4. Eastwood Town

Peeling back the layers of history

The original marketplace for Eastwood was directly outside the Sun Inn. Lawrence used the location in Sons and Lovers (1913): “Mrs Morel loved her marketing. In the tiny market place on the top of the hill, where four roads, from Nottingham and Derby, Ilkeston and Mansfield meet, many stalls were erected.”

We can pinpoint significant people in Lawrence’s life and writing to specific properties which still exist in the area today. Flossie Cullen was a family friend and inspiration for Alivina Houghton in The Lost Girl. Her family’s business, Cullen’s grocery shop, was the large property on the corner of Nottingham Road and Mansfield Road. Willie Hopkin, friend and mentor to Lawrence, ran a shop and post office in what is now Concept Hair. Alice Dax, the married woman Lawrence had an affair with, ran a chemist with her husband Harry at 36 Nottingham Road. His relationship with Alice in 1911-12 came before he met Frieda Weekley; Frieda was not the first married woman who he asked to go away with him.