When I was little, my mother used to take me on a walk through Millhouses Park. Sometimes we'd go a little further, to a lovely little park called Beauchief Gardens. It was so neatly maintained and peaceful, almost like a Garden of Remembrance. It had a drinking fountain and a sundial, and trellised roses. It even had its own gardener.
This is all that remains of the sundial.
Nature has taken hold.
Which is not in itself a bad thing.
The general impression on this dull October day was somewhat gloomy.
The little stream, the Limb Brook, a tributary of the Sheaf, is overhung with branches and ferns.
It feeds the dam which powers the restored water wheels of Abbeydale Industrial Hamlet, and provides a haven for water fowl.
Beauchief Gardens was gifted to the City of Sheffield by Alderman JG Graves in 1935.
I remember there being swans on the dam when I was a boy, and, perhaps because of the nearby railway line, confusing the words "cygnets" and "signals", to the amusement of my relatives.
The gardens fell into disrepair due to council cut-backs, but since 1990 they have been maintained by a group of volunteers, the Friends of Millhouses Park.
Update:
