kinds free from breakage, cracks, soft or other inferior quality bricks’.
An advertisement, placed by Beart’s, in a newspaper from this time
boasted an extensive of buildings that had been constructed of their
bricks. Among these were Chelsea Barracks, Alexandra Palace,
St. Thomas’s Hospital, Selfridges, Harrod’s and Debenhams.
Text based on ‘Arlesey – The Pits’ by Geoff Page (bibliography: Kellys Directory
1898 edition, Bricks to Build a House by John Woodforde, and Bedfordshire
County Planning Department. With references to Robert Beart from the British
Brick Society. Information Sheet 115, February 2011.
‘Arlesey – The Pits’ can be read here:
http://www.onthebuttonarlesey.co.uk/features.html
Arlesey, construction work at the site in 1938.
Image supplied by Andrew Mortlock, Whittlesey, Peterborough
in conjunction with Hanson Building Products
Next month: Building the future
If you have some stories or images you would like to share of the
brick works here in Arlesey, please contact us – see details below.
three counties column
Each month Richard Knight will feature an item from Three Counties
Hospital from his collection of history and memorabilia. This month we have:
Codd’s
bottle
Have you ever
wondered where the
saying “ What a load
of old Codd’s Wollop”
came from?
It is believed to be a late Victorian beer
drinkers sarcastic slang term aimed at Hiram
Codd’s globe stopper bottles. The bottles
were used for lemonade, selzer water
and other flavoured children’s carbonated
drinks. Wollop was a term for beer or drink
in Victorian times. It was said ‘no selfrespecting beer swilling gent would be seen
dead with a bottle of Codd’sWallop’.
However these bottles were very attractive
and desirable to children at the time because
after they had finished the drink they could
smash the top off the bottle and retrieve the
marble from inside.
Three Counties Asylum was a self
sufficient unit, which along with everything
else it had its own lemonade/mineral water
bottling plant. The bottles and plant were
supplied by Messers Hayward Tyler and Company of London.
in 1911 attendants were able to purchase two mineral water bottles per
day at a cost of 10 shillings {approx 50p} annually. Deaths and severe
illness had hit Three Counties through an outbreak of typhoid from the
contaminated asylum water supply. Staff refused to drink water from the
taps and purchased the mineral water, unfortunately the patients were not
so lucky, because some of the patients were of a childish nature it was felt
that they would be to attracted and tempted to brake the bottle to retrieve
the marble from the inside. The heavy bottles are made from really thick
glass and when broken become a very viscous sharp strong weapon which
could inflict serious damage if used this way. Because of this the patients
had to take their chances with the contaminated water supply.
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on the button, 32 Stotfold Road, Arlesey. Bedfordshire. SG15 6XT www.onthebuttonarlesey.co.uk
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October 2015
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