Together Trust Archive

On 13 January 1872, the Boys’ Refuge and Industrial Home, as we were then known, held their second annual meeting. This was reported in the Manchester Weekly Times and even in those early days many of Manchester’s elite turned out for the meeting, including the Bishop of Manchester, M.P. Mr. Oliver Heywood , John Rylands and Thomas Wright.   On Admittance Within two years the venture had been so successful that the charity had managed to move away from its initial premises on Quay Street, in the notorious district of Deansgate, to Francis Street, Strangeways. Four three storey houses and a yard were purchased and converted into one building. The report also referred to a story that would eventually lead to the opening of a new building on Major Street in 1884, the 24 hour shelter . In the winter months of 1871 three boys applied at the Refuge looking for shelter. As the home was already full, they had to be turned away. Seeking warmth and shelter and being unable to affor...

I thought we’d have a look today at the work of the Manchester Architect, F. B. Dunkerley and the work he did for the Manchester and Salford Refuges and Homes. Children’s Shelter, Chatham Street, 1910

Over the last fifty years the city of Manchester has been undertaking change. The 1960s saw extensive re-development of the city with the slums areas being cleared and new buildings taking their places. The detonation of an IRA bomb in the city centre in 1996 destroyed many buildings (although fortunately no lives were lost) and was a catalyst for the regeneration of many of the run down areas of the city. Today sees a Manchester populated with high rise buildings and new developments, a far cry from the slum areas of old. The Manchester and Salford Boys’ and Girls’ Refuges and Homes opened up its services in many of these poorer parts of the city. Consequently few of its original buildings remain today. Plan of Central Refuge, 1895  

"Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests but many a little child received there has had no mother’s arms outstretched to receive him, no place to lay his head." This was observed by William Edmondson, Secretary to the Manchester and Salford Boys’ and Girls’ Refuges and Homes, in 1921, when speaking of the charity’s Children Shelter on Chatham Street. The home was opened in 1883 to give shelter to children sleeping on the streets of Manchester. Up until 1920 it received 15,000 children through its doors, taking them out of the cold and into safety.  Children’s Shelter ‘Mother’ receiving a child from a policeman