Blimey! It seems the centre of Stoke-on-Trent could have been gassed during the First World War, had things gone awry and the wind been in the wrong direction. A forthcoming local history article has the details, “The Most Dangerous Factory in Britain: First World War Gas Warfare and the H.M. Cylinder Depot, Stoke-on-Trent“. The factory was located a mile or so west of Hanley, at Bucknall…

“By 1916 it was storing some 70,000 defective, dud and partially-discharged poison gas cylinders salvaged from the Western Front [the battlefield frontline in France]. With desperate gas shortages, cylinders were emptied, repaired and sent on to regional manufacturers to be refilled. The factory operated on a 24/7 basis.”

And there were escapes. For instance, William Heath of Silverdale was a worker there and was awarded the Medal of the Order of the British Empire for his bravery. From his citation… “This man, on numerous previous occasions [in addition to bravely rescuing a man saturated with escaped gas], has also displayed bravery and promptitude in dealing with serious escapes of poison gas”.

Working at Mintons, Stoke-on-Trent, in what looks in the late 1940s / early 1950s.

Germany’s Flux2 Klein 4B colorisation of eBay images, processed locally in ComfyUI, with a fix to prevent pixel-drift.

I looked for Stoke-specific items in the new Local Nature Recovery Strategy for Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent (Consultation draft, May 2026).

“Action T12. Appeal for information on orchards”.

They consider it possible that Stoke may be one of three districts in the county that still have a few traditional orchards, or partial relics of traditional orchards with a few old variety fruit-trees left. Let them know, if you know of one locally.

That’s it, in terms of the Stoke-specific Action items nestled among the boilerplate copy-paste and questionable climate claims. Though several other potential Actions seem relevant to Stoke, such as…

– reducing heathland fires in summer
– creating viable new ponds
– create rich new hedgerows
– care for ex-quarry habitats, especially rocky outcrops
– wildlife corners / strips on allotments
– reduce light pollution

No mention of litter and dumping, though, or of keeping dogs out of nature reserves.

Also of note…

According to the latest BlueSky data, [tree] canopy cover in Staffordshire County is currently around 14.5%, whilst Stoke-on-Trent has similar canopy cover of 14.7%.

Nice to think the city is as tree-ish as the county, and I assume the figures were calculated on local council area and not on postcode (the ST postcode ranges far afield). If so, then leafy Kidsgrove would have been excluded from the Stoke tree-count.

There’s a new website and a worthy project for Burslem. Honouring the Royal Doulton Fallen, Burslem, in tribute to the fallen of the First and Second World Wars who went to the wars from Burslem. They plan to erect a new Kilngate Memorial with names.

Picture: Burslem’s current war memorial, seen here circa the 1920s.

The additional new war memorial will be a bronze plaque, fired in Newcastle-under Lyme, engraved with names. With sponsorship from St. Modwen for the siting, I’m told. The organisers welcome contacts from descendants who find the names of their kin on the website.

There is also a specific local history research interest, in discovering more about the workers from the Royal Doulton factory who served in the world wars…

“At Honouring the Royal Doulton Fallen, we want to remember and commemorate the lives of those who worked at the Royal Doulton factory and lost their lives in the First and Second World Wars. We are dedicated to finding out their stories through careful research, aiming to honour their sacrifices and recognise their contributions to our freedom.”

11 families have so far been found.

Further, they plan… “an annual award to honour and celebrate the legacy of our heroes, “The Sylvester – Hall – Bolton Award for Design Excellence” to be awarded every year to local school children aged from 4 – 18yrs.”

They welcome donations and volunteers.

Picture: North Staffordshire recruits, out of camp for field musketry training near Tixall Hall. Presumably from the nearby Brocton army training camp on Cannock Chase, a few miles to the south. In the early years of the First World War men from Brocton marched to a special rifle-range camp near Keele for a few days to ‘fire’ (and hopefully pass) their musketry course with live ammunition, so the young men in this restored photograph are likely not using live ammunition. Just as well, as two of them are aiming at the cameraman!

A rare reason for a Midlands chap to totter down to London. “Wright of Derby: From the Shadows” is a major exhibition of the paintings and other works of Joseph Wright of Derby. At the National Gallery, until 10th May 2026. A hefty £12 entry, which means it should not be too crowded.

Picture: A family iron-forge, with a water-mill powered trip-hammer, 1772. WikiMedia via Google Art Project.

A major new image archive of the British Isles, now publicly accessible, the Country Life Magazine Image Archive. Access to the entire picture library from the inception of the venerable weekly magazine onwards, including unpublished items. Nearly complete and due to be 100% complete just before Christmas 2025, according to the magazine three weeks ago.

Sadly the pictures have no ‘date of making’, which is unfortunate for historians and restorationists. Though one can at least assume b&w pictures are older and are pre colour-film. Personal use appears to cost £75 per picture. Biddulph Grange (above) is the most interesting local b&w set from Staffordshire, possibly made in the 1950s at a guess? Surprisingly there are no pictures from places which might have been expected, such as Alderley Edge or Cannock Chase.

When searching for Stoke, note that searching for Stoke-on-Trent does not call pictures of Gladstone Pottery which was a rare venturing of the magazine into the city. Thus there may be Stoke items that need to be called by their exact name, since they haven’t been tagged with Stoke-on-Trent.

Useful for cycling Stokies to know. The large independent bicycle and bicycle repairs/accessories shop Rourke Cycles has moved out of Cobridge (was at the top of Grange Park, by the Community Centre, for many years). They’re now based down at Pennant House on Salem Street, Etruria, said to be near to the Bet365 mega-offices.

I know Etruria, but even I had to look up Salem Street. The map on their site is not helpful either. Turns out I know it well, but not the street name. The new shop is actually at the start of that industrial cul-de-sac on the other side of the Etruria Road from Bet365, a cul-de-sac into which no-one ventures except van-drivers. Next to the gas-bottle depot, which one can see across while cycling past on the canal, and to the builders-supply yard. Which means it’s easily accessible from the canal towpath, which is rather handy. Hopefully they’ll persuade the gas-bottle place to put a sign on their towpath-facing fence/gate, telling cyclists that there’s a big bike-shop just out of sight over the hedge.

Anyway, above is my orienting picture to show my readers where it is now. Not sure where you’d do cycle-locking there, though. I assume the new shop will have installed some secure locking-bars outside. I’ll check on Sunday. Update: No locking bars outside, as yet. One would lock the bike to the canal towpath off-ramp metal fence, or perhaps the industrial fence opposite the shop, if not taking one’s bike inside the shop.

The best pub in Stoke, the Holy Inadequate, is a few hundred yards away. Should you want to mull over a big bike purchase, or to celebrate one. Bike stuff stores Go Outdoors and Halfords are also nearby over on Festival Park, which means (provided you know the best routes) it’s an easy bike-trip over to Rourke Cycles for a third opinion — they may be able to provide what you want at a lower cost, have in-stock something the others have run out of, or to do bike maintenance to a higher standard.

Update: Shortly after this post, I learned of another shop, quite a bit further up the towpath and up by Westport Lake. Called the Cyclist Discount Centre (CDC) and apparently specialists in electric bikes? Sadly their website doesn’t like VPN users… so I didn’t find out any more.