Nostalgia

TAKE a step back in time with these pictures of Coventry taken 150 years ago.

The photographs were taken by Wyatt Wingrave who owned a chemist shop in the High Street and was also a gifted photographer.

They date back to about the 1860s.

There isn’t a single car in any of the pictures because at that time people in Coventry didn’t have them – instead horse drawn carts wait outside shops for deliveries or travel the streets.

At the time the pictures were taken film hadn’t been invented. They were taken on large and heavy glass plates which were slotted into a huge camera.

The print was then developed using chemicals from the glass negative.

Mr Wingrave, as a chemist, was well placed to use the chemicals needed to develop the pictures. The High Street picture shows his shop on the ground floor of a half timbered building long gone. Two children are looking out of the window but sadly we don’t know who they are.

Bayley Lane is still recognisable as the street still has some of the original timber framed buildings.

But Broadgate with its cobbled streets, shops with awnings and horse drawn carriages seems unrecognisable.

The picture of Greyfriars Green gives us a glimpse of a time when it was surrounded by grand residences rather than offices as it is now and there was no ring road bounding one side.

In the row of buildings behind the green it’s possible to see Christchurch.

A Second World War bombing raid destroyed most of the building leaving only the spire. But in the picture it’s possible to see part of the rest of the church.

People who wanted to be in the picture had to keep very still as exposures were long.

Girls wear bonnets while women wear shawls and long dresses. There’s even a police officer with a row of shiny buttons.

People who didn’t stay still appear as ghostly figures from the long exposures.

Ironmonger Row, Gosford Street and Bishop Street have also changed since the pictures was taken.

A combination of Second World War bombs and development changed them forever.