New Street is greatly altered. At that time it was not much more lively than Newhall Street is now. The Grammar School is just as it was; the Theatre, externally, is not much altered; "The Hen and Chickens" remains the same; the Town Hall, though not then finished, looked the same from New Street; and the portico of the Society of Artists' rooms stood over the pavement then. With these exceptions I only know one more building that has not been pulled down, or so altered as to be unrecognisable. The exemption is the excrescence called Christ Church, which still disfigures the very finest site in the whole town.
Hyam and Co. had removed from the opposite side of the street, and had just opened as a tailor's shop the queer old building known as the "Pantechnetheca," and the ever-youthful Mr. Holliday was at "Warwick House." The recollections of what the "House" was then makes me smile as I write. It had originally been two private houses. The one abutted upon the footway, and the other stood some thirty feet back, a pretty garden being in the front. The latter had been occupied by Mr. James Busby, who carried on the business of a wire-worker at the rear. The ground floor frontages of both had been taken out. A roof had been placed over the garden, two hideous small-framed bay windows fronted New Street, and a third faced what is now "Warwick House Passage." The whole place had a curious "pig-with-one-ear" kind of aspect, the portion which had been the garden having no upper floors, while the other was three storeys high. The premises had been "converted" by a now long-forgotten association, called the "Drapery Company," and as this had not been successful, Mr. Holliday and his then partner, Mr. Merrett, had become its successors. It was in 1839 that the first portion of the present palatial building was erected.
A few doors from this was the office of The Birmingham Journal, a very different paper then from what it afterwards became. It had been originally started as a Tory paper by a few old "fogies" who used to meet at "Joe Lindon's," "The Minerva," in Peck Lane; and this was how it came about: The Times had, early in 1825, in a leader, held up to well-deserved ridicule some action on the part of the Birmingham Tory party. This gave awful and unpardonable offence, and retaliation was decided upon. Notes were sent to several frequenters of the room that, on a certain afternoon, important business would be "on" at Lindon's, and punctual attendance was requested. The room at the appointed time was full, and the table had been removed from the centre. The ordinarily clean-scrubbed floor was covered with sheet iron. A chairman was appointed; and one gentleman was requested to read the obnoxious article. This over, a well-fed, prosperous-looking, fox-hunting iron merchant from Great Charles Street rose, and in very shaky grammar moved, that The Times had disgraced itself and insulted Birmingham, and that it was the duty of every Birmingham man to stop its circulation in the town. This having been seconded, and duly carried, another rose and proposed that in order to mark the indignation of those present, the copy of the paper containing the offensive leader should be ignominiously burnt. This, too, was carried; whereupon the iron-dealer took up the doomed newspaper with a pair of tongs, placed it on the sheets of iron, and, taking a "spill" between the claws of the tongs, lighted it at the fire of the room, and ignited the ill-fated paper, which, amid the groans and hisses of the assembled patriots, burned to ashes. This ceremony being solemnly concluded, the "business" began. It was deplored that the "loyal" party was imperfectly represented in the town. It was considered desirable that the party should have an "organ" in the town; and it was decided to open a subscription there and then, to start one. The necessary capital was subscribed, and a committee was formed to arrange with Mr. William Hodgetts, a printer in Spiceal Street, for the production of the new paper. Mr. Hodgetts subscribed to the fund to the extent of £50, and the singularly inappropriate name for a weekly paper, The Birmingham Journal, was selected. The first number appeared June 4th, 1825. The editor was Professor Bakewell. It continued in the same hands until June, 1827, when Mr. Hodgetts paid out the other partners, and became sole proprietor. He enlarged it in 1830, at which time it was edited by the well-remembered Jonathan Crowther. In 1832 it was sold to the Liberal party. The Argus, in its issue for June, 1832, thus chronicles the fact:
"THE JOURNAL.—This newspaper is now the property of Parkes, Scholefield, and Redfern. It was purchased by Parkes in February last for the sum of two thousand pounds, and was delivered up to him on the 25th of March last. Poor Jonathan was unceremoniously turned out of the editorial snuggery into the miserable berth of the Editor's devil. 'Oh, what a falling off is here, my countrymen!' And who, think ye, gentle readers, is now Editor of The Journal? An ex-pedagogue, one of the New Hall Hill martyrs, a 'talented' writer that has been within the walls," &c., &c.
This seems to point to George Edmonds; but I cannot find any other evidence that he was ever editor. Be that as it may, Crowther remained, and the paper was published at the old office in Spiceal Street as late as May, 1833, when it seems to have been removed to New Street, and placed under the care of Mr. Douglas. In May of that year, Mr. Hodgetts published the first number of The Birmingham Advertiser. Meanwhile, Mr. Douglas sat in The Journal office, in New Street. It was a little room, about 10 ft. by 6 ft., and the approach was up three or four steps. Here he reigned supreme, concocted Radical leaders in bad taste and questionable English, and received advertisements and money. The whole thing was in wretched plight until about the year 1844, when—Mr. Michael Maher being editor—Mr. Feeney, who was connected with another paper in the town, went to London, saw Mr. Joseph Parkes, and arranged to purchase The Journal. Mr. Jaffray soon after came from Shrewsbury to assist in the management, and with care, industry, and perseverance, it soon grew to be one of the very best provincial papers in the country.
The Post Office occupied the site now covered by Lilly and Addinsell's shop. The New Street frontage was the dwelling house of Mr. Gottwaltz, the post-master. A little way up Bennetts Hill was a semicircular cove, or recess, in which two people might stand. Here was a slit, into which letters were dropped, and an "inquiry" window; and this was all. There were seven other receiving houses in the town, which were as follows: Mr. Hewitt, Hagley Row; Mr. E. Gunn, 1, Kenion Street; Mr. W. Drury, 30, Lancaster Street; Mr. Ash, Prospect Row; Mr. White, 235, Bristol Street; Miss Davis, Sand Pits; and Mrs. Wood, 172, High Street, Deritend. Two deliveries took place daily—one at 8 a.m., the other at 5 p.m. The postage of a "single" letter to London then was ninepence; but a second piece of paper, however small, even the half of a bank note, made it a "double" letter, the postage of which was eighteenpence.
Between Needless Alley and the house now occupied by Messrs. Reece and Harris, as offices, were three old-fashioned and rather dingy looking shops, of which I can tell a curious story. Rather more than twenty years ago, the late Mr. Samuel Haines acquired the lease of these three houses, which had a few years to run. The freehold belonged to the Grammar School. Mr. Haines proposed to Messrs. Whateley, the solicitors for the school, that the old lease should be cancelled; that they should grant him a fresh one at a greatly increased rental; and that he should pull down the old places and erect good and substantial houses on the site. This was agreed to; but when the details came to be settled, some dispute arose, and the negotiations were near going off. Mr. Haines, however, one day happened to go over the original lease—nearly a hundred years old—to see what the covenants were, and he found that he was bound to deliver up the plot of land in question to the school, somewhere, I think, about 1860 to 1865, "well cropped with potatoes." This discovery removed the difficulty, the lease was granted, and the potato-garden is the site of the fine pile known as Brunswick Buildings, upon each house of which Mr. Haines's monogram, "S.H.," appears in an ornamental scroll.
The Town Hall had been opened three years. The Paradise Street front was finished, and the two sides were complete for about three-fourths of their length; but that portion where the double rows of columns stand, and the pediment fronting Ratcliff Place, had not been built. The whole of that end was then red brick. Prom the corner of Edmund Street a row of beggarly houses, standing on a bank some eight feet above the level of the road, reached to within a few yards of the hall itself, the space between them and the hall being enclosed by a high wall. On the other side, the houses in Paradise Street came to within about the same distance, and the intervening space was carefully enclosed. The interior of the hall was lighted by some elaborate bronzed brackets, projecting from the side, between the windows. They were modelled in imitation of vegetable forms; and at the ends, curving upwards, small branches stood in a group, like the fingers of a half-opened human hand. Each of these branchlets was a gas burner, which was covered by a semi-opaque glass globe, the intent being, evidently, to suggest a cluster of growing fruits. Some of the same pattern were placed in the Church of the Saviour when it was first opened, but they, as well as those at the Town Hall, were in a few years removed, greatly to the relief of many who thought them inexpressibly ugly.
Nearly opposite the Town Hall was a lame attempt to convert an ugly chapel into a Grecian temple. It was a wretched architectural failure. It was "The School of Medicine," and, as I know from a personal visit at the time, contained, even then, a very various and most extensive collection of anatomical preparations, and other matters connected with the noble profession to whose use it was dedicated. From the Town Hall to Easy Row the pathway was three or four feet higher than the road, and an ugly iron fence was there, to prevent passengers from tumbling over. On this elevated walk stood the offices of a celebrated character, "Old"—for I never heard him called by any other name—"Old Spurrier," the hard, unbending, crafty lawyer, who, being permanently retained by the Mint to prosecute all coiners in the district, had a busy time of it, and gained for himself a large fortune and an evil reputation.
Bennetts Hill was considered the street of the town, architecturally. The Norwich Union Office then held aloft the same lady, who, long neglected, looks now as if her eyes were bandaged to hide the tears which she is shedding over her broken scales. The Bank of England has not been altered, though at that time it was occupied by a private company. Where the Inland Revenue Offices now stand, was a stone barn, which was called a news-room. It was a desolate-looking place, inside and out, and it was a mercy when it was pulled down. At the right-hand corner, at the top, where Harrison's music shop now stands, there was, in a large open court-yard, a square old brick mansion, having a brick portico. A walled garden belonging to this house, ran down Bennetts Hill, nearly to Waterloo Street, and an old brick summer-house, which stood in the angle, was then occupied by Messrs. Whateley as offices, and afterwards by Mr. Nathaniel Lea, the sharebroker. At the corner of Temple Row West was a draper's shop, carried on by two brothers—William and John Boulton. The brothers fell out, and dissolved partnership. William took Mr. R.W. Gem's house and offices in New Street, and converted them into the shop now occupied by Messrs. Dew; stocked it; married a lady at Harborne; started off to Leamington on his wedding tour; was taken ill in the carriage on the way; was carried to bed at the hotel at Leamington, and died the same evening. His brother took to the New Street shop; closed the one in Temple Row; made his fortune; and died a few years ago—a bachelor—at Solihull.