Cannock Soroptimists learned about life in the Back to Back Houses in Birmingham recently from their speaker Mac Joseph. Mac was born and lived in one of the back to backs and he is now a guide with the National Trust properties in Birmingham.
These houses were one room deep, built back to back around a courtyard. One side of the houses had their front doors on the street, the other had the door onto the courtyard. They were built in the 1840’s to provide homes for the many families who moved to Birmingham to work – Birmingham was a thriving work place and many skills and trades were needed. There were usually 11 houses around a courtyard with one wash house and one toilet per 4 houses; 20,000 courtyards were provided and there were usually around 10 people living in each house. People were still living in these houses as late as the 1960’s!
Conditions were terrible: the houses were damp and until 1908 there were no sewage pipes – Chamberlain came to power in Birmingham then, he did a tremendous amount to improve living conditions.
Each courtyard had a ‘Boss’ – she would be either the oldest woman living there or the woman who had lived there the longest. It was her job to rota the wash days – in fact, nothing happened unless she said it could. Often there would be a tiny fence around a patch of the courtyard outside her house, that way, everyone knew where the Boss lived.
Women’s lives were hard – in Mac Joseph’s opinion their lives and work were much harder than men’s. The women built and tended the fires to heat the water and cook the food, they washed and cleaned all day long, caring for their large families. Above all, they took a pride in their homes, for that is what they were. We may look at photos now and consider the back to backs to have been slums but they were home to thousands of families.
Mac told the club that he had very fond memories of a loving home in the back to backs when community spirit was so evident. Soroptimist Shirley Brown thanked him for giving such an informative and interesting talk which had created a lot of discussion about housing conditions and community spirit.
The November speaker meeting is 11th November, 7.00pm at the Barns, when Marian Canning will be talking about her role as a Toastmaster. Tickets cost £13.00 and are available by phoning 07971 494510
Photo attached: Dr Janis Lomas, President, S I Cannock & District with Mac Joseph