ON TUESDAY, I printed a picture of Etchell's shop, on Bradshawgate, as you see from the photo (see instructions on how to view below), an old-fashioned building.

By co-incidence, I have just come upon more details, in an article in the Evening News about 50 years ago, and I thought you might be interested in the history of the building.

The article, by P. McC (a well-known journalist on the paper at the time) read: "There are not many buildings in Bolton that would ornament a Christmas card, for the timbered walls that go so well with the snow, also seldom seen, are few and far between nowadays.

"One that I was very sorry to see give way to a bright glittering cinema with a truly modern facade, was in Bradshawgate.

"The Lido stands now on the spot where this little, low, two-storeyed remnant of old Bolton charmed the eye. Even as a boy I wondered at the survival of this house among the rapidly changing buildings in one of the busiest streets of the town.

"Two sweet old ladies., the Misses Etchell, lived there and conducted a dyers' business. Customers and friends, usually the terms were synonymous, had to use a stone step, well worn by many feet, to go down in the low ceilinged shop, there to be met by one or other of the sisters primly dressed in black silk that harmonized discreetly with the background of coats and dresses, large feathers, boas and other feminine fripperies, cleaned and awaiting the owners.

For the history of the house we have to start with William Hatton, a reed-maker, who lived there until he died after being kicked by a horse in 1819. His widow stayed on in the house, and their son was Dr. Hatton, who lived there circa 1856.

"There is some mystery about the predecessors of the Hattons. Certainly the Boltons, a family that claimed descent from the Normans, were in occupation for several generations. A Robert Bolton, captain in the local volunteers, died in Bolton in 1817. He was a counterpane manufacturer with work premises in the town centre.

But if he lived in the old house, he did not own it, for there was a deed in existence dated 1759, which gives the landlord as John Blackburne of Warrington, who sold it to Daniel Bromiley in 1779. Then it was owned in quick succession by Elizabeth Horrocks, N. Haslam and T. Haslam before in 1814 it was owned by the Hattons.

The next owner was Mr Etchells, dyer, presumably the sister of the two sisters.

It has been said that the architecture of the house placed it in the 400-year-old class. Certainly it was a quaint survival of the days when the Earl of Derby was beheaded outside the old Man and Scythe, in revenge for the massacre of Bolton in the days when there was little of Bolton beyond Bradshawgate, Churchgate and Deansgate."

There is no indication of when the building was actually demolished. It certainly appears in the 1911 Bolton Directory, but not in the one for 1932 (in fact for 105 and 107 Bradshawgate there was no entry). However, the Lido opened in March, 1937 on that site.

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