Allan Evans and Trevor England
16 Mar 2015
Alan’s talk started with Radcliffe’s Print of 1829 (the earliest known) showing the High Street, with chickens in the road, looking towards St Alphege Church. There were four pubs (only The Mason’s Arms still survived) within that short distance. Lime Tree House, so called because of the trees in front of it, was now known as The Manor House. The print showed a horse drawn carriage turning into the narrow Mill Lane (then called New Street) where Fairfields had a haulage business.
The pictures taken by Allan, aged 12 in 1962, showed exteriors of buildings in Mill Lane now demolished. No 5, Black’s Cottage, where Barclays Bank is today; then Nos 13-15 (Marks & Spencer) which was originally one substantial building. The Public Elementary School for Boys (aged 8-14[1]) opened in 1891 at a cost of £2,500. Designed by the famous Birmingham architect W.H. Bidlake (1851-1938) - who also designed the War Memorial - for up to 250 boys, the average attendance was apparently only 130. It closed in 1938, on amalgamation with the Girls School in Park Road which had more land available, and became the Parish Hall up until the 1960s when the Oliver Bird Hall opened. The Rima (nobody understood its name) was a bakery in a mediaeval building. Its owners also sold bread and cakes in another mediaeval building on the corner of Drury Lane/High Street. This was damaged by a bomb in WWII and then became The White Cat Restaurant (now an estate agent’s). In the High Street Harborne House was dated 1571 (although dendrochronolgy has proved it was much earlier). At the time of the photo it had the fascia ‘Solihull Seeds’; previously it had been Hawkesford & Napier, also a horticultural shop, and subsequently was a wine bar. There was a stone lined well at the rear but no trace of this was found when the building was restored in 2000 at the entrance to Touchwood.
Trevor explained the construction and age of these, and other, buildings. Unseasoned timber was always used which would harden over the years. The structure was prefabricated, the parts numbered and then erected on the site. There were no foundations apart from a brick sill. The houses could be, and were, moved as the owner of the house did not necessarily own the land on which they stood. The timbers were held together by mortice and tenon with wooden pegs, never nails. In the 16th century brick infill replaced wattle and daub, which housed insects and rats.
No 5 Mill Lane was originally jettied and an interior photo revealed a tie beam and a wind brace. Rear views of Nos 13-15 showed three catslides added in the 19th century. The large timbers used proved that the original owners were not bothered by cost. The six cottages (where Argos is now) still had their vertical timbers, although brickwork covered the rest of the frontage. One of the original chimneys survived so maybe it was a hall house. In Drury Lane on its corner with Warwick Road the Tanyard Cottages (demolished 1962) were brick fronted but the roofline suggested something much older. Southwards ‘The Gazebo’ of Touchwood Hall showed clearly in a photo taken during the 1960s redevelopment. The Hall was rebuilt in 1712 but the chimneys proved that the hearths of the original mediaeval building could not be moved. A demolition photo of The Rima showed the truss and close rafters – not a ridge beam – besides wattle and daub of the original structure.
In the High Street the Masons’ Arms now has a Georgian frontage, but mediaeval timbering was still visible at the rear of the building. The Gardeners’ Arms (demolished in 1971) had fake timbering on top of a brick skin behind which was the original timber framed house. The Gothic fronted house (now the Café Rouge) was an original timber framed house, as shown by its roofline and chimney (the hearth was still inside). The Manor House – built in the late 15th century by the Greswolds - was originally two buildings, as the west end belonged to the next door house.
Solihull had been rich in mediaeval timber framed buildings but many have been demolished over the years, especially in the 1960s development. Several of those that remained had been covered with brick facings, so only a few still reveal their original timbering.
[1] The school leaving age at this period