The Marples and high street in Sheffield City Centre

[Sheffield History]

Zoom in on this one. It's a photo taken from Fitzalan Square looking up towards High Street

On the left is the old Marples Pub building. What a great looking building that was

[Gordon crapper]

The tram in the foreground, 264, still exists, at Beamish Museum in County Durham, restored to its original condition with open balconies on the top deck.

[tozzin]

Your thread title is bit out, it wasn't THE Marples it was just Marples but as everyone knows it's proper name when it was built was the London Mart.

[lysander]

My cousin was one of those presumed killed after the Marples received a direct hit during the blitz. He was seen entering the pub and never seen again. Unable to be safely recovered the bodies were left in the cellar...  which was filled with quick-lime.

[Sheffield Col]

On ‎18‎/‎09‎/‎2017 at 07:44, tozzin said:

Your thread title is bit out, it wasn't THE Marples it was just Marples but as everyone knows it's proper name when it was built was the London Mart.

It was not called the "London Mart" until many years after it was built..

  Standing on the corner of Fitzalan Square and High Street, the site was occupied during the 1870s by the Wine and Spirit Commercial Hotel. By the late 1880s it was known as Market Street Wine Vaults. The owner was a John Marples, and the licence held in the name of Edward Marples. Despite a further change of name to the London Mart, regulars always referred to the pub as Marple's. It's official name was still the London Mart in 1940. The building itself was seven stories high comprising of guests bedrooms, concert rooms, bars and lounges with a network of cellars - it was thought of as a solid and safe building. 

[Casey's kid]

My father narrowly missed being in the Marples on that fateful night. He was in the city centre when the air raid sirens sounded. he had the choice to leg it for the bus and jump on the platform while it was leaving at speed or go for a 'safe' lock in at the Marples. Luckily he and rest of the passengers made it out of Sheffield centre or my mum would have been wodowed with my older sister and my as yet unborn brother.

I was the surprise that turned up 12 years later.

This event at the Marples is mentioned in Catherine Davies novel 'Black diamonds' a good read if Wentworth Woodhouse and the coal industry appeal to anyone.