123 Cresent Rd, Crumpsall 1843

[Viktoria]

Hi, on my aunt`s death cert she is stated as dying at 123  Crescent Road, she was 31 and died from tuberculosis in 1931. On my grandmother`s death cert  it also says 123 Crescent Road, she was 67 and died from complications following a perforated gall bladder . In 1941 a cousin died from leukaemia aged 39 also at 123 Crescent Road  so it was not a hospital or ward specialising in one illness.My grandfather died in1946 of "senility" and was in Delauney`s the address on the death cert is  72 Delauney`s Road.His daughter- my aunt died in North Manchester General Hospital. Crumpsall, according to her death cert, of cancer and heart failure. I`m still puzzled. Delauney`s Road was where the policeman was killed when raiding a suspected terrorist house, it is a residential road and the hospital drive goes off to the right. Crescent Road is a long long winding road.There is a very old cemetery on the hill, a Jewish cemetery I think. It used to look like a scene from Dickens with the blackened buildings silhouetted against the sky and the gravestones at all angles. Brrr! Viktoria.

[hilarybelton]

123 and 223 seem to be the same place, but at one time there seem to have been three different hospitals, one at Delauney Road and the other two both seem to have been on Crumpsall Road. My best guess is that the site at Delauneys Road grew in importance and became the main hospital with the accident and emergency and eventually, sometime in the 70s perhaps, the Crumpsall Road hospital was gradually wound down and closed. A similar thing happened in Salford, Ladywell hospital eventually became more of an old people's hospital with no accident and emergency, and fairly recently (10 years or so) it was finally closed and sold to become a shopping centre!

I am guessing. Of course, the patients would have had all sorts of complaints, but the hospital gradually treats the ill rather than the critical and the emergencies. Just my guess - and I am unlikely to research it further as I have now found out where our relative died and that it was a hospital.

Best wishes, Hilary

[hilarybelton]

PS! On Google Earth I can see the rather rocky looking ground at the end of the road. If that is where the Jewish cemetery is, I can imagine how spooky it looked! I'll have a look around there in the next couple of weeks.

Hilary

[emmsthheight]

Hi Just another thought from what you said.  I don't know the Crumpsall Hospital, but you mentioned one site being private houses.

It doesn't rule it out being part of the hospital.

I lived in rooms in a terraced hpoiuse when I first came here, and at different times, the buildings - two houses together had been used as different departments of the hospital nearby.,

I've been told it was once used for maternity and also has been used for rlderly care - in fact I've seen it in directories.  It was also used for some kind of surgery at one stage.

Iused to live back tio back with this pace, and there was an upstairs back window which was an unusual shape - large but blocked in.

When I moved in I discovered that this was a large bed sit which has once been used as an operating theatre!  There was still evidence in that rather than skirting boards, there was a concrete curved section between the floor and the ceilingv- so that it could be sluiced out!

Also, the basement was only half depth and there was water, but in it were old basketweave bath chairs and old glass bottles obviously intended for rather personal use!

So, the houses actually could have been used by the hospital!

Just a thought!

Best wishes

Emms

[emmsthheight]

Hi Again

Just another little thought.  Could Street renumbering come into the equation somewhere?  I'm sure the locals will know!

Emms

[hilarybelton]

I'll try and find a local who is old enough to know! And when I do, I'll let you all know what I discover!

Thanks a lot,
Hilary

[Viktoria]

Hi emstheight, your description of the contents of the place you lived in reminded me of what was in the cellars at Crumpsall Hosp. in the 1950`s when I was on the prem baby unit. I used to get the bus home on Delauney`s Road and had to walk quite a long way along the main corridor and then double back and do the same journey back the way I had come outside the building. I had not much time to get the once an hour bus so used a short cut by leaving the building via one of the little "turrets"  ( this was not allowed.) I did this once only to find the door to the outside was locked so I had to go back up stairs to the entrance to the turret back to the  main corridor well someone had locked that too,the only way out was through the cellars.It was dark, there were funny beds with restraints and strait jackets attached for restraining mentally ill people I suppose , although this was not the psychiatric unit -  but worst of all were the seemingly HUNDREDS of feral cats living below the gratings covering the central heating pipes. They started ganging up--well that`s what it seemed like,making dreadful unearthly miaows. Finally I found a door not locked ,just near Matron`s office ,so I`d had to walk from the furthest part of the building nearest Delauneys Road in the cellars to the main entrance . There was very poor lighting just "bulkhead " lights . Horrible. On another occasion  (on 24th December 1958 )I was walking to get the bus and it was foggy ,a real pea-souper so thick sounds were  distorted and I heard what sounded like an abandoned new-born baby in the overgrown bushes. I naturally investigated . It was two B----Y tom cats staring each other out but it really sounded like a tiny distressed baby.Cheerio . Viktoria.

[hilarybelton]

I think you two should write the book - or even the film!

[emmsthheight]

The book might be too scary for Rootschat, never name the film!

I've never explained the noises I heard!

By the way, you said there was equipment for tying pople down, etc but could this have been for other reasons than a mental hospital.  Didn't they do this for all sorts of gory proceedures before anaesthetics became more sophisticated?

Viktoria, that basement sounds fascinating!  Really scary though!

Time for tea!

Emms