course of manufacturing such dangerous articles as gun caps and
cartridges cannot be matter of surprise, and, perhaps, on the whole,
those named in the following list may be considered as not more than the
average number to be expected:--Two lives were lost by explosion of
fulminating powder in St. Mary's Square, Aug. 4. 1823.--Oct. 16, same
year, there was a gunpowder explosion in Lionel Street.--Two were killed
by fireworks at the Rocket Tavern, Little Charles Street, May 2, 1834.--
An explosion at Saltley Carriage Works, Dec. 20, 1849.--Two injured at
the Proof House, Sept. 23, 1850.--Five by detonating powder in
Cheapside, Feb 14, 1852.--Thirty-one were injured by gas explosion at
Workhouse, Oct. 30, 1855.--Several from same cause at corner of Hope
Street, March 11, 1856.--A cap explosion took place at Ludlow's, Legge
Street, July 28, 1859.--Another at Phillips and Pursall's, Whittall
Street, Sept. 27, 1852, when twenty-one persons lost their lives.--
Another in Graham Street June 21, 1862, with eight deaths.--Boiler burst
at Spring Hill, Nov. 23, 1859, injuring seven.--An explosion in the
Magazine at the Barracks, March 8, 1864, killed Quartermaster McBean.--
At Kynoch's, Witton, Nov. 17, 1870, resulting in 8 deaths and 28
injured.--At Ludlow's ammunition factory, Dec. 9, 1870, when 17 were
killed and 53 injured, of whom 34 more died before Christmas.--At
Witton, July 1, 1872, when Westley Richards' manager was killed.--At
Hobb Lane, May 11, 1874.--Of gas, in great Lister Street, Dec. 9, 1874.
--Of fulminate, in the Green Lane, May 4, 1876, a youth being killed.--
Of
gas, at St. James's Hall, Snow Hill, Dec. 4, and at Avery's, Moat Row,
Dec. 31, 1878.--At a match manufactory, Phillip Street, Oct. 28, 1879,
when Mr. Bermingham and a workman were injured.
~Eye Hospital.~--See "_Hospitals_."
~Fairs.~--The officers of the Court Leet, whose duty it was to walk in
procession and "proclaim" the fairs, went through their last performance
of the kind at Michaelmas, 1851. It was proposed to abolish the fairs in
1860, but the final order was not given until June 8th, 1875. Of late
years there have been fairs held on the open grounds on the Aston
outskirts of the borough, but the "fun of the fair" is altogether
different now to what it used to be. The original charters for the
holding of fairs at Whitsuntide and Michaelmas were granted to William
de Bermingham by Henry III. in 1251. These fairs were doubtless at one
time of great importance, but the introduction of railways did away with
seven-tenths of their utility and the remainder was more nuisance than
profit. As a note of the trade done at one time we may just preserve the
item that in 1782 there were 56 waggon loads of onions brought into the
fair.
~Family Fortunes.~--Hutton in his "History," with that quaint prolixity
which was his peculiar proclivity gives numerous instances of the rise
and fall of families connected with Birmingham. In addition to the
original family of De Birmingham, now utterly extinct he traced back
many others then and now well-known names. For instance he tells us that
a predecessor of the Colmores in Henry VIII.'s reign kept a mercer's
shop at No. 1, High Street; that the founder of the Bowyer Adderley
family began life in a small way in this his native town in the 14th
century; that the Foxalls sprang from a Digbeth tanner some 480 years
ago; and so of others. Had he lived till now he might have largely
increased his roll of local millionaires with such names as Gillott,
Muntz, Mason, Rylands, &c. On the other hand he relates how some of the
old families, whose names were as household words among the ancient
aristocracy, have come to nought; how that he had himself charitably
relieved the descendants of the Norman Mountfourds, Middemores and
Bracebridges, and how that the sole boast of a descendant of the Saxon
Earls of Warwick was in his day the fact of his grandfather having "kept
several cows and sold milk." It is but a few years back since the
present writer saw the last direct descendant of the Holtes working as a
compositor in one of the newspaper offices of this town, and almost any
day there was to be seen in the streets a truck with the name painted on
of "Charles Holte Bracebridge, Licensed Hawker!"
~Famines.~--In the year 310, it is said that 40,000 persons died in this
country from famine. It is not known whether any "Brums" existed then.
In 1195 wheat was so scarce that it sold for 20s. the quarter; ten years
after it was only 12d. In 1438, the times were so hard that people ate
bread made from fern roots. In 1565, a famine prevailed throughout the
kingdom.
~Fashionable Quarter.~--Edgbaston is our "West End," of which Thomas
Ragg (before he was ordained) thus wrote:--
--Glorious suburbs! long
May ye remain to bless the ancient town
Whose crown ye are; rewarder of the cares
Of those who toil amid the din and smoke
Of iron ribbed and hardy Birmingham.
And may ye long be suburbs, keeping still
Business at distance from your green retreats.
~Feasts, Feeds, and Tea-fights.~--Like other Englishmen, when we have a
good opinion of people we ask them to dinner, and the number of public
breakfasts, dinners, teas, and suppers on our record is wonderful. We
give a few of the most interesting:--3,800 persons dined with our first
M.P.'s., Attwood and Scholefield, at Beardsworth's Repository, Sept. 15,
1834.--A Reform banquet was the attraction in the Town Hall, Jan. 28,
1836.--Members and friends of the 'Chartist Church' kept their Christmas
festival, by 'taking tea' in Town Hall, Dec.28, 1841.--1,700
Anti-Cornlawites (John Bright among them) did ditto Jan. 22, 1843.--The
defeat of an obnoxious Police Bill led 900 persons to banquet together
April 9, 1845.--A banquet in honour of Charles Dickens opened the year
1853--The first anniversary of the Loyal and Constitutional Association
was celebrated by the dining of 848 loyal subjects, Dec. 17, 1855.--
dinner was given to 1,200 poor folks in Bingley Hall, Jan. 25, 1858, to
make them remember the marriage of the Princess Royal. Those who were
not poor kept the game alive at Dee's Hotel.--John Bright was dined in
Town Hall, Oct. 29, 1858.--A party of New Zealand chiefs were stuffed at
same place, March 16, 1864--To celebrate the opening of a Dining Hall in
Cambridge Street, a public dinner was given on All Fools' Day, 1864.--On
the 23rd April following, about 150 gentlemen breakfasted with the
Mayor, in honour of the Shakespeare Library being presented to the
town.--The purchase of Aston Park was celebrated by a banquet, Sept. 22,
1864.--Over a hundred bellringers, at Nock's Hotel, 1868, had their
clappers set wagging by Blews and Sons, in honour of the first peal of
bells cast by them, and now in Bishop Ryder's Church.--The Master
Bakers, who have been baking dinners for the public so long, in
December, 1874, commenced an annual series of dinners among themselves,
at which neither baked meats, nor even baked potatoes, are allowed.--Of
political and quasi-political banquets, there have been many of late
years, but as the parties have, in most cases, simply been gathered for
party purposes, their remembrance is not worth keeping.--To help pay for
improvements at General Hospital, there was a dinner at the Great
Western Hotel, June 4, 1868, and when the plate was sent round, it
received £4,000. That was the best, and there the list must close.
~Females.~--The fairer portion of our local community number (census
1881) 210,050, as against 197,954 males, a preponderance of 12,096. In
1871 the ladies outnumbered us by 8,515, and it would be an interesting
question how this extra ratio arises, though as one half of the
super-abundant petticoats are to be found in Edgbaston it may possibly
only be taken as a mark of local prosperity, and that more female
servants are employed than formerly.--See "_Population" Tables_.
~Fenianism.~--It was deemed necessary in Jan., 1881, to place guards of
soldiers at the Tower and Small Arms Factory, but the Fenians did not
trouble us; though later on a very pretty manufactory of dynamite was
discovered in Ledsam Street.--See "_Notable Offences_."
~Ferrars.~--The De Ferrars were at one time Lords of the Manor, Edmund
de Ferrars dying in 1438. The ancient public-house sign of "The Three
Horseshoes" was taken from their coat of arms.
~Festivals.~--Notes of the past Triennial Musical Festivals for which
Birmingham is so famous, the performances, and the many great artistes
who have taken part therein, will be found further on.
~Fetes~ were held in Aston Park July 27, and September 15, 1856, for the
benefit of the Queen's and General Hospitals, realising therefore
£2,330. The first to "Save Aston Hall" took place August 17, 1857, when
a profit of £570 was made. There have been many since then, but more of
the private speculation class, Sangers' so-called fête at Camp Hill,
June 27, 1874, being the first of their outdoor hippodrome performances.
~Fires.~--When Prince Rupert's soldiers set fire to the town, in 1643,
no less than 155 houses were burned.--Early in 1751 about £500 worth of
wool was burned at Alcock's, in Edgbaston Street.--May 24, 1759, the
stage waggon to Worcester was set on fire by the bursting of a bottle of
aqua-fortis, and the contents of the waggon, valued at £5,000, were
destroyed.--In November, 1772, Mr. Crowne's hop and cheese warehouse,
top of Carr's Lane, was lessened £400 in value.--The Theatre Royal was
burned August 24, 1791, and again January 6, 1820.--Jerusalem Temple,
Newhall Hill, was burned March 10, 1793.--St. Peter's Church suffered
January 24, 1831.--There was a great blaze at Bolton's timber yard,
Broad Street, May 27, 1841.--At the Manor House, Balsall Heath, in
1848.--Among Onion's bellows, in March, 1853.--At the General Hospital,
December 24, 1853.--At the Spread Eagle Concert Hall, May 5, 1855.--At a
builder's in Alcester Street, October 4, 1858.--At Aston Brook Flour
mill, June 1, 1862, with £10,000 damage.--At Lowden & Beeton's, High
Street, January 3, 1863; the firm were prosecuted as incendiaries.--At
Gameson's Tavern, Hill Street, December 25, 1863; six lives lost.--On
the stage at Holder's, July 3, 1865; two ballet dancers died from fright
and injuries.--At Baskerville Sawmills, September 7, 1867.--In Sutton
Park, August 4, 1868.--In a menagerie in Carr's Lane, January 25, 1870.
--At Dowler's Plume Works, March 16.--In Denmark Street, May 23; two
children burned.--At Worcester Wharf, June 2, 1870; two men burnt.--At
Warwick Castle, Dec. 3, 1871.--At Smith's hay and straw yard, Crescent,
through lightning, July 25, 1872.--In Sherbourne Street, June 25, 1874,
and same day in Friston Street; two men burned.--At the hatter's shop in
Temple Street, Nov. 25, 1875.--At Tipper's Mystery Works, May 16, and at
Holford Mill, Perry Barr, August 3, 1876.--At Icke and Co.'s, Lawley
Street, May 17, 1877; £2,500 damage.--At Adam's colour warehouse,
Suffolk Street, October 13, 1877; £10,000 damage.--In Bloomsbury Street,
September 29, 1877; an old man burned.--In Lichfield Road, November 26,
1877; two horses, a cow, and 25 pigs roasted.--January 25, 1878, was a
hot day, there being four fires in 15 hours.--At Hayne's flour mill,
Icknield Port Road, Feb. 2, 1878, with £10,000 damage; first time steam
fire engine was used.--At Baker Bros'., match manufactory, Freeth
Street, February 11.--At Grew's and at Cund's printers, March 16, 1878;
both places being set on fire by a vengeful thief; £2,000 joint damage.
--At corner of Bow Street, July 29, 1878.--At Dennison's shop, opposite
Museum Concert Hall, August 26, 1878, when Mrs. Dennison, her baby, her
sister, and a servant girl lost their lives. The inquest terminated on
September 30 (or rather at one o'clock next morning), when a verdict of
"accidental death" was given in the case of the infant, who had been
dropped during an attempted rescue, and with respect to the others that
they had died from suffocation caused by a five designedly lighted, but
by whom the jury had not sufficient evidence to say. Great fault was
found with the management of the fire brigade, a conflict of authority
between them and the police giving rise to very unpleasant feelings. At
Cadbury's cocoa manufactory, November 23, 1878. In Legge Street, at a
gun implement maker's, December 14, 1878; £600 damage.--And same day at
a gun maker's, Whittall Street; £300 damage.--At Hawkes's looking-glass
manufactory, Bromsgrove Street, January 8, 1879; £20,000 damage.--The
Reference Library, January 11, 1879 (a most rueful day); damage
incalculable and irreparable.--At Hinks and Sons' lamp works, January
30, 1879; £15,000 damage.--At the Small Arms Factory, Adderley Road,
November 11, 1879; a fireman injured.--At Grimsell and Sons', Tower
Street, May 5, 1880; over £5,000 damage.--Ward's cabinet manufactory,
Bissell Street, April 11, 1885.
~Firearms.~--See "_Trades_."
~Fire Brigades.~--A volunteer brigade, to help at fires, was organised
here in February 1836, but as the several companies, after introducing
their engines, found it best to pay a regular staff to work them, the
volunteers, for the time, went to the "right about." In 1863 a more
pretentious attempt to constitute a public or volunteer brigade of
firemen, was made, the members assembling for duty on the 21st of
February, the Norwich Union engine house being the headquarters; but the
novelty wore off as the uniforms got shabby, and the work was left to
the old hands, until the Corporation took the matter in hand. A
Volunteer Fire Brigade for Aston was formed at the close of 1878, and
its rules approved by the Local Board on Jan. 7, 1879. They attended and
did good service at the burning of the Reference Library on the
following Saturday. August 23, 1879 the Aston boys, with three and
twenty other brigades from various parts of the country, held a kind of
efficiency competition at the Lower Grounds, and being something new in
it attracted many. The Birmingham brigade were kept at home, possibly on
account of the anniversary of the Digbeth fire. Balsall Heath and
Harborne are also supplied with their own brigades, and an Association
of Midland Brigades has lately been formed which held their first drill
in the Priory, April 28, 1883.
~Fire Engines.~--In 1839 the Birmingham Fire Office had two engines,
very handsome specimens of the article too, being profusely decorated
with wooden battle axes, iron scroll-work, &c. One of these engines was
painted in many colours; but the other a plain drab, the latter it was
laughingly said, being kept for the Society of Friends, the former for
society at large. The first time a "portable" or hand engine was used
here was on the occurrence of a fire in a tobacconist's shop in
Cheapside Oct. 29, 1850. The steam fire engine was brought here in Oct.
1877.--See "_Fire Engine Stations_" under "_Public Buildings_."
~Fire Grates.~--The first oven grate used in this district was
introduced in a house at "the City of Nineveh" about the year 1818, and
created quite a sensation.
~Fire Insurance Companies.~--The Birmingham dates its establishment from
March 1805. All the companies now in existence are more or less
represented here by agents, and no one need be uninsured long, as their
offices are so thick on the ground round Bennet's Hill and Colmore Row,
that it has been seriously suggested the latter thoroughfare should he
rechristened and be called Insurance Street. It was an agent who had the
assurance to propose the change.
~Fish.~--In April, 1838, a local company was floated for the purpose of
bringing fish from London and Liverpool. It began swimmingly, but fish
didn't swim to Birmingham, and though several other attempts have been
made to form companies of similar character, the trade has been kept
altogether in private hands, and to judge from the sparkling rings to be
seen on the hands of the ladies who condescend to sell us our matutinal
bloaters in the Market Hall, the business is a pretty good one--and who
dare say those _dames de salle_ are not also pretty and good? The supply
of fish to this town, as given by the late Mr. Hanman, averaged from 50
to 200 tons per day (one day in June, 1879, 238 tons came from Grimsby
alone) or, each in its proper season, nearly as follows:--Mackerel,
2,000 boxes of about 2 cwt. each; herrings, 2,000 barrels of 1-1/2 cwt.
each; salmon, 400 boxes of 2-1/2 cwt. each; lobsters, 15 to 20 barrels
of 1 cwt. each; crabs, 50 to 60 barrels of 1-1/4 cwt. each; plaice,
1,500 packages of 2 cwt. each; codfish, 200 barrels of 2 cwt. each;
conger eels, 20 barrels of 2 cwt. each; skate, 10 to 20 barrels of 2
cwt. each.--See "_Markets_."
~Fishing.~--There is very little scope for the practice of Isaac
Walton's craft near to Birmingham, and lovers of the gentle art must go
farther afield to meet with good sport. The only spots within walking
distance are the pools at Aston Park and Lower Grounds, at Aston Tavern,
at Bournbrook Hotel (or, as it is better known, Kirby's), and at Pebble
Mill, in most of which may be found perch, roach, carp, and pike. At
Pebble Mill, March 20, last year, a pike was captured 40 inches long,
and weighing 22 lbs., but that was a finny rarity, and not likely to be
met with there again, as the pool (so long the last resort of suicidally
inclined mortals) is to be filled up. A little farther off are waters at
Sarehole, at Yardley Wood, and the reservoir at King's Norton, but with
these exceptions anglers must travel to their destinations by rail.
There is good fishing at Sutton Coldfield, Barnt Green (for reservoir at
Tardebigge), Alcester, Shustoke, Salford Priors, and other places within
a score of miles, but free fishing nowhere. Anyone desirous of real
sport should join the Birmingham and Midland Piscatorial Association
(established June, 1878), which rents portions of the river Trent and
other waters. This society early in 1880, tried their hands at
artificial salmon-hatching, one of the tanks of the aquarium at Aston
Lower Grounds being placed at their disposal. They were successful in
bringing some thousand or more of their interesting protegees from the
ova into fish shape, but we cannot find the market prices for salmon or
trout at all reduced.
~Fishmongers' Hall.~--Not being satisfied with the accommodation
provided for them in the Fish Market, the Fish and Game Dealers'
Association, at their first annual meeting (Feb. 13, 1878), proposed to
erect a Fishmongers' Hall, but they did not carry out their intention.
~Flogging.~--In "the good old days," when George the Third was King, it
was not very uncommon for malefactors to be flogged through the streets,
tied to the tail end of a cart. In 1786 several persons, who had been
sentenced at the Assizes, were brought back here and so whipped through
the town; and in one instance, where a young man had been caught
filching from the Mint, the culprit was taken to Soho works, and in the
factory yard, there stripped and flogged by "Black Jack" of the Dungeon,
as a warning to his fellow-workmen. This style of punishment would
hardly do now, but if some few of the present race of "roughs" could be
treated to a dose of "the cat" now and then, it might add considerably
to the peace and comfort of the borough. Flogging by proxy was not
unknown in some of the old scholastic establishments, but whipping a
scarecrow seems to have been the amusement on February 26th. 1842, when
Sir Robert Peel, at that day a sad delinquent politically, was publicly
flogged in elligy.
~Floods~--The milldams at Sutton burst their banks, July 24, 1668, and
many houses were swept away.--On the 24th November, 1703, a three days'
storm arose which extended over the whole kingdom; many parts of the
Midlands being flooded and immense damage caused, farmers' live stock
especially suffering. 15,000 sheep were drowned in one pan of
Gloucestershire; several men and hundreds of sheep near to Worcester;
the losses in Leicestershire and Staffordshire being also enormous.
Though there is no local record respecting it here, there can be little
doubt that the inhabitants had their share of the miseries.--July 2,
1759, a man and several horses were drowned in a flood near Meriden.--
Heavy rains caused great floods here in January, 1764.--On April 13,
1792, a waterspout, at the Lickey Hills, turned the Rea into a torrent.
--The lower parts of the town were flooded through the heavy rain of
June 26, 1830.--There were floods in Deritend and Bordesley, Nov. 11,
1852.--June 23, 1861, parts of Aston, Digbeth, and the Parade were
swamped.--Feb. 8, 1865, Hockley was flooded through the bursting of the
Canal banks; and a simmilar accident to the Worcester Canal, May 25,
1872, laid the roads and gardens about Wheeley's Road under water.--
There were very heavy rains in July and October, 1875, causing much
damage in the lower parts of the town.--Aug. 2 and 3, 1879, many parts
of the outskirts were flooded, in comparatively the shortest time in
memory.
~Flour Mills.~--The Union Mill Co. (now known as the Old Union, &c.) was
formed early in 1796, with a capital of £7,000 in £1 shares, each
share-holder being required to take a given amount of bread per week.
Though at starting it was announced that the undertaking was not
intended for profit,--such were the advantages derived from the
operations of the Company that the shareholders it is said, in addition
to a dividend of 10 per cent., received in the course of couple of years
a benefit equal to 600 per cent, in the shape of reduced prices. Large
dividends have at times been received, but a slightly different tale is
now told.--The New Union Mill was started in 1810; the Snow Hill Mill
about 1781; the Britannia Mills in 1862.
~Fly Vans.~--"Fly Boats" to the various places connected with Birmingham
by the canals were not sufficient for our townspeople seventy years ago,
and an opposition to the coaches started in 1821, in the shape of Fly
Vans or light Post Waggons, was hailed with glee. These Fly Vans left
the Crescent Wharf (where Showell and Sons' Stores are now) three
evenings a week, and reached Sheffield the following day. This was the
first introduction of a regular "parcels' post," though the authorities
would not allow of anything like a letter being sent with a parcel, _if_
they knew it.
~Foolish Wager.~--On July 8,1758, for a wager, a man named Moraon got
over the battlements of the tower at St. Martin's, and safely let
himself down to the ground (a distance of 73 feet) without rope or
ladder, his strength of muscle enabling him to reach from cornerstone to
cornerstone, and cling thereto as he descended.
~Football.~--See "_Sports_."
~Forgeries.~--The manufacture of bogus bank-notes was carried on here,
at one time, to an alarming extent, and even fifty years ago, though he
was too slippery a fish for the authorities to lay hold of, it was
well-known there was a clever engraver in the Inkleys who would copy
anything put before him for the merest trifle, even though the
punishment was most severe. Under "_Notable Offences_" will be found
several cases of interest in this peculiar line of business.
~Forks.~--Our ancestors did without them, using their fingers. Queen
Elizabeth had several sent to her from Spain, but she seldom used them,
and we may be quite sure it was long after that ere the taper fingers of
the fair Brums ceased to convey the titbits to their lips. Even that
sapient sovereign, James I., the Scotch Solomon, did not use the foreign
invention, believing possibly with the preacher who denounced them in
the pulpit that it was an insult to the Almighty to touch the meat
prepared for food with anything but one's own fingers. Later on, when
the coaches began to throng the road, gentlemen were in the habit of
carrying with them their own knife and fork for use, so seldom were the
latter articles to be found at the country inns, and the use of forks
cannot be said to have become general more than a hundred years ago.
~Forward.~--The self-appropriated motto of our borough, chosen at one of
the earliest committee meetings of the Town Council in 1839. Mr. William
Middlemore is said to have proposed the use of the word as being
preferable to any Latin, though "Vox populi, vox Dei," and other like
appropriate mottoes, have been suggested. Like all good things, however,
the honour of originating this motto has been contested, the name of
Robert Crump Mason having been given as its author.