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Historical items found during car park excavation

Kaleigh Watterson
BBC Political Reporter, Cheshire
Reporting fromCrewe
BBC The remains of an old hearth, which is covered heavily in dirt and what appears to be moss. It is built in to a brick wall which is also very dirtyBBC
A hearth was discovered under the 1970s car park

The remains of a former Methodist chapel and a variety of locally-made bottles have been discovered as work has started on a new youth centre in a Cheshire town.

Crewe Youth Zone is being constructed on a site on a former car park in the town.

The car park was built in the 1970s and existing buildings in the site were partially knocked down but also filled in and covered up.

Archaeologist Ashleigh Harrington said the team had expected to "find absolutely nothing surviving".

The youth zone is being developed by charity OnSide on the site of the former council car park on Oak Street.

The site previously included some housing as well as a Methodist church.

A green bottle is held up to the camera. It has the words High Street Crewe embossed on it
Bottles with local links were found on the site

Ms Harrington works for Oxford Archaeology Lancaster and her team opened up a 10m by 20m trench on what was designated as a chapel on historical maps.

They found a 2m deep cellar in a house next door and then started uncovering the remains of the chapel.

"We found a little range indicating that we've got a little kitchen, and a sweet little fireplace which indicated some sort of sitting room and then we found a bottle store room which was full to the top with broken bottles, with a lot of them having 'Crewe' on them," she said.

"This building was pushed down in the 70s to make way for this car park which has been overlaid and the tarmac is right on top of this building, they did not bother taking it out, so just finding the amount of remains we have found is crazy."

The team will then go and research the bottles to find more about their links to both the chapel and the town.

An excavation site where rows of brick walls are visible, a person in an orange hi-viz jacket and a helmet is visible behind one of the walls.
A dirty brick wall with a fireplace built into it. A shovel is leaning against the wall on the left of the image. The floor of the room is made up of old tiles but many of them in the centre are damaged
Archaeologists have uncovered the remains of a Methodist chapel and a house
A fireplace was also discovered in a second room in the former chapel

Stuart Mannifould is the chief executive of the youth centre, and said the project represented an investment of almost £14m.

"We've been in a position for a few months where we've been in the back room getting our systems in place but now we can actually see some real progress on site - it's just nice to see a digger," he said.

"The young people of Crewe that we're working with with our young persons development group are so excited for this to come to fruition."

He added: "It's not a secret that there's lots of challenges going on with our young people, there's a huge amount of poverty in Crewe.

"So to have somewhere they can come and be themselves and interact with other young people and amazing youth workers can only add to their ability to progress in their lives."

The youth zone is set to open in spring 2026.

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