Nostalgia
Down memory lane
Historian David Owen takes a walk back in time to discover the fascinating history of two more of Oswestry’s best-known streets; Beatrice Street and Willow Street.
Beatrice Street
Remarkably little has changed in this 1910 scene of Beatrice Street and The Old Fighting Cocks and today. The Fighting Cocks is regarded as a typical 16th century inn and was, until 1727, called the Lower White Horse (to differentiate it from the White Horse in Church Street). The gables of the building once projected much further into the road but were modified in the 19th century to improve the passage of traffic. Next to the Fighting Cocks, heading towards Albion Hill, was another half-timbered public house called the Upper Swan (the Lower Swan was further down Beatrice Street) and this appears to have been demolished sometime during the 20th century and replaced by Roy Evans Motorcycle Shop (Sissy Blu) and the Midland Bank Trust Building (Baldwins). On the opposite side of Beatrice Street was yet another public house called The Rainbow giving credence to the
story that Oswestry once boasted the highest number of public houses (per capita) anywhere in the United Kingdom.
Willow Street
Shown around 1905, this imposing entrance to the Market was replicated at the other end of the building in Bailey Street. When this picture was taken the entrance had been in existence in its pictured form for some 25 years, having been redeveloped around 1880. A public house called The Grapes Inn adjoined the market building and was demolished to form the New Street link between Willow Street and Bailey Street. At the same time the Market Hall was widened, and its entrance façade enhanced to include the imposing peak and the legend Oswestry Corporation Market. The building became a ‘shadow factory’ during WW2 for Coventry Climax who built fire pump engines. Incidentally, that same engine was developed further in the 1950s and 1960s and ended up powering the Hillman Imp car. The market building survived until the mid-1960s, when it was demolished and replaced by the ‘new’ Woolworths (Home Bargains) store. On the right-hand side of the road the pawnbrokers sign can clearly be seen outside Dale Brothers and, next to this, was yet another public house, the Bulls Head as well as the Boars Head which, of course, still exists. 50 | Oswestry life