Hopwood Street

I was fascinated to come across these photographs, thank you so much. My second great grandparents Hugh Perry and Sarah Perry (nee Bird) lived at 135 Hopwood Rd at the time of the 1871 census. Other members of the household were a son, also Hugh Perry, and a Henry Galbraith listed as 'stepfather'. The occupations of father and son were 'Painter' and 'Apprentice Painter.

The famous Parrot on the corner of Hopwood Street and Scotland Road, sadly no longer operating as one of Scottie's famous pubs.

I came across a photograph this week that was shocking and heart breaking in equal measure, providing an unexpected personal link back to Liverpool’s challenging Victorian days. Take a look at the young lads staring at the camera in Hopwood Street, off Scotland Road. Under those ‘pass-me-down’ cloth caps, all of them are beaming for the camera, but closer inspection of the image reveals that most are bare-footed. My two times great grandparents Peter and Maria Rogers and great grandparents Thomas and Margaret Rogers occupied a property in this street from the 1870s onwards and I’m proud of my Scottie Road links. The cheerful lad in the middle of the front row, arms folded, is standing on his tip-toes to look just a few inches taller. What testing days they must have been. We are bombarded by daily news bulletins right now, correctly pointing out how the cost of living is going through the roof while asking how we might cope when we have to turn down the heating as energy bills soar. The featured image, in a dramatic way, puts all of our modern worries into perspective. Clearly, many inner-city boys and girls would walk the streets without any footwear in those days, even into the early 20th century when the local police would hand out clogs where possible via local charities. In our throw-away era of designer this and designer that, wearing the latest ‘named’ training shoes for many is not an aspiration, but a must-have. However, even in the Fifties when I first went to school, children would wear canvas ‘pumps’ until they were holed and literally dropping off their feet. Even then, the solution might be a cardboard insert. Leather shoes were never thrown away until they had survived several trips to the cobblers, so when was the last time you uttered those famous words: “Soled and heeled, please.” Cheers to those boys of yesteryear who dealt with everything life could throw at them and could still ‘smile for the birdie’.

Paternal grandparents Joseph & Elizabeth Nixon living at no.35, at the time of their marriage in 1894.

Hopwood Street in 1926

Hopwood Street around 1916

One of the courts off Hopwood Street