A Visit to Rotherham - My Home Town

 

To complete my research into my family history, I had been waiting some time for the opportunity to visit my home town of Rotherham.  My great grandfather, George Askew moved from the fens of  Lincolnshire around 1870 to work in the coal mines in Rotherham. His background is on my postings of  7th December 2011 and 11th September 2017.  

I had hoped that I could find some information in the local history and archives section of Clifton Park Museum (photo above). However this was one Saturday that it was closed. The Museum was open but all I found was a small room dedicated to the York and Lancaster Regiment with whom my father was attached during the war. There was no mention of the two battalions who operated in southern Burma where my father was posted. But before I arrived at Clifton Park, I first visited where I was born.

My journey from Baslow, where I had dropped off Alison, took me through Chestefield, then the M1. I found the right junction to take me into Rotherham, but spent a wasted 15 minutes trying to find the Herringthorpe district. It was here, at No 58 Wordsworth Drive,  that my grandfather Ralph Askew (son of George) lived with my grandmother. Their children were there including my mother Dorothy Askew. It was where I was taken as a baby after being born in Clifton Lane Nursing Home. my father was away in Burma when I was born, so No 58 was my very first home, and was so for three or four years. This is the house.

I knew the house was semi-detached, but had forgotten that it was a semi on the corner of Middle Lane. This road is the boundary of Herringthorpe Playing Fields so when my brother John and I went to stay with our grandmother for a week in the summer holidays at the ages of around seven to nine, we only had to cross this road to play on the huge open expanses of grass.

I know we were staying there in 1953, when I was eight years old, because that was when we were invited next door to watch England regain The Ashes at the Oval. Video on YouTube. In the early morning my brother John and I would cross the fields to the far end to feed the donkeys that were there to give rides during the school holidays.

Even at that age we were put on the train at St Pancras in the care of the guard and met at Rotherham station by our grandmother. I now realise we slept in the best bedroom in her house, John and I sharing the high double bed with a noisy clock nearby. 

As it was August, Rotherham United players were in early season training on Herringthorpe Playing Fields, and we were able to get autographs of footballers that we had no clue of who they were.

I always remember that on the corner of Middle Lane and Clifton Lane in the 1950's, there used to be a fish and chip shop where Nanan would buy us a bag of chips to eat on the walk back. Something our mother would never have allowed. I'm not sure if the current shop is exactly where the previous one stood, but it might be.

I have a vivid memory of the August of 1953, at the age of eight, when we were invited next door to watch the moment England beat Australia in the last test to win that ashes series. 

It was only a very short drive to the car park at Clifton Park Museum. After the disappointment mentioned above, it was much better the stroll around the perimeter of the park.

 

There was at least one week when we visited in the 50's, the Clifton Park hosted each evening a week of events. One was a circus act, one a dog display team, and grass track motorcycle races, far too loud for our young ears. There is nothing I could find at the museum or online. I think I found the one level piece of grass, near the road, that might have been the venue.

Back at the car, I still had plenty of time, and the closed archives did me the biggest favour of all. I had seen a sign for the town centre, so I set off down the hill. Only ten minutes walk from the far end of the park and I was there, unrecognisable from when Nanan took us there on the bus. It is now completely pedestrianised. 

However, I did see the church that looked very like the one pictured on my christening record. 

 However, the sign said the church was Rotherham Minster, and this meant nothing to me. Undeterred, I climbed those steps and went inside. 

It was very quiet and as I was about to leave, I mentioned to one official that I really wanted Rotherham Parish Church. He called across to the vicar who came over and explained it had only changed name to an urban minster in the last few years. Yes, indeed it was always Rotherham Parish Church. Where Mum and Dad were married on 7th December 1943 before he was posted to Burma. And where I was christened after he returned. The font is the same one.

This was all quite emotional and totally unexpected as I had not planned on going to the town centre. As a climax to my family history, it could not have been better. Outside I realised that the church stood on a high promontory overlooking the town. It is mainly 15th Century and one of the finest examples of medieval perpendicular architecture in the north of England.

 I had not been back to the church for 77 years. But I'm so glad I made it.