Harrison Rd

I've had a fantastically quick response from the new friends I made at the Holy Cross lunch club on Tuesday. These two photos were taken at St.Patrick's School, Harrison Rd, around 1956/7 and were given to me by Susan Quilter, top left of the netball team with the lovely bow in her hair.

Surely some of you, your parents, friends and family are in these photos too. I would love to hear from you if you are!

The school netball team. St Patrick's School, Harrison Rd, 1956/7
Susan Quilter, Shirley Russell, Monica Reid.
Front row Ann Robinson,Pat Bailey, Janet Irwin, Judith Shell and Susan Fox..

This photo includes Mr Brennan centre stage. He was Deputy Head at the time, and went on to be Headmaster at English Martyrs.

St Patrick's School, Harrison Rd, 1956/7.

For more about St. Patrick's school and club and its role in the life of The Irish in Leicester see :

Garden St,  St. Patrick's school, Royal East St., Wharf St, St. Patrick's club, Abbey St  

 If you'd like to be involved contact us on 0116 276 9186 or pop in to:

The Emerald Centre, Gipsy Lane, Leicester. LE5 OTB

We're now also on Twitter: follow me on  @irishleicester or join The Irish in Leicester group on Facebook.

Click here to view a map of The Irish in Leicester.

St Leonard's Rd.

Alice McCreesh outside the Victoria Park cafe.

Alice McCann came over to Leicester in 1957. Her boyfriend, Gerry McCreesh, was already over here working on the building with his two brothers.Alice and Gerry were both from South Armagh. Alice was 17 ½ and Gerry was 25. Although there was a bit of an age gap Gerry was a neighbour and the families knew each other well. 

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As they were not yet married Alice first shared a house with Donegal people in Leicester. She had gone to the Tourist Information office looking for accommodation and they’d given her a list to choose from. One advert said “Irish preferred” so that made up her mind! The house was on St. Peter’s Rd and she shared a room with 2 Donegal girls and shared a bed with one of them. While she was living here she worked first at Woolworths and then at John Bull. 

“You could look in the Leicester Mercury and have your pick of the jobs.”

Gerry was living on Lower Hastings St and they went home to Armagh to get married in 1959.

Gerry McCreesh working on Newmarket St near The Craddock.

After they were married they lived together in a top floor flat on Saxby St: it had a living room, bed room, kitchen and bathroom and they paid £2 a week. Their eldest child, Caroline, was born while they were living here. Alice remembers dances at St Peters where they had great bands. However they didn’t have dances on a Sunday night like they did at home and this made her very homesick.

Alice and Caroline at De Montfort Hall Gardens

For a while in the 1960s, Alice worked with Etta Grady selling tea towels, mist clothes soaps etc on behalf of the blind and disabled. The work was door to door, 6-9 in the evenings: they were paid £3 a week but had to, at least, sell that amount of stuff. After that they were on commission. 

“We would call to the council houses at the weekend, when they had money, and the private ones in the week.”

St Leonard's Rd

 Alice and Gerry later moved to St. Leonards Rd. Their 3 children Caroline, Collette and Barry went to St. Thomas Moore school and then to English Martyrs.

Caroline McCreesh (left) and her friend making their Holy Communion at St. Thomas Moore's school.

Barry McCreesh (left) and his friend making their Holy Communion at St. Thomas Moore's school.

 As Leicester got bigger new shops began to pop up. Alice especially remembers Brierly's on Belgrave Gate which was the first of the "pile 'em high" type shops that we are so used to now.

For more pictures of Alice see Victoria Park

 If you'd like to tell your own family's story contact us on 0116 276 9186 or pop in to:

The Emerald Centre, Gipsy Lane, Leicester. LE5 OTB

We're now also on Twitter: follow me on  @irishleicester

Click here to view a map of The Irish in Leicester.

Bardolph St

Bardolphe St

Jim Stretton from Kerry came to Leicester on Sept 1, 1967 with his wife Catherine (McCarthy). They had previously been living in London but couldn’t afford to stay there. Jim worked in civil engineering. They had a house on 25 Bardolph St. and later moved to 53 Lainesborough Rd.

They had two children in London, James and Geraldine, born in Paddington. Two more children were born in Leicester: John at Bond St. hospital and Janet at the Royal Infirmary. The children went to St.Patrick’s and English Martyrs.

Catherine Stretton at 25 Bardolphe st

Jim remembers the Catholic Club on Highfield St, the JFK on Sparkenoe St., St. Patrick’s on Abbey St and St Peter’s Catholic Club on Hinckley Rd. He recalls that Jim Finnegan ran the Royal Oak in Belgrave Gate and that Melton Rd was a good shopping area. 

Jim Stretton: Tug of war anchorman

Jim was well known in Leicester as a powerful anchor man for the St. Patrick's Tug of war team.

Thanks to Colin Hyde for the modern day photos: East Midlands Oral History Archive

If you'd like to be involved contact us on 0116 276 9186 or pop in to:
The Emerald Centre, Gipsy Lane, Leicester. LE5 OTB

We're now also on Twitter: follow me on  @irishleicester

Click here to view a map of The Irish in Leicester.

St. Peter's Rd

 

Nora Barry was from Tralee, County Kerry and went to London in 1955 as she had relatives there. While she was there she worked at British Home Stores. When she came to Leicester she worked in Woolworths.

She first lived in a room on St. Peter's Rd, then a room on New Walk. By then she had two kids, Terry and Anne, and got a house on Slawson St, finally moving to Saffron Lane area.Terry went to school with Lynda Callaghan at the new Holy Cross on Stonesby Avenue.. He later went to Gateway and Ann went to English Martyrs

If you'd like to be involved contact us on 0116 276 9186 or pop in to:

The Emerald Centre, Gipsy Lane, Leicester. LE5 OTB

We're now also on Twitter: follow me on  @irishleicester or join The Irish in Leicester group on Facebook.

Click here to view a map of The Irish in Leicester.

Myrtle Rd

Kitty Shields and Don Nolan were both from Dublin: Kitty, Ardee St/Watkins Sq and Don, The Realto/James Walk.  Don was Kitty’s brother’s friend and they married on Dec 28 1963. Kitty had been 21 on Oct 5.

Don had been over to London before but Kitty “came as bride” when they flew back the day after they were married. Kitty’s brother George was already living in Leicester on Melbourne St.

Kitty and Don first lived at 444 East Park Rd and paid £4 7/6 rent. Don was first working at Dunlop earning around £12 a week and continued at John Bull, Evington Valley Rd.

They had a flat on the bottom floor of a 3 storey house. Everyone shared a bathroom on the landing. She remembers her neighbour Dorothy.

 Kitty had two children here, Margaret and Shaun, and moved to a flat at 37 Myrtle Rd when Shaun was 6 months old.

George and his wife, Nelly, moved into no.35 when they told them there was a vacancy. They had an end terraced and shared a back garden

Kitty remembers that many people paid rent to a landlord whose office was on Peacock Lane. She also remembers a family of local doctors on Regent Rd: old Dr. Lenten, born and trained in Ireland: his nephew Dr. Peter (Lenten) and finally Peter’s son Jonathon who was known as “Jewish Jonathon.” Peter was also the doctor for Leicester City Boxers.

In 1966 the family moved to a terraced house on 5 St. Saviour’s Rd and stayed there for 10 yrs.

By 1974 there were eligible for a house from the Council as Shaun was 11 and having to share with his sister. The council moved them to a house on St. Saviours Estate which they later bought.

Kitty remembers taking the children to Wesley Hall, Mere Rd, to have the babies weighed and to get supplies of orange juice and rose hip syrup.

Kitty would shop at the Co-op on East Park Rd and a supermarket on Eugene Rd but would mainly walk into town to the market.

She remembers Mary Considine on St. Saviours Rd and they would meet when talking the kids to school. Kitty’s children went to Sacred Heart and then either The Convent/St. Paul’s and English Martyrs.

She remembers getting a china cabinet from a shop on Cork St, nr East Park Rd and somehow managing to get it home with Don.

If you'd like to be involved contact us on 0116 276 9186 or pop in to: 

The Emerald Centre, Gipsy Lane, Leicester. LE5 OTB

We're now also on Twitter: follow me on  @irishleicester or join The Irish in Leicester group on Facebook.

Click here to view a map of The Irish in Leicester.

Gotham St

George Corry came to Leicester in 1958 where his cousin Michael Howard was working as a ward orderly. Michael had told George that there was work in Leicester and that the money was good.

Michael worked at The Hilcrest, Sparkenhoe St. and spoke to the ward sister/assistant matron who was from Belfast about George needing a job and she told him to come up to see her. He went up on the Monday and started work the next day earning 15/- a week. Most of the staff, nurses and ward orderlies where from either Ireland or the West Indies.

George first lived in was a room in a terraced house in Gopsall St but only stayed a couple of weeks. He then had a room around the corner in 22 Gotham St which cost him 7/6d a week. He got all his food at work and worked 7-5. Some shifts included a break between 2 and 4 which meant you had to then work till 8.

Gotham St.

He lived in Gotham St for a couple of years and shared a room.

A friend of his lived in Tichbourne St, but he and his girlfriend, were killed by a faulty gas pipe in the house.

A friend in Gotham St asked George if he’d like to move over to another place and so he moved to Tennyson St. Here he had a room on the top floor of a 3 storey building. He did his own cooking using a cooker on the landing shared with a lady who had the other room.

Gotham St.

George remembers going to 7.00 mass at Holy Cross on a Sunday and being late for work. However, the Matron was Catholic too and he’d have been in more trouble with her if he hadn’t gone!

He remembers dances at The Corn Exchange, Sacred Heart, the Palais de Dance. and Joe Willis running dances at The Trade Hall.

George married Sorca Gregan and they  moved to Eastleigh Rd then Latimer Rd.

He worked at Wolsey Hosiery.

George’s two children Gerard and Sara went to Christ the King and later English Martyr’s school.



If you'd like to be involved contact us on 0116 276 9186 or pop in to: 

The Emerald Centre, Gipsy Lane, Leicester. LE5 OTB

We're now also on Twitter: follow me on  @irishleicester or join The Irish in Leicester group on Facebook.

Click here to view a map of The Irish in Leicester.