CHIMNEY sweeps were an essential part of life in the late 1850s through to the mid 1950s when the main source of heating and cooking was a coal fire for the working classes.

Huge cast iron fire ranges, which were black-leaded every week, heated the main room in the household.

Often these had an oven, with a big brass knob on one side, and a boiler on the other side for hot water.

Lighting a coal fire was a real skill often left to the husband who treated the matter with utmost care.

Do you remember how the flames had to be drawn? Usually the coal shovel was placed against the opening, with a piece of newspaper over.

Here is where the real skill of the firelighter came into being, for as the fire grew fierce, the paper would turn red before igniting into a ball of flame.

Just before this happened the householder would whip off the shovel from the fire opening and grab the newspaper and throw it up the chimney just as it burst into flames.

Often this would cause the soot in the chimney itself to catch fire, and the houseowner could be fined for calling out the fire brigade to extinguish the flames.

A cleanly swept chimney could avoid all these problems of chimney fires.

Here we see a typical Burnley sweep, Andrew Lord, around 1898, outside his house in long-gone Greenhalgh Place, which was behind the Roebuck Inn on the old section of Padiham Road between the Mitre and Gannow Top.

It was a street of sturdy terraced housing, built for the mill and mine workers of the time. However, conditions inside were grim by today’s standards.

Note the outside toilets on the right which meant the house was a two-up, two-down affair and not a back-to-back like many others in Burnley at this time.

However, there would be no hot, running water and lighting would have been by gas lights or lanterns.

Andrew Lord was born in Burnley around 1869 and married Elizabeth Jane Starkie at Holy Trinity church in 1886. The couple had several children, including son, George, daughters Susannah, Alice and Betsy.

By the early 1900s Andrew and his family were living in Lorne Street near the top of Gannow Lane, a slight improvement on their housing conditions. The toil and filth of chimney sweeping took Andrew’s life at a comparatively young age of 56 in 1925 when he was living at 118, Briercliffe Road, Burnley, and he was buried at Burnley Cemetery.

By the end of the war there were still 11 sweeps doing the rounds in Burnley.CHIMNEY sweeps were an essential part of life in the late 1850s through to the mid 1950s when the main source of heating and cooking was a coal fire for the working classes.

Huge cast iron fire ranges, which were black-leaded every week, heated the main room in the household.

Often these had an oven, with a big brass knob on one side, and a boiler on the other side for hot water.

Lighting a coal fire was a real skill often left to the husband who treated the matter with utmost care.

Do you remember how the flames had to be drawn? Usually the coal shovel was placed against the opening, with a piece of newspaper over.

Here is where the real skill of the firelighter came into being, for as the fire grew fierce, the paper would turn red before igniting into a ball of flame.

Just before this happened the householder would whip off the shovel from the fire opening and grab the newspaper and throw it up the chimney just as it burst into flames.

Often this would cause the soot in the chimney itself to catch fire, and the houseowner could be fined for calling out the fire brigade to extinguish the flames.

A cleanly swept chimney could avoid all these problems of chimney fires.

Here we see a typical Burnley sweep, Andrew Lord, around 1898, outside his house in long-gone Greenhalgh Place, which was behind the Roebuck Inn on the old section of Padiham Road between the Mitre and Gannow Top.

It was a street of sturdy terraced housing, built for the mill and mine workers of the time. However, conditions inside were grim by today’s standards.

Note the outside toilets on the right which meant the house was a two-up, two-down affair and not a back-to-back like many others in Burnley at this time.

However, there would be no hot, running water and lighting would have been by gas lights or lanterns.

Andrew Lord was born in Burnley around 1869 and married Elizabeth Jane Starkie at Holy Trinity church in 1886. The couple had several children, including son, George, daughters Susannah, Alice and Betsy.

By the early 1900s Andrew and his family were living in Lorne Street near the top of Gannow Lane, a slight improvement on their housing conditions. The toil and filth of chimney sweeping took Andrew’s life at a comparatively young age of 56 in 1925 when he was living at 118, Briercliffe Road, Burnley, and he was buried at Burnley Cemetery.

By the end of the war there were still 11 sweeps doing the rounds in Burnley.