Clipstone street Leicester

[deskhermit]

Tony,
My grandfather, George Endall, worked backstage in the Music Hall before joing the Royal Flying Corp in WW1 as a mechanic. He then worked at the Rank optical factory on Clipstone Street until he retired. You could see the works from his house it was just a short walk. Just as well since he was gassed twice in the war and always had trouble breathing.
My favourite on the DMC site is the lady who used to play in Spinney Hill park as I did.

[tony vines]

Hi deskhermit

It's a great site isn't it.

I was really just an occasional visitor to Highfields and only in a work capacity as I lived most of my time in Leicester Forest East (having been born in Westcotes Drive off Narborough Rd.) It wasn't really until the last few years that I discovered that I had ancestors who lived there.

Funnily enough I had an uncle who as well as being a policeman was also a good violinist (imagine that) and he used to play in a small band at the local cinema with his sister who was a pianist, accompanying the Charlie Chaplin/Will Hay era silent movies. They were half a generation after your grandfather perhaps being too young, just, to have served in the Great War.

Hi Nightryder
My great grandfather Joseph King was there in the 1871 census too, so given that they were only 4 houses apart your ggparents and mine probably knew each other, at least briefly. By the the 1881 census they had moved to Hutchinson St. What a small world! Do you know what yours did for a living? As one of Leicester's stations was close by I expect quite a few railwaymen lived thereabouts.

[malcolm99]

deskhermit and Tony,

I'm so pleased that this thread has proved so valuable. Many thanks for your thanks.

malcolm99

[deskhermit]

I don't want to drag out this post but I was interested to see that Tony lived in 'Leicester Forest East'. Is this a modern term? I never heard anyone, family, friends or neighbours mention 'Highfields' and I did not ever refer to myself as living there. After we moved Anstey Lane I was not aware that had a district either.

[Nightryder]

Henry Lee was a butcher his entire working life as far as I can tell, Im not sure if he might have had his own butchers shop, In his will he leaves money & shares in the Leicestershire Butcher Hides Skin and Fat Company Limited, he left enough money that by 1881 Jemima has a grocery shop.
I think people were much more neighbourly in those days,so chances are they did know each other, it sure is a small world.

[tony vines]

In passing it is interesting to see that both Nightryder and deskhermit come from Canberra these days. Is there a common link e.g. special passages were given to people from Highfields who wanted to live in Canberra? :-)

Leicester Forest East was really more of a postal description than a defined area. It is situated along the Hinckley Rd. starting at the city boundary (Braunstone Lane) and continuing some couple of miles either side of the road westwards. It gave its name to the service station on the M1 motorway that was built on the fields I used to play in during the 1950s.

Highfields does have some history as a name and it appears on the 1913 map (Godfrey Edition) of the area which I used to find Clipstone St. but there are no apparent boundaries that define where it refers to. There is of course Highfields St. that ran roughly northwards from London Rd. Interestingly the bottom boundary of the 1913 map cuts through the rear of the station and thence through the lower half of Spinney Hill Park, if you can picture that. So to see details below the line I use a 1902 map and although it covers the junction of Conduit St with London Rd there is no reference on the face of the map to Highfields as a district, only the street.

Now here's a find for nightryder! The map sources I refer to above also have printed on the back an extract from C.N.Wright's Directory (I cannot see its date) and listed at 273a possibly St Saviour's Rd is "Edwin Lee, butcher" .

[Nightryder]

Tony,
Maybe they had a special on, 5 pounds instead of ten, Highfields to Canberra, although I was born in Vulcan road does that count as Highfields.
One of the problems I have with Leicester is that I dont have a good map either old or new, but my brother who lives in reading tells me he has a Leicester map printed in the 1880s & hes going to post it too me,im hoping it will have Upper Conduit Street & a few others I have absolutly no idea where they were.
I had a look at C.N wrights directory for the Edwin Lee Butcher but I cant figure out the search, no matter what I put in it didnt like it.

[clipo]

hi deskhermit
i lived at No 89 clipstone street which was next door to ada and george endall,i was born there in 1947 and lived and lived there untill 1966

[deskhermit]

clipo I presume no 89 was across the street near to the butchers? Did you meet the Endall family members or their next door neighbours the Jones? Mrs Jones kept a parrot in her backyard it squaked at me each time I visited the outhouse!

[clipo]

deskhermit no 89 was next door to the endalls mrs jones was my mother and the parrots name was tom.