Dan Cruickshank on Liverpool Housing

[lynne99]

Thanks all. I enjoyed the echo link and looked at "Stop the rot" I hope all their plans come to fruition,,

[Blue70]

Someone on another site mentioned this too so it intrigued me. Here are a couple of links showing these properties as they were in the past (Bridson's Buildings) and as they are now:-

https://www.flickr.com/photos/44435674@N00/9484531079/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/44435674@N00/8257320848/


Blue

[MaryA]

Just came across a couple of photos, thought they would fit in well with this post

Upper Frederick Street (c1934)


Do you think they were dressed and smiling specially for the picture?

[BarbaraW]

They all look happy enough, poor but they don't even know it.

[Fledge]

Enjoyed all the links here.

C9 H6 - that was my great-grandmother's address. Old photographs show a neat, impeccably turned-out lady - she always reminded me of the Duchess of Duke Street. However, her living conditions in the court must've been cramped and not at all pleasant. Mum recalls watching her opening and closing her purse repeatedly, looking for coins that weren't there - so the elegant lady on the photos struggled to make ends meet. People in these living conditions still had pride.

[Blue70]

The squalor of the court houses shows what can happen when profits are put before quality in housing provision.


Blue

[Fledge]

How many storeys were these old court buildings, generally?

[MaryA]

I couldn't be sure but believe some of them would have been only two stories, from the photographs I've seen, however, the one I posted above appears to be three at least and probably a basement too. From censuses there are many addresses which are basements.

[Fledge]

Thanks, Mary.

I tried Googling 'court housing' and typically got magistrates' courts. I fared better with 'back-to-backs'.

The National Trust, of course, has a back-to-backs museum in Birmingham with the last surviving examples of court housing there. Their tour was on my 'to-do' list about five years ago when my daughter was set to move to Brum; I'd forgotten that. She had a change of plan and I didn't go.

Also interesting discussions on Coventry forums about day-to-day life in the old courts there. Many Prescot watch-makers moved away to work in the Spon Street area of Coventry, the centre of the watch-making industry. The courts there survived the Blitz but were demolished afterwards.

[BarbaraW]

Another one I've been reading about recently is the mis-named Angel Meadow in Manchester, I'd thought my Irish Mancunians lived there (but it turns out they lived in Deansgate), I don't know if the slums of Liverpool would have been much different from this "Hell upon Earth" as described by Friedrich Engels.


http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-enter ... 96021.html

[MaryA]

Try googling "court housing Liverpool" you will get more centred results including the nearest I could find detailing the insanitary conditions https://municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2 ... in-europe/
There used to be a much better description on the Port Cities site that I can't now find

[BarbaraW]

There's a book by Hugh Shimmin about the court dwellings in Liverpool, I remember I had lots of copied pages from it which I no longer have, I googled it last night and it's out of print but you can get a copy for £46!! Might be in your library for a loan.

[MaryA]

A little update
http://www.artinliverpool.com/galkoffs- ... ign=buffer