Manchester - Cromwell Monument and Exchange Station

            The Postcard

A Hunt's Series of Manchester postcard that was published prior to June 1918 and phototyped in Berlin. Although the card was not posted, it bears a recipient's name and address:

Miss A. C. Hammond,
Mayfield,
Wood Street,
St.-Annes-on-Sea.

There was also a message on the divided back of the card:

"Well you give Baby a big
hug & a kiss from me, and
love to yourself.
From Nurse."

Manchester Exchange Railway Station

Manchester Exchange was a railway station in Salford, immediately north of Manchester city centre, which served the city between 1884 and 1969. 

The main approach road ran from the end of Deansgate, near Manchester Cathedral, passing over the River Irwell, the Manchester-Salford boundary and Chapel Street. A second approach road led up from Blackfriars Road. 

Most of the station was in Salford, with only the 1929 extension to platform 3 east of the Irwell being in Manchester.

Construction and Opening

The station was built by the London and North Western Railway (LNWR), and opened on the 30th. June 1884. The station had five platforms: 1 and 2 were bays and 3, 4 and 5 were through. Platforms 4 and 5 were reached by a footbridge from near the station entrance. 

The opening of Exchange allowed the LNWR to vacate Manchester Victoria station to the east, which it had shared with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway since the 4th. May 1844.

From the 16th. April 1929, Exchange had a platform link with the adjacent Victoria, when an eastward extension of platform 3 over the Irwell bridge was opened, meeting Victoria's platform 11, thus creating Europe's longest platform at 2,238 feet (682 metres). It could accommodate three trains at once.

The station originally provided alternative services from Manchester to London Euston. 

Second World War Damage

The station suffered hits by several German incendiary bombs during the Manchester Blitz at Christmas 1940. On the 22nd. December, the station roof was severely damaged, portions of which were never replaced. Fires took extensive hold on the building which could not be re-opened for passengers until the 13th. January 1941.

Closure

The railway station was closed on the 5th. May 1969, and all remaining services were redirected to Manchester Victoria.

Despite closure, the station remained operational for newspaper trains until the 1980's. Manchester produced several 'northern editions' until the newspaper revolution. The night-time operation was very busy with several trains being loaded and readied for departure to various trans-Pennine destinations (Halifax / Huddersfield / Leeds / York etc.).

In July 2017, Q-Park opened a brand new car park called Deansgate North, restoring the original red brickwork of the Exchange Station.

Taken on: October 22, 2023

Tags:

postcard

old

nostalgia

nostalgic

28MCM42

Manchester

Cromwell

Monument

Exchange

Station

phototyped

Berlin

Miss

Hammond

Mayfield

Wood

Street

St.

Annes

Sea

baby

Nurse

Hunt's

Series

Salford

1884

1969

River

Irwell

1929

1940

1941 « less

Sets appears in: • UK

Stats: 279 views

close tools panel

Badge creator

Use Flickriver Badge Creator to create a badge linking to your photos, your group or any other Flickriver view.

You can place your badge on your Flickr profile, Blog or Website.

Add to your iGoogle or Netvibes page

Flickriver widget for iGoogle or Netvibes can display almost any Flickriver view - most interesting today, by user, by group, by tag etc. Once added to your personalized homepage, just edit widget settings to select your desired view.

Clickr on one of the buttons below to install:

Embed on your Web site

To embed this view, Copy and Paste the following HTML code:

Black background (preview):

White background (preview):

Firefox and Chrome addons

Adds a 'Flickriver' button to your browser. While viewing any Flickr photos page, click on this button to open the same view on Flickriver.

Install in Firefox
Install in Chrome

Search plugin

Add 'Search on Flickriver' to your browser's search box. Works with Firefox and Internet Explorer. Install search plugin

"View on Flickriver" Greasemonkey script

A Greasemonkey script that adds Flickriver links to various Flickr photo pages - user photos, favorites, pools etc, allowing to quickly open the corresponding Flickriver view.

Also, allows quickly viewing any Flickr photo on black background in large size.

Install "View on Flickriver" script

Bookmarklet

While viewing any Flickr photos page, click on the bookmarklet to open the same view on Flickriver.

To install: drag and drop the following link to your Bookmarks toolbar.
IE users - add the link to your Favorites under the Links folder