Cauldwell Hall Road: house names

Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 4a
Cauldwell Hall Road runs from the Woodbridge Road/Rushmere Road junction in the north down to the Foxhall Road/Derby Road junction in the south. Walking from The Golden Key southwards, its length contains a whole range of style and period in terms of house name plaques. The one featured above on number 72a is almost unreadable due to very shallow carving of characters and over-whitewashing. We think that it is 'ASHBROOKE COTTAGES'. The central wheat sheaves and curled, furling scroll (and the plaque's narrowness) make it worthy of note. Long shots are suffixed by 'a'.

1
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 2
2a

2

3
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 54a
4

5
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 86a
6

7

8
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 14
9a
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 15
10a
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 11
11a

11

12
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 16
13a

13
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 19
14a

14
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 20
15a

15
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 22a
16

16a

17

18

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Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd 26
20a

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Ardire Villa 1
29a (Warwick Rd)
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Ardire Villa 2
29 (Warwick Rd)
The locations of these names (from top left)
1. 'GLENHURST' is on (perhaps oddly) numbers 71 and 75 Cauldwell Hall Road.
2. 'COBDEN COTTAGES' on numbers 64 and 66 is deeply carved on the characteristic flamboyant scroll of the Ipswich & Suffolk Freehold Land Society (compare with scrolls on the next example at number 72a and the last, a much plainer affair). Richard Cobden (1804-1865) was a British manufacturer, radical and Liberal statesman, associated with John Bright in the formation of the Anti-Corn Law League as well as with the Cobden–Chevalier Treaty, an Anglo-French Free Trade treaty.

3. 'ASHBROOKE COTTAGES' [?] on number 72a :see the top of this page.
4. 'VICTOR COTTAGES' on number 94 is a corner name plaque, although it must apply to number 92 also.
5. 'LORRIMORE VILLAS 1882' at numbers 98 and 100 is the first to bear a date. A 1681 map of Walworth made for Dean and Chapter of Canterbury Cathedral shows a common called "Lattam-more" (or Lower Moor), which is now the location for Lorrimore Square, south London.
6. 'S-SLAND? COTTAGE' on the corner of number 115 is very difficult to read.

7. 'ALLEGRO COTTAGES 1891' on numbers 125 and 127 on a block between two central windows.
8. 'RICHMOND HOUSE' and 'WEST VILLAS' are neighbours and show the names on lintels above ground floor bay windows. Possibly numbers 135 and 141? Several of these examples are here:
9a. 'MALCOM VILLA' ans 'MARJORIE VILLA'.
10a. 'CHESHAM VILLA' and 'WARWICK VILLA'.
11. 'FREEHOLD TERRACE A.D. 1877' is in the centre of a terrace above numbers 172 and 174; commemorates the Ipswich Freehold Land Society which was responsible for much of the housing development here.
12. 'FLORENCE VILLAS 1895' above numbers 195 and 197.
13. 'PEMBROKE VILLAS 1899' above numbers 217 and 219.
14. 'CHESTER HOUSE 1899' above number 212.
15. 'LONDON LODGE 1902' above number 257, a large double-fronter.
16. 'THE ELMS' above the front door of number 259.
The Elms
17. 'ORCHARD VILLAS 1891' above number 252 and 254.
18. 'GARDEN VILLAS 1891' above numbers 256 and 258.
19. 'MOREL VILLAS 1891' above numbers 267 and 269; the rendering on the left has covered the squared off corners of the plaque which are visible agains the brickwork on the right. Morels are edible fungus.

20. 'PROVIDENCE TERRACE' above numbers 266 and 268; the decorative incised script is somewhat spoilt by the rainwater downpipe.
21. 'GRANGE TERRACE 1895' above numbers 287 and 289; just readable despite the damage.
22. 'VICTORIA TERRACE 1897' above numbers 299 and 301; a curving serif'd font curving over the date.
23. 'ST JOHNS TERRACE 1899' above numbers 298 and 300.
24. Unreadable '---S COTTAGES' above 307 and 309.
25. 'ST GEORGE'S TERRACE 1876' above numbers 310 and 312.
26. 'ARTHUR COTTAGES' above numbers 323 and 325.
27. 'CAULDWELL HALL BUILDINGS' above numbers 331 and 333.
28. 'ARDIRE COTTAGES.' above numbers 339 and 341; unusual squared-off scroll ends. 'Ardire' appears to be Italian for foolhardiness....
29. 'ARDIRE VILLA a.d. 1883' – but here is the name again on a house in Warwick Road. 'Ardire' sounds Scottish?

173-177 Cauldwell Hall Road
Not named on stone plaques, but these flint and brick houses were early developments by the Freehold Land Society; see our California page for more.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cauldwell Hall Rd FLS 4  
Shopping in Cauldwell Hall Road in the 1950s
As so often, David Kindred's  Kindred Spirits website (see Links) provides a fascinating memoir by Rod Cross (who grew up in Clifford Road) of family shopping in this area.
'Rod said: “Cauldwell Hall Road may not immediately spring to mind as one of the more exotic or remarkable roads in Ipswich, but along with its widely diverse range of buildings, which represent almost every decade since the middle of the 19th century, it can also lay claim to being the longest completely straight road in the whole town. It is possible to stand outside the Golden Key on the corner of Woodbridge Road and see the traffic lights by the Railway Hotel in Foxhall Road, just under three quarters of a mile away.
“The road owes its unusual name to the unimposing hall, which still stands at the bottom of Cauldwell Avenue. It was the main residence of the vast Cauldwell Hall Estate, so called because of its 'cauld wells' (cold wells), which were the principal source of water for the north east of the old town.
“In 1849, nearly 100 acres of this estate were acquired on behalf of the Ipswich and Suffolk Freehold Land Society. Roads were constructed and the land divided up into 282 plots or “allotments”, which members of the society could purchase for £21.10s to build homes. It became such a common sight to see shovel-carrying workers trudging up Spring Road, like the gold-diggings in the USA, that the area became known as California.
“Its population of just 100 in 1851 increased more than tenfold within 20 years and by 1904 California was almost completely built up. Cauldwell Hall Road was an integral part of this housing boom, as evidenced by the plaques on the houses today: St George's Terrace 1876, Lorrimore Villas 1882, Chester House 1899 and London Lodge 1902. [All of these examples shown above.]
“I was totally oblivious to its historical pedigree when, as a small boy in the mid-1950s, I accompanied my mother to what I knew as “Cordlawl” Road to do the weekly shopping. The first stop was always J S Hotson and Sons, on the corner of Marlborough Road. This was a traditional family grocer's shop. It had bare floorboards and, down one side, a solid wooden counter, on which stood a shiny red bacon slicer. In one corner were open hessian sacks containing washing soda, flour, sugar and various types of dried fruit, all to be weighed out and bagged up as required.
“The white-coated proprietor who, strange as it seemed to me at the time, was not called Mr Hotson, but Mr Bush, would write down mother's order in a little notebook, while I would be carefully examining each and every box of Weetabix or Cornflakes. These often contained various free gifts, whilst the back of the packets sometimes bore designs for models such as vintage cars. These had to be cut out, folded and glued together. Only careful scrutiny ensured that I made the right selection.”
I also selected the biscuits, Rich Tea, Nice or Osborn. They were all sold loose with their individual tins lined up on a shelf. There was also a tin labelled 'broken biscuits', priced a little cheaper than the others. Once the complete order had been taken, Mr Bush would pack everything into a stout cardboard box ready for delivery by Les on his tradesman's bicycle later that day.
“Shufflebotham's Bakery stood on the other corner of Marlborough Road where it joined St John's Road. Because these roads met at an angle, the shop was V-shaped. Customers entered from the “pointed” end and walked down the ever-widening shop floor to the counter at the bottom. Loaves and other bakery products were displayed on shelving down the right-hand side. Mother always bought an un-sliced Devon loaf, freshly-baked. We never got to eat it until much later in the week, once the old had been consumed down to the last crumb! At that time a large loaf cost 4½ [old] pence!
“Crossing St John's Road we sometimes called into Mrs Savage's haberdashery before reaching our next port of call. Bloomfield's was a little butcher's shop with scrubbed wooden tables and a sawdust-covered floor. It was founded by Isaac Bloomfield, but I only remember Albert Bloomfield, the short, elderly proprietor and his young assistant, the tall, young, sleek-haired Ray Sale. Ray, a county bowls player, later bought the shop. At Bloomfield's we bought shop-made sausages and pork, cheese, liver and the weekly joint of lamb, mutton or beef. Bloomfield's also supplied our Christmas chicken, which had a lovely savoury flavour, totally absent in today's factory-reared birds.
“Opposite was Dean's greengrocery. For convenience we mostly bought our fruit and vegetables from the Co-op, whose horse-drawn greengrocery cart paid a twice-weekly visit to our road, but we usually found some reason to visit Mrs Dean to stock up on what we were short of.
“Passing Alex Fordham's betting shop, we would cross back into Marlborough Road opposite the off-licence on the corner of Freehold Road and head home. The weekly shopping was all done within a radius of some 50 yards and from shopkeepers who were all specialists in their particular field.”
In the 1950s there was far more to Cauldwell Hall Road than just the shops we visited. There was a hairdresser and a fearsome dentist named Pritchatt. Further along, between Fuchsia Lane and Foxhall Road, was another row of shops, including a general store, a newsagents, Durrant's electrical engineers, a furniture shop run by Gardiners and an upholstery business, which my uncle, Lew Fitch, took over from Albert Todd. Opposite was Blackburn's the chemist, who also ran a confectioner's next door.
“Today, of all these businesses, only the ladies hairdresser's, one of three clustered round the Marlborough Road junction, and the off-licence remain. The others have been converted into private homes or demolished and rebuilt.
“In the other direction, towards Woodbridge Road, were more shops. These included a fishmonger's, a wool shop, a fish and chip shop and a Co-op store. Opposite the Co-op, on the corner of Upland Road, was the garage for the Co-op bakery vans. These little, red, box-shaped vehicles were powered by electric batteries, which were recharged every night. This created a gentle, not unpleasant, humming noise, which you could hear as you walked by. This site is now another housing development.
“Beyond the Spring Road traffic lights and The Old Times public house, the character of Cauldwell Hall Road changed and it became rather less residential. It was dominated by the massive red-brick St John's Church. Next door was the church hall and the chapel of rest, with the Mount Zion Baptist Church opposite and the original St John's Primary School.
“In the schoolyard children played in their distinctive purple blazers. Finally there was a furniture remover, Pawsey's wholesale warehouse and an engineering works. Near Woodbridge Road was Welham's, a traditional grocer. Each of these landmarks became extremely familiar to me as, every day for seven years, during the late 50s and early 60s, I cycled to school.
“One in particular came to have a special significance. This was the Lion's Head on the corner of Freehold Road. At the rear of the pub was a billiards room containing a full-size snooker table. Once old enough, we would time our journey home from school each Wednesday to coincide with the pub's five o'clock opening time and then spend a blissful hour on the table.
“Fred Rattle, the bluff, shirt-sleeved landlord was not over-keen on an invasion of his pub by schoolboys with little money to spend. We would try to avoid his eye by not using the main entrance, but by entering the pub through the door at the rear. There was also an elderly barman called Albert. We called him 'Post' as he was extremely deaf! Ask for a packet of hamburger crisps and you could well end up with a small shandy!
[http://www.ipswichstar.co.uk/news/features_2_511/when_the_shopping_was_a_local_event_1_164335]


Related pages:
House name plaque examples: Alston Road; Broom Hill Road; Burlington Road; Bramford Road; Cavendish Street; Marlborough Road; Rosehill area;
Ipswich & Suffolk Freehold Land Society (F.L.S.); California
Street index; Origins of street names in Ipswich; Streets named after slavery abolitionists.
Dated buildings list; Dated buildings examples;
Named buildings listNamed (& sometimes dated) buildings examples.
Street nameplate examples;
Brickyards


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