Stroud historian Howard Beard has released a new book called Minding Their Own Business.

Here Vernon Harwood reviews the publication, which takes the reader on a tour of Victorian and Edwardian Stroud and introduces us to the characters behind the counters of bygone businesses.

Minding Their Own Business - review

England may have been a nation of shopkeepers in the eyes of Napoleon, but even the great French Emperor would have been surprised at the number of store owners and retailers in Howard Beard’s family tree.

A century or so ago there were no fewer than 11 shops in Stroud which were run by his forebears, including a tailor, a blacksmith and his enterprising grandfather who advertised himself as a ‘builder, decorator and undertaker’.

This remarkable shop-keeping ancestry is at the heart of Howard’s new book which takes the reader on a tour of Victorian and Edwardian Stroud and introduces us to the characters behind the counters of a further 32 bygone businesses.

There are fond memories of Bell’s the drapers with its system of wires and metal canisters which hurtled cash and receipts across the store. While anyone who thought oyster bars were the preserve of upmarket Boston or the swankier parts of New Orleans will be amazed to discover that James Bradshaw was serving the famed aphrodisiac from his shop at The Cross in 1910.

There are evocative old photographs of every shop featured, alongside rare mementos; unpaid bills, beautifully illustrated advertisements and, most bizarre of all, a lock of dead man’s hair preserved in a loose tea wrapper from Mills Brothers’ grocery shop.

This is a timely publication, coming just as the nation agonises over the role of the High Street in light of lockdown and the rise in internet shopping.

Howard Beard’s name on any book is a guarantee of meticulous research, captivating images and crisp, lively writing; Minding Their Own Business is no exception and should be required reading for anyone with a curiosity for Stroud and an interest in its retail past.

Minding Their Own Business by Howard Beard is published in softback by Stroud Local History Society at £10.

It’s available from the Museum in the Park, Stroud Bookshop, R&R Books and via stroudlocalhistorysociety.org.uk

By Vernon Harwood