Bakewell St.

Peter Joseph Breen outside 26 Bakewell St.

Patch Breen’s father, Peter Joseph Breen came from County Wexford. He had volunteered to join the British Army and served in the Dublin Fusiliers. He fought in WW1 and sadly lost a leg in battle in France.

Rose Lawson, Patch’s mother, was an English girl from Leeds. Her family had moved to Leicester and they rented a house at 26 Bakewell St. in Highfields.

Rose Breen

Peter and Rose met in 1945 at the Wolsey hosiery factory on Abbey Lane where they both worked. He was a sweeper up, she was an overlocker.  They went for drinks in a pub on Conduit St. opposite The Jolly Miller, called The Hare and Hounds run by Harry Callaghan. As far at Patch knows it was frequented by Irish and Scots drinkers.

She was a Protestant and he, a Catholic. This never seemed to be a problem although sometimes “ if she was in one room and he was in another my dad would ask me to go over and ask her if she’d become a Catholic. But there wasn’t any real seriousness in that I don’t think.”

There was quite an age difference; he was 65 and she was 45 when they were married in 1947 and they had Patch two years later on March 17 in 1949. “As far as I know I think the neigbours thought that Mam and Dad were too old to have a child. It was her first child and she was 47 and Dad was 67.”

Once they married, Peter moved into Bakewell St. with Rose and her father. Patch doesn’t know why his father came to Leicester but does know that the marriage certificate states that he was living in Slawson St. at the time.

 26 was a corner house and had several rooms that Rose’s family would rent out and Peter and Rose carried on. It was rented for £1 from Spencer’s at the time.

In the 50s, because of Irish migration, there were lots of Irish lodgers and Patch remembers a particular couple of Irish lads that lodged with them when he was a child: Paddy Holly was in his 20s and stayed with the family for about 10yrs. Pat Deveane stayed for a few months and later became Entertainment Secretary of the Spinney Hill Working Men’s Club.

Rose would tell a story that Pat forgot his keys one night and had to climb up the drainpipe. Patch has an idea that his Dad met the two lads, and other people that stayed in the house, at The Imperial pub in Highfields on Mere Rd, just round the corner. It wasn’t too far for Peter to walk with his bad leg.

Paddy Holly worked at Pollards in the Engineering on St. Saviour’s Rd. again not very far from Bakewell St. Patch remembers that he didn’t drink but he used to back the horses.

Across the street lived an Eastern European family: she was German and he was Czech, "as we used to say." They had a lodger, an Irish girl called Brenda. She was single and in her late fifties and had been a ballet dancer previously in her life.

An Irish couple lived next door at 24 Bakewell St; Minnie (nee Reid) and Alex Pryor. There was another Irish family down the road at No. 18, The Merrymans.

“The street then was cobbled, it wasn’t tarred, so on Bonfire night you could have bonfires in the street. I remember that we played out a lot on the streets but when they tarred them you couldn’t, which was probably in the late Fifties.”

Patch and his Mam, Rose, on holiday in Skegness.

Patch went to Sacred Heart School and would go to Saturday night mass at Sacred Heart Church with his father. He remembers Cannon Lindboom visiting one time and the Cannon died in the pulpit giving a sermon! “ I imagine he died there and then in those days there were no paramedics.” The parish priest was Father Murdoch.

He was taught by nuns at Sacred Heart; Sister Columbo was the Headmistress with two other nuns, Sister Joan and Sister Gemma, who each had a year class. There was a convent on Mere Rd above Bakewell St. and they’d walk from the convent to Sacred Heart everyday and back again.

Patch remembers

“ having a bit of a roll about  on the floor, a fight, not a real fight with my Polish friend Schindler, I can’t remember his first name. The two nuns passed us and didn’t say a word. The next day in assembly Mr. Riley called us out. “The two boys who were fighting on Mere Rd yesterday can they come to the front of the hall" and all the rest of it. Then we went to see the Headmaster, Mr. Blacklock. Sister Columbo must have left by then. He did nothing, had a quick word with us and that was it. I thought we were going to get the cane!””

 

Patch Breen, centre left, with his Mam, centre right, having a drink in a pub on the front at Skegness.

Further down from Bakewell St. on the corner with Chatsworth St, there was Lee’s newsagent where Patch’s friend Tez Lee lived. There was another newsagent, Bert’s on Hartington Rd, the other end of on Bakewell St. Tom Dorral ran the Post Office where Peter went for his pension.

“ We were near the railway on Bakewell St. and we used to play on this place called the Rally Banks. It was right near to the railway line, on top of Melbourne St, if I can remember. It was a steep embankment really and we just used to climb up it and slide down it. And there were lots of sticky sort of things. Any plant that was growing there used to stick on you but it was black with soot. Your trousers got black but you didn’t think about it as a kid really.”

Patch married Breda Maclean from Belfast in 1976. They met because they both worked on Dorothy Rd, on the other side of Spinney Hill Park. Patch worked at Consort Press, a printers. Breda worked in the office for Crypto Peerless at the other end of Dorothy Rd. They made machines for kitchens and offices and Breda worked in the office.

 “I was a van driver at the printers, I was always outside loading the van or driving. That’s how I met Breda, when she was walking by to the Post Office round the corner on St. Saviours Rd."

Patch’s father died in 1961 when Patch was 12. His mother Rose died in 1975 when he was 25 and he continued to live in the same house on his own. When Patch and Breda got married in 1975 she moved in too. Some years later when she became pregnant Patch realised just how damp the house had become and he felt ” you couldn’t bring a baby up in this”. So they had to find somewhere else to live.

The East Midlands Housing Association got them a house on Frederick Rd. This was great and just in time for the baby, Damien, being born in June 1982. But in Frederick Rd. they had a neighbor who made a hell of a lot of noise, ‘you could hear the bass coming through all the while”. There was nothing they could do about it and lived there for a year. A friend of Patch’s, Johnny Maloney, lived on the next street, Grove Rd. When he wanted to move out Patch asked the Housing Association if he and his family could move in and they agreed. The lads had a couple of bikes and cycled down to Narborough Rd. to hire a van. They put the bikes in the van, came back and moved the two houses on the same day!

Patch playing steel pans at Leicester's Caribbean Carnival mid 80s

For others who live on Bakewell St. click here.

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. 

Biddle Rd

Susan Quilter was born in Leicester to an English mother and Irish father.  Her father, William Greally (called Bill in Leicester) was born in Roscommon in 1922. He was the eldest  of 7 brothers and a sister.

The family moved to New Parks from Moira St in 1961. Mum, Dad, Pete, Sue, Maggie, Dette and Gez moved to 145 Biddle Rd when Sue was 14: her younger brother Paddy was later born here.  Her father Bill had had an accident down the mines in the late 60s and was pensioned out.

Bill Greally's pit tag.

With the money he got he bought a van and rented a shop selling second hand clothes, bric-a-brac etc. He also had a stall on Leicester Market.


Maggie Greally's birthday at Biddle Rd. Gez, centre left in a stripy dress, Dette centre right, blond hair,
Susan the older sister at the back.

Ann Morrisey and Maggie Greally st Biddle Rd.

Later the family moved to Beatrice Rd to a 4 bed house with a shop attached so he gave up the first shop but kept the van and stall on the market. Sue remembers playing hide and seek and skipping with her friend Linda Illiffe.

Sue had married in 1969 and became Susan Quilter but divorced in 1995. She later met her own Irishman, Pat Cullen in 1998 and they have been together ever since.  She was in The Standard having a drink when they got talking and it turned out that Pat knew Sue’s Dad and her uncles. He took her to an Irish music session at Molly O’Grady’s and the rest is history!

Pat had come over himself from Ballaghaderreen, County Roscommon in 1963. He says “I came here on the Saturday, I was 18 on the Sunday and I started work on the Monday”

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

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

St Steven's Rd.

John Walker on St Steven's Rd. Tall fella, centre right.

John Walker was born in Tubbercurry, County Sligo in 1937. He came over to England when he was 19 on October 5, 1956 and arrived in Leicester the next day, a Saturday. He was met by his brother James who was the eldest brother and had already come over “for money".

The Black Boy, Albion St.

John first stayed in South Albion St. with a Kerry man, John Brosnan and his wife. James warned him that the food wasn’t very good and that he’d soon look like a greyhound.

After a few months the brothers found a room in a house on Avon St with a cousin, Johnny Armstrong, and they cooked for themselves. They lived here for 2 yrs. and during this time John worked for John Laing. John and James  paid £2 a week rent, a pound each. John did the shopping and James did the cooking and when James left John had forgotten how to cook!

He met two fellas from Charlestown who got them work with cars," no tax”. John first worked in Derby,  Matlock, Sponden and finally back to Leicester. In Leicester he worked for Johnson and Stubbs, a Birkenhead firm, digging trenches and laying gas pipes. After 2 or 3 months he was transferred to Northampton, then Runcorn and back to Leicester. He was then 23 years old.

Back in Leicester he got a room on his own at 8 Tichbourne St. and then 43 St. Peter’s Rd. with 2 other fellas, Johnny Quinn and George Callaghan.

George “ never washed a shirt”. He would buy a new shirt each week, wear it till it was black and then buy a new one. He’d be spending £2 for a shirt when John was paying £4 a week to have his entire washing done at a local laundry. When John told him George couldn’t believe how all his shirts came back clean and pressed: he didn’t buy another shirt for 6 months!

Johnny Quinn would take his dog to the pub; he’d buy two pints, one for himself and one for the terrier sitting on the bar!

They had a cooker in the room and John did the cooking and shopping. The first week they paid £3 each and John kept a tally of all the costs in a book.

John had been a Pioneer since he was 16 in 1953. People used to say “drink is a bad dog you have to muzzle” and ” Drink never made a strong man or a great nation.”

The other fellas liked a drink and would be dying for a drink on Sundays when the pubs were shut. Although John was a Pioneer he could see how much the fellas wanted their drink; once he bought bottles of beer and hid them under the sink. He told them he could get them drink on a Sunday and charged them £2 for it! They couldn’t understand where he’d got it from and he could never understand why they didn’t do that for themselves. (He gave them their money back when it he told them what he’d done.)

John would often make a big stew. One time he put the 4lbs of stewing beef in the pot but fell asleep and forgot to turn it on. When he woke up he put it on for a while and went out. That night George Callaghan brought a fella back from the pub saying “John always had a great stew on” but this time it was half raw!

In 1963 he bought a house on St. Steven’s Rd for £1,800. His friend, Big John Ward was amazed: “You buy a house? You couldn’t buy your breakfast!”

Like many fellas John would go home to see his family and would help out on the family smallholding. One time, in 1966 he met Mary McDonagh at a dance in Cloonacool. This was a fundraising dance for the local priests in a marquee and cost 2/6d to get in.

Mary had a great musical ear and could pick up a lilt. She could go to a dance, sit up with the band, come home and lilt a tune to her father. “Daddy, I have a nice tune” He’d say ” bring me the fiddle from under the bed” and between them they’d get it! They were married in 1968 by John’s brother, Michael, who was a priest.

Dunlop, Leicester.

Mary had already been over to England: she had lived in Birkenhead with an Aunty and trained as a bookkeeper. When she came to Leicester she worked at Dunlop filling in for a woman but they wanted her to stay on. Their first son, Michael, was born in 1969 and she went back to work after wards.

He remembers going to the pictures regularly on Melbourne Rd. and an off-license called Walker’s on Biddolph St  (which is now a funeral directors.)

They used both Holy Cross and Sacred Heart Church. They were in Sacred Heart Parish but the other side of St. Steven’s Rd was in Holy Cross.

John doesn’t recall experiencing any prejudice during those early years and one friend had even asked why so many people talked to him. John says “If you’re alright with people, people will be right with you.” “I often meet a black man and stand up and have the craic.” "When I go in if they don’t speak to me I speak to them."

Both children were born in Leicester; Michael in The General in 1969, John in The Royal in 1972.

Once both his uncle and father had died John says " Being as I was supposed to go home anyway” he went home and the family stayed in Ireland for the next 14 years.

John came back to Leicester in 1986 while Mary and the boys stayed in Ireland. They'd had a very bad year on the farm and eventually John decided to rent all the land out  and the whole family returned to 14 Linton St, Evington, a 3 bed-terraced. (The family still own that land.)

Linton St today.

Michael went to Charles Keene College and John went to St.Paul’s. It was only after a visit from the Headmaster that John realised his youngest had been ”schemin’ school” for months. Young John had done the work in school in Ireland and was able to miss school here in England and still keep up. The Headmaster even said " If he was my son I’d take him out and get him a job”. John went on to night school and continued his education getting a degree in Electrical Engineering.


 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.

Thank to Colin Hyde at EMOHA for the photo of Linton St.

First Holy Communion

How many of us have the exact same photo?
Lynda Callaghan, Sacred Heart Church.

Anyone else have one of these?

With my cousin Les Holt, Sacred Heart Church

 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.

Moira St

Susan Quilter was born in Leicester to an English mother and Irish father.  Her father, William Greally (called Bill in Leicester) was born in Roscommon in 1922. He was the eldest  of 7 brothers and a sister. His grandparents had a small farm but, although there was plenty of work to be had at home, the money was better in England. He first came over with three or four other fellas when he was 17 in 1939.They came to Reading where he got a job as an apprentice electrician. This was a reserved occupation which meant he was not conscripted when war broke out.

He later moved up to Leicester to work in the mines at Desford and had rooms at 2 Moira St.

Bill Greally's pit tag.

Susan’s Mum, Irene Lismore, had come to Leicester with her family when they moved from Bisceter, Oxfoshire. They lived at 4 Moira St!

Bill and Irene met and were courting for about 2 years before they married in 1944.

Irene’s parents moved back to Oxford and, after they had married at Leicester Registry Office, Irene and Bill lived at no. 4. They had 5 of their 6 children here: Pete, Sue, Maggie, Dette and Gez. It was a 3 bedroom rented house and Irene’s Mum came back to live with them after she was widowed.

Pete Greally in the backyard of Moira St.

 The older children, Dette, Sue and Mags went to St. Patrick’s school on Harrison Rd and Sue later won a scholarship to go to Wyggeston Girl’s school.

There was one other Irish family on the street called Quinn, and Kathleen Quinn went to St. Patricks School too.

Sue can remember Griffith’s shop; potatoes in sacks, sweet jars full of collar studs and buttons, slabs of cheese and bacon. She says “Even though they might be closed you could always knock on the door and they’d serve you.”

The family used Our Lady’s Church on Harrison Rd. which is now a Hindu temple. She remembers the May Day procession which went down Moira St, along Melton Rd, up Canon St and back along Harrison Rd to the church.

The picture below is taken on Coronation Day, 1954 under an archway on Moira St. There had been a street party to celebrate the Coronation with tables set out in the street. Unfortunately it started to rain and the women pulled the tables in out of the wet. Susan's mother, Irene, is left of centre wearing a swagger coat and expecting Maggie.



Moira St. Coronation day 1954.

Her uncles followed their brother Bill over and would often stay with the family. They might then find their own rooms or even go back to Ireland and come back again. Sue remembers that her Uncle Pat, known as “Black Pat” would pawn his suit on a Monday morning and get it out again at the weekend. “He’d come round on a Friday night with a steak to be cooked and a tin of Lucky Numbers sweets.”

Bernard Greally's Travel Identity card.

Click through for more about the original St.Patrick's school on Royal East 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.

The General Hospital

Julia Sullivan, known as Shelia, came to Leicester on Sept 13, 1955. She already had two sisters here: one was working as a nanny for an English family and the other, Eileen, was married to an Englishman, Eamon Snee.

Julia was one of eight children and the youngest of six girls. She was educated at the Convent school back home in West Kerry and longed to pursue her interest in horses. However, her father felt it was not a career befitting a convent educated girl and expected her to get something better.

When she first came to Leicester she lived with her married sister on Duxbury Rd, off Uppingham Rd and later moved into nurses’ accommodation at The General Hospital on the outskirts of the city near Evington. 

The General Hospital, Gwendolen Rd.

Coming from the country at home she loved living on the outskirts of town, as it was then, and hearing the animals and horses in the morning. The new Goodwood Estate had been built but not yet around the General Hospital where you could still see working farms.

Shelia earned £7/17/6d a month and the highlight of the month  was going to Brucciani’s on Horsefair St. for coffee and cherry cake. She could also buy a new skirt in M+S for 29/11d and a blouse for £1!

She loved to go dancing at the “Irish venues”: Sacred Heart, The Co-op Belgrave Rd, The Trade Hall  St. James’ St., St. Peter’s parish hall on King Richard’s Rd and the Corn Exchange (which she remembered didn’t have a bar). And of course there was always De Montfort Hall on St. Patrick’s night. She and the other nurses would search the drawers for odd 3d. bits at home to give them the money to get in to the dances. 

Sheila belonged to the Pioneer Association, a Catholic temperance group, and she had taken a pledge not to drink. She kept this till she was 23 when at a nurse’s party she held onto the same drink all night so that the others wouldn’t keep on at her!.

The nurses had an English lady, May, who looked after them in the nurses' home and lived on St. Saviours Rd. She treated them all well and the girls would bring her back presents from Ireland when they went home. Sheila remembers May having a particular present from Ireland with Irish writing on it that said…Made in Japan!

One year there was a polio epidemic back home in the National schools and Shelia’s mother told her not to go home for the annual holiday in September. Sheila was given permission to take her holiday ay Christmas which was unheard of. She travelled back with another nurse, Mona Carey from County Clare, and turned up at Holyhead without a ticket and had to wait two days with no food to get a ferry home. When she arrived in Dublin she was due to stay with another nurse, Marie before carrying on home to Kerry the next day. This arrangement fell through and Marie arranged for Sheila to stay with a blind friend. Sheila spent a long night worrying if the friend would be able to wake her up on time in the morning….. which of course she did!

Sheila says that most people at home in West Kerry were self sufficient and lived a much better life that the city people: city life in Leicester was new to her and she had never had chips or seen a Brussel sprout!

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

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

St Patrick's Church and Club.

This account of a St Patrick's day procession and the good times to be had around the Royal East St/Abbey Steet area comes from a lovely member of the Irish community in Leicester.

The day was March 17^th 1935 and a St. Patrick’s flag waved proudly over the mean, close pack of streets surrounding St. Patrick’s Church, Royal East St. Oh, the magic in the air as the crowd swirled around before entering church for the special St. Patrick’s day mass. Carr’s button factory, on the opposite side of Royal East St, had allowed any Irish the day off and the rest of the workforce peeped out of the doorways and available windows, interested and excited by the patriotic fervour across the way.

I was seven at the time and had been diligently practicing the Kyrie, the Agnus Die and the Sanctus in Latin. I was a proud member of the choir; dressed in a green velvet dress and matching green beret made by my aunt. I definitely still remember the magic of it all: the whole day was filled with feasting, drinking, of course, and music that lives with me forever.

 

My mother was a fine singer and “Kathleen Mavorneen” was her special song. My Dad’s cousin Martin was steward at the club: his special song was “Irish Manufacture” the story of a salesman going around promoting Irish goods. Granny had two special songs: “The hat my father wore” and “If I had the wings of a swallow”. At St Patrick's club, Paul’s regular was “County Armagh”: Peggy’s: “The Croppy Boy.”

 We lived and breathed Irish culture as children and knew every song from “Mistral Boy” to “The Old Bog Road.”

Though a mixture of nationalities inhabited the surrounding area, the Irish and the feel of Ireland were predominant. One priest, a Father Parle, was beloved by the whole population in that area. A big strapping Irishman in his prime, and a rugby player, he organised the May and June processions through the streets of Leicester carrying the Blessed Sacrament under a canopy up to the Town Hall square where he would conduct Benediction. Sadly he died suddenly, only in his thirties. The whole area went into mourning regardless of religion; the crowds surrounded the area weeping.

This area around Royal East St./Abbey St. was peopled first by a trickle of Irish immigrants fleeing the famine and then onwards through the lean times in Ireland in the 20s, 30s and 40s.

At this time Leicester was a prosperous city, renowned for its cleanliness and its variety of manufacturing, particularly hosiery and shoes. Even in those days, Corahs and Wolsey were known world wide so Irish immigrants had no trouble finding work and were diligent and prized by their employers.

St Patrick's school, Royal East St.

On the social side, a parish hall was added to the side of the school and church in Royal East St. which was eventually licensed and became the St. Patrick’s club.

The club became the mecca of the newly arrived immigrants over the years. Here they felt at home and everyone knew everyone so the area retained and embellished its Irishness.

As the years rolled by new Catholic churches were built and the social life of the Irish in Leicester widened out. St. Joseph’s had its parish priest, Father Leahy, who organised the building of a huge church on the site of a stable on the corner of Goodwood/Uppingham Rd: he always drew great crowds to his dances.

Mr. Joseph Willis ran an Irish dance on Saturday or Sunday nights at the Secular Hall, Humberstone Gate. Sacred Heart Hall was also a popular venue.

Meanwhile, when the old St. Patrick’s church school was closed the old club was replaced by a new one facing the, now widened Abbey St. and St Margaret’s bus station. The new bus station replaced all those terraced houses and mean streets that once bustled with life that today’s citizens could never compete with. There was faith, love, loyalty, neighbourliness and tolerance that today’s Leicester would never understand. Irish humour lay over all.

For more about this lady's life in Leicester click: Garden St,  St. Patrick's school, Royal East St., Wharf St
Click here for more about St. Patrick's club, Abbey St  and here for other mentions of  the Secular Hall, Humberstone Gate

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.

Lincoln St

Lincoln St from College St

Thomas Paul Flannery and Gerardine Mary Flannery moved from Castlebar Co Mayo to Leicester, to 135 Sherrard Road in 1959. Mary came originally from Sallynoggin, Dun Laoghaire. Thomas, known as Paul, had been over for a while with the older kids and the youngest came over later with Gerardine, 6 in all: Pauline, David, Rita, Robert, Hilary and Stella.

There had been an outbreak of gastro-enteritis which had killed some children in Castlebar and made one daughter, Hilary quite ill (the story was it was caused by the water supply). Gerardine always said that she didn't feel the same about living in Castlebar after this. The irony is they moved from a 'modern' council house with a bathroom into a terraced house with an outdoor loo and metal bath hung on the yard wall!!  Education was also a big consideration-at that point the Irish state was charging for education.

Tom had been over at times before looking for work: once over here he worked on the roads with Mayo CC and then got a job working at Frederick Parker's as a factory storekeeper. His version of the need to come over to England was that 'instead of seeing us off at Castlebar station one by one, we'd all go together.'

Gerardine had a lot of English connections in that her Dad was English and he lived in Cheltenham and her twin brother lived in Widnes.

The house was rented by a private landlord Mr Armstrong and eventually Tom and Gerardine bought it off him.
In the summer of 1968 the family had to move as the house was compulsory purchased and condemned. They moved to 6 Lincoln Street which they paid a mortgage for and David, the eldest son helped put down the deposit for, as at that point he was out to work.

Hilary still remembers her mum spending the removal day cleaning an empty house that was going to be knocked down-however, it was 1968, the year she was moving up to Collegiate Girl’s School, College St. and it was good to finally have a bathroom!

Tom played in a band called the 'Tom Cats'. He played the accordion and the piano and he sang, so he had quite a wide circle of friends in all the Irish Clubs. But they weren't often invited home-him and Gerardine tended to go out on their own on a Friday evening to the Belmont Hotel and Tom then went to play on Sat and sometimes Sundays. He was quite a performer and he delivered a range of songs in a range of styles-including boogie -woogie and he usually got people up dancing.

Gerardine had a few friends, not all from the Irish community, sometimes people she met from her cleaning jobs and from the Church such as Mary Stembarski, and Aggie Sullivan.

For a while, a great aunt Ann lived with them until she died in 1961-she had been a substitute mum for Gerardine.

Then there were a crowd of great aunts and uncles who had reared Gerardine who lived in Dun Laoghaire. As a family the children were invited back during school breaks to the house which was part of an ex-farm/smallholding and bank of cottages, magically named Thomastown, Sallynoggin Road.

Going back there as a child from industrial redbrick Leicester was like visiting a fantasy world of freedom, fresh air and flowers.

The family received Xmas cake which was as heavy as a brick and sprinkled with the silver balls like miniature ammunition and best of all real shamrock in a box for St Patrick’s Day. Tom and Gerardine always got sent The Connaught Telegraph and the occasional An Phobalcht from their good neighbours the Rotherys in Castlebar.

However, it tended to be one-way traffic back to Ireland with Gerardine and Tom going back during the Leicester industrial fortnight. Relatives never came to visit, except maybe some of Tom's family might drop in. The next door neighbours were English people, Reg and Ivy Brown.

The family frequented a range of pubs, mainly the Daniel Lambert, The Highfields Club, The Sacred Heart Club and The St Patrick's Club.  any other Working Men's Club. Skidmores, The Co-op.

Because there were 6 children they were fairly self-contained but there were families living locally they were friendly with-The Moran’s,  O'Callan’s and The Scannell’s.


For more of the Moran's story read Mere Rd.

Thanks to Colin Hyde for the 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.

74 Dronfield St.

 Kathleen, Brian (a friend Brenda Cree ) and Judith Flynn on the step of 74 Dronfield St. 1952.

Judith Hubbard’s father, Timothy Flynn from Roscommon, first came over to Birmingham where he worked on the railway.

Mary Cunningham, from Port Laois, had come to Birmingham too: Mary’s dad had died and there were possibly too many mouths to feed with no money coming in to the house-so she came to England.

Timothy and Mary married in 1939 and moved over to Kettering where their daughter, Judith, was born in 1941. They moved to Leicester in 1942 and found a terraced house, 74 Dronfield St , through someone Timothy worked with. 

During the war Timothy signed up with the British Army and was based at Catterick but Mary and Judith stayed in Leicester. Three more children, Timothy, Kathleen and Brian were born in Dronfield St. after the war and Mr and Mrs Flynn lived there all their lives.

The children went to Sacred Heart and Judith remembers the Headmistress, Sister LLoyola, Miss Veal and Miss Burkett. She also remembers Father Murdoch, Father Henry and Sister Gemma.

Judith later went to Moat, Brian to City of Leicester and Kathleen, Corpus Christi.

Mary worked at John Bull, Evington Valley Rd.

Judith remembers many, many shops around where she lived:

Norton’s  a haberdashery shop on the corner of Eggington and Dronfield St. and an off licence on the opposite corner called Ward’s.

Mrs. Deacon’s was a general grocer’s store at the 3^rd corner of the crossroad where they would cut the butter to size and weigh out the sugar.

The Finnegan’s had The Dew Drop Inn, Laxton St.

Winterbottom’s Grocery Shop was at the top of Dronfield St. on a corner with Mere Rd.

Houghan’s Greengrocer’s, an electrical shop called Buttons and a newsagent were also part of the strip of shops at the top of Dronfield St.

There was a sweet shop in middle of the street, Frank’s. When sweets were rationed she remembered him slicing up a Mars bar to share between the family. This shop keeper donated ice lollies for the Coronation Day celebrations on the street.

Judith remembers:

Kathleen and Maureen Larkin,

Pauline Everett,

Brother and sister, Marie and Tommy Kebill,

Nora Lee, who lived opposite Sacred Heart and Nora O’Gorman, who lived next door to her.

Who and where do you remember?

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

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

St. Patrick's rosette

With St. Patrick's day over for another year I found myself remembering what  it used to be like for me as a child. Like many of us, my grandparents lived in Ireland: both sets in Dublin. I'd see them in the summer, when along with aunties, uncles and cousins, we all went Home. They occasionally came to Leicester but in general there was very little contact.

Shortly before the big day small boxes would arrive through the post. (I remember them as the kind of small boxes you get pieces of wedding cake in.). The boxes were printed with tiny shamrocks with the "foreign" Irish stamps and you knew it was the package from Home. Inside we'd find sprigs of bright green shamrock that we'd  wear proudly, with our St. Patrick's rosettes and our green dresses to school on March 17. Almost everyone at Sacred Heart school would be wearing the same that day: all belonging to the same, seemingly all encompassing, group of The Irish in Leicester.

What are your memories of St. Patrick's Day?

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.