Wigan Album

Photograph taken in 1962 looking at was then Brindles farm and before the M6 was built

I spent a lot of my childhood playing around Drummers Lane.

Does anybody know the origins of the name Drummers ? from History ?

I grew up on that farm and lived there from 1953 until 1976. I was told by "Old George" who helped my Dad on the farm that the name came from the drummer boy who was killed by Perry Brook during the Wars of the Roses. He was said to have been heard playing his drum during the cold winter evenings of January and had been seen by some carrying his head under his arm! this tale was told to me by others who worked in the pit and helped us out at hay time. (I never saw or heard him however).

Yes Joan I heard something similar although it was a skirmish in the English civil war on the corner of Drummers Lane and Soughers Lane where the drummer boy was killed. The truth or otherwise probably falls between the two tales.
Incidentally although I knew Soughers lane was quite an old road I didn`t realise it was Lancashire dialect for Soldiers lane and so we`ve been pronouncing it wrong for all these years

Soughers are the men who built soughs! Pronounced in exactly the way we do.

i kept my pony on old man brindles farm as we called it then for many years .1974 / 1980
great memories

I was also told the story of the drummer boy. I used to live in Bryn and it always stck in my mind that tale.