The four children of Matthew Henry Herd and Mary Louise Herd (nee Oates), c1916.
Photo: Paul Herd

My grandparents, Matthew Henry Herd and Mary Louise Herd (nee Oates) married at the Parish Church, Wigan on the 29th July 1903. This photograph was taken c1916 and is of their first four children including my father, Reginald Herd at Market Street (far right behind his sister Mary). They traded initially at 34 Market Street under the name Howard Oates and also at 20 Makinson Arcade as Matthew Herd. I think they left Wigan about 1925 and moved to Fleetwood and Morecambe. The businesses were later taken over by their daughter Mary who married Clifford Martindale on the 5th of March 1930 at St Pauls Church. I was born in Chorley and I am trying to establish when my grandparents moved from Sheffield and Leeds respectively where they both lived at the time of the 1901 census.