Memories Of Somercotes by Mary Bullock
by Mary Bullock on
Friday 25 March 2016
When I look back at my early life we certainly did things very differently….. and in today’s clime it certainly feels very foreign.
I was born in Somercotes, Derbyshire in December 1945 and like many babies of that era I was born at home and my first bed was a drawer! The house was a simple two up, two down terrace, one of four, of the type built to house workers when the mining boom took off at the end of the 19th century. The village had obviously grown during this period and my antecedents provided the labour for the mine-owners and the hosiery industry.
My grandparents (Richards) and great grand-parents( Chamberlain) had lived nearby, in Seely Terrace on Nottingham Road, though they had died before I was born. All the family were miners, including my father. The housing provided was very basic and how families of 8 or 10 ever lived in them I have no idea.
Above: The man on the far right back row I understand to have been my grandfather, Thomas Richards. For some reason flat caps, scarves (often white) and dogs ( often used for ratting)were the common accessories for miners of this era.
Below: Seely Terrace girls: Clara Richards (back left), Mary Hannah Richards (back right), and Emma Richards (front), my mother. 1921
There were two bedrooms upstairs (steep and winding) and there was often a fire grate in the front bedroom. The only lighting was by candles. Children often slept 3 to a bed, and sometimes at the top and bottom. As there was no upstairs bathroom most families used chamber pots (sometimes called Jeremiahs, though I don’t know why).
Downstairs there were also two rooms, in my case a backroom where I remember the washing, ironing and cooking being done and a parlour where there was a fire-range, table and chairs and perhaps a settee and sideboard. There was also a pantry cupboard under the stairs. Downstairs was lit by gas mantles. The front door opened straight onto the street. Outside the back door was a cobbled yard, common to the four houses and each had an outside lavatory, a coal shed and a tin bath hanging at the back door. There was a semblance of a back garden, long and narrow.
Below: A picture of me taken at the back door at Coupland Place, about 1948.