History of River Street, Alexandra Gardens and nearby in Windsor History, Old Views and Genealogy Forum

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History of River Street, Alexandra Gardens and nearby

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Hazel Austin	History of River Street, Alexandra Gardens and nearby	Lead	[-]
Posts: 880 (17-Jan-2010 02:20 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Tags : None Many of us know that Bier Lane, now River Street, was one of the less lovely parts of Windsor in the 19th century. Presumably at some point it had reasonable housing and living standards because it had a largish church, St. Saviours, and some old photos show working carts, businesses and relatively well dressed householders. Gradually though it deteriorated into a slum, with overcrowded and unhealthy housing, regularly flooded because of its proximity to the river, and a variety of seedy drinking places selling wine, beer and spirits. At No. 21 was a pub called the Princess Royal apparently. Like the other beershops in the lane I imagine it was short lived, but I came across something which really brought home the reality of life in Bier Lane (and similar strrets in the town) more clearly than the condemnation of contemporary government reports in lurid language. For the 1851 census clearly an official went to the Princess Royal in order - as was being done across the country - to list every single person there, from the infants to the old. This is an excerpt from the census record of the people at the Princess Royal, like a snapshot in time. Look first at how many people there were crowded into that small pub. Look at the ages they gave, and their replies to the question about their birthplace. Look at their occupations. It tells you all you need to know. Real people. Year/Publican or other Resident/Relationship to Head and or Occupation/Age/Where Born/Source. 1851/Thomas Goodchild/Victualler/36/Windsor, Berks/Census 1851/Selina Millward/Servant, General Servant/23/Gosport/Census 1851/Thomas Goodchild/Son/13/Windsor, Berks/Census 1851/George Hawkins/Guest, Traveller/above 20/N K/Census 1851/Sophia Hawkins/Guest, Traveller/above 25/N K/Census 1851/Daniel Mutchy/Guest, Traveller/above 40/N K/Census 1851/Mary Mutchy/Guest, Traveller/above 25/N K/Census 1851/Daniel Fury/Guest, Traveller/above 40/N K/Census 1851/Ann Fury/Guest, Traveller/over 45/N K/Census 1851/John Fury/Guest, Traveller/over 20/N K/Census 1851/Jane Fury/Guest, Traveller/above 35/N K/Census 1851/John Brian/Guest, Traveller/above 25/N K/Census 1851/Mary Brian/Guest, Traveller/above 25/N K/Census 1851/Robert Jones/Guest, Traveller/above 20/N K/Census 1851/Elizabeth Jones/Guest, Traveller/20/N K/Census 1851/Harriet Jones/Guest, Traveller/over 25/N K/Census 1851/John Jones/Guest, Traveller/over 25/N K/Census 1851/Janet Jones/Guest, Traveller/over 25/N K/Census 1851/William Pope/Guest, Traveller/over 20/N K/Census 1851/Ann Pope/Guest/above 40/N K/Census 1851/William Pope/Guest/over 20/N K/Census 1851/Ann Pope/Guest/over 4/N K/Census 1851/Thomas Smith/Guest/over 35/N K/Census 1851/John Hawkins/Guest/over 30/N K/Census 1851/John Wilson/Guest/25/N K/Census 1851/Jane Farley/Guest/above 24/N K/Census 1851/Mary Sullivan/Guest/22/N K/Census 1851/Thomas Barber/Guest/35/N K/Census Thomas Goodchild is recorded as the publican three years later in 1854, but then the name Princess Royal disappears, maybe changing ownership a couple of times before the next census comes seven years later. This isn't going to be interesting to many forum-readers 160 years on, but a closer look at the people at the Princess Royal on that day in 1851 tells you what life was really like for the people in those grainy photos...and indeed life in the town itself, because Bier Lane was just a few steps from the more respectable Thames Street and the castle walls. Here was Bier Lane, with Red Lion Row* leading off it, and there is more about its history here. Apart from the publican, his son and Selina the general servant, few people in the beershop are able to give their accurate age, or indeed where they were born. (Not Known) Chances are they weren't even registered, not even ones who are presumably local because they aren't labelled Traveller. "Traveller" is unlikely to mean romanies, I imagine, because they would have had their own wagons, and skills like basket-making would have been noted, and I noticed that when a group travelling together were recorded in Clewer (I can't recall which census year) they had the unordinary names that traditional romany families pass on down. In fact the families at the Princess Royal seem to name their children with their parents' christian names too , as was the custom, but they are common names like Thomas and Ann. Clearly some families are travelling together, although these may be relatives rather than parents and child, and would have boarded together (possibly at the beershop itself) however poor conditions were rather than stay on the streets, where the policeman and charges of vagrancy would have landed them in the workhouse. "Travellers" I suppose meant any kind of itinerant worker, moving from place to place (maybe some on the river yards away) to find work of any kind - not just the men, but women and children too. That kind of life would have shortened their life-expectancy considerably even in a time when mortality rates were already horribly high. All this seems of course a million years away from today's riverside Windsor, but next time you park your car in River Street, you should know that back then, in that place at no. 21, the Princess Royal and its people were a real part of Windsor's story. * The Red Lion, which presumably gave its name to Red Lion Row actually fronted onto Thames Street, at no.27. Clearly a different "class" of drinking place it has a far longer history, ending it would seem when in the 1920's this area was redeveloped for the River Street car park. Clearly Windsor (as elsewhere) was a town where by walking a few yards you could find yourself in a different world. This (for comparison) is a brief history of the Red Lion: Year/Publican or other Resident/Relationship to Head and or Occupation/Age/Where Born/Source. 1830/Benjamin Paice/../../../Pigots Directory 1840/Ben Paice/../../../Robsons Directory 1844/William Darling/../../../Pigots Directory 1847/William Darling/../../../Post Office Directory 1851/William Darling/Victualler/36/Eton, Bucks/Census 1851/Martha Darling/Wife/42/Coleshill/Census 1851/Mary A Darling/Daughter/5/Clewer, Berks/Census 1851/Eliza Price/Visitor, Annuitant/37/Coleshill/Census 1851/Emma Feasey/Servant, House Servant/18/New Windsor, Berks/Census 1851/William Chuff/Servant, Errand Boy/13/New Windsor, Berks/Census 1852/William Darling/../../../Slaters Directory 1854/Wm Darling/../../../Billings Directory 1861/William Darling/Victualler/46/Eton, Bucks/Census 1861/Martha Darling/Wife/54/Coleshill, Warwickshire/Census 1861/Mary A Darling/Daughter/15/Clewer, Berks/Census 1861/Jane Day/General Servant/38/Portsmouth, Hants/Census 1861/John Carr/Potman/30/Westbury, Wilts/Census 1863/W Darling/../../../Duttons Directory 1864/W Darling/../../../Kellys Directory 1877/George Woolward/../../../Harrods Directory 1883/Charles Doggett/../../../Kellys Directory 1887/Charles Holmes/../../../Kellys Directory 1891/Robert Edwards/Publican/45/Isle of Wight, Hants/Census 1891/Mary E Edwards/Wife/42/Lyme Regis, Dorset/Census 1891/Florence Edwards/../21/London/Census 1891/Elan Lesser/Visitor/5/London/Census 1899/Alfred Killeen/../../../Kellys Directory 1907/Mrs Eliza Killeen/../../../Kellys Directory 1920/George Sparks/../../../Kellys Directory I must thank the family historian who compiled these records and many more from various sources, on a site for "defunct" drinking places; I cannot claim for all that hard work! Last Edited By: thamesweb 28-Jan-2011 02:40 PM. Edited 9 times.
Hazel Austin	Ice cream sellers in Bier Street	#1	[-]
Posts: 1071 (19-Feb-2010 10:56 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Following Jane's discovery of organ-grinders and ice cream sellers in the street in 1901 (see post below) I was interested to find out how the sellers kept their ice creams frozen - given that this was always considered an economically poor area where businesses could presumably not afford the latest mechanical means for freezing. This is the link to probably more than you will ever need to know about the Victorian/Edwardian ice cream trade http://www.canalmuseum.org.uk/ice... The second half of the nineteenth century was the period in which ice cream became a treat for ordinary people. Italy continued to lead Europe in ice cremery and immigrants to the UK from thee broughtwith them a tradition and expertise which led to the popular name "Hokey Pokey" which is thought to derive from a corruption of the Italian for "try a little". In other countries too, especially the United States, ice cream gained popularity. The commercial harvesting of ice in cold climates and its transport to population centres was a growth area from the earl nineteenth century. This ice trade made large volumes of ice available at a realistic price and it became possible for ice cream sellers to offer a taste of ice cream to the ordinary person. Ice was sold on glasses which were wiped clean and re-used. These glass "licks" remained in use in London until they were made illegal in 1926 for reasons of public health. Ice cream edible cones were first documented by Mrs Agnes Marshall in her book Fancy Ices of 1894. It's likely I suppose that as elsewhere in the town many of the buildings in Bier Street had cellars which would have facilitated ice-storage (although I don't know the water table or flooding levels lower than Thames Street) and new batches would have been made perhaps daily in Summer so storage wouldn't have been for long periods. Lots of questions come to mind though... was there an ice cream "shop"? Was it sold from wheeled boxes along the riverfront and in the town? Did they use delivered ice the same as local fishmongers or refreshment places? How early do censuses/directories show these ice-cream families - and the organ grinders - living in Bier Street? Lots to discover...
Hazel Austin	Old maps of River Street/Bier Lane	#2	[-]
Posts: 1076 (19-Feb-2010 07:44 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	This isn't the oldest map of Bier Street - it is part of Collier's map of 1747, but I'll edit and add as I can find the others. This one shows it as Bear Lane.
Jane Lindsay	Bier Lane in Directories	#3	[-]
Posts: 75 (21-Feb-2010 01:02 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I'm collecting all the directory entries I can find for Bier Lane, and I will try matching them to census information. There are no ice cream sellers listed. Not all businesses are listed. They had to pay to have their names included, and many would not have bee able to afford it. So far I have entries for 1844, 1852-53, 1854, 1863, 1869, 1876 and 1883. The businesses/occupations listed over these years are cabinet maker, shopkeeper, boot & shoe maker, baker, muffin baker, carpenter, dressmaker, marine store dealer, school, beer retailer, hair cutter, hairdresser, grocer, butcher, Anglers' Rest. A lot more occupations will come out of the censuses. I have found another group of Italians in Bier Lane in 1881. This time there were nine single males aged 18-55 all living in one house - number 9 - and all described as "organ travellers"; the census clerical staff have written "muscns" beside them. Only one surname, Sartori, appears in the 1901 census as well, and that was a different person. Work is continuing, but there are so many interesting diversions! Last Edited By: Jane Lindsay 21-Feb-2010 01:07 AM. Edited 2 times.
Jane Lindsay	Bier Lane Snippets and Location of Garden Court	#4	[-]
Posts: 76 (21-Feb-2010 10:06 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	In 1852 flood water stayed in the houses for 17 days, and it reached the tops of the kitchen grates. (Maurice Bond. The Story of Windsor.) In the Medical Times Vol 24, 1851, the Registrar of Windsor is quoted as reporting that out of 26 deaths from Asiatic cholera and diarrhoea, 14 occurred in Bier Lane and its adjacent courts; a medical attendant reported that the houses in one of the courts abut on a black ditch, and are filled with disgusting odours at all times, and there were other (unspecified) nuisances in the area; within 25 yards of this part of Bier Lane there were ten cholera deaths in one month, and there were cases of diarrhoea in every house. In an 1859 report to Parliament there was an offensive gulley pit opposite Cayley's [I have found Caley families in Bier Lane in the censuses], and an offensive dung heap of long standing at Collins's buildings. Also offensive heap of refuse in Garden Court, Bier Lane, said to have been emptied from sewers and left there for weeks. There was also a nuisance in the back premises of 6 and 7 Garden Court, oozing through the wall of Cave the fishmonger in Thames Street. In the 1851 census there was a fishmonger Robert Cave at no 8A Thames Street. By 1861 he had moved his business to no 22 Thames Street. Last Edited By: Jane Lindsay 21-Feb-2010 10:38 AM. Edited 3 times.
Jane Lindsay	A Bier Lane Success Story	#5	[-]
Posts: 77 (21-Feb-2010 10:21 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	James Jennings, baker, and his wife, Sarah, first appeared at 16 Bier Lane in the 1851 census. James was from Egham, and Sarah a local girl. They had two small children - Isabella, 2, and Ellen, 1 month. They had three more children over the next six years - Rose, Ann and Henry. Little Isabella died in 1853, but the others all grew to adults. James died in 1861, at the age of 39, and Sarah then ran the business herself with some assistance from various young bakers, who might well have been learning the trade, although not formally apprenticed. In 1891 Sarah was still a baker at 16 Bier Lane, which had become River Street by then, but by 1901 she was in St Marks Road, living on her own means; daughters Ellen and Annie were with her, and Ellen was reported as being blind for 30 years. James and/or Sarah appeared in directories at least from 1852 to 1876.
Hazel Austin	Don't forget to go to bed sometimes!!	#6	[-]
Posts: 1086 (21-Feb-2010 05:21 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Jane, that's all just lovely... you must have your bedroom wallpapered with directories. I love it when the people come out of the pages and become real.... The environment must have been really horrid, and the people deserved better - it's great to read of a success story like the Jennings family. So were those young men organ-grinders/players with barrel organs or accordian players - or mouth organs, or what? A lot of people seem to have earned their living from home but they're not listed in business listings - I suppose they eked a living selling on the streets. They certainly wouldn't have had "shop" premises, maybe just a converted "front room" - in fact in Victor Road (just come from the Spittle thread) in the sixties there was a good old-fashioned cobbler who worked from home - last house on the left with your back to the laundry. The "occuptions" are fascinating - and it's great that you're adding them. You obviously have much easier access to censuses than me - I have to rely on online directories or references from other websites, so not only is a Bier Street article in the pipeline (are you listening, thamesweb?) but a Windsor occupations one too. It's all good... Thanks for working so hard - I know it's fascinating, but it's still hard-work - especially with the diversions... life's just not long enough... :-)
Jane Lindsay	Italian Street Organs	#7	[-]
Posts: 82 (21-Feb-2010 11:48 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	They would have been barrel organs, either small ones strapped onto the chest, or larger ones pushed along on a barrow, depending on what the players could afford. No, I don't have directories for wallpaper, or even standing on my bookshelves, I just read the on-line ones. A copy of my post #49 on the Thames Street thread: In Garden Court, River Street, there were eight Italian families. The heads of six of these families, plus the wife of one of them, were street organ grinders or players; the other two were ice cream vendors, bakers & potato sellers - enough variety to keep them going in all weathers. The ice cream families were Minchello and Sartori, and the street organ families were Valente, Neri, Pellecchio, Minchello, Ferrara and Dinambro. How many street organ grinders would be able to work the streets of a small town like Windsor? No doubt some would have walked to other nearby towns, but this needs further investigation, and that could take a while, so bear with me. This website has lots of interesting stuff on organ grinders - what they did, how they were regarded, how they were treated etc - http://www.absoluteastron...com/topics/Organ_grinder Last Edited By: Jane Lindsay 26-Dec-2010 05:55 AM. Edited 4 times.
Pat Larkin	Organ-grinders, ice-cream vendors, bakers and potato sellers.	#8	[-]
Posts: 1598 (22-Feb-2010 10:13 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I've posted on another thread some points and questions about the above, and, I think I've posted to the wrong thread! Apologies. It still puzzles me how the Italian families were able to buy the ingredients for their trade when considering the very small amount of money they probably had. Do you think they began an early form of today's Co-op? Perhaps the head of each family, and the wife of one, pooled their resources and helped each other form a business. Bakers need ovens and surfaces to roll and bake loaves of bread, and ice-cream vendors need quantities of ice and the other ingredients required to make this commodity, so where did they begin? Where would they have bought all the various ingredients needed to make whichever of the above selection, (not, of course, including the organ-grinders and maybe a monkey or two), they chose to create, then sell......were the potatoes grown in Dedworth, perhaps. There were farms in that area, and although it was many years later, our family, along with others, collected and picked potatoes off the ground in order to earn extra money after the war. The homes of the Italians were, on all accounts, very small, so the ice-cream, for instance, must have been made and cooled in some part of these homes. Once the vendor returned to his/her home, and after working hard during the day to sell their wares, the cleaning of the ice-cream tubs, bakers' and potato-sellers' carts needed to be carried out. Was there an ample supply of water in this small area? Was there a bourne or a well close-at-hand perhaps? Jane, when you say 'potato sellers', were the potatoes raw do you know, or had the vendors baked or perhaps, cooked them Italian-style? This area of Windsor must have buzzed with life, noise and a variety of 'aromas' at all times, especially so during the Summer months. There used to be a butcher's shop on the corner of Thames Street and Bier Lane when we lived in Windsor, but I don't know when this business first started up. If there was a butchery business in those premises when the Italian families arrived, this would have added to an already varied selection of 'smells' and if animal blood was running into gutters and roads, the area would have been very ripe for picking up all sorts of illnesses. When the carpark surface was laid, were there any artefacts discovered on the site, does anyone know? Last Edited By: Pat Larkin 22-Feb-2010 10:17 AM. Edited 2 times.
Jane Lindsay	1841 Occupations in Bier Lane	#9	[-]
Posts: 83 (22-Feb-2010 10:22 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Parts of the 1841 census are notoriously difficult to read, and Bier Lane is no exception. Many occupations are illegible, so this list could be incomplete: baker, bricklayer, carpenter, cellarman (I think), confectioner, dressmaker, dyer, gardener, gilder, hairdresser, hat maker, labourer (lots of them), laundress, painter, plumber, sawyer, shoemaker (at least 9, all in Garden Court), tailor (at least 4), wheelwright. Work on 1851 occupations is close to completion. Later censuses will be some time, as our current mini heatwave is coming to an end, and I will be working in the garden instead of on the computer! Last Edited By: Jane Lindsay 22-Feb-2010 10:34 AM. Edited 1 times.
Jane Lindsay	Potato sellers	#10	[-]
Posts: 84 (22-Feb-2010 10:31 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	when you say 'potato sellers', were the potatoes raw do you know, or had the vendors baked or perhaps, cooked them Italian-style? They would probably have been baked in some sort of brazier, much like those used by the hot chestnut sellers in parts of Europe these days. In Vienna in the 1980s the chestnut men used to have a tray or two of potatoes on the go, as well as chestnuts.
Hazel Austin	Organ grinders....entertainment or earwigs?	#11	[-]
Posts: 1091 (22-Feb-2010 01:02 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	It seems the image of organ grinders wandering the streets bringing music and Italian smiles to the populace is rather inaccurate... below is a satirical sketch of the 1860's (when there were thousands in London) showing the street swarming with organ grinders like insects - earwigs - there is an insect drawn on the roadway if you look carefully. Apparently their "music" was considered at best an annoyance, at worse what we would call noise pollution, and dislike at their proliferation (expressed by no least a writer than Dickens) was apparently due in no small part to xenophobia - most organ grinders being immigrants, as our Bier Street families were. Although clearly in Windsor they would have played for the tourists during the day, they most often frequented the streets with drinking places, and attracted not only children who would be left outside pubs while their parents drank, but lewd and drunken brawling crowds and petty criminals. Oh, dear, another image bites the dust... This is the link to the article that is already on the website about Bier Street/River Street: http://www.thamesweb.co.uk/.../thenandnow/BierLane.html. Because this particular thread explores the people who lived there and their lives, I've reposted a 1947 picture showing how this whole area would have frequently been flooded by the river - Jane has described how at times the waters reached the kitchen ranges - and because the street went down to the Cut that was used for access to the river there was no embankment - nothing to protect the houses so even the lowest floods would have affected the lower end of the street. The car park area shows where there was a warren of small terraces behind the street itself... Last Edited By: Hazel Austin 23-Feb-2010 12:35 PM. Edited 2 times.
Jane Lindsay	The Caleys of Bier Lane	#12	[-]
Posts: 85 (23-Feb-2010 01:42 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Jonathan Caley (c1813) and Thomas Caley (c1821) were almost certainly brothers, sons of Jonathan and Sarah Caley. In 1841 Thomas was living with his parents in Distil House Row, Bier Lane. There was no occupation recorded for Thomas, but his father was a post boy - today we would call him a postman. In 1847 Thomas married Elizabeth Butt. In 1841 Elizabeth had been living with her family in Acre Passage, and her father, too, was a post boy. In 1841 Jonathan Junior, age 26, was living in Sun Passage with an Elizabeth Caley, also aged 26, presumably his wife, but we can’t be certain of that, as family relationships were not recorded in the 1841 census.. No occupation was recorded for Jonathan. The death of an Eliza Caley was recorded in the Eton registration district early in 1842. Later that year Jonathan married Caroline Ruff, who was ten years younger than him and came originally from Colnbrook. In the 1851 census the brothers Thomas and Jonathan were both living in Bier Lane, Jonathan at number 12 and Thomas at number 17, and both were described as “flyman”. At first I thought they were working as stage hands at the theatre just round the corner, but later Jonathan called himself a fly driver. A fly was a two-wheeled, one-horse light carriage; the drivers were usually employed by a fly proprietor who owned the carriages. These days the Caley brothers would be taxi drivers. I’m assuming that Thomas, too, was a fly driver rather than a stage hand. Sadly, Thomas died early in 1866 at the age of 45. Elizabeth continued to live at 17 Bier Lane until at least 1901, sharing the house with a variety of other folk. She worked as a laundress, although in 1901 there was no occupation recorded for her. Elizabeth died in 1903 at the age of 79. While Elizabeth was eking out a living in Bier Lane, her brother-in-law was moving on. By 1861 Jonathan Junior and his family had moved from number 12 to number 13 Bier Lane, and was still there in 1871, and still fly driving. In 1881, however, Jonathan and Caroline were in Oxford Road, at the corner of Greenham Place. Caroline was a shopkeeper, and Jonathan was a “gentleman, formerly fly driver”. By 1891 Caroline was a widow living on her own means at 42 Gardner Cottages, and in 1901 she was a boarder at 10 St Stephens Villas, still living on her own means. She died early in 1903, not long after Elizabeth. I have not found a death entry for Jonathan. Last Edited By: Jane Lindsay 23-Feb-2010 09:16 AM. Edited 2 times.
Hazel Austin	Jane..	#13	[-]
Posts: 1092 (23-Feb-2010 11:58 AM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I look forward to your daily postings bringing to life these people from Bier Lane...let's hope the cold spell persists to keep you out of your garden! Two things strike me. The first is that the families you are uncovering alter one's perception of the common image we have of Bier Lane/Red Lion Row/ Garden Court etc. Poor housing, slum conditions, beer and spirits drinking places, vagrants, prostitution and petty crime. Much as one thinks of other similar 19th century streets in the town - George Street, South Place, Goswell Lane, Russell Street and others around the barracks area... Certainly those places attracted the flotsam and jetsam of the town (for various reasons) but a closer look at the occupations in Bier Lane (and I imagine the other places as well) show not slum no-go areas (well not in the daytime anyway!) but poor areas where families had trades and occupations and tried to make an honest living against the odds. Secondly, (and this is obvious, but looking closer gives it reality) are the unexpected occupations that are now superceded or in many cases, defunct - post boy, fly-driver, potboy, whitesmith, slop seller... Not just jobs but a picture of life in the town and on the streets. I've linked elsewhere - and will edit and repost here - a very useful glossary of Victorian occupations. I discovered fly-driver when I was looking up horse transport and pubs/inns that had stabling; several of the big hotels - certainly the White Hart and the Castle, were listed as "post houses" which had a postmaster (sometimes the licence holder) and post boys. I assume (another thing to look up) that as carters and carriages went up to London, Oxford, Bath, etc., regularly sometimes daily, that post was delivered to the "post houses" and then delivered? Obviously once there was a central Post Office this was done through the government nationally, but does anyone know what the situation was before the advent of the Post Office as such? Yet another on my list of look-ups to do.... Thirdly, your choice of family in the latest post is ironic. My instant reaction was to wonder what on earth the Caleys family was doing in Bier Street - but of course this is a Caleys family at the other end of the social scale! How beautifully it sums up the haves and have-nots in Windsor... Keep 'em coming, Jane. Victorian occupations from 1891 census - this is for London so it will be comprehensive enough to describe not only regular town occupations, but the less usual ones that travellers, strollers and itinerant workers may have brought to the town. http://www.census1891.com/occupations-a.htm Last Edited By: Hazel Austin 23-Feb-2010 12:04 PM. Edited 1 times.
Jane Lindsay		#14	[-]
Posts: 86 (23-Feb-2010 12:21 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Hazel, it's the heat that's keeping me indoors, not the cold! I live at the other end of the world. It's summer here. The Bier Lane area certainly seems to have been quite respectable in the mid 19th century, but in 1901 there were several lodging houses with 12-15 people living in 3-4 rooms. One of them described itself as "furnished apartments". I hate to think what they would have been like! So perhaps the area went downhill as time went on, although I have read some horror stories about the drainage in 1859. But the area around Love Lane was pretty bad too, especially in the mornings when the loos at Victoria Barracks were flushed out!
Hazel Austin		#15	[-]
Posts: 1093 (23-Feb-2010 12:50 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I would say You lucky thing! but I like England too much! I've just edited my previous post, putting up an English organ grinder sketch and correcting the image I had of these smiling Italian music-makers - apparently the reality is a little less attractive. As one would imagine the image of Bier Lane, actually... Like you I reckoned (not that I know enough about the street yet) that it once had been relatively respectable - a "working class" street, which deteriorated throughout Victoria's reign to such an extent that a couple of decades into the 20th century they were happy to wipe it all away. Thamesweb has written elsewhere that these were real slums, poorly built, that were not retrievable, unlike all the Goswells area, stretching over to Oxford Road. I wonder where the house and business holders in Bier Lane went to - or were they just pushed on, to swell poor housing areas elsewhere? As you've traced, some families moved to better areas - Oxford Road, Gardner Cottages.....so there must always have been an element of what you might call the "ordinary working class" families alongside the more dubitable ones? All very interesting....
Beryl Mann		#16	[-]
Posts: 543 (23-Feb-2010 01:28 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Hazel - #11 "Another image bites the dust..." How right you are! What compelling and amazing pictures these postings conjure up! Thanks to both Jane and yourself for having the patience as much as the ability in spelling it all out for us. Could there have been anything romantic about that area or era for that matter? Last Edited By: Beryl Mann 23-Feb-2010 01:31 PM. Edited 2 times.
Pat Larkin	'.......anything romantic......'	#17	[-]
Posts: 1607 (23-Feb-2010 02:30 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Beryl, do you mean perhaps that one or two Italian boys/young men, may have married into Windsor families?
Hazel Austin	Oh, oh, Antonio.....	#18	[-]
Posts: 1095 (23-Feb-2010 08:35 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	...and you know what happened to his icecream cart in the song! If the xenophobia was as strong in parochial Windsor as it was apparently in other places for immigrant workers like these, I should not have thought there was much real marriage that took place - hanky panky (or whatever the Italian is for hanky panky) yes, but not formal marriage; I think immigrant groups tend to bond together - as they obviously did in Bier Lane - but Jane's been browsing the censuses, and she may be able to tell us if the wives had English or Italian names. It would be rather nice if there was the occasional wedding or so! And Beryl - what a good question. Makes you stop and think, especially on a historical forum like this which so often does uncover lovely nostalgic memories of the "old days"... But no, I don't think there was anything romantic about living next to an open sewer, or watching your baby die of pneumonia from the cold, or starvation or disease no doctor was going to cure, or knowing there were few if any places to go where people would help you when you and your children were that destitute, except the Old Windsor workhouse. And nor was there anything romantic about a "Great" Britain whose hypocricy ignored for so long the poverty of its people - not a thousand miles away in some corner of the Empire, but within several hundred yards of the Monarch of that Empire in her castle. Whose consort ironically died from disease probably brought on by the insanitary conditions in her town which her government failed to legislate for, and which her councillors neglected. It's easy to find something romantic, so long as you don't have to actually live it yourself. What I do find "romantic" for want of a better word, is the stoicism and dignity of the ordinary people, (such as might perhaps have been my gran and grandad decades before) who made every effort to overcome the awful conditions in some areas, and bring up their families as best they could without resorting to drunkeness, or prostitution or crime. And even if they did apparently make an awful noise, that includes the Italian organ-grinders of Bier Lane too...
Beryl Mann		#19	[-]
Posts: 545 (23-Feb-2010 11:13 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Oh Hazel - only you could have written that! How very ironic it was that Prince Albert should have suffered a similar fate to those poor wretched families. I haven't quite understood how the residents in the Castle Ditch houses could have escaped the dreadful consequenses that their Bier Lane neighbours had to cope with. I think there will be some work ahead when I/we? get the opportunity to look into our Blythe family's death dates. I am really amazed...reading here earlier...how on earth they could have made edible ice cream there, taking into account the heat, bugs and shocking sanitation, not to mention poor hygeine habbits! Health and Safety would have had their work cut out!
Jane Lindsay	Italians in Bier Lane	#20	[-]
Posts: 87 (23-Feb-2010 11:43 PM) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I have found the Italians very hard to trace, as they moved around a lot. One family in Bier Lane in 1901 had four children: Mario, 9, born Italy; Michelo, 5, born Croydon; Raffaelo, 3, born Windsor; Vergilio, 1, born Worcester. I found a birth registration for Vergilio in Worcester, but I haven't found any registrations for the children born in Windsor, and in the 1901 census there were 11 of them. It seems that these people just didn't register the births of their children. They might have had them baptised, but I won't go looking for Catholic baptism records just yet. I'll stick to Bier Lane for now, and take the Italian diversion later! The Italians I have found so far were either single, or had Italian wives. There was one who had a stepson named Antonio Yates, but no sign of a wife, and I couldn't find a marriage registration for him in England/Wales. I suspect that they were generally regarded with suspicion, contempt and possibly even fear. Then there was the language problem too. They probably spoke little English, and the local residents of Bier Lane certainly wouldn't have spoken any Italian, nor any other foreign language.