The shop at 27 Harvey Street, on the corner with Quarella Road, Cadoxton, is a relative mystery. I posted on our Barry and District Museumeers page, and not many people could remember it as a shop, until our page expert found a few nice facts.
But, before we look at this research let’s look at the fabric of the building and where it fits on the old maps.
Although the building that we discuss this week at 27 Harvey Street is shown as standing, it is not marked as a shop in 1898 or 1915 on the Ordnance Survey; this is not surprising either. Most shops were not marked on maps at the turn of the 1900s.
I realised there was something special about 27 Harvey Street, as it has lots of blocked up windows and doors. The large partially blocked up window that faces Quarella Road looks like one that was used to display products, sold from a shop. The Quarella Road frontage uses primarily local yellow bricks from one of the many Cadoxton brickworks from the late 1880s. Terracotta red brick in string courses stretching around to Harvey Street is also used, and on the ground floor level plinth as well, alternating with the yellow bricks for windows and doorway detail.
The corner of Harvey Street with Quarella Road isn’t angular, but creates its own frontage. This frontage shows evidence of a former narrow door blocked up, using a different stone work than the blue Lias limestone that survives as five courses above the former doorway below. Above this is a clearly blocked window, the same stone used to block the doorway.
Here on the corner frontage, at first floor level, as with windows and the doorway on the Harvey Street front, are fine terracotta keystone bricks. In relief on the keystone is a flush of leaf detail.
Three other points: Looking at the Harvey Street frontage, this uses Lias limestone instead of yellow brick, except for windows and doorway detail. There is also a large blocked up window using a different stonework than that surrounding it. This window is very shop like. The chimneys of red and yellow brick are ornate.
Now over to what our Barry and District Museumeers said. The first sign that saw some sanity in my thinking of this building being a shop was from Sandra Campbell, who used to buy ‘toffee dabs’ from there in 1955, from an Ethel Green. However, Angela Palmer, who lived at 27 Harvey Street in the 1980s, told us it had previously been a family home for 25 years. However, more confusion?
Nino Spiteri did remember 27 Harvey Street as a shop in the 1970s. It was his friend’s parents’ shop. But the confusion is answered, as whoever ran the shop lived above.
Now some last-minute gems from the star of the show, John Anzevino of the Barry and District Museumeers. It was a shop! For in the Barry Dock News of August 7, 1891, Martel and Barker was the name of the shop at 27 Harvey Street! “The Noted Shop for Home-knitted Stockings and Real Scotch Wools. A large assortment of Gentlemen’s, Ladies’ and Children’s Socks and Stockings at a very low price.” The shop claimed in 1891 that it was ‘the sole Agents for the Sketchley Dye Works.’
But, as reported in the Barry Dock news of November 16, 1894, the shop was up for let! Known at that stage as The Central Stores. According to the Barry and District Newspaper of the day, it was “Suitable for Grocery Business. Shop complete with Fixtures and Gas Fittings. Convenient Dwelling House and Back Premises.”
On a final note this week, the Barry Dock News of November 12, 1897, tells us that a John Evans at our 27 Harvey Street shop was fined five shillings for the illegal sale of fireworks. The fireworks were exposed for sale in the window of his shop without a license. As a forensic archaeologist and film maker, I love this detail, this proves that they were blocked up shop windows after-all!
Deepest thanks for continuing to read this weekly column, and if you have any stories for us on the shop at 27 Harvey Street, email me: Karljlangford@hotmail.com
