143 Cotton End Road Wilshamstead

143 Cotton End Road March 2013

143 Cotton End Road was, for many years, a shop. The Rating and Valuation Act 1925 specified that every building and piece of land in the country was to be assessed to determine its rateable value. Like most of the county, Wilshamstead was largely assessed in 1927 and the valuer visiting the property [DV1/C65/82] found that it was a grocer’s shop owned and occupied by T. Smith.

The property comprised the shop itself, measuring 11 feet square, a parlour, a living room and a scullery with three bedrooms above. A barn, used as a store shed, stood outside.

Directories do not reveal a T. Smith as a grocer in Wilshamstead but do list a Gertrude Smith as a grocer in volumes of 1928 and 1931 (directories were not published every year but every few years). Gertrude may have gone through a number of husbands. A Gertrude Izzard is listed as a grocer in 1920 and 1924, succeeding William Henry Izzard, who is listed in 1910. As we have seen Gertrude Smith was a grocer in 1928 and 1930 and in the volumes of 1936 and 1940 (the last for the county), Gertrude Taylor is listed as a grocer.