Display 21 of 27

Previous Image                                                                                                                                           Next Image

Poster advertising sale of Wheeler’s Alvin Street nursery, 1853 (D3269/accession 3550/box A (part))

Gloucester's growing population provided a ready market for produce and the rich, easy draining soils allowed for extensive market and nursery gardens to be established in the suburbs.  The most well-known was that belonging to James Daniel Wheeler, who inherited his father’s business and had a nursery on Alvin Street (now Gloucestershire Heritage Hub).   He was one of several Wheelers who were nurserymen and market gardeners and although space precludes a full account of the family and their businesses, a good introduction to the family and other gardeners can be found in Gloucester Gardeners 1650–1763 by Jan Broadway (Transactions of the Bristol & Gloucestershire Archaeological Society No. 131 (2013) – available to be viewed online at https://www.bgas.org.uk/resources/bgas-resources/search-past-transactions).  The main unifying theme however was that as time passed, pressure on the nurseries increased as demand for land (for housing, roads and the railway) in Kingsholm grew and,  one by one, as the area was developed, the nurseries (and allotments) closed.