Looking back at Littlegate
I was interested to see the photograph of Littlegate – the site of my birth - and read in the Echo, Tuesday, August 18, that the area next to Sunderland Minster is being made into a new Town Park.
I was born on December 27, 1928, the son of Benjamin Houghton and Laura Isabel (Nee Petch), at 1 The Green, Bishopwearmouth.
It was a two-storied house, with a coach house at the right, and we lived on the ground floor.
Six or so smaller higgedly-piggedly arranged houses were in the row.
Our home had four to five stone steps, with metal railings either side, up to the very wide front door which had tracery above it.
Inside was a stone flagged floor, with more stone steps leading to the first floor.
These were blocked off on the first landing, as the family who lived above us entered their home by wooden steps located outside in the back yard.
I remember my father telling me about the day of my baptism at St Michael’s Bishopwearmouth Church – The Minster.
It was January 1929, it had been snowing and must have been getting dusk by then.
My mother, her mother and grandmother carried me toward the church with my father locking the door before following.
My father said that he looked at the party.
The ladies, with the church in the background, all dressed in full length black dresses and coats, walking three abreast on the snow covered “Littlegate”.
He said to himself he would never see such a scene again.
I wonder what he would think of the area now.
I look forward to seeing a photograph of the completed new Town Park.
“Undervalued, overlooked and vulnerable to stereotypical assumptions.”