Hi
Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2011 6:26 pm
Hi, I was recommended to join here by the good people of Black Country Connections and Cradley Links. My father, Anthony Brian HINGLEY, came from the Black Country and I am interested in information regarding him and his forebears.
My grandfather was Horace James HINGLEY, he lived in Compton Road, Cradley Heath. He worked for GWR as a clerk (at Birmingham, Snowhill I think) then as a solicitors clerk in Stourbridge (I think). He was an active Mason (I think at the Rowley Regis lodge). He had a sister Milly who married Jim JOHNSON, a tool maker, they lived in Witley Avenue, Halesowen. For many years my great-grandmother (research suggests she was Lydia Sarah) lived with them in Halesowen.
My grandmother was Fanny Louise BIRCH, I understand that her family ran a bakery and had a handful of shops in the area but these were sold before I was born. She had a younger sister, Minnie, who married the firm's delivery man, Tom TANDY, who came from the countryside having been a carter for a farm, possibly at Clent, Romsley or Belbroughton. They lived in the Birch family home; High House in Lawrence Lane, Old Hill. I understand that there was an older brother too; family gossip was that he ran off with a barmaid to run a pub, anathema to the church going Birches, my grandmother never referred to him but my great-aunt, who was much more down-to-earth, did acknowledge his existence even if she knew nothing else about him.
We are a small family; my father was an only child and was killed in 1959, with no siblings or direct cousins, and I was his only child. So I am the last living member of my branch of the Hingley family. The only memories are those told me by my mother, Audrey HAINES who died in 2004.
I have a website at http://www.riverdale.org.uk/ where there are pages regarding my father and the family tree I have managed to put together with the (considerable) help of those mentioned above.
I'm looking forward to getting to know people here and, hopefully, find out a little more about my family.
My grandfather was Horace James HINGLEY, he lived in Compton Road, Cradley Heath. He worked for GWR as a clerk (at Birmingham, Snowhill I think) then as a solicitors clerk in Stourbridge (I think). He was an active Mason (I think at the Rowley Regis lodge). He had a sister Milly who married Jim JOHNSON, a tool maker, they lived in Witley Avenue, Halesowen. For many years my great-grandmother (research suggests she was Lydia Sarah) lived with them in Halesowen.
My grandmother was Fanny Louise BIRCH, I understand that her family ran a bakery and had a handful of shops in the area but these were sold before I was born. She had a younger sister, Minnie, who married the firm's delivery man, Tom TANDY, who came from the countryside having been a carter for a farm, possibly at Clent, Romsley or Belbroughton. They lived in the Birch family home; High House in Lawrence Lane, Old Hill. I understand that there was an older brother too; family gossip was that he ran off with a barmaid to run a pub, anathema to the church going Birches, my grandmother never referred to him but my great-aunt, who was much more down-to-earth, did acknowledge his existence even if she knew nothing else about him.
We are a small family; my father was an only child and was killed in 1959, with no siblings or direct cousins, and I was his only child. So I am the last living member of my branch of the Hingley family. The only memories are those told me by my mother, Audrey HAINES who died in 2004.
I have a website at http://www.riverdale.org.uk/ where there are pages regarding my father and the family tree I have managed to put together with the (considerable) help of those mentioned above.
I'm looking forward to getting to know people here and, hopefully, find out a little more about my family.
things have changed more than a little; The mews cottages near the top where Compton Road meets St Annes Road have gone, Dudley & Dowell steelworks have gone and the little pub/cafe opposite has too. I remember being in there one mid-morning having a little stiffener and watching the barman pull up pint after pint of Banks's Mild and stacking them along the bar, on the hour the factory hooter sounded and the pub was full of steel men who sank pint after pint, after 15 minutes the hooter sounded again and they were gone, the bar was full of empty glasses and the barman started gathering them up to wash them before repeating the process for midday. Along St Annes Road the parade of shops where there was a sweet shop and a ladies outfitters/haberdashers (Trude something or other worked there before moving out to the country to run a farm that had fields of daffodils), The chapel on the right where we'd go to listen to the local choral society sing Gilbert & Sullivan have all gone, the Little Pub Company pub (The Cradley Sausage Works) which had been an Ind Coope pub is now a private house, the Banks's pubs on the right have both gone and The Five Ways on the other side of the road is up for sale. Down to the right on the corner of Sydney Street and Lower High Street the Swan With Two Necks has gone as has the pub opposite the station, everywhere are estates of matchbox houses looking exactly the same. In the High Street I see Evans the chemist is still there (I quite fancied a girl who worked in there) and there's still a cafe where the hot pork sandwich shop was (fancy having a shop dedicated to providing just hot pork sandwiches with stuffing and gravy 
).