Fulwood Cottage Homes

Fulwood Cottage Homes were built on Blackbrook Road, Lodge Moor in Sheffield and opened in 1905.[1].

The complex comprised 20 large semi-detached houses on a remote hilltop beyond Fulwood. Each housed 14 boys or girls in two dormitories. There were also sewing and knitting rooms and an assembly hall and a school nearby[2].

The homes closed in 1960 when the buildings were used as a girls' approved school called 'Moorside'.

The buildings are still standing - now used as housing.

The following quote which gives an insight into early Fulwood life was taken from www.sheffieldforum.co.uk:

"My mum was a 12 year old girl in Fulwood Cottage Homes in 1918. I don't know when she was first taken there but she left and went to live with her sister at age 16.Her sister had also been in FCH but ran away. They both hated it. I have a pic of my mother standing outside one of the stone buildings. She is wearing black stockings (which they made there I gather) and a gym slip. She told me that she remembers being taken to visit her mother in the workhouse on Sundays and that the visiting room was large with wooden benches round the walls; babies in nappies crying and other children visiting in the same room at the same time."

The following unhappy memory was submitted to this Cottage Homes site:

"My Brother and I were marched across the moors by our dreadful father and deposited into FCH in 1951. I was about six years old and my brother was eight. We were not allowed to keep the clothes we arrived in, instead they gave us some hand me downs which just about fitted.

"As you can imagine we were confused and frightened and needed each other for comfort, they immediately spilt us up and put us in different houses, each house was run by a so called house mother, who, as I remember, lacked any compassion and caring skill - in my case I received a nasty gash on my head from my caring house mother!.

We both suffered many traumas, which, in this day and age would be regarded as out and out child abuse. My brother and I endured this brutal regime for about two years until our mother was able to take us away."

Dean M.

Do you have any memories you would like to share of Fulwood Cottage Homes or the children's homes that followed them? We'd love to hear from you.

LOOKING FOR RECORDS?

We have received the following information from the archives at Sheffield:

We hold records of both the Fulwood Cottage Homes for 1905 - 1945 (with some gaps) and the Sheffield Scattered Homes at Sheffield Archives for 1894 - 1950s (again with some gaps).

The normal procedure is that people contact us to obtain the reference numbers of potentially useful records which we supply along with the address of the Council department to whom the records belong (in this case, Family and Carers Team - FACT). The customer then needs to write to FACT quoting our reference numbers, descriptions of the items and full details of their research request.

It is normal for Archives staff to undertake the research on behalf of the customer given the sensitive nature of the records. The charge for research is £12 per 30 minutes and the amount of time a search takes varies on the information provided or requested. If a person is obtaining information about themselves then there is a flat fee of £10 per search request (this is subject to the provisions outlined in the Data Protection and Freedom of Information Acts). Once a permission letter has been received by the customer, they need to fill out a research form (which can be downloaded from our website) and send it to us at Sheffield Archives along with a copy of the permission letter and payment.

We would always recommend that a customer gets in touch with us so we can provide the latest information in terms of the material we hold, contact information and any fees involved.

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A search of the records held by the archives can be made here. Fore records you cannot find in the archives (eg. more recent case papers), try contacting the Council's Children's Services team directly.

Please also see our section on Accessing records.

[1]. MP Dunn, For the Love of Children

[2]. In search of lost childhoods, Yorkshire Post, 23rd January 2008

Marjorie P Dunn wrote a book 'A Story of the Poor children of Sheffield and of Fulwood Cottage Homes' (pictured above) in the 1980s which includes a chapter on Fulwood Cottage Homes.

Sadly it seems now to be out of print and I have been unable to contact either the author or the publisher.