Childhood Memories

A Memory of Winson Green.

My mum grew up in Heath Street (5/275) and after marriage moved to South Sheffield.
I used to go and stay with my nan and granddad in Winson Green and have very fond memories of staying with them. I remember walking down the red brick yard, where the houses were back to back and my nan and granddad lived at the far end of the row. There was a wash house with a big boiler in it and a row of lavatories - one for each household, just round the side of Nan's house. The house overlooked spare ground but had yards all around and relations lived in other yards. Out of the upstairs windows (only two!) you could see the canal and railway lines. The house was very small with just one room downstairs with a black 'range', a tiny little kitchen area with a pot sink, a coal store was inside the house under the winding stairs. Just two bedrooms upstairs - which still had the gas mantles on the walls. Baths were taken in a tin bath in front of the fire, but I was taken sometimes to the bathhouse. I think it was 1/- for a bath. I can't remember the year but I was playing outside the pub down the road with other children - waiting for their parents. We enjoyed being plied with crisps and lemonade! - when a man ran in shouting that the foundry was on fire. I must have been about six and was very scared - lots of fire engines and noise. I remember the shops - one being Mrs Butler's, and her two little dogs with the squashed faces - Peckanese (?), the chip shop, the fruit shop and others up and down the road. I remember the smell of hops from the brewery, the cobbled roads, the rag and bone man with his horse and cart and walking past Winson Green prison going to my Auntie's about a mile and half away. I was always scared of the place and the echoing sounds coming from the prison.
I loved going to Nan's but always went home with nits in my hair. My Nan and granddad were the Johnsons. Both were from the area. Nan was a Gwilliam before marriage and we visited a number of their relatives who lived locally. The Gwilliams lived on Moilliet Street. I have some photos of family at Heath Street which I will try to upload to the website. At my young age I didn't realise that these houses were slums, and would not be there for much longer. I only have happy memories of being there.

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