A REQUEST for information about the Rookery and the Shute Silk Mill has prompted several readers to send in information, copies of pictures and documents relating to businesses and people who worked and lived at the site.

Margaret Ann Eames wrote in to explain that her grandparents, Wilberforce and Eliza Bunnage, lived in a Rookery cottage by the River Colne and their children, Florence (Mrs Eames' late mother) and Sue, were born there.

Mrs Eames writes: "Our grandfather Wilberforce was killed in an accident at the factory. I think our mother was only five years old at the time.

"When our parents married, our father was a Watford man, they bought an oak sideboard from the piano factory. If my memory serves me correctly, I think it was made by Crawleys. I also have a pair of crystal vases which are still in use today, I remember my mother saying they cost 6d each and late aunts and uncles had the same vases in their homes."

Mrs Eames sent a photocopy of a postcard bearing a 1924 Watford postmark, showing the top floor of the mill building in flames. The caption reads: "The fire at Messrs Morrison Jones & Cos' Cabinet Factory, Watford, Aug 17th 1910". Sadly, the copy is not of sufficient quality to reproduce on these pages. The picture shows bystanders watching the approach of a horse-drawn vehicle with a figure in a tall helmet running alongside could this have been one of the Sedgewick's Brewery steam fire pumps, which generated much interest from readers of these pages in the summer?

Peter Ross, chairman of Watford Launderers and Cleaners Ltd, based in Sydney Road, Watford, sent in several articles related to the Watford Steam Laundry, which was originally housed at the silk mill building.

According to an extract from Henry Williams' History of Watford, the silk mill building was converted into a steam laundry around 1883.

A quote from what appears to be an advertisement published in the Watford Observer in 1887 states: "Customers sending whole of their work will be charged, with the exception of some few articles, at the rate of one shilling a dozen.

"Curtains cleaned and framed one shilling a pair any size.

"Carpets beaten 1d per square yard, cleaned 3d, 4d and 6d per square yard."

A copy of a share certificate dated 1891 reveals that the company's capital was £10,000, divided into 2,000 shares of £5 each.

The Ross family became associated with the company in the early 20th Century, when John Albert Ross, a shirt manufacturer from Londonderry in Northern Ireland, moved "over the water" to work as a manager at the Watford Steam Laundry.

In Ireland, Albert, as he liked to be known, had specialised in making stiff-fronted shirts, which were sewn together by people living in croft houses heated by open peat fires. The smoke and smell from these fires dirtied the shirts and it became necessary for Albert to build a laundry at his factory, to wash the clothes when they came in from the crofts.

By 1905, the style of shirts Albert was making were going out of fashion and he decided to capitalise on his experience with laundering when the Watford Steam Laundry advertised a post.

The Watford company had been struggling and decided to give up in 1906. Albert bought the goodwill of the firm and re-opened it in 1907, at a site he had bought in Sydney Road, Watford. The business has remained in Sydney Road ever since, although the building has been greatly expanded to accommodate modern machinery and the company name has changed to Watford Launderers and Cleaners Ltd.

Can any readers provide further memories or pictures of life and work in the Rookery area?