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Llanthony Rd./Gloucester Quays

Llanthony Rd./Gloucester Quays

From here, you can see a lot of the regeneration that has taken place in the docks area over the last decade or so. On the site of the Gloucester Quays Shopping Centre and the Gloucester Antiques Centre once stood the famous engineering firm Fielding and Platt.

Fielding and Platt made steam engines, steam boats, hydraulic presses and even machines that helped build the Forth Bridge, Blackpool Tower and Concorde! In 1902, Fielding and Platt manufactured the first vacuum cleaner, developed by another Gloucester resident, Hubert Cecil Booth. The company moved out of Gloucester in the 1990s.

Also in the vicinity were firms such as the Gloucester Wagon Works (which made rolling stock for trains) and the Moreland's Match Factory, home of 'England's Glory' matches.

To the south east of Llanthony Rd. lies the site of Gloucester Spa. In the early nineteenth century workmen discovered a saline spring some 80 feet down. The landowner, Sir James Jelf, had the waters tested successfully for iodine and built a Pump Room in 1815. Several thousand bathers took to the waters on the opening day itself! The waters were said to benefit those with kidney and digestive disorders as well as scurvy and jaundice. The Pump Room became the focus for entertainment in the area (firework displays and balloon ascents regularly took place here) and soon visitors from the around the country came to visit, including Gladstone’s parents and the famous poet Elizabeth Barrett, later Barrett-Browning when she was just 15.

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