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Sharing our memories of Heald Green
Last Updated 13thApril 2025
The Cottage Café, Wilmslow Road
By Helen Morgan
Published on Facebook 04/03/2025
Last Updated 13/04/2025
Another business remembered by so many. An ideal place to have a trucker’s pitstop, long before motorways!
This has been a tricky one to research with the cottages listed under different district censuses, coming from opposite directions along Long Lane and three cottages, sometimes listed as two and having different road numbers over the years. The area was also classed as Handforth. So here is my interpretation.
The cottages were built in 1754. The row can be seen on old maps but unfortunately there is no description for the plot.
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Fig. 1 Map from c.1846
© Cheshire Tithe Maps
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Fig. 2 Cottage Cafe Wilmslow Road Courtesy of Graham Gill
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This really is a story about one family: the Moss Family. This family lived in some part of these cottages from the earliest recorded census of 1841 (and I would suggest even before that) until they were demolished in the early 1970s. They had a lot of Johns!! I am concentrating on this family, as the censuses are so hard to decipher who may have been their neighbours, especially the early ones. The area of Bolshaw Outwood was large and there seems no uniformity of recording what and who was where.
The census of 1841 recorded the building just as Bolshaw Outwood, Cheadle, Stockport, Cheshire. John Moss, an agricultural labourer, lived with his wife Elizabeth (she would later be referred to as Betty). They were both 40 years of age and lived there with two daughters and three sons. Anne was 13 and Harriet was 6. Samuel was 12, Isaac was 3 and baby John was just 9 months old.
The census of 1851 recorded the cottages as Bolshaw Outwood, Cheadle Bulkeley, Stockport, Cheshire. John and Betty had added to their family with the birth of James in 1844. Eldest daughter Anne, now 23, had left the property. Son Samuel, now aged 21, was a calico printer. This census also states that John’s profession was now a shopkeeper and provisions dealer. So, within those ten years the cottage had become a shop.
By 1861, Long Lane was being called Wilmslow Road, Cheadle Bulkeley. Shopkeeper John and his wife Betty were still at the cottage along with their three youngest sons, Isaac, John and James, who were all agricultural labourers.
The 1871 census names Outwood House as a point of reference. The next three entries were these. Elizabeth (Betty) died in 1867 so by this census John, still a shopkeeper, was now a widower and living with his three sons. Isaac aged 33 was at home, John now 30 was a gardener domestic servant and 27 year old James was a farm labourer. The census records the cottages as Outwood, Cheadle Bulkeley. In the middle cottage may have lived Sarah Holbrook a 29 year old laundress and head of the family. She was there with her two brothers. John aged 26 was a carter and Eli aged 22 was a farm labourer. There was also a 52 year old boarder living there. He was Joseph Moss and was registered blind. In the next cottage was a George Fisher, a 51 year old pensioner.
In 1881, the Moss family took over the whole row and would continue to do so until around 1915/20. Father John Moss died in 1875 and it was his son John, still a gardener domestic servant and now aged 40, who was the head of the household on this census. His wife, whom he married in 1874, was 35 year old Kezia (nee Price). She was the shopkeeper now. They had two daughters. Kezia was a scholar aged 4 and baby Marian was 1. Next door to them lived John’s younger brother James and his family. James was 37 and an agricultural labourer. His 38 year old wife Sarah was a launderess. They had a 6 year old daughter Annie and a 2 year old son John. Joseph Moss, their blind uncle, lived with them. The census records the addresses as Wilmslow Road, Cheadle.
On the 1891 census there are now house numbers. In 199 Wilmslow Road, Cheadle, 50 year old John Moss was still an agricultural labourer but there was no recorded occupation for Kezia. 14 year old daughter Kezia was a teacher!! 11 year old Marion was a scholar. The family had increased with the birth of another John in 1882 and a daughter Elizabeth in 1885. James and his family next door, in number 201 Wilmslow Road, had not increased in numbers and they were doing the same jobs. However, the blind uncle had died in 1887.
By 1901 the house numbers had changed. John and his family now lived in 317 Wilmslow Road, Cheadle. John, now 60, was a labourer on a farm and 55 year old Kezia was once again a shop keeper. 19 year old John was a joiner apprentice/carpenter. Also, there was 16 year old Elizabeth. Next door in 319 Wilmslow Road James and Sarah, still doing the same jobs lived with their son 22 year old John, who was a carter on a farm.
Kezia Moss died in 1908 and so by the census of 1911, John Moss now 70 was a widower and no longer working. Son John aged 29 was a day gardener and his wife Annie aged 31 lived at the house. 26 year old Elizabeth was still at the property and noted as “feeble minded”. This was now recorded as 315 and 317 Wilmslow Road, Handforth. Next door at 319 Wilmslow Road, James was now 68 and still a farm labourer, along with his wife Sarah who was still a laundress at 69 years of age. Their son John was aged 33 and a farm labourer.
John senior died in 1916. James died in 1915 and Sarah either in 1912 or 1918. Therefore, there was a change on the 1921 census. John and Annie had moved to Grove Lane in Cheadle Hulme. Sadly, I found Elizabeth as inmate number 394 at St Thomas’s workhouse in Stockport. More of our dark social history right there. In number 315 Wilmslow Road, Handforth was the Lewis family. John Thomas aged 45 was a master tailor. He lived with his 45 year old wife Olivia and their two daughters. Muriel was 11 and Nesta was 4. Next door John Moss aged 42 and a general labourer working for Clarke and Rowyer, lived with his wife Martha Ann who was 38 and their baby son, John Holbrook Moss, born in 1921.
By 1939, 315 and 317 were once again a shop run by 40 year old Henry Taylor who was a grocer, newsagent and tobacconist. He was assisted by his 39 year old wife Sarah. Their son Geoffrey was born in 1934 and under school age and a Muriel Dewhurst aged 12 was at school. Another person was listed but had been redacted from the record. Next door in 319 John Moss was now a public works contract gardener and his wife Martha was doing unpaid domestic duties. Son John was redacted from the record.
Fig. 3 From Heald Green in Wartime
© Joan Heinekey
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I do not know the family Joan is referring to or exactly where on Wilmslow Road this would have been.
The photo is dated c.1930 so perhaps the Taylor family or perhaps it is a bit later and this is the Austin family?
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The Austin family owned the shop and café throughout the war. The RAF personnel from MU61 behind it, loved going as there was a juke box. At number 319 The Moss family still lived there. John Moss died in 1942. His widow Martha, born 1884, would remain there until her death in 1972.
Fig. 4 Moss Cafe on Wilmslow Road c. 1930
© Ratepayers' Association
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In 1946 the Bunting family, remembered by many residents, arrived to take over the business. I was lucky enough to speak with Nick Bunting and this is what he told me.
“My mother and father were Nita and Harold Bunting. According to my dad’s army discharge papers, when he came home from Germany in 1946, his home address was the café. I think they must have moved there at that time, as mum lived in Burnage with her parents whilst he was away during the war. They managed the shop and the café for a couple of businessmen for most of the time they were there until they decided to buy it around 1969/70. I was born in March 1955 and we lived there until dad died suddenly of a heart attack in 1971.
The shop, café and kitchen were downstairs and our two bedroomed living quarters were upstairs with a large living room and bathroom. I understood that the building was very old, maybe 300 years or so. I can remember that in front of it was a cobbled footpath. In 315, the café was at the front with a door to the road that was permanently closed and the kitchen was at the back. In 317, the two rooms were knocked into one effectively, separated by a counter for the newspapers. In the front we just had a freezer and a magazine rack. You got to the café through a doorway from the shop, no corridor but it was quite dark and very old fashioned with a stone floor and an open fire.
Our café did welcome many truck drivers, as the A34 Wilmslow Road was the main route south out of Manchester towards Stoke and Birmingham. We didn’t have any parking area though, so they just parked on the side of the road. The newsagents probably provided the main income, I guess. I would think we had about eight paper rounds covering the Outwood Road estate opposite, Greenway Road, Bolshaw Road and Stanley Road. Not many papers delivered these days!
Next door at 319 was Mrs Moss, a very old lady, who we rarely saw. Her son, John I think, came to see her occasionally. I had no idea that their family had run the business before you mentioned it.
The RAF camp was derelict all the time I lived there, so it was a brilliant adventure playground for me, apart from when it was regularly taken over by gypsies.
Fig. 5 Watercolour of the Cafe
From Nick Bunting
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This watercolour was painted in the late 1960s. It was done by an artist guy who used to come by on horseback as he travelled the country.
To the rear and side of the building was the large Quick’s Ford garage and petrol station. That had been there all my life at least. When my dad died in March 1971, we stayed on until I had finished my exams in the June. Mum sold up to Quicks, for peanuts at the time she reckoned and we moved away. Mrs Moss was still in 319 and stayed on for a while as far as we knew, even though Quicks wanted that land too. We didn’t really go back for the next few years. Mum couldn’t drive and I had joined the RAF. The next time I went past it had become a business park.”
"The artist on horseback came to visit the old Griffin Farm and I have an autographed book that he gave the Sloane family. He was called William Holt and he visited the farm in 1962. He was born in 1897 and died in 1977. He made a trip across Europe on Trigger, an ex rag and bone horse, and a documentary of his life was made in 1969. He was also a BBC presenter as well as an author and artist.”
- Patricia Darby, Facebook 2025
"Many drivers used the café, as the A34 was the major route going south to the Midlands, London and beyond prior to the motorways. On a Sunday evening the road was very busy with HGVs going south.”
- Phil Jones, Facebook 2021
"As a child my dad took us on a Sunday morning to pay for the newspapers and purchase sweets. It had a stone floor and a black door with an old fashioned latch on. The shop was on the right hand side. The café was on the left where people had fried breakfast etc...sort of a truck stop.”
- Charles Hough, Facebook 2021
"I had a paper round there, loved going in in the morning to the smell of bacon butties.”
- Lynda Jackson, Facebook 2021
"The only place I could buy Superman comics.”
- Les Clough, Facebook 2021
"The only place to buy anything in the late 1950s. Then up the road to Shenton’s farm for chickens and veg.”
- Edward Metcalf, Facebook 2021
"Both my sisters had paper rounds from the Cottage Café. Early to mid 60s. It was very small inside and had a creaky uneven floor. However, the sweet selection was to die for. I used to go with them just so I could get a bag of kali (sherbet) on the way home.”
- Colin Wolstenholme, Facebook 2021
"Does anyone remember buying a Pendleton’s Twicer ice lolly from the Cottage Café?”
- Tina Pownall, Facebook 2021
"I remember Pendleton Twicers. Ice lolly and ice cream all in one.”
- Steven Hough, Facebook 2021
"I had a paper round there. We used to deliver pink finals too. If I remember correctly, we used to get extra pinks to try and sell in the pubs.”
- Danny McCarthy, Facebook 2021
Graham Hampson, James Roscoe, Anthony A Pownall and Sidney Rose Frsa, all remember their paper rounds there.
My memory of the café is from going there every Sunday with my dad and baby sister in her pram. We walked from Wilton Ave to Bolshaw Road to say hello to a grey horse there, that we nicknamed Silver. Then on to the café for a Sunday paper for dad and blackcurrant fruit pastilles for me. This gave our mum some time to get things done in our house ... like clean and get the Sunday dinner started!!
"I have so many memories of this shop too, as my dad used to take me and Caroline for sweets and a paper.”
- Joanne Thomas, Messenger 2025
"I remember it. My dad used to take us there before they built the shops on Outwood Road.”
- Gail Rose-Allen, Facebook 2025
"I used to work at Quick’s garage in the late 1960s and early 70s. We used to go t0 a little café on Wilmslow Road for sausage and bacon butties. Great times!”
- Wendy Harrison, Facebook 2025
"My wife used to call in there before she got the bus to school in Longsight. That was early 1958. Still live nearby, Memories.”
- Peter Sutherland, Facebook 2025
"Bunting’s café and ginger beer after playing football on the gypsy camp.”
- John Houghton, Facebook 2025
"I went there in the 1960s with my mother Bessie Sloane. Memories of choosing sweets and collecting my magazines. We walked from the old Griffin Farm to the café and then to Greenway to the local post office each week.”
- Patricia Darby, Facebook 2025
There is some debate about whether the whole row was demolished together after Mrs Moss died in 1972 or whether the Bunting’s side of the row was demolished leaving Mrs Moss in her cottage for a while longer.
Whatever happened, the land went to make Quick’s garage larger.
"That was the newsagent and cottage between Quicks garage and the old RAF fields with the bomb shelters. I did a paper round from there. I lived opposite on Wilmslow Road.”
And demolished?
"I would guess 1972. I went over there just after it was demolished and found an old newspaper and a bottle with a marble stopper in the neck. There was an old lady that lived in the adjoining cottage. We sometimes looked through the window and would see the old lady wearing a white nightgown.”
- Nigel McGivern, Facebook 2025
"There was a café type thing at that shop. The old dear in the cottage, we named the white witch with crazy hair. I remember the shop going first and she refused to move. When she did, they demolished the cottage with all her belongings in it. Sad when you look back. School books dated 1891, I took them home.
Sweets and the Twinkle on a Saturday with my dad. Had to walk to Greenway Road when it went. Unrecognisable now.”
- Donna Harcourt, Facebook 2025
The large Southgate centre now occupies the land that was the café and Quicks garage.
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Fig. 6 Where Cottage Cafe stood - June 2021
© H Morgan
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Fig. 7 Where Quicks stood - June 2021
© H Morgan
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Bibliography
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Williams, K & Williams, JT (1998), Long Lane Cheadle Remembered, pp.38
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Heinekey, J (1996). Heald Green In Wartime. pp.63.
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