Can you help turn back time?
Our bid to turn back time and unite an antique pocket-watch with a relative of its original owner have so far proved unsuccessful.
Fifty years ago watch enthusiast Rod Langley bought a gold-plated American Standard type pocket-watch for £5 from a shop in the market town of Glossop, near Manchester.
He realised it was inscribed; “John N Nelson, Durham Bank, Overtown, Wishaw”, and was dated “Annos 1922”.
The watch needs repaired and 73-yearold Rod from West Lancashire turned to us for help, thinking now might be a good time to reunite it with the family of its original owner. As it would have cost around $100 when new, he thought the watch’s original owner may well have been someone who was well-to-do.
But despite our efforts so we have been unable to find anyone related to John N Nelson.
The house at Durham Bank has long gone, but a gardening nursery of that name occupies land close to where it stood. We were put in touch with James Naismith, who was a neighbour of the Nelson family up until the late 1960s.
He said: “There were two sisters who lived in the house, Marion and Janet, better known as Mirrin and Jenny, they also had a brother David who stayed in the Pather Buildings.
“They were older than me, probably around my father’s age and he was born in 1906. They were both spinsters and the brother was married, but none of them had any children.”
James remembers the women living together at Durham Bank until there was a break-in during the 1960s.
“The people who broke in gave them an awful doing”, he recalls. “There was nothing in the house for them to get. They had no telephone in the house, no electricity, they had absolutely nothing at all. The existence they had was terrible. Jenny came across to my uncle’s house and my father phoned the police.”
The women, who, by James’ reckoning, were in their sixties at the time, were taken by ambulance to Law Hospital.
A couple of days later James accompanied his father to Durham Bank to pick up personal belongings of the two women.
“We went in and saw it had been ransacked. The women had been staying in just one room in the house.
“There were no floorboards in the other rooms as they had used them for firewood to keep themselves warm. They had nothing apart from one or two wee knick-knacks.”
The sisters had grown fruit to earn a living and James believes they once ran a small corner shop selling their wares in Overtown.
He said: “They had a fair-sized orchard and glass houses.
“They were rehoused in Waterloo following their release from hospital and the house disappeared from the landscape soon after.
“After they left the house vandals got in and set fire to it”, James continued. “The Burgh put on a compulsory order for demolition and it was knocked down.”
He believes it’s possible the pocketwatch belonged to their father or another male relative.
It’s also possible that the watch was stolen during the break-in.
A couple of years ago a man turned up at James’ door asking about the Nelson family, he said he was connected to the family. He believes the individual was from Newarthill, Carfin, or surrounding areas.
If any readers has further information on surviving Nelson family members then email: news@wishawpress.co.uk