Does anyone know if a photograph exists, or an engraving, of the former Leechmere House, near Ryhope, Sunderland? 'Leechmere House' is marked on the OS maps for the 1860's, but appears to undergo a slight name change sometime after the 1930's. By the 1950's it become marked on the OS maps as 'Leechmere Hall (Miners' Memorial Home)'. It is still standing at the beginning of the 1960's, but by the 1970's, has disappeared and replaced by housing (Edgmond Court). The route of an original approach to Leechmere House off present-day Hewitt Avenue still exists. It looks as though the last person to live in Leechmere House as a private dwelling was Thomas (Tom) Hall. I found one account of him being a manager of Ryhope Colliery. He certainly seems to have been quite well off as probate records state he left the respectable sum of £12,914 4s 1d to his widow, Kate Alexandra Hall, when he died on 1 September 1930. I am 99% certain that his wife was born Kate Alexandra Comrie, in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk about 1870. The 1871 census records her as a 12 month old baby living in Jesmond at 2 Hutton Terrace with her mother Anne Comrie. Anne was born in North Shields, so she appears to have come back up north from whatever took her to Norfolk. It also looks as though Anne is a widow on the 1871 census, aged 31 and living off the interest of some substantial sum of money (can't quite make out the exact detail on the 1871 census). The house in Hutton Terrace is still there, a substantial property that today is an Italian restaurant (Casa Mia). Ten years later, in 1881, Kate, aged 11, was a pupil at a boarding school at Coxlodge, Gosforth, Northumberland. I came across a William F Hall JP, listed as living at Leechmere House in a 1902 directory. I don't yet know whether the surname is just a coincidence, or whether William was the father of Thomas. Regards... David Allan.