Woolpack, Deansgate [Manchester]). “From the work usually known as ‘James's Views,’ published May 9, 1825.” Source: Old Manchester, Plate 18. [Click on image to enlarge it.]
Deansgate, the most ancient of all our public thoroughfares — a roadway that dates from the time of Tarquin and the doings of the Arthurian knights, and which has been trod successively by Saxon, Dane, and Norman, was entirely omitted in Ralston's delineations of Old Manchester, and has furnished only two subjects for the pencil of James. The first of them (No. 18) presents us with a view of the tottering pile which formerly stood at the lower end of Deansgate, between Shepherds-court — "Shepp-des Court" as it was called two centuries and a half ago — and Smithy-door-bank. In early days it had been the abode of gentility, for at one time this was accounted the fashionable quarter ; and pleasantly must the houses then have been situated, with their gardens and pleasure-grounds reaching down to the river's brink; but in later days, and up to the time of its demolition, the building was occupied as a tavern, and bore the sign of the Wool-pack. Contiguous to the old tenement was another dwelling of equal antiquity, that in the early part of last century passed into the possession of that accomplished scholar and critic Robert Thyer, when he took to wife the winsome widow of John, son of Peter Leigh, of the West Hall, in Cheshire, the great grandfather of the present Officer of Health for Manchester. [Old Manchester. 20]
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References
Old Manchester: A series of Views of the more ancient buildings in Manchester and its vicinity as they appeared fifty years ago.. Manchester: J. E. Cornish, 1875. Internet Archive. Web. 7 November 2012.
Last modified 7 November 2012