Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham by Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell

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~King's Norton.~--Mentioned in Domesday, and in the olden times was
evidently thought of equal standing (to say the least) with its
five-miles-neighbour, Birmingham, as in James the First's reign there
was a weekly market (Saturdays) and ten fairs in the twelve months. The
market the inhabitants now attend is to be found in this town, and the
half-score of fairs has degenerated to what is known as "King's Norton
Mop" or October statute fair, for the hiring of servants and labourers,
when the Lord of Misrule holds sway, the more's the pity. The King's
Norton Union comprises part of the borough of Birmingham (Edgbaston), as
well as Balsall Heath, Harborne, Moseley, Northfield, Selly Oak, &c.,
and part of it bids fair to become a manufacturing district of some
extent, as there are already paper mills, rolling mills, screw works,
&c., and the Smethwick men are rapidly advancing in its direction--the
Midland Junction with the West Suburban line being also in the parish.
The fortified mansion, known as Hawkesley House, in this parish, was the
scene of a contest in May, 1645, between King Charles' forces and the
Parliamentarians, who held it, the result being its capture, pillage,
and destruction by fire.

~Kirby's Pools.~--A well-known and favourite resort on the outskirt of
the borough, on the Bristol Road, and formerly one of the celebrated
taverns and tea gardens of past days. The publichouse (the "Malt
Shovel") having been extended and partially rebuilt, and the grounds
better laid out, the establishment was re-christened, and opened as the
Bournbrook Hotel, at Whitsuntide, 1877.

~Kossuth.~--Louis Kossuth, the ex-dictator of Hungary, was honoured with
a public welcome and procession of trades, &c., Nov. 10, 1851, and
entertained at a banquet in Town Hall on the 12th. He afterwards
appeared here May 7 and 8, 1856, in the _role_ of a public lecturer.

~Kyott's Lake.~--A pool once existing where now is Grafton Road, Camp
Hill. There was another pool near it, known as Foul Lake.

~Kyrle Society.~--So named after the character alluded to by Pope in his
"Moral Essays":

"Who taught that heaven-directed spire to rise?
'The Man of Ross,' each lisping babe replies."

John Kyrle, who died Nov. 11, 1724, though not a native, resided at Ross
nearly the whole of his long and loyal life of close on 90 years, and
Pope, who often visited the neighbourhood, there became acquainted with
him and his good works, and embalmed his memory in undying verse as an
example to future generations. A more benevolent lover of his fellowman
than Kyrle cannot be named, and a society for cultivating purity of
taste, and a delight in aiding the well-being of others, is rightly
called after him. The Birmingham Kyrle Society was established in 1880,
and frequent paragraphs in the local papers tell us of their doings, at
one time cheering the inmates of the institutions where the sick and
unfortunate lie, with music and song, and at another distributing books,
pictures, and flowers, where they are prized by those who are too poor
to purchase. The officers of the society will be pleased to hear from
donors, as let contributions of flowers or pictures be ever so many, the
recipients are far more numerous. Mr. Walliker, our philanthropic
postmaster, is one of the vice-presidents, and the arrangements of the
parcel post are peculiarly suited for forwarding parcels.

~Lady Well.~--There is mention in a document dated 1347 of a "dwelling
in Egebaston Strete leading towards God well feld," and there can be no
doubt that this was an allusion to the Lady Well, or the well dedicated
to the blessed Virgin, close to the old house that for centuries
sheltered the priests that served St. Martin's, and which afterwards was
called the Parsonage or Rectory. The well spring was most abundant, and
was never known to fail. The stream from it helped to supply the moat
round the Parsonage, and there, joined by the waters from the higher
grounds in the neighbourhood of Holloway Head, and from the hill above
the Pinfold, it passed at the back of Edgbaston Street, by the way of
Smithfield passage and Dean Street (formerly the course of a brook) to
the Manor House moat. The Ladywell Baths were historically famous and,
as stated by Hutton, were the finest in the kingdom. The Holy Well of
the blessed Virgin still exists, though covered over and its waters
allowed to flow into the sewers instead of the Baths, and any visitor
desirous of testing the water once hallowed for its purity must take his
course down the mean alley known as Ladywell Walk, at the bend in which
he will find a dirty passage leading to a rusty iron pump, "presented by
Sir E.S. Gooch, Bart., to the inhabitants of Birmingham," as
commemorated by an inscription on the dirty stone which covers the
spring and its well. God's Well field is covered with workshops,
stables, dirty backyards and grimy-looking houses, and the Baths are a
timber-yard.

~Lambert.~--Birmingham had something to do with the fattening of the
celebrated Daniel Lambert, the heaviest lump of humanity this country
has yet produced, for he was an apprentice to Mr. John Taylor, button
maker, of Crooked Lane. His indentures were cancelled through his
becoming so fat and unwieldy, and he was sent back to his father, the
then governor of Leicester gaol. Daniel died June 21st, 1809, at
Stamford, where he was buried; his age was 39, and he weighed 52 stone
11 lb. (at 14 lb. the stone), measuring 9 ft. 4 in. round the body, and
3 ft. 1 in. round the thick of each of his legs.

~Lancashire Distress.~--The accounts of the Local Fund raised for the
relief of the cotton operatives of Lancashire were published Aug. 3,
1863, showing receipts amounting L15,115 4s. 10d.

~Lamps.~--The number of ordinary lamps in the borough, under the control
of the Public Works Department, on the 31st of December, 1882, was
6,591, of which number 1,950 are regulated to consume 5.20 cubic feet,
and the remainder, or 4,641, 4.30 cubic feet per hour; their cost
respectively inclusive of lighting, cleaning, and extinguishing, was L2
12s. 4-1/2d., and L2 5s. 2-1/4d. per lamp per annum. In addition there
are 93 special and 53 urinal lamps.

~Lands.~--In Birmingham it is bought and sold by the square yard, and
very pretty prices are occasionally paid therefor; our agricultural
friends reckon by acres, roods, and perches. The Saxon "hyde" of land,
as mentioned in Domesday Book and other old documents, was equivalent to
100, or, as some read it, 120 acres; the Norman "Carncase" being
similar.

~Land Agency.~--An International Land and Labour Agency was established
at Birmingham by the Hon. Elihu Burritt in October, 1869; its object
being to facilitate the settlement of English farmers and mechanics in
the United States, and also to supply American orders for English
labourers and domestic servants of all kinds. Large numbers of
servant-girls in England, it was thought, would be glad to go to
America, but unable to pay their passage-money, and unwilling to start
without knowing where they were to go on arriving. This agency advanced
the passage-money, to be deducted from the first wages; but, though the
scheme was good and well meant, very little advantage was taken of the
agency, and, like some other of the learned blacksmith's notions, though
a fair-looking tree, it bore very little fruit.

~Land and Building Societies.~--Though frequently considered to be quite
a modern invention, the plan of a number uniting to purchase lands and
houses for after distribution, is a system almost as old as the hills.
The earliest record we have of a local Building Society dates from 1781,
though no documents are at hand to show its methods of working. On Jan.
17, 1837, the books were opened for the formation of a Freehold Land and
Building Society here, but its usefulness was very limited, and its
existence short. It was left to the seething and revolutionary days of
1847-8, when the Continental nations were toppling over thrones and
kicking out kings, for sundry of our men of light and leading to bethink
themselves of the immense political power that lay in the holding of the
land, and how, by the exercise of the old English law, which gave the
holder of a 40s. freehold the right of voting for the election of a
"knight of the shire," such power could be brought to bear on
Parliament, by the extension of the franchise in that direction. The
times were out of joint, trade bad, and discontent universal, and the
possession of a little bit of the land we live on was to be a panacea
for every abuse complained of, and the sure harbinger of a return of the
days when every Jack had Jill at his own fireside. The misery and
starvation existing in Ireland where small farms had been divided and
subdivided until the poor families could no longer derive a sustenance
from their several moieties, was altogether overlooked, and "friends of
the people" advocated the wholesale settlement of the unemployed English
on somewhat similar small plots. Feargus O'Connor, the Chartist leader,
started his National Land Society, and thousands paid in their weekly
mites in hopes of becoming "lords of the soil;" estates here and there
were purchased, allotments made, cottages built, and many new homes
created. But as figs do not grow on thistles, neither was it to be
expected that men from the weaving-sheds, or the mines, should be able
to grow their own corn, or even know how to turn it into bread when
grown, and _that_ Utopian scheme was a failure. More wise in their
generation were the men of Birmingham: they went not for country
estates, nor for apple orchards or turnip fields. The wise sagaciousness
of their leaders, and the Brums always play well at "follow my leading,"
made them go in for the vote, the full vote, and nothing but the vote.
The possession of a little plot on which to build a house, though really
the most important, was not the first part of the bargain by any means
at the commencement. To get a vote and thus help upset something or
somebody was all that was thought of at the time, though now the case is
rather different, few members of any of the many societies caring at
present so much for the franchise as for the "proputty, proputty,
proputty." Mr. James Taylor, jun., has been generally dubbed the "the
father of the freehold land societies," and few men have done more than
him in their establishment, but the honour of dividing the first estate
in this neighbourhood, we believe, must be given to Mr. William Benjamin
Smith, whilome secretary of the Manchester Order of Odd Fellows, and
afterwards publisher of the _Birmingham Mercury_ newspaper. Being
possessed of a small estate of about eight acres, near to the Railway
Station at Perry Barr, he had it laid out in 100 lots, which were sold
by auction at Hawley's Temperance Hotel, Jan. 10, 1848, each lot being
of sufficient value to carry a vote for the shire. The purchasers were
principally members of an Investment and Permanent Benefit Building
Society, started January 4, 1847, in connection with the local branch of
Oddfellows, of which Mr. Smith was a chief official. Franchise Street,
which is supposed to be the only street of its name in England, was the
result of this division of land, and as every purchaser pleased himself
in the matter of architecture, the style of building may be called that
of "the free and easy." Many estates have been divided since then,
thousands of acres in the outskirts being covered with houses where erst
were green fields, and in a certain measure Birmingham owes much of its
extension to the admirable working of the several Societies. As this
town led the van in the formation of the present style of Land and
Building Societies, it is well to note here their present general
status. In 1850 there were 75 Societies in the kingdom, with about
25,000 members, holding among them 35,000 shares, with paid-up
subscriptions amounting to L164,000. In 1880, the number of societies in
England was 946, in Scotland, 53, and in Ireland 27. The number of
members in the English societies was 320,076, in the scotch 11,902, and
in the Irish 6,533. A return relating to these societies in England has
just been issued, which shows that there are now 1,687 societies in
existence, with a membership of 493,271. The total receipts during the
last financial year amounted to L20,919,473. There were 1,528 societies
making a return of liabilities, which were to the holders of shares
L29,351,611, and to the depositors L16,351,611. There was a balance of
unappropriated profit to the extent of L1,567,942. The assets came to
L44,587,718. In Scotland there were 15,386 members of building
societies; the receipts were L413,609, the liabilities to holders of
shares amounted to L679,990, to depositors and other creditors L268,511;
the assets consisted of balance due on mortgage securities L987,987, and
amount invested in other securities and cash L67,618. In Ireland there
were 9,714 members of building societies; the receipts were L778,889,
liabilities to the holders of shares L684,396, to depositors and others
L432,356; the assets included balance due on mortgage securities
L1,051,423, and amount invested in other securities L79,812. There were
150 of the English societies whose accounts showed deficiencies
amounting to L27,850; two Scotch societies minus L862, but no Irish
short. It is a pity to have to record that there have been failures in
Birmingham, foremost among them being that of the Victoria Land and
Building Society, which came to grief in 1870, with liabilities
amounting to L31,550. The assets, including L5,627 given by the
directors and trustees, and L886 contributed by other persons, realised
L27,972. Creditors paid in full took L9,271, the rest receiving 8s. 9d.
in the pound, and L4,897 being swallowed up in costs. The break-up of
the Midland Land and Investment Corporation (Limited) is the latest.
This Company was established in 1864, and by no means confined itself to
procuring sites for workmen's dwellings, or troubled about getting them
votes. According to its last advertisement, the authorised capital was
L500,000, of which L248,900 had been subscribed, but only L62,225 called
up, though the reserve fund was stated to be L80,000. What the dividend
will be is a matter for the future, and may not even be guessed at at
present. The chief local societies, and their present status, areas
follows:--

_The Birmingham Freehold Land Society_ was started in 1848, and the
aggregate receipts up to the end of 1882 amounted to L680,132 12s. 7d.
The year's receipts were L20,978 16s. 5d., of which L11,479 represented
payments made by members who had been alloted land on the estates
divided by the Society, there being, after payment of all expenses, a
balance of L11,779 12s. 9d. The number of members was then 772, and it
was calculated that the whole of the allotments made would be paid off
in four years.

_The Friendly Benefit Building Society_ was organised in 1859, and up to
Midsummer, 1883, the sums paid in amounted to L340,000. The year's
receipts were L21,834 19s. 6d., of which L10,037 came from borrowers,
whose whole indebtedness would be cleared in about 5-1/2 years. The
members on the books numbered 827, of whom 684 were investors and 143
borrowers. The reserve fund stood at L5,704 5s. 9d There is a branch of
this Society connected with Severn Street Schools, and in a flourishing
condition, 32 members having joined during the year, and L2,800 having
been received as contributions. The total amount paid in since the
commencement of the branch in June, 1876, was L18,181 13s. 11d. The
Severn Street scholars connected with it had secured property during the
past year valued at L2,400.

_The Incorporated Building Society_ comprises the United, the Queen's,
the Freeholders', and the Second Freeholders' Societies, the earliest of
them established in 1849, the incorporation taking place in 1878. The
aggregate receipts of these several Societies would reach nearly 3-1/2
millions. The amounts paid in since the amalgamation (to the end of
1882) being L1,049,667. As might be expected the present Society has a
large constituency, numbering 6,220 members, 693 of whom joined in 1882.
The advances during the year reached L78,275, to 150 borrowers, being an
average of L500 to each. The amount due from borrowers was L482,000, an
average of L540 each. The amount due to investors was LL449,000, an
average of L84 each. The borrowers repaid last year L104,000, and as
there was L482,000 now due on mortgage accounts the whole capital of the
society would be turned over in five years, instead of thirteen and a
half, the period for which the money was lent. The withdrawals had been
L85,409, which was considerably under the average, as the society had
paid away since the amalgamation L520,000, or L104,000 per annum. The
amount of interest credited to investors was L19,779. A total of
L100,000 had been credited in the last five years. The reserve fund now
amounted to L34,119, which was nearly 7-1/2 per cent. on the whole
capital employed.

_The Birmingham Building Society, No. 1_, was established in May, 1842,
and re-established in 1853. It has now 1,580 members, subscribing for
shares amounting to L634,920. The last report states that during the
existence of the society over L500,000 has been advanced to members, and
that the amount of "receipts and payments" have reached the sum of
L1,883,444. Reserve fund is put at L5,000.

_The Birmingham Building Society, No. 4_, was established in June, 1846,
and claims to be the oldest society in the town. The report, to end of
June, 1883, gave the number of shares as 801-3/4, of which 563-1/4
belong to investors, and the remainder to borrowers. The year's receipts
were L10,432, and L6,420 was advanced. The balance-sheet showed the
unallotted share fund to be L18,042, on deposit L3,915, due to bank
L2,108, and balance in favour of society L976. The assets amounted to
L25,042, of which L21,163 was on mortgages, and L3,818 on properties in
possession.

_St. Philip's Building Society_ was began in January, 1850, since when
(up to January, 1883) L116,674 had been advanced on mortgages, and
L28,921 repaid to depositing members. The society had then 326 members,
holding among them 1,094-1/4 shares. The year's receipts were L13,136,
and L7,815 had been advanced in same period. The reserve fund was
L3,642; the assets L65,940, of which L54,531 was on mortgages, L7,987
deferred premiums, and L2,757 properties in hand.

Several societies have not favoured us with their reports.

~Law.~--There are 306 solicitors and law firms in Birmingham, 19
barristers, and a host of students and law clerks, each and every one of
whom doubtless dreams of becoming Lord Chancellor. The Birmingham Law
Society was formed in 1818, and there is a Society of Law Students
besides, and a Law Library. At present, our Law Courts comprise the
Bankruptcy and County Courts, Assize Courts (held _pro tem_ in the
Council House), the Quarter Sessions' and Petty Sessions' Courts.

~League of Universal Brotherhood.~--Originated by Elihu Burritt, in
1846, while sitting in the "Angel," at Pershore, on his walk through
England. He came back to Joseph Sturge and here was printed his little
periodical called "The Bond of Brotherhood," leading to many
International Addresses, Peace Congresses, and Olive-Leaf Missions, but
alas! alas! how very far off still seems the "universal peace" thus
sought to be brought about. Twenty thousand signatures were attached to
"The Bond" in one year. Far more than that number have been slain in
warfare every year since.

~Lease Lane.~--Apparently a corruption of Lea or Leay Lane, an ancient
bye-road running at the back of the Dog or Talbot Inn, the owners of
which, some 300 years ago, were named Leays. When the Market Hall was
built and sewers were laid round it, the workmen came upon what was at
the time imagined to be an underground passage, leading from the
Guildhall in New Street to the old Church of St. Martin's. Local
antiquarians at the time would appear to have been conspicuous by their
absence, as the workmen were allowed to close the passage with rubbish
without a proper examination being made of it. Quite lately, however, in
digging out the soil for the extension of the Fish Market at a point on
the line of Lease Lane, about 60ft. from Bell Street, the workmen, on
reaching a depth of 8ft. or 9ft., struck upon the same underground
passage, but of which the original purpose was not very apparent. Cut in
the soft, sandstone, and devoid of any lining, it ran almost at right
angles to Lease Lane, and proved to extend half way under that
thoroughfare, and some four or five yards into the excavated ground.
Under Lease Lane it was blocked by rubbish, through which a sewer is
believed to run, and therefore the exact ending of the passage in one
direction cannot be traced; in the excavated ground it ended, on the
site of a dismantled public-house, in a circular shaft, which may have
been that of a well, or that of a cesspool. The passage, so far as it
was traceable, was 24ft. long, 7ft. high, and 4-1/2ft. wide. As to its
use before it was severed by the sewerage of Lease Lane, the conjecture
is that it afforded a secret means of communication between two houses
separated above ground by that thoroughfare, but for what purpose must
remain one of the perplexing puzzles of the past. That it had no
connection with the Church or the Grammar School (the site of the old
Guild House) is quite certain, as the course of the passage was in a
different direction.

~Leasing Wives.~--In the histories of sundry strange lands we read of
curious customs appertaining to marriage and the giving in marriage.
Taking a wife on trial is the rule of more than one happy clime, but
taking a wife upon lease is quite a Brummagem way of marrying (using the
term in the manner of many detractors of our town's fair fame). In one
of the numbers of the _Gentleman's Magazine_, for the year 1788, Mr.
Sylvanus Urban, as the editor has always been called, is addressed as
follows by a Birmingham correspondent:--"Since my residing in this town
I have often heard there is a method of obtaining a wife's sister upon
lease. I never could learn the method to be taken to get a wife upon
lease, or whether such connections are sanctioned by law; but there is
an eminent manufacturer in the vicinity of this town who had his
deceased wife's sister upon lease for twenty years and upwards; and I
know she went by his name, enjoyed all the privileges, and received all
the honours due to the respectable name of wife." A rarer case of
marital leasing has often been noted against us by the aforesaid
smirchers of character as occurring in 1853, but in reality it was
rather an instance of hiring a husband.

~Leather Hall.~--As early as the Norman Conquest this town was famed for
its tanneries, and there was a considerable market, for leather for
centuries after. Two of the Court Leet officers were "Leather Sealers,"
and part of the proclamation made by the Crier of the Court when it held
its meetings was in those words, "All whyte tawers that sell not good
chaffer as they ought to do reasonably, and bye the skynnes in any other
place than in towne or market, ye shall do us to weet," meaning that
anyone knowing of such offences on the part of the "whyte tawers" or
tanners should give information at the Court then assembled. New Street
originally was entered from High Street, under an arched gateway, and
here was the Leather Hall (which was still in existence in Hutton's
time), where the "Sealers" performed their functions. It was taken down
when New Street was opened out, and though we have an extensive hide and
skin market now, we can hardly be said to possess a market for leather
other than the boot and shoe shops, the saddlers, &c.

~Lench's Trust.~--See "_Philanthropic Institutions_."

~Liberal Association.~--On Feb. 17, 1865, a meeting was held in the
committee room of the Town Hall for the purpose of forming an
organisation which should "unite all the Liberals of the town, and
provide them with a regular and efficient method of exercising a
_legitimate_ influence in favour of their political principles." The
outcome of this meeting was the birth of the now famous Liberal
"Caucus," and though the names of ten gentlemen were appended to the
advertisement calling the meeting, the honour of the paternity of the
Liberal bantling is generally given to Mr. William Harris. The governing
body of the association was fixed at two dozen, inclusive of the
president, vice, and secretary; all persons subscribing a shilling or
more per annum being eligible to become members. The "General
Committee," for some time known as the "Four Hundred," was enlarged in
1876 to Six Hundred, and in June, 1880, to Eight Hundred, the Executive
Committee, at the same time, being considerably increased. The recent
alteration in the franchise, and the division of the borough and
outskirts into seven electoral districts, has led to a reorganisation of
the Association, or Associations, for each of the seven divisions now
works by itself, though guided by a central Council.--A "Women's Liberal
Association" was founded in October, 1873, and a "Junior Liberal
Association" in October, 1878.