References to Gwydir Street in 1879 directory
This information was taken from Historical Directories. Apologies if I have made any mistakes. The printing is sometimes hard to read! Also, the search engine obviously uses OCR (optical character reader) which may not pick up all references.
Post Office directory of Cambridgeshire 1879
Edited by E.R. Kelly, M.A., F.S.S.
Printed and published by Kelly and Co
Price to subscribers, eight shillings - non-subscibers, ten shillings (this would be 50p in modern money)
The references are only to commercial people, and one person (a "gentleman") on the Cambridgeshire Court Directory. Unfortunately, in most cases the house number is not given - just 'Gwydir Street'. The street was renumbered sometime between 1878 and 1881. It used to be numbered from the Norfolk Street end sequentially on that side down to Mill Road, and then continued on the other side back to Upper Gwydir Street, which was next to the highest number. Now, like most streets (but not all!), it's numbered with odd numbers on the Norfolk Street side and even on the other side, starting from the Norfolk Street/Upper Gwydir Street end, with the highest numbers in both cases being at the Mill Road end. Frederick Bridges is at No. 87, while Sidney Strange, a beer retailer, has no house number. But on the 1904 directory, Sidney Strange, a publican, lives at 87. So this must be on the old house numbering. Perhaps if the renumbering was going on, most people didn't feel like giving their house number!
Cambridgeshire Court Directory
This begins with the following delightful sentence: In order to afford space for the address, the abbreviation "esq." for esquire has no longer been appended to each name in the "Court Directory". It should be understood that such should be added to the name of every gentleman in the following pages to which no inconsistent addition is affixed.
We only seem to have one gentleman in Gwydir Street at this time. He has an "inconsistent addition".
Rev. John Jull, Leicester House, Gwydir Street
There is a Commercial directory by surname and by trade. I have only given the references to Gwydir Street in the surname ordered directory, since the entries are the same in both.
| Commerical (by surname) |
|---|
| Last name | First name | Trade | House number |
|---|
| Bridges | Frederick | baker | 87 Gwydir St |
| Carpenter | William | butcher | Gwydir St |
| Clarke | John | shopkeeper | 10 Gwydir St |
| Cross | William | butcher | Gwydir St |
| Ellwood | James | beer retailer | Gwydir St |
| Forster | Francis | Alexandra Arms | Gwydir St |
| Heap | Edward | chemist | Gwydir St |
| Key | Edward | shopkeeper | Gwydir St |
| Odell | Elijah | greengrocer | Gwydir St |
| Pamphilon | Brothers | carpenters | Gwydir St |
| Porter | James | Gwydir Arms | Gwydir St |
| Start | Joseph | hosier | 36 Gwydir St |
| Strange | Sidney | beer retailer | Gwydir St |
| Watson | Herbert Johnson | grocers | Gwydir St |
| Wilderspin | John | carpenter | Gwydir St |
Cambridgeshire Population in 1871
This was an interesting bit of this directory.
| Caxton | 11,661 |
| Chesterton | 27,948 |
| Cambridge | 30,078 |
| Linton | 13,768 |
| Newmarket | 29,498 |
| Ely | 22,284 |
| North Witchford | 15,585 |
| Whittlesey | 7,002 |
| Wisbech | 34,209 |
Note that Chesterton was considered separate from Cambridge, which makes Cambridge about the same size as Newmarket and not much bigger than Ely. And look at Wisbech!
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