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Show Me Manchester, Quaytickets Sun, 29th August 2010 - Sat, 30th April 2011 From £6.00*During the last three decades of the 19th century, the slums of industrial Manchester and Salford were the battle ground for gangs of violent youths. They called themselves scuttlers. The ‘dangerous game called scuttling’ involved fighting turf wars that left many injured, maimed and sometimes dead. They were as fashion conscious as the teds, mods, perry boys or casuals. Their uniform of brass tipped clogs, bell bottom trousers, long soaped down fringes with angled caps, Burberry-like scarves and belts with a heavy buckle said “we’re ready for a fight”. A typical scuttle was a ‘seething mass of sixty lads fighting with sticks, stones and belts’. Walk the streets of Ancoats, where the Bengal Tigers fought Prussia Street, discover where the Meadow Lads defended their patch, explore the Flat Iron and Greengate, see the New Cross battleground of the ‘Rochdale Road War’ and listen to shocking stories as told in Andrew Davies’ The Gangs of Manchester. Understand the rise and fall of this earliest recorded instance of a youth culture that emerged from the slums. Tour is lead by Manchester guide Emma Fox and finishes in the Marble Arch pub, Rochdale Road, where books signed by Davies will be available for purchase.
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