The Little Shop at Hunshelf Bottom
The history of what is now Samuel's Kitchen
August 2024 sees the 21st anniversary of Tracey Martin’s ownership of the café at Hunshelf Bottom now known as Samuel’s Kitchen. The building has had several tenants, but has only ever had two owners; Tracey, and Samuel Fox (the founder of the steelworks at Stocksbridge). Tracey bought the building from Corus, the owners of the steelworks at that time, in 2003. People might remember it being known as Loz’s Lunchbox, Hanwell’s and Rusby’s.
Unfortunately, the deeds to the building have been lost, and there are no copies lodged with the Deeds Registry at Wakefield.
Today the building is used solely as a shop and café, but it was originally built as four separate flats. Because the deeds have been lost, it is hard to pinpoint exactly when the building was erected, but because it was originally owned by Fox’s it was probably one of the many houses which were built for the workers as the Works grew rapidly after Samuel Fox started his wire drawing business here in 1842. Nigel Hanwell enquired at Fox’s about the date it was built when he was doing a school project, and was told it dated back to around 1860-1870. The building does not appear on an Ordnance Survey map published in 1854 but it does appear on an old photograph dated 1868. Unfortunately, only its roof can be seen, so it is impossible to tell whether the lean-to shop was also in existence at that time.
The four separate dwellings eventually became numbers 2, 4, 6 and 8 Hunshelf Road. Nigel Hanwell, whose family had the shop after the Rusbys, remembers the layout from before the four were converted into one. The two bottom flats were nos. 2 and 4 and were “1 up /1 down” with a stone staircase connecting the two floors. There might have been a dark, damp cellar-type room at the back, but without any natural light and not fit for habitation. There was no separate kitchen, but a Yorkshire Range was installed on the party wall which would have done for heating water, cooking, and providing warmth. The upstairs flats, nos. 6 and 8, were larger, with two rooms plus an attic bedroom and these were accessed by staircases at the back of the building. All the houses on Hunshelf Bottom and Hunshelf Park above were re-numbered in about 1953 and when these four flats were converted into one house it became no. 2 Hunshelf Road.
The lean-to shop abutted the end of a row of three terraced houses on Ford Lane. I have been unable to find out when they were built, but they appear on the 1868 photograph and, along with Corn Mill Row, were some of the first terraced houses on Ford Lane, pre-dating Bath Terrace which was a bit further on. They were possibly known as Peace Row originally.
An Ordnance Survey map of 1893 clearly shows the lean-to extension at the front right of the building, which proves that there was a shop here before Leonard Rusby moved in between 1911 and 1921.
I have read that in 1881 John Milnes had his grocer and draper’s shop in this lean-to. However I don’t think this is true; I think his shop was further up Hunshelf Bank, in the vicinity of the Rising Sun Inn and Prospect Cottages, perhaps just below Brownhill Row, where there was certainly a shop within living memory. It stood next to what became the electricity sub-station and has now been demolished. When John Milnes died, his house and shop went to auction and were bought by Fox’s. The description of John’s property when it was put up for sale does not match the known facts about the “Samuel’s Kitchen” building, and Tracey was told that the building had only ever had one previous owner, Fox’s.
It is very difficult to pinpoint “Samuel’s Kitchen” and the nearby houses using the old census returns. The census was only taken once every ten years, and it was quite rare to find the same people in the same house ten years apart. The census enumerators could be frustratingly inconsistent with the route they took and the names they gave streets and rows of houses, often recording them using unofficial names. For example, Vaughton Hill at Deepcar was so called because of the Vaughton family who lived there, with the row of houses which included the Travellers Rest public house being known as Vaughton Row. Except for when the landlord of the pub was called Makin and the row was recorded on the census as Makin Row.
Following the census enumerator’s schedule in 1881, he records the houses he passed from Henholmes, calling at Corn Mill Row, Ford Cottage, Bath House and Coach House. The next three houses were recorded as Peace Row, occupied by John Firth, William Barber and Verdon Ibbotson. Coming next were four households at what was recorded as “Newton Cottages,” which were occupied by William Newton, a butcher, John Spivey, Mary Newton and Edward Sykes. This does seem to me to be describing the three terraced houses at the end of Ford Lane, followed by “Samuel’s Kitchen” with four families living there including a butcher. John Milnes is listed next, draper and grocer, but, as mentioned above, I think he lived further up Hunshelf Road towards Brownhill Row.
When the 1891 census was taken the eight houses known as Bath Terrace had been built, but they were recorded as Bailey Row. Peace Row isn’t named, but there were three households at “Hunshelf Bottom” which could be them. Of “Newton Cottages” there is no mention, and I cannot pinpoint the “Samuel’s Kitchen” building with any accuracy. On the 1911 census the occupants of the three terraced houses, numbers 286, 287 and 288 Ford Lane, were Martha Brown, Frank Ellison and Sam Heaton. Four households were recorded at Hunshelf Bottom (one of those added “Newton Cottages” to the address); Thomas Ollerenshaw, Percy Wade, Harry Weston Crawshaw (my great uncle) and William Reaney. Whether this is the “Samuel’s Kitchen” building I cannot be certain.
Click on the photos for more information
THE RUSBYS
The Rusbys took over the shop between 1911 and 1921. Leonard Rusby had been born at Green Moor in 1868 at a pub called The Friendship Inn which his grandmother Ann Rusby had run. The 1871 census records him there, aged 2, with his parents William Rusby and Mary (nee Birkinshaw) and his grandmother, who was recorded as a “beer house keeper.” William and Mary took over the Friendship after the death of Ann. As far as I know, this pub was where Pond Cottage is at Green Moor, on Well Hill Road. William went on to be the landlord of The Rock Inn, also at Green Moor.
Leonard originally worked in the quarries at Green Moor. He married Amy Pickford in 1893 and in 1901 they were living at Trunce Farm, Green Moor. In 1911 they were at Old Mill, Huthwaite Bank in Thurgoland. They had four daughters, but only two survived to adulthood, Mary and Alice. Mary was born in 1894, and Alice in 1899. Annie died as a baby and Hannah died in 1915 aged 12. Mary and Alice worked in the shop and ran it together for many years after their father’s death.
As mentioned above, Leonard Rusby opened his shop sometime between 1911 and 1921. The first mention of Leonard and Amy being at Hunshelf Bottom is in the Electoral Registers for 1919, but none were published during the War, 1914-1918, so they could have been there earlier than 1919. Leonard and Amy’s daughter Mary married Tyson Birkhead in 1919 and Mary moved out, going to live with Tyson and his parents at Brownhill Row. Then in around 1924 Leonard, Amy and Alice moved to Haywood Lane, Deepcar, and Mary and Tyson moved into the house behind the shop. Leonard died in 1932; the local newspaper reported that he had seemed in his usual good health but died suddenly in his garden. He was 64 years old, and the paper said that he was a well-known tradesman who had formerly had a business in Ford Lane. Amy died in 1948 at the age of 83.
Alice continued to live at Haywood Lane – later electoral registers give the number as 52 – and she continued working in the shop alongside her sister Mary. In 1947 Mary and Tyson moved to no. 64 Haywood Lane. Mary would have been 54 years old and Tyson 55, so they weren’t of retirement age; perhaps they just wanted a larger house. Janet Sanderson, who had been born at the house adjoining Rusby’s shop, remembers that Alice’s house was at the bottom of Mary and Tyson’s garden. She remembers the two ladies fondly, and called them both “auntie.” In 1948 Tyson bought another house, at 281 Hunshelf Park (which became number 2 in 1953 and not to be confused with 2 Hunshelf Road, the shop!). He seems to have bought this as an investment and let the current occupants continue to live in it. The house had been bought in 1932 by Harry Grayson Dixon. He died in 1943 and his widow continued to live in the house after his death, along with her daughter Jessie and her husband Frederick Mudd. They were still living there after Tyson bought the house, presumably paying rent to him.
Tyson died in the Royal Hospital in Sheffield in 1956. The house at 2 Hunshelf Park passed to his widow Mary, and she sold it to Arnold Robinson in 1958. Mary and Alice continued to work in the little shop at Hunshelf Bottom until it was taken over by the Hanwells in about 1957/58.
Mary and Tyson never had any children; sadly, Mary had five full-term stillborn babies. Alice never married. The sisters went to live in a nursing home near Cawthorne before moving to a nursing home at Skelmanthorpe, which is where they died. Mary died in 1989 aged 94 and Alice died in 1994 aged 95
There are two similar photographs of Rusby's shop below, one of which can be dated more precisely than the other. The third of the four photographs dates to before 1960. Janet Sanderson’s parents lived in the end house on Ford Lane to which the lean-to shop was attached. Around the time Janet was born a lorry damaged the garden wall and possibly also caused some damage to the house. The lorry had been parked up on Hunshelf Road and was towing a trailer carrying a generator. The driver had got out of the cab and the handbrake failed, causing the lorry to run down the hill and collide with the wall. Janet’s mother, worried about it happening again, had the wall painted with black and white squares to draw attention to the fact it was there (although this would have had no effect on a runaway truck). Janet dates this happening sometime between 1958-60. The family later moved away, into the house known as The Barracks on Bramall Lane, behind the Chemical Laboratory. The fourth photograph was taken after the wall had been painted.
This wasn’t the first accident on this corner. Back in 1934 a Tennant’s Brewery steam lorry ran out of control on the steep incline of Hunshelf Bank. The driver stayed at the wheel and was aiming to steer the vehicle onto Ford Lane, but he saw some children playing in the road there, and although he leaned out of the cab to warn them of the danger, he was forced to try to swing round the sharp bend into Smithy Hill. Unfortunately, with the increasing speed of the lorry, he was unable to get round and collided with a stone wall in front of Bank House, knocking down about five yards of it before stopping on the edge of the bridge. The driver had only minor injuries, but his mate was taken to hospital in a serious condition. They would have been delivering to the Rising Sun on Hunshelf Bank, which was a Tennant’s house.
Click on the photos for more information
THE HANWELLS
Keith and Barbara Hanwell got married in May 1955 and Keith’s father, Jack Hanwell senior, moved them into the family shop at Old Haywoods, Deepcar which belonged to the bakery W. & J. Hanwell Ltd. The following year Jack heard that Rusbys were selling up and he sent Keith to speak to them about buying the business; the actual building still belonged to Fox’s at this time. They then moved into a house on Bath Terrace, 11a Ford Lane (there had never been a number 13 due to superstition about it being an unlucky number). They had moved from a house with an indoor bathroom to one with no bathroom, and toilets at the end of the row. They lived here until they were able to move into the flat above the shop, possibly in October 1961.
Nigel Hanwell has vague memories of the old Rusby’s shop. There was a long wooden counter to the right as you went in. There was a door into the downstairs flat behind the shop which contained an old black Yorkshire Range. The room was used for storage and was full of boxes. There was possibly an alcove off to the rear right where they made up sandwiches. Butter and sugar were weighed out as you wanted them, and the sugar bags were kept in an old dresser, which was eventually moved into the attic to be used as a work bench.
In the 1960s half the shop was taken up with loose sweets and sweets in glass jars – all the old-fashioned ones such as wine gums, humbugs, lemon sherbets and Fisherman’s Friend. The shop sold nylons (tights), hairnets and sachets of shampoo as well. Living above the shop had its advantages and disadvantages; people calling round at all hours to buy cigarettes for example. Being a keen fisherman, Keith sold fishing tackle for a while, but a mishap with some maggots eventually saw the end of this little venture!
After the Hanwells took over, renovation work was carried out to knock the four flats into one and create a shop inside the building instead of the lean-to, which was demolished; this was perhaps in 1961/2. The rent before the alterations was £2 11s. 1d. a week, which increased to £5 in 1962. It did not go up again until 1978.
When the Hanwells took over the building, there was no one living in no. 2, but there were tenants in the other three flats; Mrs. Firth lived in the bottom left flat, the Watkinsons in the flat top left and the Ollerenshaws in the flat top right. They were all re-housed. Mrs. Firth went to live in one of the new “old folks’ flats” on Pot House Lane just below Whitwell shops. The Ollerenshaws and Watkinsons moved into houses on Ford Lane, the Ollerenshaws to number 9 and the Watkinsons to number 15.
Click on the photos for more information
TRACEY MARTIN / SAMUEL’S KITCHEN
Fast forward a few years and in 2003 Tracey Martin succeeded Lorraine Taylor who had been running “Loz's Lunchbox,” buying the building from Corus, who were the owners at the time of Fox’s various properties, those that hadn’t been sold back in 1932 to the Bradford Property Trust. Tracey named it Samuel’s Kitchen in 2015 in honour of Samuel Fox’s 200th birthday.
He had been born in Bradwell, Derbyshire on 7 June 1815.
Click on the photos for more information
