Herbert Loades was born in 1889 in Ripley; his father Thomas, like so many others, was a miner. When Herbert was five, his father died, leaving his mother Elizabeth a widow with seven children. They were living in Station Terrace, a row of poor housing next to the old railway station on Peasehill. Life must have been hard.

Unlike his brothers, Herbert did not go down the pit, but in 1911 was a grocer’s porter. After serving in the Royal Artillery in World War One, he teamed up with his brother-in-law Henry Beach, who was a miner but whose family had a bakery business in Somercotes, to take over Kay’s bakers in Greenwich.

Henry died in 1923, reportedly of typhoid, and Herbert was joined in the firm by other members of his family. Although it eventually became Loades Brothers, the old name is still evident on this picture of one of their vans in 1925.

In 1926, Herbert started a new business, the Triumph Match factory on Steam Mill Lane. He apparently imported the match splints and matchboxes from Russia and named them the ”Derby” match, with a picture of a horse and jockey on the cover. However, three years later a disastrous fire destroyed the factory, and although it was insured, Herbert quickly sold the factory to the British Match Corporation.

The bakery continued, although it too was damaged by fire in 1943. Herbert retired in 1953 and in 1957 moved to Skegness. He died in Derby in 1978.

His son Thomas worked in the bakery until he joined up in 1939. He was evacuated from Dunkirk and later sent to North Africa where he was captured by the Italians in 1942 at the siege of Tobruk. He was at first imprisoned in Italy, but later moved to Germany until liberated by the Americans in 1945.

He ran the bakery until 1961, when it was taken over by Blanchards. He and his wife then ran The Boys Shop on Grosvenor Road until he retired in 1979.

The Loades’ story is echoed by many in the area: from pits and hardship to successful family business in an era before the chain stores took over the High Street.