Did your ancestors work at Bursledon Brickworks?

On 9th September Bursledon Brickworks is opening

to the public as part of the National Heritage week.

For this event entrance will be free.

We are hoping to attract local people or anyone who had

contact with the brickworks when they were a thriving industrial site – perhaps

ex-employees, family of ex-employees, neighbours who remember the site when it

was in full operation. For example, we know there were strawberry fields associated

with the site – does anyone know people who worked in them? We do have

volunteers who were ex-employees and their knowledge has been invaluable, but

we would like to see if there are more people in the area who were once

connected to the site.

As part of the heritage open day we will have our

photographs on display and hope that visitors will bring any photographs or

other memorabilia that they have, for us to see. We can scan photos and add

them to our collection and photograph any objects of interest. One area that we

would really like help with is putting names to the faces of the work force.

Whilst the museum has a recognised collection of artefacts  related to brick making we don’t have many

records of the people who worked on site. Yet we know that the workforce was

large in its heyday. We have an intriguing photograph dated 1907 showing the

works outing. We don’t know where the photo was taken or who anyone in it is!

What we do know is that one of the work force was a black man – which must have

been uncommon at the time – and we hope that this might trigger someone’s

memory. Our understanding is that he ran away from the circus to join the

brickworks!

We are hoping to increase our knowledge of the workers on

site and the conditions they worked in. We are also going to start creating an

oral history based on the tales of those who remember working in or living near

the brickworks. All of this will become part of the main exhibition over time.