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From: "Jane & Ian" <>
Subject: [SXP] Back to Backs
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2003 20:36:39 +1000


Hi Pam & others,

The following was on the Birmingham list last year, not sure if it fits your case of Back House, but might help explain.

Jane in sunny Queensland

Back-to-backs were a cheap way of fitting as many families into small confined areas as possible in the large Industrial cities in Victorian times.Space was at a premium and most houses were rented. The landlords built the houses to be divided down the middle so that at the front of the house would be two rooms downstairs with another two rooms upstairs. The same accommodation would be built at the back of the house. The houses were usually built in quadrangles so that the occupants at the front would face onto the street and the people who had the backwould face onto the court at the rear. In the court would be shared toilet and washing facilities. A special feature that the Birmingham back-to-backs had was that some of the earlier ones were built with workshops in the court so that men could actually carry on a trade from home. These type of courts were not built anywhere else.If you imagine that the average household in the latter half of the l 9th century was 10, then ov!
er 100 people would probably share just one or two toilets in a court. This standard of living was just not acceptable after the second world war. So most of the back-to-backs were slowly pulled down. It was known as slum clearance. What it really did was take the heart out of the old communities. These people were put into high rise blocks which soon became the slums that they had left. This is when the real old Birmingham disappeared.

There is just one example of a back-to-back left in Birmingham now, in Inge Street just off Hurst Street. It is at present being restored to its former glory and will be a museum with rooms depicting different eras of its history from the 1820's130's when it was built.

There were other back-to-backs in Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool and major Industrial cities. But 1 think they are all gone now. 1 know there are non left in Manchester. If you have seen the film, Angeia's Ashes, this will give you some idea of what the courts were like at their worst.


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