Swindon in the Past Lane

Today marks the anniversary of Emmeline Pankhurst's birthday, although the date is still up for debate. Emmeline always celebrated her birthday on July 14 aligning her arrival with that other revolutionary happening Bastille Day. It is more generally accepted that she was born in Manchester on July 15, 1858, the second of Robert and Jane Goulden's ten children.

Emmeline Pankhurst

Emmeline's involvement in socialist politics began in the 1890s when she joined the fledgling Independent Labour Park with her husband Richard Pankhurst. Her conviction that the only way women could improve their situation, still very much one of subordination to men across every stratum of society, was to campaign for the parliament vote.

In 1903 the widowed Emmeline and her daughter Christabel founded the Women's Society and Political Union in Manchester and three years later moved their organisation down to headquarters in London.

Mrs Pankhurst under police escort

On May 19, 1906 the first Women's Suffrage Demonstration was held in Trafalgar Square. Among the speakers was Keir Hardie Labour MP for Merthyr Tydfil and in the crowd was a Swindon schoolteacher, Edith New.

Edith began her career as a pupil teacher at Queenstown Infants, one of the first schools built in 1880 by the new Swindon School Board. Following two years spent in London studying for her teacher's certificate, Edith returned to Swindon but in 1901 she took up a teaching post at Calvert Road School in East Greenwich. When Charles Booth conducted his Inquiry into the Life and Labour of the People of London he identified this area as largely poor where the average income was between 18 and 21 shillings a week.

Edith New

Edith joined the Women' Social and Political Union and in March 1907 she was sentenced to two weeks in Holloway Gaol for attempting to get into the House of Commons. In 1908 Edith left teaching and became a paid organiser for the WSPU. She travelled the length and breadth of the country, organising by-election campaigns and addressing meeting and demonstrations. She served several terms of imprisonment, most famously for breaking windows at 10 Downing Street.

Edith New (right) and Mary Leigh following their release from Holloway

On July 14, 1913 Emmeline Pankhurst celebrated her 55th birthday during a brief respite from Holloway Gaol. In April she had been sentenced to three years penal servitude for being an accessory before the fact in the attempted burning of a house at Walton Heath. She was released on June 16th under the terms of the Prisoners (Temporary Discharge of Ill Health) Act. More commonly known as the Cat and Mouse Act, suffragist prisoners weakened by hunger strikes and forcible feeding, were temporarily released when their health fave prison officials cause for concern. Released on licence, once deemed sufficiently recovered, they were rearrested to continue their sentence.

Both Mrs Pankhurst and Annie Kenney had ignored the terms of their licence and on July 14 they turned up at the London Pavilion for the weekly WSPU meeting. Mrs Pankhurst received a rapturous welcome from the audience, however, the police were also present and ready to arrest the two women.

They turned their attention first to Annie while Emmeline was said to have walked through the crowd and out int a waiting taxi cab.

Annie Kenney

"A struggled followed, the detectives and uniformed policemen rushing into the mass with their heads down to protect their faces from the possibility of attacks by hatpins, and striking out in all directions," the Times reported the following day. "Detectives attempted to encircle Miss Kenney, but women pressing out from the entrance to the Pavilion rushed to the rescue. Two detectives put their prisoner into a taxicab and took her to Holloway. Standing on the pavement were women with their hair down their backs, their hats off, and clothes torn while the detectives had suffered equally, their coats being in some cases alsmot torn from their backs and their hats broken in."

Mrs Pankhurst spent the following week in a flat on Great Smith Road, Westminster with a police guard on duty outside. An attempted escape using a 'double' to lure police away from her door failed, but a week later supporters managed to smuggle her out of the flat and into the London Pavilion yet again. A week after her birthday Mrs Pankhurst was rearrested as she attempted to take the stage for the WSPU meeting.

Emmeline Pankhurst's memorial in Brompton Cemetery

Emmeline Pankhurst died on June 14, 1928, just one month before her 70th birthday and shortly after the Representation of the People Act extended the vote to all women over the age of 21. On March 6, 1930 a monument to the suffragist leader was erected in Victorian Tower Gardens next to the House of Parliament and unveiled by Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin.

Emmeline Pankhurst

Edith New died on January 2, 1951 in Polperro, Cornwall. Recognition in her home town for her achievements in the Votes for Women Campaign would take another 60 years to be put in place, thanks to an appeal made by Greendown Community School pupils. In 2011 s street on Nightingale Rise, Moredon was named Edith New Close.

Edith was buried with her much loved sister Ellen

A walk through Radnor Street Cemetery reveals some striking new discoveries as the Community Payback Team continue their excellent job of work, for example, this striking monument with its crazy paving gleaming in the summer sunshine.

Ever Loving Memory of

Arthur William

Burson

Who Fell Asleep 18th

May 1934 Aged 73 Years

Nothing in my hand I bring

Simply to they cross I cling

Also of

Emily Anna

Wife of the above

Who entered into Rest

14th March 1950

Aged 85 years

Arthur William Burson was born in Steventon, Berks, the son of farmer Richard Burson and his wife Louisa. In 1871 Richard was farming 140 acres and employing six labourers and two boys at Sutton Courtney, but Arthur appears to have been unwilling to follow in his father's agricultural footsteps.

By 1881 Arthur had moved to Swindon and was working as a grocer's assistant, living above the shop at 57 Bridge Street. In 1888 he married Emily Anna Solway and at the time of the 1891 census the couple were living at 52 Fleet Street where Arthur appears to have his own business.

Ten years later and the family business was at 94 Commercial Road, approximately where the TSB Bank is now situated. Arthur describes himself as a Grocer & Provision Merchant. By now the couple have three daughters, Edith, Elsie and Hilda, fourth daughter Grace was born in 1903.

Arthur went on to become a JP and by 1903 the family were living at Hedworth House, 69 Bath Road.

Arthur died on May 18, 1934. Probate was made on June 26 to his widow Emily Anna and his son in law Frederick Augustus Dadge, a railway clerk. Arthur's effects were valued at £56,668 6s 6d.

Emily outlived her husband by 16 years. She died on March 14, 1950 at the Cheriton Nursing Home in Westlecott Road. Her last home had been at number 4 Corby Avenue, Old Town.

She left her estate of £41,430 10s 7d to her daughter Edith Dadge who by this time was also a widow and Kenneth Burson Dadge, draughtsman, presumably her grandson.

As Lydiard House closes its walled garden doors on another successful NGS Open for Charity Sunday, SPL takes a trip to neighbouring Cirencester on the trail of a once lost daffodil.

The Bowly family roots are dug deep in Cirencester. From millers and brewers to local politicians and a slavery abolionist, the Bowly’s have left their stamp on the town. But one Bowly wife had family roots of a different kind – daffodil roots.

Born in 1851 Sarah Aldam Bowly nee Backhouse, like her husband, came from a Quaker family. Her father, William Backhouse began work in the Newcastle branch of the family banking business, but his first love was horticulture and in particular, daffodils.

Sarah and her four brothers, the children of William’s second marriage to Catherine Aldam, grew up at St. John’s Hall, near Wolsingham Co. Durham where her father owned 669 acres, an ideal setting for William’s studies and where he wrote his major horticultural work, Narcissus about the development of new varieties of daffodil.

Sarah married Cirencester widower Christopher Bowly in Darlington in 1874. She was 22 years old and he was fifteen years her senior. The couple began their married life at Christopher’s home at 1 Queens Hill where he was described as a Cheese Monger and Merchant in the 1881 census. By 1891 Christopher, by then a Justice of the Peace, and Sarah had moved into Siddington House.

In Wolsingham Sarah’s brothers Charles, Henry and Robert carried on their father’s work. Following William’s death in 1869 Peter Barr, a seedsman of Covent Garden, bought his collection comprising 192 new distinct varieties of daffodils. William’s most famous daffodil, the Weardale Perfection flowered for the first time some three years after his death and was named by one of his sons.

Like previous generations of his family, Christopher took a prominent role in his local community serving as a member of the Board of Guardians, chairman of the Cirencester Highway Board and President of the Cirencester Liberal party.

Christopher left £130,291 in his will when died at his home on May 23, 1922 aged 85, appointing Sarah and his nephew Edward Gibbons of Cheltenham, as executors. Among his bequests were £500 to the Friends’ Foreign Missionary Society, £100 each to the British and Foreign Bible Society, the Gloucester Infirmary, Cirencester Cottage Hospital and the YMCA Cirencester Branch, £50 to the Aborigines Protection Society and £50 to each of his indoor servants - his head gardener, and chauffeur if of twelve months’ service, and a further £2 for each additional completed year of service. A further £10,000 was bequeathed to his wife to dispose of at her discretion in benevolent, charitable, or other purposes according to his known wishes.

Christopher and Sarah also left their mark on Cirencester. Following her husband’s death, Sarah commissioned Norwich born architect Norman Jewson, a member of the Arts and Crafts movement based in the Cotswolds, to build a row of six almshouses on Watermoor Road.

Sarah died on September 24, 1931. Her daffodil growing father also left a legacy that has only recently been rediscovered. A solitary example of the Weardale Perfection, once thought to be extinct, was discovered in a Wolsingham cottage garden in 1998 and has since been revived by Dr. David Willis of the Daffodil Society.

Images: Sarah Bowly nee Blackhouse (top); Harry Backhouse (facing right); Aldham Backhouse (reading); Charles J. Backhouse; Weardale Perfection

Bruce travelled 12,000 miles by rail and raised more than £890 for charity, mostly for the Swindon Victoria Hospital, in a life that spanned just ten short years. Awarded 16 gold and silver medals and a solid silver collar, Bruce the famous fund raising dog has gone down in local history, but what about his owner.

Thomas Arthur Beal was born on January 31, 1878 at 5 Read Street. His father, also named Thomas, was a railway coach body maker in the GWR works, and on his 14th birthday Thomas junior joined him in the railway factory, beginning a seven year apprenticeship in the Turning Department.

By the time of the 1901 census Thomas was boarding with a family in Portsmouth where he worked as an electrical engineer fitter, but it would not be long before he returned to Swindon. In 1905 he married Jane Rice and set up home in Nelson Street, living with his new wife, her 12 year old son and, presumably Bruce who was born the same year.

An obituary was published in the Evening Swindon Advertiser when Bruce died in July 1915 - "Mr T.A. Beal of 16 Nelson Street, Swindon, informs us his well-known collecting dog, Bruce died last Friday morning, after three months illness, suffering from an ulcerated stomach. Two veterinary surgeons have attended the animal, and did all that was possible to save his life."The report continued - "He will be greatly missed on Hospital Collection days and especially by the children, with whom he was a great favourite. By his death Mr Beal has lost a valuable pet.' Bruce was photographed many times but Thomas only appears in one picture taken by William Hooper.

Thomas died in 1957, not at the Victoria Hospital for which he and Bruce had raised so much money, but at St Margaret's Hospital built on the site of the former workhouse at Stratton St Margaret. Whether he owned any subsequent dogs remains unknown, but Bruce would have been a tough act to follow.

Images published courtesy of P.A. Williams and Swindon Local Collection.

As the centenary of the outbreak of the Great War fast approaches, I remember two incredible Swindon women, Mary Slade and Kate Handley.

The Swindon Committee for the Provision of Comforts for the Wiltshire Regiment was formed in 1915. Over thirty years later Mary Slade and Kate Handley would still be supporting the soldiers who had survived the horrors of the Great War and the families of those who hadn’t.

Mary Elizabeth Slade was born in Bradford upon Avon in 1872, the daughter of woollen weavers Frank and Susan Slade. Mary and her brother George grew up in Trowbridge but by 1899 Mary had moved to Swindon and a teaching position at King William Street School.

Mary headed the team of women volunteers who were based at the Town Hall. Their work was much more than despatching a few cigarettes and a pair of socks to the Tommies on the Front Line and soon became a matter of life and death as the plight of the prisoners of war was revealed.

“When letters began to arrive from the men themselves begging for bread, it was soon realised that they were in dire need, and in imminent risk of dying from starvation, exposure and disease,” W. D. Bavin wrote in his seminal book Swindon’s War Record published in 1922.

All the prisoners received daily was a slice of dry bread for breakfast and tea and a bowl of cabbage soup for dinner.

“Had it not been for the parcels received out there from Great Britain we should have starved,” said returning serviceman T. Saddler.

The team of women co-ordinated supplies and materials with the support of local shopkeepers, schools and hard pressed Swindon families.

In the beginning the committee spent £2 a week on groceries to be sent to Gottingen and other camps where a large number of Wiltshire men had been interned following their capture in 1914. By October 1915 the committee was sending parcels to 660 men, including 332 at Gottingen and 152 at Munster. And at the end of July 1916 they had despatched 1,365 parcels of groceries, 1,419 of bread comprising 4,741 loaves, 38 parcels of clothing and 15 of books.

As the men were moved from prison camps on labour details, the committee adopted a system of sending parcels individually addressed. Each prisoner received a parcel once every seven weeks containing seven shillings worth of food. More than 3,750 individual parcels were despatched in the five months to the end of November 1916.

But the women’s work did not end with the armistice on November 11, 1918. Sadly the soldiers did not return to a land fit for heroes, as promised, but to unemployment and poverty. Mary Slade continued to fund raise for these Swindon families through to the end of the Second World War.

On July 25, 1919 Mary Slade and Kate Handley represented the Swindon Prisoners of War Committee at a Buckingham Palace Garden Party and in 1920 Mary was awarded the MBE.

Mary Slade died suddenly on January 31, 1960 at her home, 63 Avenue Road. She was 87 years old. The previous evening she had been a guest at the choir boy’s party at Christ Church.

Mary's MBE is on display at The Swindon in the Great War exhibition,which opens at Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, Bath Road on Wednesday August 6 at 1pm. Artefacts, photos and letters from the Prisoner's of War and records from The Swindon Committee for the Provision of Comforts for the Wiltshire Regiment that supported them are also on display.

For more information about events during the centenary visit the Swindon in the Great War website.

And for a review and details of how to buy Remembering Swindon 1914-1918 by Dr Mike Pringle see Swindon's Link Magazine.

Mary Slade (seated) and Kate Handley

Photographs published courtesy of the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre, Chippenham.

The people of Swindon marked the centenary of the outbreak of the Great War across the town in a variety of events this week.

On Monday August 4 Dr Mike Pringle (pictured below) launched the publication of his book Great War Britain - Swindon: Remembering 1914-18. A professional in the arts and heritage sector, Mike follows in the footsteps of headteacher WD Bavin who in 1922 was commissioned by Swindon Corporation to write Swindon's War Record. Read more about Mike's book in The Link Magazine.

Tuesday was a busy day for Swindon in the Great War volunteers who welcomed Swindon Mayor Teresa Page to open their exhibition - One Town's War - at Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, Bath Road, Swindon. The exhibition, created by volunteers and funded by an HLF grant, features exhibits and artefacts donated by Great War historians Mark Sutton and Richard Fisher. The exhibition will run until January 31, 2015. The Museum is open Wednesday to Saturday 11am to 3pm.

On Friday evening a free, public viewing of Steven Spielberg's War Horse, adapted from a children's novel by Michael Morpurgo, was shown on the big screen at Wharf Green and on Saturday August 9 the Brunel Centre hosted a series of Great War events in and around the shopping centre.

And in conversation with Alastair Greener of SwindonWeb, Mike talks about Swindon during the Great War. Among the topics he discusses is the work of Old Town furnishers Gilberts who provided furniture for Chiseldon Camp and the story of two incredible Swindon women. Mary Slade MBE and Kate Handley headed a team of volunteers who collected provisions for the men of the Wiltshire Regiment. They later went on to support Swindon men taken prisoner of war. Read more about these women in Swindon in the Past Lane and visit the exhibition to see evidence of their work.

Commemorations continue next week with a local history exhibition in the Radnor Street Cemetery Chapel and guided cemetery walks on Sunday August 19. For further details see below.

Dr Mike Pringle - Swindon: Remembering 1914-18

Swindon in the Great War - One Town's War exhibition

More from One Town's War - exhibition at Swindon Museum and Art Gallery

More from One Town's War - exhibition runs until January 31, 2015.

Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Teresa Page, Swindon Mayor; Sophie Cummings curator at Swindon Museum and Art Gallery and Great War historians Mark Sutton and Mike Pingle - Calyx Picture Agency

Swindon Society photographic exhibition

Swindon Heritage magazine

The team from Swindon Heritage will be launching the publication of the Autumn edition of the magazine at the Richard Jefferies Museum tomorrow.

The farmhouse at Coate was the home of Victorian naturist, novelist, poet and journalist Richard Jefferies and throughout the day Dr Mike Pringle will be conducting tours of the property. Mike will also be signing copies of his own book Swindon - Remembering 1914-18, the story of how Swindonians served in and survived the Great War.

Read about Kate Tryon in the Autumn edition of Swindon Heritage. An American artist and Jefferies devotee, Kate wrote an account of the first of her three visits to Jefferies Land to accompany a series of paintings, some of which will be on display at the museum tomorrow.

Visitors are invited to join the Bluegate Poets annual open day and barbecue, which begins at 3pm. Come and make a day of it at the Richard Jefferies Museum, Coate.

Mike Pringle

Richard Jefferies

Kate Tryon

Coate Farm

Reservoir House, Coate

The Lawn

Today it is difficult to picture the former GWR Park on Faringdon Road without it's splendid railings, yet it is a mere four years ago since the installation of the new ironmongering. A £200,000 developer funded project was announced in March 2009 and the final section along Church Place was finished in the summer of 2010.

The park project generated an interest in the distinctive Victorian blue brick capping on the walls stamped with the imprint Joseph Hamblet from West Bromwich and canal historian Janet Flanagan contacted me about a former boatman Bill Cutler.

Bill was born in 1895, a third generation boatman, and in 1969 the Advertiser interviewed him. He told of working on his father's two horse-drawn narrow boats called Lea and Rea, bringing bricks and brewery sugar from his native West Bromwich to Swindon.

"It was a lovely life," he told the Advertiser. "Peaceful, yet you were doing some hard work."

The Cutler Family connections in the Midlands saw them perfectly placed to transport the blue bricks manufactured at Joseph Hamblet's West Bromwich brickworks.

Like Bill, Joseph Hamblet worked in the family firm where the blue engineering bricks were a speciality. In the 1890s the firm was producing more than 400,000 bricks a week, among them the ones used to cap the walls around the GWR Park.

Bill recalled bringing the bricks down from the Midlands, through Gloucester and on to the Thames and Severn Canal at Stroud. Turning off at Latton the blue bricks made their way along the North Wilts Canal, eventually joining the Wilts and Berks Canal.

The Staffordshire blue bricks, made from the local Etruria Marl red clay, had a high crushing strength and were much favoured by civil engineers. Used in bridge, canal and railway construction, the blue bricks were the Victorian equivalent of reinforced concrete. These impermeable bricks were also ideal for parapet copings and capping walls and apart from a minimal amount of damage those used on the GWR Park walls remain in excellent condition, more than 100 years later.

No record remains of how large the Cutler shipment of Hamblet's blue bricks was and in 1969 Bill made no mention of the GWR Park but said that family memory was they were destined for Clarence Street School.

When Joseph Hamblet senior died in 1894 his grandson took over the business and in 1898 it became a limited company, the Hamblet Blue Brick Co.

Labour and fuel shortages during the Great War marked the end of the Hamblet family business and Bill was later employed to fill in the Swindon canal junction through which he had travelled so many times.

On the eve of voting in the Scottish Independence Referendum, the United Kingdom holds a collective breath. This is possibly the most emotive if not the most important political event to take place during my lifetime. With more than 81% of the population in England, Northern Ireland and Wales hoping for a 'no' vote, all we can do is sit back and wait.

The past two weeks has been a period of intense campaigning by those representing both sides of the argument with old fashioned tub thumping accompanied by extensive media coverage.

Press coverage more than 130 years ago also had a major influence on public opinion, resulting in a landslide Liberal victory in the 1880 General Election. But even William Morris, founder of the Advertiser, could hardly have anticipated it would lead to a riot in Swindon.

Polling day dawned dull and dismal but nothing could dampen the enthusiasm of the people. This had been a long anticipated election and the popularity of the Liberal Party had seldom been greater.

The GWR Works had closed for the day, increasing the number of people on the streets and as yellow and blue supporters jostled at the polling stations the excitement reached an alarming point, according to Morris.

"At New Swindon Mr Maskelyne's [Liberal candidate] reception was unprecedented in the history of all our local demonstrations," he reported.

Supporters of Mr Maskelyne made a dash for his carriage and having unfastened the horses, "drew him in triumph through the streets of the town accompanied by some thousands of spectators cheering and shouting vociferously."

However at the closing of the poll the mood on the streets changed sharply as crowds gathered in Bridge Street. The road from the Volunteer Inn to the opposite side of the Golden Lion Bridge was virtually impassable for several hours.

Local pubs and landlords, especially those who had declared their political allegiance, were targeted by the mob and an attempt was made to throw two publicans in the canal.

Pub windows were smashed on a route through the town centre to the railway village where the Cricketers' Arms and Thomas' in the Market Place were broken. The crowd then stormed up Prospect Hill where private houses also came under attack.

It was after 9 pm before a police presence arrived on the scene, a matter much criticised in the aftermath of the riot. Forming a cordon four deep, the officers swept through the town and eventually managed to clear the streets.

On Saturday morning stunned Swindonians returned to the town centre to view the damage.

"Every right thinking person must sincerely regret and denounce the window breaking which disgraced the election proceedings of last week," Morris reported in Monday's edition of the paper.

Highlighting inflammatory pre election campaign tactics fostered in two New Swindon coffee palaces, Morris urged that criticism should not be too severe "on the action of a thoughtless mob, provoked and irritated by the action of those who ought to have known better."

It remains to be seen how the Scottish people will react when the result of the Independence Referendum becomes known.

Sir Daniel Gooch

Mervyn Herbert Story Maskelyne

Major Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard's dying request was that his funeral service be as simple as possible and that he wished to be buried in a"plain elm coffin made from timber grown on my estate."

The last Lord of the Manor to live at The Lawn, Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard died at the family home on Friday August 12th 1927 and less than three weeks later Fielder and Tuckett, a firm of auctioneers, valuers and surveyors, were called in to catalogue the family treasures.

An Inventory of Plate, Pictures, Busts, Statutes, Books and Jewellery fills several typewritten sheets of paper, recording items of both financial and sentimental value. Items were listed under headings of the rooms where they were observed, for example the Dining Room, the Lobby to Drawing Room, the Blue Room and the Rose Room along with the Gun Room and the Billiard Room.

Pages and pages of books are recorded not just from the library but all over the house. An eclectic selection of titles such as Williams' Dogs and their ways is listed alongside a Welsh Dictionary, a photograph book and a scrapbook.

Among the silver plate was a tankard with lid dated 1643 and a Queen Anne crested salver on stand from 1711. There was a Georgian sugar sifter along with a Victorian one, a pair of small rat-tail sugar tongs and dozens of forks, knives and spoons.

Surprisingly there were few items of jewellery. A gold half hunter watch and chain, and seal has an explanatory annotation initialed E.W.G. "given to the Reverend C.F. Goddard (Fitzroy Pleydell's younger brother) at my husbands death."

Oil paintings of animals including two by Benjamin Marshall, an early 19th century canine and equestrian painter, hung on the walls alongside photographs of Teignmouth and Torquay.

In the Major's private room were two photographs of his parents taken on the occasion of their Golden Wedding anniversary in 1897.

Whether the inventory was made for probate or sale is unknown. Fitzroy Pleydell's widow spent a brief four years at The Lawn after her husband's death, before leaving for America where she made her home.

The Major's funeral took place on Monday August 15 at 8pm. Advertiser headlines read 'Interred at Sunset' and 'Large Attendance.'

As requested the Major's coffin was made from one of his trees, cut down in Drove Road during road widening work. Covered by a Union Jack the coffin was carried from The Lawn to the Parish church on a handbier where Canon C.A. Mayall and Dr. R. Talbot, the Archdeacon of Swindon conducted a simple service in Christ Church. The congregation was estimated to number in the thousands as Swindon marked the end of an era.

The Goddard Family - Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard is perched on the bench wearing a bowler hat

The ha-ha

The gazebo

Old images of the Goddard family and the Lawn are published courtesy of Swindon Local Studies see www.flickr.com/photos/swindonlocal/

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The Lawn

In 1952 Swindon embarked upon an ambitious programme of expansion. One of the objectives was to encourage London based industries to relocate and thereby revitalise a town too dependent on a declining railway industry.

As central government made an attempt to tackle the chronic housing shortage in the post war capital, country towns were given incentives to develop and expand. But Swindon had first to address a few pressing housing problems of its own.

A memorandum from the Medical Officer of Health to the town Clerk dated September 11, 1951 confirmed that Swindon had '138 sub-standard dwelling houses.' Some were considered to be 'in such a condition as to be a potential danger to life and limb, or to the health of the occupants.

The state of Swindon' housing was already causing concern in the 1930s. Wilfred Moss with his wife and daughter lived in a bungalow at Lower Walcot Farm, described as having four small rooms with timber partitions, two of which had insufficient light and ventilation. There was no water supply and the corrugated iron roof let in rain.

The family was eventually rehoused and the building threatened with demolition however W.G. Partridge, dairy farmer and Goddard estate tenant said he would 'probably use it for a cattle food store.'

But it was not only the private landlords who needed to get their house in order. In 1947 eight Corporation owned properties in Byron Street racked up a long list of defects. Structural work such as attention to brickwork and roof repairs, along with the replacement of joists and floorboards, ill fitting windows with broken glass and defective ceiling plaster came in at an estimated £962 (more than £27,000 today) and this would only raise the accommodation to 'reasonably fit for human habitation.'

One tenant, fed up with trying to get results from her landlord, took her complaints to the Right Honourable T. Reid, labour MP for Swindon in 1949.

Built around 1900 the houses in Beatrice Street were obviously in need of some renovation and Mrs Stevens living at number 129 described her house as being 'not damp but wet from top to bottom.'

'I pay 19/6 (97p about £85 today) per week for this place yet I can get nothing done. I am turning to you as my last hope,' she wrote. Her daughter lived with her and was shortly expecting a baby. 'I do not know what to do about bringing a new born baby here,' Mrs Stevens said.

The complaint was referred back to Swindon's Medical Officer of Health. The District Sanitary Inspector, who had previously been unable to gain access to the property, made an inspection and sent the owner a notice of essential repairs.

In June 1945 the local housing waiting list stood at 1,100. By 1947 the figure had risen to 3,685.

In 1951 construction work began on 200 acres at Stratton Cross Roads, When completed in mid 1955 the Penhill estate comprised 1,500 homes as work began on three neighbourhoods in the Walcot area. Park North, Park South and Walcot were completed in the early 1960s, each comprising between 1,500 - 1,950 new homes.

Photographs taken during another town regeneration scheme - 1957 Byron Street (top left) 1957 Commercial Road (middle right) and 1964 Farnsby Street (bottom) see these and others on www.flickr.com/photos/swindonlocal/

Window bills, confectioner's bags and sermons are just a few of the seemingly endless list of printing services produced by Robert Astill at his works in Victoria Street.

Born in Coventry in 1833 Robert Astill married Margaret Delphi Considence Hall in 1866 and by 1871 the couple were living at 18 Victoria Street with their two young children. Employed as foreman at the printing works established by auctioneer William Dore, Robert Astill became proprietor probably after Dore's death in 1877.

In 1883 Astill celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Swindon Almanack, Trades' Register and Local Guide which he 'Circulated Gratuitously to Householders.'

Astill's premises occupied the large corner plot at the top of Victoria Street where Victoria House now stands. With a Victoria Street frontage measuring 93ft (28.3 metres), the area was known locally as Astill's corner. Astill had bought the property in 1885, signing a conveyance between Charles Richards Plummer and his first wife Mary, most probably the former Mary Dore and daughter of Astill's employer, William.

By the turn of the century Robert was widowed, the youngest of his eleven children, Lily Blanche, had recently emigrated to Australia where she worked as a domestic servant in the Brisbane/Gold Coast area. With the business now in the hands of his sons, Robert was preparing to retire to Zeals, a small village near Warminster.

The whole complex was placed on the market in 1903 when it was described as being 'suitable for any Large Business or Offices with Stable, Coach House, Out Buildings, Yard and Garden ground.'

The 1903 sale catalogue describes a complicated arrangement of domestic and workplace accommodation. On the ground floor there were two entrance lobbies, one opening on to Bath Road and the other on to Victoria Street.

The Breakfast Room facing Victoria Street was used by Astill as a 'Stationery and Fancy Shop' while W H Bush used the Bath Road side Drawing and Reception Rooms as a 'Hairdressing Establishment.' The stables and use of the yard were let to Mr Greenman on a weekly tenancy.

A selling feature was made of the bressummers, strong beams supporting the superstructure of the building, thus enabling a conversion into two shops if the purchaser so desired.

With a dining room, seven bedrooms, a dressing room, WC and Linen closet on the two upper floors, this building presented a serious undertaking.

There appears to be no report in the Swindon Advertiser of the auction held at the Goddard Arms Hotel on the evening of Monday February 16. Kelly's Directory of 1915 reveal that the Astill brothers still occupied the premises, then described as 103 Victoria Road after renumbering of the recently built up road linking former Old and New Swindon.

Images courtesy of Swindon Local Studies

When Florence Poole married Elver Milsom in 1900 her family was at the peak of their profession, enjoying celebrity status across the country. Florence was the daughter of Joseph Poole who with his four brothers developed novel techniques in the art of myriorama, introducing explosive special effects, which caused great excitement amongst audiences, especially when the scenery caught fire.

The family business began in the 1840s when Malmesbury brothers George, Walter and Charles Poole, itinerate musicians working south coast resorts, met old showman Moses Gompertz.

By 1863 the brothers were managing Gompertz's panorama and diorama touring productions. However, it would be their nephews who would take the myriorama, a presentation of painted pictures moving across the stage on rollers, to new heights of popularity.

One of the Poole brothers most successful shows was 'The Bombardment of Alexandria' which included realistic gun fire achieved by a network of brass tubing loaded with small pieces of gun cotton and finely ground gunpowder. A performance at the Colston Hall in Bristol literally brought the house down when parts of the ceiling plaster fell off.

A handbill advertising the arrival of the show at Lowestoft in September 1896 announced among the many variety acts supporting the myriorama were, soloist Miss Ada Violet Poole (Joseph's daughter) and Professor De Voye's Performing Dogs who waltzed, skipped, somersaulted and sang.

By 1897 the brothers had added 'cinematographie.' a combined film camera, projector and developer, to their repertoire.

Eldest brother Joseph and his wife Susannah led a very peripatetic lifestyle with their four children born on tour - Florence (pictured bride) in Leighton Buzzard, Minnie in Plymouth, Ada in Leek and Joseph junior in Cardiff.

However, Malmesbury continued to remain base camp for the family. The 1881 census reveals that George had given up the travelling life and was landlord at the Railway Hotel in Malmesbury with his wife and four children, assisted by his parents John and Matilda.

By 1883 Joseph had bought a house named Verona where he established a studio for the maintenance of the paraphernalia associated with the shows. He later went on to become an Alderman and served as Mayor of Malmesbury in 1890-91.

Florence's wedding took place on August 29, 1900 at the parish church Malmesbury. Most of the travelling Poole clan were present for the big occasion. The bride's parents Joseph and Susannah are to the right of the photograph on the end of the front row, with Charles and Fred in the middle row and Harry and George at the back. In 1901 Florence's sister Ada married Elver's brother Percy B. Milsom, their brother Joseph's business manager.

At the time of the 1900 wedding the Poole family had seven elaborate shows touring the UK, Ireland and the Channel Islands.

The third generation of Poole family entertainers moved into cinema. Charles Poole junior, son of Charles William, opened Taunton's first cinema, the Empire Electric Picture House in 1910 while Percy Milsom, Ada's husband, managed The Grand Cinema at Newport on the Isle of Wight in the 1920s.

Today it is de rigueur for the about-to-be-married couple to circulate a gift list, but few would publish the results in the local paper. Yet this was common practice among the great and the good of the 19th century and when the Goddard heir married he did just that.

Captain Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard, second eldest son of Ambrose Lethbridge Goddard married Mrs Eugenia Sutton, widow of Alexander George Sutton, at the Parish Church, Chippenham on June 1, 1895. The wedding, described as being of ‘a very quiet character,’ was performed by Captain Goddard’s brother, the Rev. C.F. Goddard assisted by the Rev Canon Rich, Vicar of Chippenham and the Rev Canon Mayne, Rector of Christian Malford. Following the wedding breakfast at The Angel Hotel, Chippenham the couple left for a honeymoon in Lynton, Devon.

While the wedding might have been a low key event, the presents were in a different league altogether and were described in the Advertiser as ‘numerous and valuable.’

Heading the list were those exchanged between the couple. The groom gave the bride a sapphire and diamond horse shoe brooch, a sapphire and diamond ring, a sapphire and diamond bangle, silver brushes and a fur coat. The new Mrs Goddard presented her husband with a gold and enamel pin, gold initial links, silver dressing case boxes, a ring, a silver cigar lighter and a silver hunting flask.

The groom’s parents were equally generous. Ambrose and Charlotte gave them a brougham, a light, four wheeled horse drawn carriage.

The Townspeople of Swindon clubbed together to buy a silver tea and coffee service and tray and the tenants of the Swindon estate gave a silver salver while the Lawn servants presented the couple with a silver vegetable dish and a silver thermometer.

Intriguingly, included in the list of presents is a silver cigarette box given by the Hon. Mrs Keppel. Could this be Alice, later mistress of Edward Vll and great-grandmother of Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall?

Among the titled gift givers were Lord and Lady Swansea who added to the silver stash with an ink bottle and a sugar basin while Lady Peel, daughter in law of Sir Robert Peel Prime Minister and founder of the Metropolitan Police Force, gave a Chippendale table.

The more unusual gifts included some fantail pigeons from Miss N. Pegler while Mr Newman presented the newlyweds with two Berkshire pigs and some meal.

The couple never had any children of their own although Major Goddard acted as stepfather to Eugenia’s two children by her first marriage, Naomi who died aged 16 in 1910 and Thomas Alexander who lived at Westlecott Manor.

Major Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard died at his home The Lawn on Friday August 12, 1927 ending more than 350 years of Goddard family history in Swindon.

Major Goddard’s widow continued to live at The Lawn for a further four years before leaving for America. She returned to England and died at her home, The Cottage, Buckland on June 8, 1947. Her funeral took place at Christ Church, Swindon two days later.

Having stood empty for several years The Lawn was requisitioned by the war office to accommodate American troops during the Second World War. It was bought by Swindon Corporation in 1946 and eventually demolished in 1952 when it was declared unsafe.

The Lawn

Major Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard in old age

Remains of the sunken garden at the Lawn

The gazebo and ice house at the Lawn

Remains of the Lawn

Goddard family vault in the remains of Holy Rood Church.

Memorial window to Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard in Christ Church, Swindon

Old images of Major Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard, the Goddard family and the Lawn are published courtesy of Swindon Local Studies Collection. Visit the website on www.flickr.com/photos/swindonlocal

If you're looking for a good cause to support this Christmas read about Rosa and Ian Matheson, a man called Angel and an orphange in Nepal.

On a cold, dark winter’s evening in the magical, twinkly lit Pen & Paper Shop in Old Town, Rosa and Ian Matheson told a story of devotion, dedication and inspiration.

Rosa Matheson may be better known in Swindon for her books on the GWR Works, but to a man called Angel and his family of orphans in Nepal, she and her GP husband Ian are life savers.

In 2009 Rosa and Ian were part of a joint British-Nepali medical venture when they were asked to attend some sick children in an orphanage. It was here that they met Angel, a professional guide who made a living taking tourists on trekking holidays across Nepal. The orphanage began when Angel came across a small boy living alone in a remote village, his only relative an elderly grandmother unable to care for him herself. Angel took the boy home and raised him as his own. When Rosa and Ian met Angel and his wife they were struggling to survive with their growing ‘family’ of twenty one abandoned and orphaned children.

"We decided we could not walk away and leave these children in such a poor state, we had to help to alleviate their poverty and distress," said Rosa and so began The Friends of Angel's Orphanage.

But the couple's mission did not stop there. They quickly recognised that educating women was the way to help the children of the future and three years on, in addition to the orphanage, they are fund raising to support women's projects in Nepal. In 2011 100 British women wrote about a day in their life to support an untold number of Nepali women to improve theirs. Money raised through the sale of the book is now supporting four micro projects.

The first project was a £1,000 investment in Nepokra. Here small groups of women with an elected project leader have bought materials to set up in business; some in animal husbandry others in crafts. They receive veterinary attention for their animals and marketing advice for their products and at the end of the project they repay their loan, which can then be redistributed to other women.

Their second project was a cash donation to purchase a moped. This vital means of transport enables Dr Archana, a young Nepali woman committed to spending two years working in rural Nepal, to get around her practise a little easier.
The Himalayan River Girls project is a work in progress, inspired by Inca, a Swedish water sports instructor, who has trained the women in canoeing, kayaking and white water rafting. Rosa and Ian pledged to pay six months' rent on a boathouse when the River Girls find a suitable property.

The fourth micro project took off in February 2013 at the beginning of the Nepali growing season. A co-operative of 100 women are growing medicinal plants and herbs. A 500 euro investment bought the tools and seeds for the first year.

The women's projects and Angel's orphanage may seem a long way from a small shop in Swindon, but as Ian told me, 'we think about the children all the time.'

If you would like to support Rosa and Ian's work visit the Book Project website on www.the100womenbookproject.com/ A Day in the Life of 100 British Women is available from Pen & Paper Bookshop, 113 Victoria Road.

Rosa and Ian Matheson

Angel

The children

Rosa, Ian and Dr Archana with her new means of transport

2013 and A Happy New Year

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International Women's Day Celebrations in Swindon

Ironically the dedication on the official Swindon Roll of Honour reads 'Their Glory Shall Not Be Blotted Out, Their Name Liveth For Evermore.' Whilst it might not be exactly blotted out, the magnificent memorial lies hidden behind curtains in the dance studio at Swindon's Town Hall and today is seldom seen.

The memorial was erected by public subscription and in the same spirit the Swindon in the Great War committee launched its own fund raising memorial project 'Adopt a Tommy.'

You are invited to adopt one of the servicemen whose name appears on the memorial. For £10 you will receive a certificate based on the one the returning soldiers, sailors and airmen received and details of that man's service.

I've 'adopted' Edward William Reginald Bevan. Why? He is no relation, but I share his surname and because he served at sea. My husband comes from Milford Haven, a small former fishing town on the Pembrokeshire coast. Generations of his family depended upon the sea for their livelihood. Uncles and cousins worked as trawlermen, aunties and sisters worked in the fishmarket or making fishing nets or in the ship's stores. My father in law William Edward Lewis Bevan served in the navy during WWII and following the war worked as a shipwright on the docks.

It seemed fitting that I should adopt Engine Room Artificer E W R Bevan. This is the wartime story of Edward and his wife Mabel.

Beatrice Street lake, an old clay pit at the back of the Princess Hotel, was the scene of a near tragedy when a young naval widow, overwhelmed by grief, poverty and worry, tried to end her life.

Mabel Hurst was born in 1890 and grew up in Wellington Street, Swindon, the daughter of Francis Hurst, a fitter in the Works, and his wife Elizabeth Ann.

In 1912 she married submariner Edward Bevan and the couple made their home in Plymouth. An Engine Room Artificer on HMS 'E 16' Edward was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal in January 1916 but just seven months later he was lost at sea when the E16 was sunk by a mine in Heligoland Bight on August 22, 1916. There were no survivors.

Mabel returned home to Swindon with her two children. She took in a lodger to try to help make ends meet, but he attacked her and beat her up.

Eventually Mabel felt she could no longer carry on and jumped in the stretch of water behind Beatrice Street. She was rescued by a passing policeman who marched her home, dripping wet. With little compassion, he pointed at her children and told her to look after them, a scene that lived long in the memory of her daughter.

For details on how to Adopt a Tommy see below.

Mabel and her baby son John

This impressive building once stood on the corner of Regent Circus and Commercial Road. The house was caught on camera shortly before and during its demolition in 1964.

In 1901 number 34 Regent Circus was the home of Swindon solicitor Alfred Ernest Withy. Alfred was born in Bath in 1860, the son of leather seller, shoemaker and Coffee House Keeper John Withy and his wife Sarah. Alfred grew up at addresses in and around Bath and in 1881 the family home was Tyndale Villa on Wells Road in Lyncombe and Widecombe where Alfred worked as a solicitor’s article clerk.

In Trade Directories of 1889 Alfred appears listed as a solicitor and commissioner for oaths, a Wiltshire County Councillor and an insurance agent for the Alliance Fire and Life Company. He married Florence Clinker in 1890 and the following year the couple were living at 1 Rolleston Crescent, an area identified as between Temple Street and York Place on the census returns of that year. With the newly completed Town Hall taking centre stage, the whole area received a makeover and York Place was renamed Regent Circus.

By 1915 Alfred had moved to a house named Westlecot on Westlecot Road, Old Town, but his business address remained at Regent Circus where he had added Clerk to the Borough Justices to his long list of duties.

Alfred’s record of public service continued into the period of the Second World War. Then aged 78, Alfred was still acting as Magistrates’ Clerk at Swindon Borough Police Court and was not averse to handing out a few home truths, especially to the drunks who appeared before the Bench.

One of the first cases to come before him following the outbreak of war was that of Ernest William Scutts who pleaded guilty to being drunk in Newport Street in September 1939. “Beer is going to cost you more in the future and you will not be able to get so much,” Alfred told the repentant Scutts.

“We are getting more drunks in Swindon than we ought to do. We are breaking the record altogether,” Alfred declared as labourer William Petrie was fined 7s 6d having been found drunk and fast asleep on the pavement in Chapel Street in November 1939.

Homeless Irishman Frank Cosgrove who caused a stir when he performed an impromptu striptease in Drove Road on Thursday December 14, 1939, received short shrift from Alfred when he appeared before the magistrates. “Have a good night’s rest,” advised Mr Withy as he returned Cosgrove to the police cells. “Tomorrow morning at nine o’clock you must march – out of Swindon.”

Alfred died at his home on March 30, 1947 and left nearly £54,000 to be administered by The Public Trustee. The Alfred Ernest Withy Trust Fund that he set up in 1939 to support disadvantaged young people from across Wiltshire to access further education, continues today, providing grants to children of secondary school age for educational purposes. Applicants must be ‘poor in pocket and rich in merit.’

Photographs are published courtesy of Local Studies, Central Library www.flickr.com/photos/swindonlocal

Today you will be unlikely to hear the thwack of leather on willow in Faringdon Road Park where in 1844 the GWR bought a parcel of land west of the Railway Village, owned by Lt. Col Vilett.

In the early days the Cricket Ground was surrounded by a hedge and wooden palings and the GWR frequently had to issue warnings when their property was vandalised.

A notice published in June 1860 by Works Manager William Gooch announced – “I have again to caution, and call the attention of the Workmen to the damage done in the village by their Children, such as destroying trees in the Cricket Ground.”

Families faced severe penalties if their children were found to be the culprits. Gooch warned that the guilty boys "will not in future at any time be employed in the Works." If the offences were repeated the men risked losing not only their job but their home as well.

The GWR Cricket club, formed in 1847, shared the Cricket Field with teams representing other Shops in the railway works, even playing separate matches on the same day.

Star all-rounder was foundry worker John Laverick who as a 19 year-old moved to the GWR Works in 1866 from his home in Northumberland. He joined the cricket club the following year and scored 60 runs in his first innings played on the home ground.

In 1870 a match played at Bedminster's home ground saw batting legend W.G. Grace bowled out for a duck by Laverick.

During the club's heyday, when crowds averaged 1,000, team members included twin brothers Tom and George Hogarth who apparently caused the tetchy Dr. Grace some confusion when they played against him. Convinced that the GWR team had put the same man in to bat twice, the brothers had to stand side by side to settle the charge.

The GWR Company continued to develop the park, although sometimes at the expense of the cricket club, as Frederick Large notes in A Swindon Retrospect. “A bandstand having been erected by them almost in midfield of play rendered the playing of matches well nigh impossible ...”

After 63 years the club's career finally came to an end in 1910. Financial difficulties compounded by the high rent charged by the GWR on the Cricket Field saw the team selling off materials to pay debts.

In 1925 the park passed out of GWR ownership when the company entered into an 'exchange' with Swindon Corporation for land at Gorse Hill.

1870 - plans are drawn up for a Lodge on the eastern side of the New Swindon Cricket Field.
1871-72 Landscaping and formal gardens are laid out. Pavilion built on western side of the park, backing onto Park Lane. Fund raising events such as Penny Readings held at the Mechanics Institute to pay for these improvements.
Drill Hall built for the XI Wilts Rifle Corp - site now occupied by the TA Centre.
1881 census - Robert Matthews is head gardener and park keeper living at Park Lodge, Church Place.
1897 - railings and ornamental gates added.
1898 - plan for Bandstand submitted.
2010 - New railings erected around Faringdon Road Park

old postcard views of GWR Park courtesy of www.flickr.com/photos/swindonlocal/

In 1906 the suffragette campaign entered its most violent phase. Over 500 women had been imprisoned by 1909 and right up there among the militant activists was a Swindon schoolteacher.

Edith Bessie New was born 17th March, 1877 at 24 North Street, Swindon, the fourth of Frederic and Isabelle New's five children. Frederic worked as a railway clerk at the GWR Works and Isabelle was a music teacher.

An assistant mistress at Queenstown Infant School from 1899-1901, Edith subsequently left her Swindon home to teach in the deprived areas of Deptford and Lewisham. It was after hearing the charismatic Emmeline Pankhurst speak at a meeting in Trafalgar Square that Edith joined the Women's Social and Political Union.

In February 1907 a deputation of suffragettes marched on the House of Commons in protest at the omission of votes for women from the King's speech. What had begun as a peaceful demonstration ended in a violent confrontation with police. Edith was among those arrested and sentenced to two weeks in Holloway gaol.

She continued to be at the forefront of innovative and dangerous protest methods. In January 1908 Edith chained herself to the railings at 10 Downing Street, the first time suffragettes had employed such tactics. It took the unprepared police sometime to release her, allowing Edith to make her protest heard by the assembled Cabinet gathered there. A three-week sentence in Holloway followed.

The hugely successful Women's Day rally held in Hyde Park on June 21,1908 attracted an estimated crowd of 250,000. Edith, by now an experienced and informative speaker, took her place alongside suffragette leaders.

Later that same month Edith, accompanied by Mary Leigh, broke windows at 10 Downing Street, another new headline grabbing tactic which would be increasingly employed by suffragettes. The women served two months in Holloway. On their release they were taken to a celebratory breakfast party in a carriage drawn by six suffragettes.

Edith resigned from teaching in 1908 to join the WSPU paid workforce. She travelled the country organising support for parliamentary candidates sympathetic to women's suffrage. In September 1909 she campaigned in Scotland where she was arrested for causing a breach of the peace during a meeting in Dundee. Sentenced to seven days imprisonment, Edith and her fellow prisoners went on hunger strike, the first to do so in Scotland.

Edith returned to teaching in 1911, where she continued to campaign for women's rights and equal pay within her profession.

Edith died aged 73 on 2nd January 1951 at The Croft, Landaviddy Lane, Polperro, Cornwall. She left property valued at £3,771 to her two nieces. She never married and her death was registered by her companion of over 40 years, Nea Campion, a fellow teacher from the Lewisham days.

Images courtesy of T. Dugdale and Swindon Local Studies

Our next guided walk around Radnor Street Cemetery takes place on Sunday, August 9, 2015. Meet at the chapel at 2pm.

Somewhere in the area marked Section C in Radnor Street Cemetery, close to the Chapel, is the grave of three boys, friends and neighbours who in 1919 lived at numbers 42, 69 and 73 Medgbury Road – Frederick Cosway 14, Frederick Rawlinson also 14 and 13 year old Stanley Palmer the adopted son of Elizabeth and Henry Holt.

Good Friday 1919 dawned bright and sunny when a group of boys, about 24 all together, set off from Medgbury Road for a day’s outing. They left early, taking with them a packed lunch and walked to Liddington Castle where they stopped to play games and eat their sandwiches.

One of the boys suggested walking over to the trenches at the Chiseldon Camp. At this point the group split with just seven of the boys deciding to go on to the Military Camp.

Fourteen year old Albert Townsend of 44 Medgbury Road, who along with Frederick Rawlinson worked for Reynolds boot and shoe manufacturer in Old Town, told a reporter from the Advertiser what happened next.

“As we were walking along Rawlinson picked up something, a piece of iron, which looked like a rolling pin, and rolled it down a bank. Suddenly I heard a loud report, and looked round, but I could see nothing but ‘mist.’ I found something strike me in the leg, and also in the back. I afterwards found that I had been wounded in three places. I have two slight wounds in the back, and one in the leg. I was able to get home, and was attended by Dr. Lavery. Two of the injured boys were first taken to a farmhouse near the scene of the accident, and then to the Military Hospital. The seventh boy, who escaped injury, is named Love. Two of the boys who were killed were blown to pieces,” he said. The explosion was heard as far away as Coate Reservoir, a distance of about three or four miles.

The funeral of the three boys took place on April 24 and was attended by what was described as ‘an immense throng’ of people.

The procession started from the boys homes along a route lined with spectators and proceeded to the Central Mission Hall in Clarence Street. The congregation numbered approximately 800 with many more standing outside the hall.

The report of the funeral continues:

“Two of the coffins were conveyed in shillibiers (a horsedrawn vehicle) and the third on a handbier. There was a great profusion of flowers. The chief mourners followed in carriages. They included the parents and other relatives of the deceased lads. Between 30 and 40 lads, companions of the deceased, followed on foot.

As the procession wended its way to the Cemetery rain commenced falling heavily, but it proved to be a storm of short duration. The interment took place in the Cemetery in the presence of several thousand spectators, and the service, which was conducted by Pastor Spargo, will long be remembered by all who took part.”

The boys were buried together in plot C728. Today there is no memorial to mark the spot.

The area in which the boys are buried

For more photographs of Chiseldon Camp visit Swindon Central Library flickr website on www.flickr.com/photos/swindonlocal

Emmeline Pankhurst

Arthur William Burson

Daffodil roots

Bruce - the famous fund raising dog

Mary E. Slade

Swindon in the Great War

Swindon Heritage - Autumn 2014 edition

Hamblet's famous blue bricks

1880 General Election Riot

Fitzroy Pleydell Goddard

Town Centre Regeneration and Slum Clearance

Astill's Corner

The Poole family's Amazing Myriorama show

To Fitzroy and Eugenia with love - two Berkshire pigs and some meal

Rosa and Ian Matheson

Adopt a Tommy

No 34 Regent Circus

GWR Park

Edith New - Swindon Suffragette

Chiseldon Camp Disaster