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Welcome Gillette - rat catcher

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Does anybody remember a character called Welcome Gillette who was a rat catcher in Oughtibridge? A friend of mine used to work in the area some years ago and remembers a man they called Welcome Gillette.

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There was a Welcome Gillatt rat catcher at Pitsmoor.

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There was a Welcome Gillatt rat catcher at Pitsmoor.
A Welcome Gillatt, described as the "official city rat catcher", is listed in the 1925 directory at 169 Woodside Lane. He was born in Jan-Mar 1897 and evidently died in Jan-Mar 1930. The BMD indexes mention another Welcome Gillatt who died in Sheffield in 1996, aged 65 (d.o.b. 2 February 1931). He would presumably have been a relative of the 1925 rat catcher and perhaps at some time followed the same profession, in Oughtibridge and/or elsewhere.

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Well said,I come from Oughtibridge and we never had a rat problem so he must have done a good job.

 

The rat catcher was a different guy to the builder !have another read at the blog....can feel a bit of banter comming on here:hihi:

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My Dad who is 86 has told me about welcome Gillat..

 

When he was a child my Dad lived on Newcastle St and his family were the last family to be rehoused from there under the slum clearance.

 

Welcome used to come and set rat traps in the cellars and that was 1930ish.

 

He said Welcomes' name was exactly how he was treat..... a welcome sight to get them rid of the rats.

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My father worked at Pears @ Frost who were situated next to the Wicker Arches,they were corn merchants and the place was over run by rats.they hired Welcome Gillatt one week end in the late 1930,s and he caught around 200 rats over the week end My Dad set traps before closing at night and first job the next morning was to go round the traps with an iron poker

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I remember when i was an apprentice in the early seventies an old guy at work once told me about a rat catcher in sheffield called welcome gillat i thought he was just winding me up.

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Welcome gillatt(died 1996) was a very good builder! A gentleman, a well repected friend and family man, who IS loved and missed by many!! NO one should be bad mouthed/dis-repected when they are no longer with us!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! RIPxxx

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My great grandad was welcome gillatt married to Elsie he died in his 30s from pneumonia and left two children Edna and Joyce he was a rat catcher.

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Hi Jessedna - welcome to the Forum!.:). I think your great-grandad could have made a good living nowadays as rats are apparently on the increase. All the same, our cat accounts for quite a few!

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Bloody rats I hate them, it stems from my childhood when we had a smallholding down Birley Meadows,we had 3cats and 3 dogs to cope with them and mice!.We lived close to the River Don so that didn,t help,having animals the vermin came after the feed,the mice for the grain the rats also killed young rabbits and chicks!.I have seen them chew through wooden hutches to reach baby rabbits,at night in the dark I used to open the pig stye top doors shine my torch in to see rats walking across the sleeping pigs some of which I shot dead with my pellet gun!,the rats not the pigs!.My Grandfather used to catch them live in a large wire trap as big as a birdcage,he would then release them in front of the dogs to train them to kill which they did.Some rats I have seen were enormous to this day I can,t stand em,that horrid rubbery tail makes me shudder,people say every animal has a place in the world I don,t think the rat has!.:gag::roll::suspect:

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Welcome was my Dad's uncle & he always said that the name came about because he was a 'Welcome' son after the births of his sisters. I understood that he started out catching rats for use in dog fighting but then turned to a legal occupation. I think his son, also called Welcome, was also a rat catcher?

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