Lenton Times

The Magazine of Lenton Local History Society

THE BACK ISSUES 21 - 25
Back Issues - 1 to 10 - 11 to 20

A BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF THE MAIN ARTICLES

Issues 1, 2, 3 & 6 have now sold out and are now available only online.  We have copies of all the remaining issues.  A brief synopsis of what each of these issues contains is included below.  Our charge for these is the cover price (£1.20) plus the cost of postage and packing.  Anyone wishing to obtain any back copies should click here for more details.

Issue No. 21 July 2004 (£1.20)

Tanners Yard, Leengate (2 pages)
Tanners Yard was a block of houses situated on Leengate but set back from the road.  Jean Rhodes (née Roper) recalls the properties where her grandparents, Lily and Walter Warrener, used to live.  Usually in the company of her mother and her brother, Jean would visit Tanners Yard most Saturdays.  The Warreners had come to Nottingham from Middlesborough in 1939 and No.1 Tanners Yard was to remain their home until the beginning of the 1960s when the block of housing and other neighbouring properties were all demolished in a mini-clearance scheme.    

From Jundialla to Johnson Road (4 pages)
Bhag Singh lived with his wife and children in Jundialla, a village in the state of Punjab in India.  In 1952 it was agreed that he should leave the family home and seek work in Great Britain.  He already knew someone living in Nottingham and stayed with them until he got a job with British Gypsum and a place of his own in St. Ann's.  In 1954 Bhag's eldest son, Harbanse, joined him in Nottingham and also got a job with British Gypsum.  Three years later it was agreed that the rest of Bhag's family should leave India and come and live in Nottingham.  A house was bought in Johnson Road, Lenton and in December 1957 his wife, Udam, and their four other children flew into Gatwick Airport.  Their daughter, Raspal Kaur, recalls their arrival in this country and the years spent thereafter at No.9 Johnson Road.  She spoke no English when she arrived which made life quite tricky when she started at Lenton Church Junior School after the Christmas break. Come the Summer it was time to move on to Cottesmore Secondary Girls, where she became the School's first Asian pupil.   After leaving school Rashpal worked at Daks Simpson on Park Street, New Lenton until her marriage to Gurnam Sahota in 1966.  Her marriage meant a move to Wolverhampton.  However she later came back to Nottingham and she and Gurnam lived at different times on Johnson Road, Petersham Street, Teversal Avenue and Willoughby Avenue - all, of course, in Lenton.  In 1980 they moved out of Lenton, took over a shop in Beeston Rylands and were able to buy a number of other properties.  They have recently sold the shop and are now both intent on enjoying their retirement in the village of Whatton.  As Raspal states at the end of the article, 'for someone who arrived in Lenton at the age of ten, not speaking a word of English I suppose I have done quite well for myself'.

The Birthplaces of Lenton's 1881 Residents (3 pages)
Courtesy of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, more commonly known as the Mormon Church, it is possible to access the whole of the 1881 British Census on a series of CD-ROMs.  Using this amazing resource we have analysed the birthplaces of all those residing in Lenton on the night of the 1881 census.   This amounted to 10,254 individuals.   Of these just over 20% were Lenton born and bred and when you add in all the others born in elsewhere in Nottinghamshire we arrive at the figure of about 66%.  The birthplace of a further 18% was in one of the five neighbouring counties while just over 12% were born in the remaining English counties. After adding on the 125 people who were born in other parts of the United Kingdom we are left with some 80 people who were actually born overseas.  The article looks in some detail at these 'exotic' individuals and in particular at all those who were born just across the Channel in France.  Numbering some forty individuals they make up by far the largest component of these foreign-born residents.  The reason for Lenton's French connection becomes clear once you read the article.

A Boer War Veteran Recalled (1 page)
John Henry Howitt featured in our list of Lenton men who served in the Boer War.  On his return he married Lily Maul and set up home in Dunkirk where they brought up seven children.  Madge Smith (née) Howitt was the youngest of these, being born in 1922.  We learn from her something of her father's life in Lenton and how the dreadful storms experienced on the return journey from South Africa definitely put her father off contemplating any further jaunts abroad.

The Wardles at War (1 page)
Andy Fox's maternal grandfather was Edward Wardle.  Two of Edward's brothers feature in our list of Boer War soldiers.  Andy provides a little more information about these two men, who both appear to have gone on to serve in the First World War.  Joseph Corthorn, another of those on our Boer war list, later married Edward's sister, Alice.  He also returned to the colours in the First World War but unlike his brothers-in-law was destined to die in the war.

The Finneys of Lenton & Massachusetts (3 pages)
In the United States there is a special kudos among those who can establish a family link with any of the early settlers.  Among these early immigrants were members of the Finney family who arrived in New England in the late 1630s.  It was only a few years ago that it became clear that the Finneys had previously lived in Lenton.  Clifford L. Stott, based in Massachusetts, was instrumental in bringing this connection to light and our feature draws on his article which appeared in the New England Historic Genealogical Register Vol.148 (1994).

The Pouchers of Grange Farm, Dunkirk (4 pages)
The site of Grange Farm now lies beneath the tarmacadamed surface of the 'B' carpark out at Boots factory complex, straddling the city boundary out at Beeston.  In the early 1920s William and Charles Poucher took over the farm and it was there in 1922 that John Poucher was born.  For the next fifteen years Grange Farm remained his home.  John Poucher recalls growing up on the farm in the days when almost everything was done with the aid of a horse.  He remembers the terrible floods of 1933 when floodwater surrounded the whole farmhouse.  The waters finally went down after a week but until then he and his brother were unable to attend school.  The flood had an unsettling effect on his family, as did the arrival of the Boots factory.  Boots went on to acquire all the farms in the immediate neighbourhood in order to provide sufficient land for subsequent expansion.  Although the farmland wasn't required for this purpose just yet the Pouchers felt it advisable to seek a new tenancy elsewhere.  They settled on a farm at Elston and took it over  in 1936 and with their move away from Lenton John Poucher's tale of life on the farm comes to a close.

Our Sponsor's Story (1 page)
Stephen While, based in Lenton, is Nottingham's only Curative Hypnotherapy practitioner.  This feature describes how he treats people and describes the range of problems he is able to address.  See also www.aqch.org/swhile.

Local Listings (2 pages)
Short reviews are included on:
The Illustrated History of Nottingham's Suburbs by Geoffrey Oldfield pub. by Breedon Books in 2003.
Lenton: Many Voices, One Community compiled by Diane Maloy pub. by Nottinghamshire Living History Archive Millennium Award Scheme 2002.

18a Willoughby Street (3 pages)
In 2003 the Djanogly Art Gallery hosted an exhibition entitled 'Everyday Images: Naïve painting of daily life 1750-1900'. Among the various paintings on display was a street scene in New Lenton.  It featured a bakery shop on Willoughby Street which was then run by Arthur Taylor.  In the early 1900s Mr Taylor had evidently commissioned a painting of his business premises, which was carried out by Arthur Goodwin.  Neil Walker, who is based at the Djanogly Art Gallery, had gathered together information about both men and the magazine includes Neil's catalogue entry on the painting alongside our own article.  We were able to provide a little additional information on Arthur Taylor and his family but ultimately drew a blank when trying to discover what had happened to Arthur Taylor and his two daughters when they left the Willoughby Street property in the mid 1920s.  We go on to provide readers with the details of the subsequent occupants of 18a Willoughby Street.  The last of these were George and Hilda Hourd who ran the bakery from 1939 onwards.  The property came down in the 1960s as part of the Willoughby Street clearance scheme - but what then happened to the Hourds was something else that remained unclear.

Issue No. 22 April 2005 (£1.20)

Life at Bridge House, Abbey Street (6 pages)
Until its demolition in 1977 this property stood just over the bridge from the Johnson Arms on a plot land at the junction of Abbey Street and Dunkirk Road.  In 1928 Bridge House became the family home of Jean Bamford (née Bird) and she was to live there for the next twenty two years.   Jean recalls her life there including wartime when her father, Thomas Bird, became the full-time air-raid precautions officer for that part of Lenton.   Her recollection’s also include the disabling impact of contracting diphtheria; school days spent at Dunkirk Juniors, Lenton Girls and Cottesmore Girls; the local shops; Sundays at church; plus her own war-time employment spent at Chilwell Depot.

Picture Inn the Past (3 pages)
Lynne Kirby was born and brought up in Vancouver, Canada.  Her link with Nottingham was that her grandparents, Albert and Meggie Burnham, had lived here before moving to Canada in 1908.  Among the family ‘heirlooms’ that had been passed on to her was this photograph of a pub.  In the original photograph it was possible to read the sign on the wall which stated that it was the Three Wheatsheaves and the licensee was G. H. Burnham.  Lynne knew that on her grandparents’ marriage certificate Albert’s father, George Henry Burnham, had been described as a licensed victualler.  So there was little doubt that this was her great-grandfather’s pub. Its precise location only came to light when she found an almost identical photograph on the Lenton Times web site.  Lynne and her husband, Nick, decided to holiday in England in the Autumn of 2004 so that they could visit their daughter, who was then working in London.  As part of their itinerary they chose to visit Nottingham and present the current licensees with a copy of their photograph.    The story of their visit to Lenton is recalled in this article along with such information as has since come to light regarding G. H. Burnham and his career as a Nottingham pub landlord.
 

The Jubilee Campus: A twentieth century history of the site and surrounding area (7 pages)
John Beckett has written two articles for us outlining the history of the area in and around the Jubilee Campus.  The first of these appears in this issue and details its history from the 1920s onwards.  The second, planned for inclusion in Issue No. 23, will look at the site in earlier times.  The topics covered in the course of John Beckett’s first article include the Corporation’s acquisition of Wollaton Hall and the surrounding park land; Middleton Boulevard and the Wollaton Park housing estate; the in-filling of the Nottingham canal; the Raleigh factory’s expansion into the Triumph Road area; Raleigh’s gradual abandonment of the Lenton factory complex and its partial replacement by the Jubilee Campus.

Alongside this article we have reproduced a superb aerial photograph taken in 1931 which shows the lie of the land from New Lenton to Wollaton.

From New Brunswick to New Lenton (2 pages)
Stuart Munns has written a short article about his grandfather, Henry Benjamin Cooper, who was born in Canada in 1867 when his father was serving with the British Army.  The Cooper family eventually settled in Lenton in the 1880s.  Henry Cooper married in 1896 and by the time of the 1901 census there were four children.  By then he had established himself as a ‘Mason and Contractor’ with a base in Traffic Street over in the Meadows and lived at 14a Osmaston Street, Lenton.  The future all looked fairly rosy.  However the Coopers’ world was turned upside when Henry Cooper suffered a fatal accident at work.  As a consequence of this his widow took the family to live at Langar with her parents.  The link with Lenton was permanently broken and it was at Langar, about two months after Henry’s death, that their fifth child was born.   This girl was destined to become Stuart Munns’ mother.    Stuart had always been aware of his grandfather’s early demise but had never really known how it had come about.  As a result of his researches readers can also discover what exactly happened over in the Meadows on 25 September 1901.

Lenton Church Athletic Cricket Club (4 pages)
One of Stuart Munns’ family photographs includes a team photo of Henry Benjamin Cooper when he played for Lenton Church Athletic Cricket Club in the 1890s.  The opportunity to feature this photograph in the magazine prompted us to research the late Victorian cricket scene in Nottingham.  Searching through the copies of the local newspapers held on microfilm at the Local Studies Library for this era enabled us not only to identify a substantial number of amateur teams with Lenton connections but also piece together a detailed history of Lenton Church Athletic.  A match report could generally be found in the papers for most games the club played and the detailed reproduction of their scorecards meant we could even amass specific information on Henry Cooper’s own playing career.  The club folded in the early part of the twentieth century but before its demise it was one of a number of clubs that participated in the short-lived cricket leagues that operated in Nottingham in the 1890s – something that was not reintroduced to the Nottingham sporting scene until the early 1950s.

The Lenton Stowaway: Hardship and Adventure in Canada (2 pages) (also see below)
At the age of just fourteen Ernest King left his family home in Willoughby Street, Lenton in May 1928 in order to work on a farm in Nova Scotia, Canada.  His passage was paid by the Canadian government.  The terms and conditions his family had been given to expect were not adhered to and Ernest was prompted to seek fresh employment while out there.  This did not work out and, after a period in jail for begging on the streets of Hamilton, Ernest King resolved to return to England.  Stowing away on a British-bound ship he turned up in Nottingham in February 1930.  The subsequent court case in London led to feature articles being written about him in several local papers.  Drawing on these we have constructed our own account of ‘The Lenton Stowaway: Hardship and Adventure in Canada’.

Our Sponsor’s Story (1 page)
In 1997 Dr. Dinesh Maini took over the Lenton Medical Centre situated at 266 Derby Road.  After seven years as a one-man general practitioner Dr Maini decided to add another string to his bow.  Following extensive alterations at 266 Derby Road he has been able to enlarge the available space and set up the Nottingham Laser Clinic there.  Our article outlines the various treatments Dr Maini is now able to offer at the clinic in addition to his services as a general practitioner.  For more details see his web site  www.nottinghamlaserclinic.co.uk.

The Nottingham Evening Post ran a feature on The Lenton Stowaway which appeared in the Bygones section on 8 July 2005.  To illustrate the article they included the photograph shown above of Halifax docks in bygone days.  One mistake that inadvertantly crept into their article was the identification of Ernest King's parents.  The article referred to them as Joseph Thomas and Florence King when his father's name should have read John Thomas King.  The article went on to appeal for anyone with more information about the King family to contact the paper - we would be equally keen to hear from any such person.

Issue No. 23 December 2005 (£1.20)

Empire Day and Lenton (4 pages)
Empire Day was largely the brainchild of Reginald Brabazon, the twelfth Earl of Meath, who dedicated his old age to spreading the gospel of empire to the young.  First celebrated in 1902, it did not really take off in Nottingham until 1908.  Thereafter most years saw the city’s schools observe the occasion with special events and these became a regular feature of the school calendar until at least the 1950s.  This article explores the thinking behind Empire Day and describes some of the ways it was celebrated in Lenton schools.

Working for the Raleigh (2 pages)
On leaving school Terry Radford went to work for Raleigh in the Sturmey-Archer division assembling and testing three speed gear hubs.  At this time in the mid 1950s Raleigh was one of Nottingham’s major employers with some 12,000 people engaged on different aspects of bicycle manufacture.  Terry worked there for thirty years and he recalls life at Raleigh both on the assembly line and away from it.  When he decided to accept a redundancy package in 1986 the workforce had fallen to about 3-4,000.  Now the huge factory complex and its remaining workers have gone and all that is left to remind us of its presence here is the former office block on Lenton Boulevard – that and reminiscences such as Terry Radford’s.

Last Trolleybus to Lenton (4 pages)
The first trolleybuses to appear in Nottingham did so in 1927 replacing the electric tram service that ran out along the Nottingham Road.  In the next few years trams made way for trolleybuses on a number of other routes and in 1931 the trolleybus arrived in Lenton.  It travelled along Derby Road and whereas the old tram service terminated at Lenton Lodge the new route was extended to include Middleton Boulevard.  Known by several different numbers it finally became the No.45 running into the Market Square and on out to Trent Bridge.  In the early 1960s the Corporation decided to phase out trolleybuses in favour of motorbuses.  The first to go in 1963 was the No.45.  To mark the occasion a set of trolleybus enthusiasts hired a Corporation trolleybus to take them along the route the day after the service was formally withdrawn.  Among their number was Rod Pearson who took photographs of the trolleybus as it passed through Lenton.  Rod’s photographs provide much of the illustrative material for this article which details Nottingham’s trolleybus service and the Derby Road service in particular.

On the Rec.: The Story of Lenton Recreation Ground (5 pages)
Drawing on information contained within the Public Parks Committee’s Minute Books, deposited with Nottinghamshire Archives, the history of the Recreation Ground from its creation in the late 1880s up to the early 1960s has been constructed.  The more recent history is also recounted but not in such precise detail as the modern day source material is far less accessible.

On the Rec.: Playing There (1 page)
Over the years the Recreation Ground has provided several different generations of local children with an attractive and safe location in which to play.  Stewart Coates recounts his memories of playing on the Rec. in the 1940s and of the occasion when he and sister pitched their tent on the Rec. and made the front page of the local paper.  He also recalls the assault course left behind after the American servicemen based in Wollaton Park had departed for Europe and how it became an early form of adventure playground for the youth of the area.

On the Rec.: The Bowling Clubs (2 pages)
Over the years, Lenton Recreation Ground has been home to a number of bowling clubs.   While providing the basic details relating to those currently based at the Rec., which include West End and Hillside Bowls Clubs, the majority of this article has been devoted to Lenton Bowling Club.

On the Rec.: Living in the Lodge (2 pages)
Cyril Wing, the park superintendent at Lenton Recreation Ground from 1948 to 1972, died in 2003 but his widow, Iris, is very much alive and still living in Lenton.  In this article she looks back at Cyril’s time as park superintendent and on their years spent living in the Lodge.

Our Sponsor’s Story: Breathing new life in Lenton’s ‘village green’ (2 pages)
This issue is sponsored by Parks and Open Space Development, Nottingham City Council and Stefan Kruczkowski outlines the improvements undertaken at Lenton Recreation Ground during the last year.

On the Rec.: Walking the Dog (2 pages)
Annette Fletcher first came to live in Lenton in 1954 but her initial connection with the Recreation Ground really began after the birth of her first son, Christopher, in 1959 when he would be taken to play on the Rec.  Later on this association would be renewed when she began to take her son’s dog for a walk, which generally included a visit to the park.  Still later she acquired her own dog and the daily visits to the Rec. recommenced.  She would meet other dog walkers - among them Gwen Leigh and Pat Galvin.  They began to co-ordinate their dog-walking so that they always met up on the Rec. and even though Annette and Gwen no longer have a dog to walk their visits to the Rec. continue on a daily basis.

Local Listings (2 pages)
Two recent publications Nottingham Pubs compiled by Douglas Whitworth and A Victorian Lady’s Diary 1838-1842: Elizabeth Nutt Harwood of Beeston edited by Margaret Cooper undergo review.

Issue No. 24 October 2006 (£1.20)

Sir Michael Stanhope (3 pages)
Following the dissolution of the monasteries, the site of Lenton Priory and its estate lands became the property of the Crown.  John T. Godfrey in The History of the Parish and Priory of Lenton (pub.1884) states that in 1539, King Henry VIII granted a lease of the Priory, with certain lands in ‘Carleholme, Lenton, and Radford’, for forty years, at an annual rent of £38 13s. 0d., to Sir Michael Stanhope, Knight, who had previously obtained a grant of the site of the dissolved Priory of Shelford, in this county.  Godfrey then details all those who subsequently held the land.  In some cases he gives quite a lot of personal information about these people but the passage cited above is the extent of what he can tell us about Sir Michael Stanhope.  A much better source of information is the recently published Sir Thomas Stanhope of Shelford: Local life in Elizabethan times written by Beryl Cobbing and Pamela Priestland.  This publication is actually about Sir Michael’s son, Thomas, but the focus of the book’s first two chapters is on Sir Michael himself.  We have drawn on this portion of the book to create a thumbnail sketch of this man whose life eventually ended courtesy of the public executioner.

The Derby Road Trolleybus Revisited (4 pages)
In 1962 Rod Bramley was Honorary Secretary of the Nottingham Trolleybus Group at the time when the trolleybuses operating along the Derby Road were replaced by diesel motorbuses.  Following the appearance of Issue No. 23 which contained the feature entitled ‘Last Trolleybus to Lenton’ a fellow trolleybus enthusiast sent a copy of the magazine to Rod who now lives in North Wales.   He was prompted to send us this follow-up article which provides the reader with additional information about the Derby Road service illustrated with a number of his own photographs featuring trolleybuses in Lenton.

Our Sponsor’s Story (1 page)
The shopping scene in Lenton has undergone many changes in recent years but among the more permanent features has been Lorna’s the florists which has been open for business on Lenton Boulevard for over fifty years.  Started by Lorna Jones in 1953 the shop is now in the hands of her daughter, Angela Spencer.  In more recent years in addition to the usual services offered by florists Angela has diversified into fruit and vegetables, balloon décor, helium filled balloons and party accoutrements.

The Jubilee Campus: The Early History of the Site and Surrounding Area (3 pages)
In Issue 22 John Beckett looked at the twentieth century history of the Jubilee Campus site.  In this second article he looks at what can be learned about the site in earlier times.

The Derby Road Gatehouse (4 pages)
In the early nineteenth century Henry, 6th Lord Middleton extended the eastern boundary of Wollaton Park as far as the Nottingham Canal.  He had a new brick wall erected around the park’s perimeter and commissioned Sir Jeffry Wyatville to build him a gatehouse on the Derby Road which would echo the style of the hall itself.  After Michael, 11th Lord Middleton sold Wollaton Hall and the surrounding parkland to Nottingham Corporation in 1924 the eastern side of the park became the site of the Wollaton Park housing estate and other portions of land were sold off to private house builders.  As a result the gatehouse became separated from the rest of the parkland.  Our article explores who lived in the gatehouse while it belonged to the Middleton family and also the various occupants since it passed into the hands of the City Council.  The article is illustrated with photographs of the gatehouse taken from picture postcards from the early twentieth century.

Life in the Lodge (1 page)
Pat Fines, her husband and their two small children emigrated to Australia in 1967 and now live in Queensland.  For a short while before her marriage to Barry Fines in 1956 Pat had lived in the Wollaton Park gatehouse.   Her article recalls this period of her life in Lenton.

That Old Plaque Magic (1 page)
Situated on the Derby Road gatehouse high above the archway at the front of the building is a bronze plaque depicting the coat of arms of Henry, 6th Lord Middleton.  This short article delves into the realms of heraldry to explain what is depicted there and explain its significance.

Book Reviews:
Old Ordnance Survey Maps Nottingham NW 1913 (1 page)
Nottingham Castle in old picture postcards (1 page)

Charlie Hawkes’ Family Tree (3 pages)
Charles and Florence Hawkes originally lived in the Broad Marsh area of Nottingham.  In the mid 1930s the City Council announced that the whole area was to be demolished and offered to rehouse some of the existing residents in a new Council housing development at Abbey Bridge, Lenton. Among those who took up this offer were the Hawkes family and so in 1937 No. 63 Coleby Avenue became their new home.  Soon after the move to Lenton their third child, Frederick, was born.  Fred Hawkes recalls his life at Coleby Avenue in this feature.  All the Hawkes children except his older brother, Charlie, eventually married and left home but No. 63 remained Charlie’s home until the late 1990s.  By this time Charlie was seriously disabled with Parkinson’s Disease and had to move into a nursing home.  He eventually died in 2004 and Fred and the other surviving members of the family resolved to mark his passing in a special way.  And so the special strain of elm resistant to Dutch Elm Disease recently planted on the Derby Road side of Lenton Recreation Ground between the little ornamental bandstand and the new children’s play area commemorates Charles Henry Hawkes (1929-2004), longstanding resident of Lenton.

The Sturmey-Archer 3-Speed Gear Hub: Its Genesis (3 pages)
In the Society’s archives is a short reminiscence by the late Thorold Stancer who claimed that the development of the Sturmey-Archer 3-speed gear hub took place in the attic room of his neighbour, a certain Mr Archer, then living on Greenfield Street, Dunkirk.  When we began to seek further corroboration for this story it became apparent that the development of this hub had taken place long before James Archer came to Nottingham and that his actual role in its design was somewhat peripheral.  Drawing on Tony Hadland’s detailed history The Sturmey-Archer Story, published in 1987, we reveal the salient biographical details of the others involved in its development and then return to James Archer to describe what else has come to light about this former Lenton resident. For more details of Sturmey-Archer see www.sturmey-archerheritage.com.

Sturmey-Archer: The End (half a page)
The site of the Sturmey-Archer factory on Triumph Road is now occupied by the National College for School Leadership.  The cycle components previously manufactured in Lenton are now made in Taiwan by Sun Race Sturmey-Archer.  How this all came to pass is explored in this short concluding feature.

Issue No. 25 July 2007 (£1.20)

Lenton Priory: A Struggle for Existence (3 pages)
Lenton Priory endured a turbulent history, particularly during the 13th and 14th centuries.  Successive Priors had to cope with crippling debts, threats of destruction by the Papacy and the greed of English kings, who continually exploited the priory’s revenue to fund wars against France.  David Pilling’s article outlines how the priory managed to survive and emerge at the end of the 14th century as a secure and respected English religious house.

The Last Days of Lenton Priory (3 pages)
David Marcombe is Director of the Centre for Local Studies at Nottingham University.  In 1999 he had an article entitled The Last Days of Lenton Priory published in a selection of essays called Studies in Church History: Subsidia 12: Life and Thought in the Northern Church c.1100-c.1700.  With the author’s permission, we have constructed our own, much-condensed version of Dr. Marcombe’s article.  The Last Days of Lenton Priory looks at the period from 1529 onwards when Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII’s chief advisor, sought to move the country gradually towards Protestantism and independence from Rome.  By 1536 Henry VIII’s government had started to dissolve the smaller monasteries – those institutions that had less than a dozen monks or nuns, and endowments of less than £200 per annum.  In the autumn of that year the Lincolnshire Rising and the Pilgrimage of Grace took place which sought, among other things, to halt this process of dissolution.  This rebellion clearly hardened the heart of Thomas Cromwell and convinced him that every monastery was a source of potential treason.  The second phase of the suppression now began with the voluntary surrender of the larger houses.  1537 was to be a decisive year and Lenton Priory was destined to play a significant part in that year’s events.  The following year the Prior of Lenton, Nicholas Heath, and Ralph Swenson, one of the other Lenton monks were sentenced to death and were hanged in Nottingham.  Only one other monk in the whole of Nottinghamshire suffered a similar fate.  David Marcombe’s article offers an explanation as to why the lives of Nicholas Heath and Ralph Swenson should have ended in this way.

The Strettons and ‘The Priory’ (3 pages)
By the beginning of the nineteenth century, apart from the former hospital chapel of St. Anthony which had been converted into Lenton’s parish church, little physically remained of the former priory.  The site was now bought by William Stretton and in 1802 he designed and built a house there for his own use, which was known as ‘The Priory’.   William Stretton had initially been in business with his father, Samuel Stretton, and together they had been responsible for the construction of a number of prominent buildings in the Nottingham locality.  William Stretton exhibited a life long passion for all sorts of antiquities and became the leading antiquarian in the county.  This interest may explain why he took the opportunity to acquire the Priory site.  During the construction of his new home it is known that he unearthed and removed a large number of medieval tiles and went on to uncover other portions of the priory.   After William’s death in 1828 his son, Sempronius Stretton inherited ‘The Priory’, and after Sempronius’s death in 1842 the house became the property of his younger brother, Severus Stretton.  Sempronius generally lived elsewhere and Severus never lived at ‘The Priory’ during the time he owned it.  Instead the building was usually rented out and what has been uncovered about the various tenants who resided there is explored in the course of this article.  We presume that it was Severus Stretton who sold ‘The Priory’ to the Sisters of Nazareth in 1880 and their occupancy of the building is described in other articles included in this issue.

Nazareth House, Nottingham (5 pages)
Victoire Larmenier came to England from France with a small group of religious women and settled in London in 1851.  Here she founded the Congregation of the Poor Sisters of Nazareth and became known as Mother St. Basil.  The Sisters took it upon themselves to care for the aged poor along with abandoned and homeless children.  Their base in Hammersmith became known as ‘Nazareth House’.   The Sisters then established bases elsewhere in the country and by 1878, the year of Mother St. Basil’s death, they were running eight Nazareth Houses in various parts of the country.  One of these was in Nottingham and this had been established in early 1876.  The house they occupied in St. Ann’s soon became too small for them and so in 1880 the Sisters of Nazareth moved to ‘The Priory’ in Lenton.  The extensive grounds that came with ‘The Priory’ meant there was plenty of room for further expansion and over the years additional buildings were added to the Lenton site.  While boys featured in the early years and also in more recent times, Nazareth House tended to focus its efforts on looking after girls.  They were all brought up in the Catholic faith and until the 1940s also received their schooling from the nuns.  There had always been elderly residents living at Nazareth House and in the early 1980s it was decided that the whole of the Lenton site should be converted into facilities for the elderly.  Any children still resident there in 1984 were found alternative accommodation.   This remained the state of play until 2002 when it was announced that the Nazareth House at Nottingham was to close.  A number of other homes around the country would also close and the properties be sold off.  The money raised would be used to carry out improvements at the remaining Nazareth Houses to ensure they met the government’s new requirements. The Sisters of Nazareth had also been faced with a reduction in the number of women wishing to become nuns and closing some of their homes would help them to address this problem.  The sale of the Lenton site was finally completed in 2005.  Bought by Bryant Homes, all the buildings, except for ‘The Priory’, have now been demolished and the site is being used for a new housing estate to be known as ‘Priory Crescent’.

Life at Nazareth House (4 pages)
Dolores Draper, née McDonald, then aged five years old, came to live at Nazareth House in 1951, along with five of her sisters.  It was to become her permanent home for the next ten years.   In a detailed account Dolores recalls what life was like there in the 1950s.  When she was sixteen Dolores was offered the option of staying on but decided that she wanted to experience life away from the nuns.  In later years she came to feel she had made the wrong decision and would have been far happier had she stayed.   Dolores continued to come back for visits until the 1980s.  So it was quite a shock for her to drive along Abbey Street in October 2005 and find the buildings being demolished.  She stopped and talked to one of the workmen who was prompted to give her a brick from the church.  The brick is now a cherished possession in her Cambridgeshire home!

Digging up the Past (2 pages)
This article briefly summaries what has come to light from the various archaeological digs undertaken during the last century on the site of the Lenton Priory complex.   The first of these was carried out by staff and pupils of the newly opened Cottesmore Boys School while the most recent was the 1976 dig which confirmed the location of a Lady Chapel.

The 1976 Archaeological Dig (2 pages)
Members of what was then Lenton Local History Group were invited to participate in a hurriedly convened dig on the priory site in December 1976.  Cliff and Maureen Voisey were among the handful of people who heeded the call and they recall what came to light in the course of their seven days of toil.

A Conjectured Layout of Lenton Priory (1 page)
Various digs had taken place on the Priory Site in the 1940s and early 1950s and these were written up in The Transactions of the Thoroton Society Vol.56 (1952) by R.H. Elliott and A.E. Berbank.  These excavations had brought sufficient evidence to light to permit the authors to construct a map showing the probable layout of the priory.  A slightly modified version of this map is featured in our magazine – one that also shows the position of the Lady Chapel which was identified in 1976.

The Nazareth House Time Capsule (2 pages)
It had been hoped that excavations for the new housing development on the site of Nazareth House would bring to light further evidence of the priory.  However this was not the case.  The only thing of historic interest to be found on the site was of much more recent origin.  When Nazareth House’s new church was being built in 1951 the Bishop of Nottingham came and laid the foundation stone at a special ceremony.  At the same time a time capsule containing various items with religious connections or specific links with Nazareth House was interred in the walls of the new church.  Neil Hough found this time capsule while working for the demolition company.  He decided to hand it over to Lenton Local History Society so that the contents could be kept in its archive.  A composite photograph of what was in the time capsule accompanies this short article.

Local Listings (1 page) 
Nottingham Canal: A History and Guide by Bernard Chell  pub. in 2006 by Tempus Publishing