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Where is this?


Guest TexxUK

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110 Wicker was in a yard behind the bank. It was Samuel Osborne's warehouse. My greatgrandfathers brother lived there in 1901 and he was a carter there.

 

All gone now

 

110 Wicker.jpg

Dan110Wicker.jpg

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Right I'm throwing my two pennorth in!

The picture shows a viaduct and arches that are built of dark brick. The problem with looking at the old LNER line is that everything on there in the Sheffield area is built (or at least faced with Dressed Sandstone, it simply does't fit!

If the picture is in the Sheffield area at all then it has to be on the elevated section of the midland line heading out of the city towards Rotherham (and even the first couple of miles of that are largely Dressed Sandstone) which narrows the area down to somewhere from Fred Mulley Street out towards Meadowhall. The only other conclusion is it isn't Sheffield.

Can anyone post an old OS or Railway Map showing the locations of Signal Boxes on that stretch of line c 1930? It might help solve the problem.

 

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On 16 July 2008 at 14:28, SteveHB said:

Looks like it could be in the Neepsend/Rutland Road area near to the Stones brewery, the vehicle at the far end of the yard has Bass written on the back of it.

Excellent photo TexxUK

Here's another curved ball to consider. You recall early on that Steve HB suggested the wagon at the back of the yard was a Bass Brewery vehicle? Well, the 'B' didn't look quite right for 'Bass', so using the visible letters, how many other well-known, old established Sheffield firms start with BASS......

Link to BASS....... info

So, considering they have always been up that end of town, Portland Street then Beulah Road, maybe the yard is a commercial vehicle repairers, rather than a brewery yard?

Not that this gets us any nearer to locating where  Kenny's grandad is leant having a smoke?!......

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Hello

I think this is 110 Bellenden Road near Peckham Rye (rail) Junction.

The OS maps is from 1954 and it gives us the building number 110 (Bellenden Road), and the signal box in the distance on top of the embankment.

The street views give us the same number of arches as the original picture as well as the same arch design, same brickwork and the same down pipe in the foreground. The close up of the brigde head (Lyndhurst Way) also seems to match what is on the original picture.

cheers

 

Old Maps.png

Street View.png

Street View 2.png

Street View 3.png

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Hours? More like many days for some of us :wacko:

Revisited it many times and concluded some time ago that it wasn't Sheffield, but that meant it was (for me) like looking for a needle in a haystack.

It looks to me like BASSWRITER has found that needle.

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Thanks Edmund.

Going back to part 2 of the original question, the date.  TexxUK said that the picture featured in Picture Post.  That was published up until 1957 so the picture must have been taken before that date.  It’s possible that another haulage firm could have occupied the premises after C. V. Blows & Company went under in 1951 but that’s not a given.  Having all this in mind and looking at the style of clothing I’d guess the picture was taken between 1948 to 1951.

As this thread has lasted such a long time I thought it deserved a full explanation of how I got from Sheffield to Peckham.   

When this picture was first posted, just like everyone else  I searched but found nothing matching it in Sheffield so moved on to other things.  I noticed the picture pop up again recently  in a thread about Boyland Road. It was mentioned that the location was still unknown. This is what started me looking again.

I thought the location wasn’t in Sheffield but could be in a town close by. I started with an images search of “railway arches Rotherham/ Barnsley/Chesterfield etc.  I was looking for the same viaduct/arch design and brickwork that was in the original picture. I found nothing that matched.  I expanded out to Leeds (this had been mentioned as a possible location) then  Manchester , Liverpool , Birmingham and Edinburgh but still nothing.

So I took the plunge and just searched images of “railway arches UK” . I got hundreds but also the first break. I found a railway viaduct with the same design and brickwork as the original picture. It  was  part of the Bermondsey Beer Mile.  I’d not thought of London before but it seemed promising as it had more railway lines and therefore more rail viaducts and arches, than anywhere else.  I searched along the Beer Mile but drew a blank.

I got another good match on Cable Street in the East End.  The arches matched and the viaduct also seemed to have the same gentle curve as the one in the picture. Even better, the arches were numbered and the next to last one before the main road was 110.  But the distance to the next road  under the viaduct was too great and a search of the old OS maps showed no sign of a signal box.

London was the right place but a different approach was needed.  I though the signal box could be  the key so I entered  the obscure and obsessive world of the Signal Box enthusiast. I’m not a nerd (honest) but I can now say with some confidence that the signal box in the picture was probably made by Evans O’Donnell & Co.  But this didn’t help finding the location.

What about the Picture Post?.  I found that they had a searchable archive but there were problems :-.

1. You had to pay for access.

2. The picture may not have been in the archive.

3. Worst of all, the picture may have been there but just headed something like, “Men On Strike” and give no location.

4. You had to pay for access – I though this deserved to be stated twice.

5. Deep down inside, this felt like cheating.

Searching in satellite view allowed more ground to be covered in a shorter length of time but I’d not be able to see number 110 from above and I doubted that the signal box would still be around. However , I thought the general layout would still be visible as long as it hadn’t been bulldozed.

So, the original picture was of a rail viaduct with 2 roads running under it.  The roads looked to be roughly parallel with each other, at 90 degrees to the viaduct and only 5 or 6 arches apart so quite close together. I checked the previous locations but got noting so kept searching for more railway arches in London. 

The next match I found was on a long railway viaduct in Peckham. In satellite view I moved along the line looking for the pattern formed by the viaduct and the 2 roads.  Moving west past Peckham Rye Station I found it. There was also a patch of greenery in the right place to be embankment where the signal box used to stand.

 I dropped down to street view on Bellenden Road taking the same viewpoint as the original picture. The arch design and brickwork still matched, the viaduct had the correct curve and the embankment was there in the distance.  

I then moved to the O/S map from the 1950’s and there was the signal box (unusually set away from the side of the track just like in the picture) on the embankment just like in the picture and the last property before the arches was number 110, just like in the picture. Going back to street view the drain pipe from the original picture was still there.  The top of the viaduct seemed to have been chopped off  (a lot of them were like this) but the design of the bridge head brickwork on Lyndhust Way (the next road under the viaduct) was the same as in the picture.

I was (and still am) 99.9% convinced I’d found the location of the original picture.  It was 110 Bellenden Road, Peckham.

I’m still looking for old pictures of Peckham to see if I can find another view of the scene and get rid of that 0.1% of doubt. If I find something, I will post it.  And if I will the lottery, I might even pay to access to the Picture Post archive.

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