THE LEICESTERSHIRE INDUSTRIAL HISTORY SOCIETY Founded in 1969 www.lihs.org.uk Newsletter Volume 8 No 1 Spring 2021 In this Issue…. Page 9 Page 4 The Great Central Railway Station. In memory of Dennis Calow 1926-2020 Page 20 Page 16 Page 23 Leicestershire Industrial History Society Spring 2021 The Leicestershire Industrial History Society Founded in 1969 Contents 3 A View from the Chair 4 The Corah Factory - Our Built Heritage vs. the Developers 6 A Tale of Two Tunnels 10 The Samuel Street Hydraulic Power Station and Tower 16 The Impact of a Railway on a Developed Urban Area - the GCR (Adapted from a 1984 article by Peter Neaverson) 20 A Tale of Two Tunnels (contd.) 22 Ullesthorpe Windmill 23 New Light on the Sheepy Magna Wheelwright’s Workshop 25 Leicestershire Railway Tunnels - Update 26 Thomas Cook, the first Railway Excursion Revisited 27 The Dale Abbey Furnace 2 Leicestershire Industrial History Society Spring 2021 A View from the Chair out by Peter Neaverson in 1984 on the impact Chris Hossack on the urban environment with the arrival of the GCR in Leicester. Last Autumn we suggested that we would With the Thomas Cook archive now at ROLLR produce four issues of the newsletter this year and hopes of having a lecture soon on the in order to better stay in touch with our subject once the huge amount of material has membership. However, Bill Pemberton, been sifted through, an interesting twist to the treasurer, membership secretary and Zoom tale is revealed as to what constituted the first master in chief has been producing frequent railway excursion. updates of events which are happening, mostly The Moira Furnace will be familiar to many of on Zoom which we can all enjoy mostly free or you and Chris Tasker poses a question about its for a small charge. I particularly enjoyed Ned relationship to the Butterley furnace built 13 Newitt’s talk about the Slums of Leicester given years before. to the Secular Society, Mark Temple’s talk about Vanishing Windmills of Leicestershire, Due to Covid, very little work has been allowed subtitled ‘Gone with the Wind’, as well as Dr over the last few months at the dig site at Bridget Towle, president of the Lit and Phil Swannington and fingers crossed, we hope to Society speaking about the Rise and Fall of the be back on site in April. As in 2020, we will not Hosiery Industry in Leicester. be opening the Glenfield Tunnel this year. It is tempting to think we could do something in Our own LIHS Zoom talks have been September for the Heritage Days, but a narrow increasingly well attended: Bill Pemberton on tunnel is not a good place for social distancing, Southern African Railways, Chas Bishop from and we will just maintain the entrance area and the Space Centre, pre-Mars landing, indicated hope for better times in 2022. the very exciting future for Space Technology here in Leicester, Prof Marilyn Palmer on the Welcome to three new members who have technology that was used in the country houses joined recently, Matt Davis from Syston who is of Britain; Kieran Lee on the Bennerley Viaduct making videos of railways, Stuart McCullouch, and Malcolm Riddle on the GCR. born in Leicester with many family links to the Leicester industrial scene now living in Solihull, An extra meeting was fitted in by inviting the and Martin Green, chair of Warwickshire developers of the Corah factory in Burley’s Way Industrial Archaeology. It is so good with Zoom to share their early plans for this iconic site in that although we cannot meet in person, we the centre of our city. Stuart Warburton’s can still enjoy lectures from anywhere in the article reflects the impressions of the audience world. I am a member of Somerset Industrial who felt too much was to be lost using these Archaeology Society and enjoyed a talk last initial plans. week on ‘The Whetstone Mines of the For our Spring 2021 News Letter, we have Blackdown Hills’ where miners tunnelled into articles by Peter Ellis from the Victorian Society the steep hillsides to bring out sandstone on the Samuel Street Hydraulic Power Station concretions which were fashioned into and Accumulator Tower; Mike Torrington sharpening stones such as you would use with compares the Glenfield Tunnel and Tunel de a scythe. Cumbre in Mexico and Bill Pemberton updates Here’s hoping that we will soon be out and his study of tunnels in Leicestershire. Fred about again for real. Hartley voices concern for the fate of the Sheepy Magna wheelwright’s workshop which appears to be falling on hard times. With the restoration and fitting out of the Great Central Station, Leicester, we revisit research carried 3 Leicestershire Industrial History Society Spring 2021 The Corah Factory - Our Built Heritage vs. the Developers Stuart Warburton This would keep a tangible link with the heritage There are plans to redevelop the Corah factory but allow the site to take on a new life for future site off Burleys Way which is a huge site largely generations, creating a site where the heritage derelict but with an incredible built heritage has acted as a catalyst to inspire the new and place in Leicester’s industrial story. The architecture, thus building a bridge between past textile history in Leicester is of immense and future. importance, it was the key industry that made The developer in producing outline plans for the Leicester one of the wealthiest towns in Europe site does not reflect the built heritage and by the 1930's. The industry touched many importance of the site to the history of Leicester, people’s lives until its wind-down during the or integrate the historic buildings into the new 1970's and 80's. One of the major players build. The proposal is to retain the splendid within the Leicester knitting story was Corah. frontage of the 1865 building and two remaining Although the buildings or site are not listed, it chimneys at the rear of the site, adjacent to the is included in the City Council’s Local Heritage Grand Union Canal. The proposal also looks at Assets Register which identifies Corah’s factory creating a pedestrian walkway from Burleys Way as a site of local historical and/or architectural to Abbey Park and opening up the canal side. The significance. development will also recreate St. Margaret’s I do not want to delve into the history of Green, an open space that was created as a Corah’s; that can be found in numerous books ‘green’ in 1865 at the front of the Head Office and websites, but I do want to stress that the building. Both these proposals are to be remains of its built heritage, i.e. the factory site, welcomed, but the same cannot be said of the are a tangible link with Leicester’s past and proposals for the remaining buildings. future. The 1865 building is largely intact, but There is no doubt that in creating a visual modern forlorn, the 1937 – 1950 corner building, known landscape in the centre of the town with old as the horseshoe building, that fronts onto derelict buildings some will need to be sacrificed. Burleys Way is a landmark building and in many However, the approach to environmental ways iconic with its now removed corner late conservation is to save buildings that are Art Deco statue, which I have been assured is architecturally worthy, easy to convert, and are safe and awaiting a new home, hopefully the a landmark within the built environmental new development? heritage. The two key buildings in the Sadly, but to be expected, the vast majority of development; the 1865 building and the 1937 – the factory site has been lost over the years and 1950 horseshoe building lend themselves to the way the site developed has in some way conversion as they are spacious factory buildings clouded the history and beauty of the factory’s that other developers around the country have development. All the 1860 – 1900 factory proven to be flexible and suitable for conversion buildings have gone, likewise much of the early to flats/offices. 1900's buildings and some of the interwar This development however sees the complete buildings, but what has survived is important; destruction of the Burleys Way horseshoe the original 1865 frontage building, hidden building, thus removing an iconic landmark behind the 20�� century developments and building and ‘facadism’ of the 1865 building. The most of the Burleys Way landmark horseshoe practice of facadism i.e. just keeping the front of building. a building and building new behind, was a With the redevelopment one would expect the principle largely abandoned in conservation and developer’s architects and planners to look at development projects during the 1980's. the remaining buildings and like so many other The argument is that it would cost too much to similar factory redevelopments and retain the whole of the 1865 building and the conversions in numerous northern and midland horseshoe building does not lend itself to towns create a plan that integrates the more conversion. iconic buildings into the new build. 4 Leicestershire Industrial History Society Spring 2021 No developer can ignore the economic 1) The whole of the 1865 building is retained. constraints of their development but if 2) The horseshoe building is largely retained or facadism is acceptable for the 1865 building at least the frontage is restored and retained then why not the 1937 – 50 horseshoe building as an iconic landmark building in a prominent and retain a landmark within Leicester’s built location.