn on the left - are they buildings in front of the farmhouse? I am searching for a photo I believe I saw on here.

From the C.E.T. 28th April 1961.

20A Manor House. Thank you. Yes that was my 'boss', and the gate built to cross the railway track on the level, but you can see how the railings behind him run down to the farm, placing the front door ten feet below the bank, therefore hiding the lower half of the farm from the 'slough'. You can also see the different number of chimneys, and how they are placed, the orchard behind him and another gate directly behind him. You can't see, made by the soldiers, the pom-pom gun 200 yds behind him across the field. If you look along the rails to the first hedgerow, then that is one of the two ditches that fed the 'slough' that came under Lentons Lanr and the canal. Now Mr Davis, you can't see his house but the houses you can see are my grandad's house and the one painted white was my house for 17 and a half years. Mrs Parish, my youngest aunt, her husband and partner bought a field at the top of 'Dirty Hole Hill' in 1935/6, placed greenhouses and started what has now become a large garden centre. Now our two families had been friends since grandad was a youth, so when I left to join the army, Fred took umbrage, cold shouldered my family - that made me feel guilty, but as it turned out, he took his money from the highway and retired early. Had I stayed, I would have been out of work at around 28 years of age.

Hi Kaga. I do appreciate your difficulties and acceptance, that the other photo is of the farm, especially as the wide pool does only look like a river in it. But I can assure you that it is. But, moving on. I thought you might like the pictures and article in the other post.

Yes, the shape is completely different, and the chimneys. Fred was a real farm lad, never went to college like his brother and sister, so would not have thought to ask English Heritage or the National Trust for help. Hall Green Manor House, Foleshill Hall, Hawkesbury Hall and Grove Farm couldn't hold a candle to this farm - a fireplace in every room with iron designs, mantel and surround, intricate woodwork, cupboards and library in beautiful design. In all the old houses I ever saw this one had to be up there with them, it was a delight in every room. It was more of a stately home than a farm. When the father lived there the library/music room, oh my! - the father was organist alternately at Ansty and Shilton churches. As a child I would sit on a swing in the orchard and listen to him play. Magical. Occasionally he would chant something I did not understand, he looked and sounded like an old monk. He also had a magical way with animals. If I or Fred went to catch the horses, they walked away - the old man, they trotted to him and nuzzled his shoulder. The railway ran by that farm gate and on past my bedroom wall, across the road, until 1927, when the Craven pit closed. They tore it up, but from the other side, AG Rd next to that end house you said, next power station, the railway remained and fed the power station with coal. Those houses, only built in 1939, the largest ack ack gun we had placed behind them, shattered the windows the first time it fired. The power station half a mile behind those houses. Yes, thanks again for sharing, and thanks to Rob for allowing me to post my memories.

Hi Kaga. What a great post. I remember the farm and buildings, but do not have the same experience of knowing it as well as you do. Such a waste. You can almost imagine what they did at the Ministry of Transport back then. Take an ordnance survey map, draw a black line on it, "right that's where the motorway is going", no care whatsoever what lies in its way!

I have learned one lesson in life, there is a right way and a wrong way, also a 'their way' and you can bet you life they have it their way!

Because of the tree growth, it was not possible to get a view from where Fred is standing at his gate: I had to move down the lane a bit to the left. The farm buildings were where the trees are on the right.

One of my sisters had a friend who she worked with at the Dunlop who she thought lived on a farm and her name was Margaret Colledge. Was she any relation to Fred Colledge?

Mr Blue Sky, If she was a couple of years older than Fred and was a school teacher, then yes it was his sister, and she taught me from a five year old to eight year old at Hawkesbury School, and I think ended up at Edgewick School. They also had a brother Frank, when the war came only one brother could remain on the farm, but if she worked at the Dunlop then no, life long school teacher. But you don't mention the years that would be. I worked at the Dunlop for a bet, for three months and met my wife.

Sorry Kaga, I should have said the photo I have with Margaret on was taken in 1963 and she would have been 18 to 20 years old, the same as my sister I was thinking of her being Fred's daughter.

Mr Blue sky Miss Colledge was teaching my sister in 1925, think that rules her out.

Hey Kaga. I just read your post on the Wyken Slough thread about the old railway line and the four cottages on a three sided square. They were called the Old Main Cottages. Two kids from my class at Eburne in 1959 lived there: Neil Bates, whose mum was a cook at the school and whose sister was called Ruth, and Peter Pickering, who was from a bigger family. In my memory they were three-storeyed cottages.

Hi Tim, welcome to the forum.