Embroidered bedspreads and tablecloths

Over the past couple of weeks, we've been looking at members of the Coltman family, who were engineers and boiler makers in Loughborough. There's still quite a bit to discover about them, but in this week's post I thought I'd leave the Coltman's until next week, and instead share an event I recently went to, and an exhibition that is still open for you to visit. 

Earlier this year I was lucky enough to visit a museum that was new to me, and one of the objects on display reminded me something similar in Loughborough.  The museum was in Coventry, a city about which I don’t know very much, and haven’t often visited, despite it being only about 40 miles away from Loughborough. Of course, like many people, I knew Coventry had been badly bombed during the Second World War, and previous visits to the Coventry Transport Museum had helped me to understand how important industrial Coventry was.

Anyway, at the Herbert Museum and Art Gallery, I found some very interesting topics to read about, like clockmaking in Coventry, friendly societies, the Great Exhibition of 1851, and various other things. But, it was the embroidered tablecloth that really caught my attention.

Coventry's embroidered tablecoth

During the Second World War, the area of Canley in Coventry was developed, and prefab houses built close to what was known as the Charter Hostel. Apparently, of all the people who were called up during the Second World War, probably about one-sixth of these folk were placed in factories, and since Coventry was a place full of factories, it seems there were at one time 300 people a week arriving in the city to work in its factories. So, while some people were lodged with families, there was a need for hostels to ensure the 8,000 people who came to Coventry had somewhere to live, especially since some had come from overseas. One such hostel was the Charter Hostel, at Canley.

The embroidered square tablecloth on display in the Herbert Museum was made up of the names of people who had stayed at the Charter Hostel during the Second World War. The signatures on the white cloth are embroidered in a myriad of colours – different shades of blues and greens, reds and yellows, browns and greys – and two of the corners bear an embroidered royal insignia of George VI – rather like the ones seen on postboxes [link to George VI postboxes post] who was king during the Second World War.

That embroidered tablecloth had me mesmerised – and then I remembered something … a bedspread, with over 500 names embroidered in blue thread, with a glorious redbrick tower taking centre stage …

Coventry's tablecloth and Loughborough's bedspread

So, it is 100 years since the Carillon Tower was opened.

Money to create memorial structure was raised in many ways, one of which was by the creation of a bedspread, which was made up of embroidered signatures of both local people, friends and relatives of local people, and many others. The bedspread was displayed at a fundraising bazaar held in Queen’s Park and on the adjacent leisure area which is now covered by the modern-day leisure centre. Visitors to the bazaar were invited to pay a small sum of money to guess the weight of the bedspread, and the person whose guess was closest would win the bedspread.

The weight was guessed, and the bedspread duly handed over to a family who passed it down the generation, until donating it to the local council. Some time later, the bedspread was put on display briefly in Charnwood Museum. Then, in 2018, it was again displayed, this time in the Sock Gallery in the Town Hall, surrounded by lists of the embroidered names (over 500 of them!). The accompanying exhibition also included numerous artefacts from the Carillon Museum, a display about the Town Hall itself, and various other fascinating displays.

Some of the embroidered names were of well-known local folk, and even royalty, while others were unknown names, and still others were indecipherable! So, work began to uncover just who’s the signatures were, and the story behind those people. This has been a labour of love for one particular lady – helped by some of the Loughborough Library Local Studies Volunteers and a few other folk. Deborah has been researching the background to the bedspread, the people behind the names, and the whole story for quite a number of years now, and has made incredible progress, having only a few unidentified and unidentifiable names remaining.

The bedspread has again been on display recently in the Town Hall, this time accompanied by some of the stories of the people behind some of the names, and a focus on one particular town street – Herrick Road – where quite a number of signatories lived.

Loughborough's Alexandra bedspread

You can find information about a few more signed articles in an earlier blogpost. 

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posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

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