Sussex's Wartime Evacuations

Once again, my gratitude goes out to the Chittenden family for the trove of information and images that they've provided for us here at Who Is George Mills? This week, we'll take a look at an very interesting document entitled "Evacuation," written recently by Ann, a daughter of Hugh and Barbara Chittenden of Newlands School in Seaford, Sussex. It's a delightful and personal recollection of a five year long event that had the potential to be a nightmare, and one hopes that most of the children who had been evacuated at the onset of the Second World War were able to, like Ann, keep many of the joys of childhood intact—at least to some degree.


Thenford

At the beginning of the war, Newlands School was evacuated for a period of five years, firstly to Thenford House situated in a small hamlet approximately five miles from Banbury in Oxfordshire. It was a lovely Georgian mansion although I remember it being extremely cold in winter, the only heating being provided by open fires. I think Thenford House had approximately 80 acres of land. I started off as the only girl in a school comprising of about 60 boys. Two other girls joined the school later on during the evacuation although for a shorter period.

We had a very carefree childhood. The worry of keeping the school going and the safety of the children must have been an absolute nightmare for my parents, but we were unaware of this at the time and I recall a very happy childhood with a lot of freedom.

Below is a list of some of my extremely random childhood memories of my time at Thenford!

Our classrooms were over the stables.

The owner of Thenford House had left his horses behind and the groom who remained there taught me to ride.

Fire practise involved putting a rope around one's middle and being lowered over the side of the house from the parapet. I doubt modern Health and Safety officials would approve!

There was a large lake on which we skated – highly dangerous! I also learnt to chop firewood with an axe at the age of 8, as did the boys at the school. Again, highly dangerous!

There was a rogue gardener who had locked the kitchen garden and was selling the fruit and vegetables, which were supposed to be for the use of the school. I recall my father, with the school doctor, climbing over the walls in the middle of the night to raid the garden for his own vegetables!

The farm was just beyond the stable yard and, after milking, I used to drive the cattle back to the fields for the farmer at the age of 8.

One night at Thenford we were all taken down to the cellars as Coventry was being bombed. I recall there was a red glow in the sky, although Coventry was a long way away.

I remember going for a walk through the woods with our gas masks on for practise. They used to steam up and I used to lift the sides up to let the air in which would have defeated the object.

My father joined the Home Guard at Thenford [above, left], which was a little bit like Dad's Army!


Wardington

After three years we moved to Wardington House in the village of Wardington near Banbury. My memories of my time at Wardington include:

There was a farm next door to the house with a herd of jersey cows and my mother used to make bowls of clotted cream for us. Delicious!

There were Italian prisoners of war working on the farm. I recall that they used to wait every evening by the front of Wardington House to be picked up and returned to their camp.

I used to ride the butcher's pony for sixpence an hour.

My mother used to provide food for midnight feasts for the school, unbeknown to anyone else!

I remember the Home Guard at Wardington also. The overriding memory is of the Home Guard marching up the village street, with their Commanding Officer shouting “Halt” and they completely ignored him and kept on marching. He kept on shouting “Halt” until he finally gave up and yelled “Oh, for gawd's sake halt!”


Seaford

During the evacuation the school buildings in Seaford were taken over by the French Canadians. They used the weather vane for target practise and shot off the North, South, East and West which were later found after the war in the flower beds in the garden.

All very light hearted memories, of no importance but I hope they are of some interest to you!


Wonderful! I do believe these memories are important, though. The numbers—how many children were relocated, what transportation, average distance travelled, destinations, costs, etc. —are, I'm sure, readily available on-line and in dusty books. The facts and the figures, however, don't really tell the human part of the story.

These recollections help me—and all of us—envision a time and a way of life that's disappearing all too quickly, no matter on which side of the Atlantic one resides. Memories of things like the fire drills, the rogue gardener, the clotted cream, and the Italian prisoners help re-create it all in a way that makes television programmes like Foyle's War so popular—at least here in the States.

Perhaps the most enduring pop-cultural reference to Britain's evacuation of children during World War II comes in the first chapter of C.S. Lewis's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, as described in Wikipedia : "The story begins in 1940 during World War II, when four siblings—Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie—are evacuated from London to escape the Blitz. They are sent to live with Professor Digory Kirke, who lives in a country house in the English countryside."

In Lewis's novel there is no reference to where, exactly, the children had been relocated, but it's easy to imagine that, had those Sons of Adam and the Daughters of Eve not become involved in their adventures beyond the wardrobe, they may have instead explored the area around Professor Kirke's country house and had much less fantastic, but quite meaningful, adventures like Ann's above.

How does any of this truly relate to George Mills? First, George lived in this world, and it was far less idyllic than as was perceived by young Ann. Mills returned to the military in 1940, becoming a second lieutenant army paymaster at the age of 40, assuring us that he was keenly aware of his duty during the conflict as well as the dangers for himself and his nation. Understanding the world in which Mills lived provides context for understand the man himself.

Secondly—and as always seems to happen when we study George Mills—we find there is a Sussex connection.

During George's time as a schoolmaster at Warren Hill School in Meads late in the decade of the 1920s, he must have been acquainted with writers (and sisters-in-law) Kitty Barne and Noel Streatfeild. Mills was not a writer at the time, and would not become a published author until the appearance of his breakthrough novel Meredith and Co.: The Story of a Modern Preparatory School on bookshelves in 1933. George had taught with Kitty's husband, and Noel's brother, musician Eric Streatfeild in Eastbourne.

Meredith and Co. contained vignettes undoubtedly culled for his time at Warren Hill, as well as his stint at Windlesham House, then in Portslade, and made a study of the vernacular used by boys of the era, a first in children's literature. It was a device that many subsequent children's authors have imitated.

Later that decade, as children were being evacuated from Sussex and in the same year that Mills was returning to active duty under the Colours, Kitty Barne published her Carnegie Medal winning book Visitors from London, an early novel about evacuees that was set in Sussex.

By 1945, Noel Streatfeild had authored Saplings, a novel intended for adult readers, set in 1939 and describing the wartime experiences of the Wiltshire family, focusing on the children Laurel, Tony, Kim and Tuesday. Saplings, according to a reviewer called Nymeth , "chronicles the psychological effect these separations, this uncertainly and instability, had on those who had to grow up with them," and "capture[s] a child’s perspective and understanding of the world" as it was for them during the war.

The on-line review continues: "The children are actually very well-off, in the sense that they are physically safe, they never go hungry, and they don't suffer discomforts. And yet my heart still broke for them."

That is very much how one might feel regarding Ann's memories above. It's a tribute to Ann, and the rest of the world's ' greatest generation,' that they survived so much and were able, for the most part, to come away with memories of a positive nature. Families were separated, lives disrupted, and a gnawing feeling of fear must have been prevalent, knowing Nazis were just miles away in occupied France, anticipating overrunning and conquering England in much the same way they'd blitzkrieged most of Europe. It's difficult today to think of those times as having been anything but frightening, a feeling of which we find a hint in Ann's recollection of the bombing of Coventry.

Ann Chittenden, as a child, seems to have lived very much in the moment, and if she harbours any grim or bitter recollections of leaving home and family for five years of her life, she isn't dwelling on them.

Noel Streatfeild, however, was still ruminating over the events of the evacuation some thirty years later when, in 1974, she published When the Sirens Wailed, a text described as being "about three evacuees and cover[ing] issues like rations for evacuees, relationship[s] between evacuees and townspeople, and the problems encountered by those who stayed behind." [You can find more about the book by clicking HERE.]

Many thanks, Ann, for adding your own memories here.


George Mills had passed away in 1972, and there's no indication that he ever discussed his feelings and experiences during the war with anyone who still living today. During the conflict, George dealt with the deaths of friends (Terence Hadow, Egerton Clarke), colleagues (Capt. William Mocatta, Joshua Goodland), and loved ones (his wife, Vera, and his mother, Edith), all between 1939 and 1945.

We certainly don't know if he kept in touch with Barne or Streatfeild after leaving behind a career as a schoolmaster and becoming, like them, an author of children's books. What we do know is that whenever we examine George's life, or the lives of those close to him, the path always seems to lead us to Sussex.

Did George spend time after the war teaching in Sussex—Seaford, specifically—at Newlands School? Right now we have no evidence of that.

But it wouldn't surprise me one bit!

It's Always Sunny on Beachy Head Road

Lately, as steamy Ocala dries out from our daily subtropical cloudbursts, I've been sifting through some older information, trying to get all my ducks in a row (Is that a British idiom as well?) and have found some items about Warren Hill School in Meads, Eastbourne, that may be of interest.

It's been over a year now since I received information researched by Michael Ockenden of the Eastbourne Local History Society, the man who located Warren Hill School for us and has provided a wealth of information over time.

However, when the location of Warren Hill was still unknown, that had been my obsession, I'm afraid to say. In my zeal to locate the site of the campus, Michael O. had provided some nuggets of information that flew past me unnoticed, well beyond what was then my narrow field of vision.

Here's the first:

One of our senior members has just e-mailed to say:-

I remember Warren Hill School as a regular opponent on our fixture lists during the 1930s. Their football field was at the top end of Carlisle Road. But I seem to recall that it was dropped from our fixtures well before 1939, so maybe it had closed by then.


I paid homage to this bit of information, along with many others, at the time (24 March 2010), but this particular recollection really failed to sink into my notoriously thick skull. (Is that a British idiom as well?) It corroborates something we eventually "discovered" later on: Warren Hill School held land at the top end of Carlisle Road.

A few days later, Michael verified it:

[In August 1931] the Times reports the registration of land (the school and its grounds) at Warren Hill, Beachy Head Road, and land (the playing field) in Carlisle Road, Eastbourne.


Sometimes one can't see the forest for the trees (Is that a British idiom as well?) in that we'd actually had that information for quite a while, and was eventually corroborated here [right]. Looking for the actual location of the building, though, seemed to be my only passion a year ago or more, and I promise that the next university degree I earn will be in History so I can manage all of this properly!


Another bit of information from last year, however, was something that has stayed on my mind constantly since then. Michael had also written during that time:

The school (which no longer stands ... apart from the former hall or gym) was situated on the left-hand side of Beachy Head Road, between Coltstocks Road and Darley Road.

Later, he added:

The low structure to the left is probably the house which still stands on the site (50 45 22 95 N and 0 15 52 90 E) - the last vestige of Warren Hill School.


The low structure to which Michael refers might have been, I had always thought as we went along, the addition we have seen numerous times at the southwest corner of Warren Hill in the black-and-white image, circa 1930 [left].

I've wondered frequently about that "last vestige" of Warren Hill, the "former hall or gym."

For some reason, though, I recently decided to drive 'virtually' down Beachy Head Road once more and do some snooping via Street View at Google Maps.

Here's an image captured along Beachy Head at a gate in the wall that presumably divides the property that was once the campus of Warren Hill School from the property upon which now sits Stanton Prior (on the corner of Beach Head and Darley Roads. That is the closest I can prowl, from Ocala, Florida, to what would have been the southwest corner of the main building of Warren Hill.


Clicking once to enlarge, I find this:


There is clearly something visible from the street [click the image to enlarge it]. You'll notice that, in the bottom right hand corner of that image, the small golden avatar that represents where I am looking is locked on a building that is in a similar spot to that low-lying addition.

Let's check the 1930 map, but at the same time see where I was looking today. I've also marked three places where structures on both seem to coincide [click to enlarge slightly]:


Only one seems to have the look of something that could have been a "former hall or gym": Number 3.

However, there are some similarities between what is visible today and what would have been there in 1930, albeit very difficult to see.

Here's a side-by-side comparison of our snooping peek through the hedge via Street View set next to an image of former headmaster F. R. Ebden standing to the west of the main building and facing the southeast in relation to the structure behind him. The street view image was captured from the opposite direction, looking in from the northwest [click to enlarge].


It seems that there are definite areas of similarity, pointed out in the comparison above, and the fact that those north-side characteristics reveal a mirror-image of the southern view would be something a symmetry-minded person might have been expecting. While this low-lying structure doesn't necessarily have the appearance of a "former hall or gym," its physical characteristics seem oddly similar to the structure that may have been there, circa 1930.

This structure would be immediately behind the hedge today, and would correspond to the narrow, east-west building we see in the map far above at location Number 1.


Sometimes I feel a bit like a veritable prowler, but is broad daylight—always broad daylight—in Street View. Perhaps then, I'm more of a stalker, but my stalking target is merely history. I suppose I can't feel too guilty about skulking about outside the gate on Beachy Head Road and peeking through. After all, I'm 4,000 miles away!

In the end, it's really all I can do, sitting here on the sun porch, watching dark the clouds roiling together above in advance of our expected afternoon thunderstorm.

So is the narrow building at Number 1 the last vestige of Warren Hill School, or is it the beefier structure found at location Number 3?

Perhaps neither. Perhaps both!

I can't tell from here, but as the thunder drives our cat out of this room and under the bed, it's nice to know that, courtesy of Google, it's always sunny on Beachy Head Road!

Focusing on Warren Hill's Master's Residence, 1901

As regular readers know, some time ago, Michael Ockenden of the Eastbourne Local History Society sent this message: "Another Michael of Eastbourne Local History has turned up these two photographs of Warren Hill School. The first is probably from a postcard and shows the view looking up what is now Beachy Head Road with the school on the left. It's hard to date precisely but one can suppose that it is pre 1900. The masters' residence must be the house on the right. The girls walking down the hill are almost level with a group of flint cottages which still stand."

It's that post card image that interests us today, especially regarding that master's residence.

The last time we looked at Warren Hill School, we determined that the configuration of the structure in those 1880 photographs discovered by Barry McAleenan was essentially the same as the image of the school from the post card mentioned above. Mr. Ockenden's assessment of the image as dating from before the turn of the century was spot on!

The house in the image is now 10, Beachy Head Road, and we've wondered for a while here about the possibility of it being the hard-to-find master's residence. I had searched the "West Ward" census for 1901 and found nothing that could be called a Master's residence, although I did find many homes and flats containing a schoolmaster or two!


It turns out that the "West Ward" document I could access using the name of Head Master A. Max Wilkinson (giving me access to the census at Warren Hill School that day) did not contain the houses across the street down near what is now the junction with Colistocks Road [pictured above, today]. And the only way of "getting in" was by knowing the name of a resident—shutting me out of those nearby houses completely.

The problem has been solved by the intrepid Jennifer M., a dear friend and a wizard with these census documents.

Here's what she had to say:


Looking at the 1899 map [which you can see by clicking HERE], I’m fairly sure the building on lot 161[which is on the 1930 map, which you can see by clicking HERE] (#10) is what the 1901 census taker called “Warren Hill cottage.”

The inhabitants are:
     1. Charles E King, 38, schoolmaster
     2. Francis H. Brodrick, 33, schoolmaster
     3. George Anderson, 24, schoolmaster
     4. Eliza Shepherd, 46, housekeeper - domestic
     5. Isabella Morrison, 25, parlourmaid


I think #6 BHR is “Fairfield Cottage.” It has a family living in it by the name of Broson. I think. The handwriting is old-fashioned and curly. The family members names are Arthur, Orpha, Katie and Edith.

I’m not sure which are the Beachy Head Villas #1 and #2 (maybe on the 1899 map in section 115 2-790?), but I think “new cottages 1-6” are the ones next to #6. If you want those names, too, let me know.

And when I searched, yes, the school itself was in a different district from all the cottages on the other side of BHR.


So, we find that the cottage of schoolmasters was appropriately named "Warren Hill Cottage." You can see the entire page of the census document by clicking HERE.


Along the road today, traveling west toward the site of Warren Hill School [as seen, above], we can start at the intersection of Beachy Head and Meads Street. On the right hand side, now recessed off the road and behind a thick hedgerow, would seem to be the "new cottages." We clearly can see cottages number 5 and 6, however, listed on this excerpt from the full census page.

Then the census taker came to Nos. 1 & 2 Beachy Head Villas. They would seem to be the L-shaped buildings across the road, to the south.


Then the taker went to both Warren Hill Cottage and Fairfield Cottages [seen, above, as they appear today, No. 10 (left) and No. 6]. One of the two buildings would be the master's residence of Warren Hill School, although I might have guessed it would have been what is now No. 6, Holly Cottage. We'll never know, however, the exact path walked by the census taker on 31 March 1901.

What is particularly interesting would be to know if the cottage was owned by Warren Hill School. We know the school's grounds encompassed land along Carlisle Road up to Boston House, which is now a girls' school. Could that tract of land have extended east to include the cottages mentioned above? Or did the school simply rent a house for the use of the schoolmasters. It would seem to have been a fairly posh set-up: In no other residence of an ordinary schoolmaster did we find domestic servants—at least not in the West Ward!

Nonetheless, it would seem the entrepreneurial enterprise known as Warren Hill School would have been flush with assets that went beyond the mere operation of the school early in the 20th century. It is staggering to consider what all of that land would be worth today!


When Joshua Goodland bought and then sold the institution [above], around and during the onset of the Great Depression, it was probably a substantial transaction. It also allowed Goodland to hire a young schoolmaster named George Mills, who is the focus of our research here.

George in all likelihood lived in that master's residence while his wife, Vera, stayed in Knightsbridge with her mother and sister, and described it in his novels. It may not be exciting for everyone, but I'm delighted to have a location for Mills during his time in Meads!

Many thanks to the relentless Jennifer, the Sultana of the Census, for her persistence in locating first, the census document, and then the residence itself. And many thanks for her kindness and friendship as well.

Playing Jenga with Barry and Warren Hill

Sometimes doing the research for this blog is like playing the game Jenga. A piece of history gets taken away for my use here, and everything is all right. Another piece… still all right. Another piece…

Bam!

Everything can fall apart.

That happened to me last week after good friend of Who Is George Mills? Barry McAleenan took a trip, doing valuable legwork I simply cannot do from here in steamy Ocala, Florida.

Barry writes: "I had a look at the map cabinet for 1875 to 1934 at the local library. There are only 3 for your area of interest. You've already seen the 1930 one.

So I attach a copy of 1899 with a selective enlargement for Warren Hill."

You can click on the entire 1899 map at the above left for the entire enlargement. What I'll focus on will be the devastating image in Barry's "selective enlargement" (which sounds exactly like an offer made in some unwanted spam e-mail I recently received).

At first glance, one finds that the image [below, right; click to enlarge] seems almost exactly like the 1930 map of Warren Hill School. In fact, it's similar as far as that entire property goes, showing only a difference in the northeast corner of the main building (A new isolation/sick wing spurred by the influenza epidemic?), a small addition to the low building in the SE, and a modified outbuilding to the northwest. All of these changes in the building are noted in the illustration, below left, with red arrows.

How disheartening for a hardworking Yank trying to 'virtually' figure out the campus, building, and neighbourhood from across the pond!

"There are three key photographic images in the provenance of our examination of Warren Hill School (1885 – 1936) in Meads, Eastbourne. All were very kindly provided by the Eastbourne Local History Society, and have been featured numerous times here.

In lieu of actual names, I've loosely considered those three the "post card image" (see it by clicking here), the "sepia image" (click here for that one), and the "B&W image" (seen by clicking here). Chronologically, it appeared to me that was the sequence in which the photographs had been taken—the post card early in the school's existence, the sepia-toned image in the 1890s and possibly 1900, and the black-and-white image much later, after an addition had been built.

That alleged order is immediately jumbled by Barry's 1899 map.

The low building I was certain must be the memorial library/reading room dedicated to those alumni who had lost their lives in the First World War was obviously fully constructed in 1899. Scratch that entire idea.

That would also make the "sepia image" the oldest of the three photographs, even if only by the length of time it might have taken to break ground on that new, low wing situated to the Southeast.

Secondly, on the 1899 map, there is no building directly across Beachy Head Road from Warren Hill. That means the structure presently there was constructed sometime between 1899 and the 1930 map. Consequently, the "post card" photograph was captured during that time frame as well.

But the post card shows a roof slanting down to the east from the eastern wall of the main building [shown in the final illustration, far below, left], and no such wall exists in the "sepia image"—simply a glass-walled and roofed conservatory/greenhouse. That could indicate an addition built there, and could be a locale for that library reading room.

However, thirdly, my reconsideration of the three photographs forced me to notice another difference that had previously escaped my eye: there is a bank of tall, thin windows, possibly almost a bay of windows protruding, on the second floor at the most eastern part of the southern wall of the school. It's seen in the B&W image, just above the tree line. There had previously been separate, paired windows there.

Also, in that "B&W image," it's difficult to discern anything to the right, on the eastern wall, that could be the protruding roof indicating a two-story tall addition there to the east. That structure appears not to exist in this image.

This would seem to mean a couple of things. First, that the post card image, depicting the eastern addition, is actually the newest of the three, not the oldest—and now that I really look carefully, does that appear to be a tall electrical light standard at the main gate, and not the flag pole I assumed it to be?

As I considered it, Barry wrote: "The lamposts look like a corporation design for gas street-lighting. The third post (later moved) may be for electricity (using 4 insulators for three-phase and neutral) or possibly telephone lines."

In addition, it appears that the new memorial library/reading room may have been added on the southern side of the second floor of the main building, adding a bay of windows with southern exposure to what must have been a remodeled library.


So much for my supposedly informed speculation!

One still wonders where the school garden that Bertram de Glanville describes would have been located. Were the glass-roofed greenhouses replaced, or simply roofed over and made sturdier?

And this completely blows up the idea that the building across the street from the school was any sort of long-time master's residence for the school—it wasn't there in 1899, and doesn't appear on the 1901 census. That residence was either elsewhere in Eastbourne, didn't come to be until after 1901, or was simply a myth.

There's only one thing that I simply don't seem to be able to resolve in my own mind: Why does the postcard image appear to show a building with a relatively flat façade in the north, along Beachy Head Road, while both maps clearly show a rounded protrusion jutting out, northward, from that wall [shown with the blue arrow in the 1899 image far above, left, to the left]?

Is it possible some of that main building to the west was demolished after 1930? Looking at the postcard image, the building across the street seems to be quite ivy-covered, and it apparently did not yet exist in 1901. Is that almost 30 years growth of ivy in Sussex [below]? 20 years? 10? How quickly will ivy creep up a wall along the Channel coast?

Could the post card be of such recent vintage that part of Warren Hill has been razed—a good reason for Joshua Goodland to have wanted to part with the school at the time! Might this post card have been produced by de Glanville to boost enrollment, using a quaint sepia image to hearken back visually to the school's halcyon days?

My, would I love to know if there's a dated post mark stamped on the other side of that post card!

The ubiquitous Mr. McAleenan notes: "It's entirely possible that aspects [of Warren Hill] would have been remodeled or demolished when changes to the layout were made."

Demolished. Just like my much of my metaphorical Jenga puzzle here...

Well, once again, I am beholden to the industrious Barry Mc for his assistance in my research and for punching larger, quite noticeable holes in my less-well-thought-out suppositions, allowing the light to shine in.

Thanks again, Barry, and if anyone else has any information, maps, images, ideas, or recollections about Warren Hill School, please let me know!

Walking the West Ward around Warren Hill in 1901

Just when you think there are no "quick hits" left to hit, more quickly turn up! Here is another one involving Warren Hill School (1885-1936) in Meads, Eastbourne. Well, maybe it's actually "not so quick" a hit…

Here is a result from the 1901 census found at: http://www3.telus.net/ggassoc/family_tree/were/pafg373.htm

It's a genealogical entry for a lad named Percival Armorer Forster, who was born in 1888 in Bishop Middleham, Durham, England. here are the details:

1901 British Census:
Dwelling: Warren Hill School - Beachy Head Road
Census Place: Eastbourne, Sussex, England
Source: PRO Ref RG13 Piece 880 Folio 90 Page 8 Family 30

WILKINSON Alfred Max, head, M, age 44, b. Hong Kong, Occ. Headmaster of Preparatory School
WILKINSON Jane [sic], wife, M, age 36, b. India
WILKINSON Kenneth, son, -, age 8, b. Eastbourne, Sussex
WILKINSON James, son, -, age 5, b. Eastbourne, Sussex
WILSON Archibald, boarder, S, age 25, b. London, Occ. Schoolmaster

FORSTER Percival, boarder, -, age 13, b. Bishop Middleham, Durham, Occ. -
+51 other pupils and 19 staff at the preparatory school


The 1901 census was conducted on 31 March 1901, and while the campus was seemingly fully staffed with servants (19 of them were on the premises), there were no schoolmasters there except the Head Master, A. Max Wilkinson and a "boarder" who was also a "schoolmaster."

Suddenly, it hit me: I could use the 1901 census to find out exactly where the mysterious "masters' residence" of Warren Hill School was! After all, it was believed to be in an image from a post card from before the turn of the century.

I checked the entire 28-page record from 1901 for the count done that day in East Sussex, Southern Eastbourne, West Ward, in the Parish of St, John the Evangelist. With every obsessive-compulsive bone in my body, I recorded the living quarters of each inhabitant even remotely connected with a school!

Here's the list, address first, noting if there was a "head" of the house who was not an educator, and exact occupation (as recorded):


Timsbury Lodge:

Herbert G. Daymond, S, 38, Tutor at Timsbury School
Emily R. Daymand, S, 34, Music teacher at Timsbury School


Aldro, Darley Road [seen above, right]:

Head, Harold R. Browne, M, 41, Clergyman, Church of England—Schoolmaster
(living with wife and 3 children; 1 nephew, age 10)

Also: 42 boarders (all students)

And: A school matron, kitchenmaid, nurse, cook, and 5 housemaids, one who also cleaned the stables.


Edensore [sic] Road (School House):

Head, Edwin G. Capon, M, 38, Head Master, National School*
(living with wife, 2 daughters, 4 sons; 1 sister, a dressmaker)

* According to Bygone Eastbourne (1902) by John Charles Wright, the National School took children "under 8 or 9" from the "manufactory" of the workhouse for lessons in the afternoons.


Warren Hill School, Beachy Head Road [census seen, left, and in next two images below]:

Head, Alfred Max Wilkinson, M, 44, Headmaster of Preparatory School
(living with wife, Jone, 38, and sons Kenneth, 8, and James, 5)

Boarder, Archibald Wilson, S, 25, Schoolmaster

Also: Boarders, 52 students, ages 9 – 13

And: 19 servants, including 2 school matrons, 6 housemaids, cook, kitchenmaid, scullerymaid, 2 footmen, a house boy, 2 hospital nurse, a parlourmaid, and a governess.


No. 1 Dalton Terrace:
(dwelling headed by a resident bath chair proprietor, his wife, and 2 daughters)

Boarder, Anna E. Magis, S, 53, Teacher of Languages


Heads of other flats at No. 1:

Eric L. Streatfeild, S, 29, Schoolmaster's assistant

Charles W. Slade, S, 34, Schoolmaster's assistant


No. 2 Dalton Terrace:

Head, Ernest C. Rogers, M, 35, School Porter
(living with wife and 2 sons)

Heads of other flats at No. 2:

Basil M. Downton, S, 22, Schoolmaster—
Gentleman's Preparatory School

Arthur C. Miller, S, 24, Schoolmaster

Bevil Close, S, 22, Schoolmaster


No. 3 Dalton Terrace:
(dwelling headed by Sarah Bartholomew, W, 62)

Daughter, Louisa Bartholomew, S, 32, Teacher of Music
Daughter, Sarah Bartholomew, S, 31, Teacher of Music
Daughter, Edith Bartholomew, S, 28, Teacher of Music


No. 5 Dalton Terrace:
(dwelling headed by a resident stationer who lived there with her servant/shop assistant)

Heads of other flats in No. 5:

Charles S. Cross, S, 26, Assistant Schoolmaster

Arthur G. Topham, S, 32, Assistant Schoolmaster

Duncan B. Tugwell, S, 24, Assistant Schoolmaster

Edward Berens, S, 27, Assistant Schoolmaster

[Update, 11-6-11: Michael O. of the ELHS relates: "Dalton Terrace is now part of Meads Street itself. It was not originally Dalton Road, which still exists as a separate road. The shops with maisonettes above, between the present 7 Meads Street (the corner of Dalton Road) and 17 Meads Street used to be known as Dalton Terrace."]

No. 2 All Saints Cottages, Meads Street:
(dwelling headed by a resident 'pensioner' master mariner, his wife, and son)

Boarder, Joseph Nicholls, S, 27, Schoolmaster


No. 1 Compton Terrace:
(dwelling headed by a resident carpenter, his wife, 2 infant daughters, and a servant)

Boarder, Samuel A. Elliot, S, 27, Schoolmaster

Boarder, Edwin Wall, S, 31, Schoolmaster


No. 5 The Village:
(dwelling headed by a resident gardener, his wife and 2 daughters)

Head of a flat at No. 2:

Rose Butler, S, 30, Teacher of English, Mathematics, and Latin


No. 6 The Village:
(dwelling headed by a resident gardener, his wife, and sister)

Boarder, Rosanna Marshall, S, 37, Elementary School Teacher


No. 9 The Village:
(dwelling headed by a resident carpenter/joiner, his wife, and 2 sons)

Boarder, Hilda F. Mueller, S, 29, Pianoforte Teacher


No. 37 The Village:
(dwelling headed by a resident gas fitter, his wife, daughter, and 2 sons)

Boarder, Lily A. Jones, S, 30, Pianoforte Teacher


No. 38 The Village:

Head, Harris Diplock, M, 39, Swimming Instructor
(living with his wife and 6 sons, ages 13 years down to 5 months)

[Update, 11-6-11: Michael O. adds: "Harry Diplock was the swimming instructor at the Devonshire (Swimming) Baths in Eastbourne. He was not associated with any school as far as I know. He used to perform a Houdini-style escape act from a barrel (ref Eastbourne Local Historian Issue 152, Summer 2009)."]

And that's it.

There is no house full of schoolmasters on Beachy Head Road, save Warren Hill itself, which housed the Head Master and one schoolmaster boarding there.

There were a couple of addresses over on Dalton Terrace [Now perhaps Dalton Road?], past The Village, that held numerous teachers, but nothing in the same census ward.

And if one of those large homes we've looked at "just below" Warren Hill on the other side of the street housed schoolmasters, why was Wilkinson boarding one at the school, and why didn't Streatfeild—one person we're certain taught at Warren Hill—live in a collective residence like that?

Oh—perhaps all of the masters were down at The Ship having a pint after a day of tough classes!

Nope.

The only people recorded at The Ship were the owners, Amos and Ada Luck, 35 and 34 years of age respectively, and their barman, George Levett, 19. Slow night...

I suppose it's possible that the masters were all simply in transit between destinations, each one always zigging while the census taker was zagging as the evening unfolded, but that simply doesn't seem very likely.

Is it possible that, if there was, indeed, a 'house for masters,' that it wasn't in existence until after 1901? If it existed in 1901, it must have been at quite a distance from the campus.

And—just an aside—in 1901, except for the above-mentioned Head Masters, the "swimming instructor," the porter, and the clergyman who doubled as a schoolmaster, not one other person charged with working with children was married.

Was that the norm? And was there a reason? As an elementary school teacher (of 10- and 11-year–olds) myself, I am curious! Around that time in the States and before, only a woman could have taught in an elementary school, and she would have had to have been unmarried (virginal) in many American locales...

Locating the Head Masters of Warren Hill

Here's one last "quick hit" regarding Warren Hill School (1885-1936) in Meads, Eastbourne. It may not seem like much, but it does help verify a couple of matters.

Over the past year we have received some photographs courtesy of the Eastbourne Local History Association, and those images have divulged much about Warren Hill. Today we'll look at the specific images of the Head Masters (or at least business partners), Joshua Goodland (referred to on at least one image as "Jim") and F. R. Ebden, Goodland's partner at the time, circa 1930.

First let's look once again at an enlargement of the southeast corner of the main building [above left]. We can see a low, one-story addition that is not in the pre-1900 image from the same angle. We can also see an embankment behind parents watching the cricket game that's occurring outside of the frame.

Warren Hill rested on the south side of Beachy Head Road between Darley Road to the west and Coltstocks Roads to the east. As one traveled westward toward the school, one would have been rising uphill. The above image of the school, however, shows a perfectly level field behind the building—hence the embankment to the left (west) in the photograph.

Let's now take a look at the image taken of "Jim" Goodland around the same time [below].


Goodland appears to be standing, facing southeast by judging the position of the morning sun, on a level concrete slab of some large dimension—a playground.

Behind him we can see what is obviously a retaining wall and steps upward, off the playground, to the west-northwest. And that's just where we would expect a retaining wall next to a level area, given the uphill rise to the school's west.

The Goodland photograph gives us an idea of how developed the playground area was, including some very nicely conceived brickwork rising at about a 45° angle behind him.

We also have an image of Ebden taken the same day, and have every reason to believe it was taken nearby. In the image at the top of the entry, we can make note of its light-colored roof of the lower building, its large windows, and distinctive wide, white corners at each end of the wall.

Let's take a look at the circa 1930 photograph of Ebden [below], quite probably captured the same day as the image of Goodland.


Ebden faces directly into the morning sun, revealing behind him a background to the northwest. We see foliage and the ground rising slightly as the image proceeds to the left—the west. Also behind the one time Head Master is a low-slung, light roofed building with large glazed windows of panes and muntins. Finishing off the image and disappearing behind Ebden's dated double-breasted suit is the white-coloured corner of the building finishing the brick façade.

This building clearly is built too low in the roof to have been an adequate gymnasium for a boys' preparatory school, reinforcing our notion that the large windows provided fine light for reading in the school's library/reading room, which had been a built as a memorial to alumni lost in the First World War.

We can see on the area map below where Goodland [red] and Ebden [blue] must have been standing when those photographs were taken, giving us some better idea of what the grounds looked like there to the west of the school. Each man is represented by the 'dot' in the center of a circle representing the possible area photographed.


Incidentally, also behind Ebden there appears to be a fenced in patch of ground that may have served as the garden of one of the boys. Perhaps students were not welcome to plant in the glass-walled greenhouse to the east, but were welcome to tend small plots in the southern exposure near the new library.

Your thoughts on my speculation, your memories, and your ephemera would be most welcome, and thank you!

Searching for the Residence of the Masters

Today's "quick hit" on Warren Hill School (1885-1936) focuses on the words "just below," and is not so "quick."

How much land did the school actually possess? We know from Joshua Goodland's freehold listing in a 1931 London Gazette, he held "Warren Hill, Beachy Head Road, and land in Carlisle Road, Eastbourne."

So how do references to a "master's residence" or "house for masters" figure into all of this? Is it possible that, despite owning the land mentioned above, the school rented a home in which the masters could live during the terms?

Let's take a look at some references to the house that we've had already.

From the Eastbourne Local History Society came this description of the post card image we see above, left: "[This image] is probably from a postcard and shows the view looking up what is now Beachy Head Road with the school on the left. It's hard to date precisely but one can suppose that it is pre 1900. The masters' residence must be the house on the right. The girls walking down the hill are almost level with a group of flint cottages which still stand. One of these was rented during various summers by Arthur Conan Doyle."


Here's a close-up of that house, across from Warren Hill [above]. We've seen it today in a street view from the front, its southern side [click HERE to view the image]. Let's see if we can espy that same side as above by 'driving' down the side street, Denton Road, via Google Street View and peering behind the foliage to get a peek at the eastern wall.

Take a look:


It appears that the same structure is still standing today, with some modifications having been made. If this was, indeed, the master's residence, and the small homes behind it are the "flint cottages" to which the ELHS refers, then it's very possible that the school (and Goodland in 1931) had possession of all of the land across from the school to the north, possibly all the way through to Upper Carlisle Road—some fine acreage!

On the 1930 map we have of the area, there are no structures on either of the two tracts of land below, or east of, the structure discussed above. Arthur Conan Doyle passed away in Sussex in 1930, and if cottages on those parcels are standing today, they must have been standing then. One wonders where the cottages mentioned actually might be.

One other bit of evidence for that large edifice having been the residence of the schoolmasters comes from the writing of George Mills.

In Chapter 6 of Meredith and Co. (1933; the dust jacket of the 1950 Oxford University Press edition is depicted below, right), several of the boys sneak out during the wee hours of the night to retrieve a troublesome lost envelope from the desk in the common-room of the master's residence. Here's the text: "Three perfectly noiseless figures crept down the corridor, a big door at the end was slightly unbarred, and the figures walked across the playground towards the master's cottage."

It appears from photographs and the map that the 'playground' at Warren Hill would have been on the west side of the building [far below], in an area between two outlying buildings. If Mills is referring to the landscape of Warren Hill, and not Windlesham House School which was in Portslade at the time, it seems likely the boys left the building from a corridor leading to the playground in the west and probably would have stolen across the quiet street.

The boys then slip into the cottage through a window with a broken latch, as depicted on the cover shown here. After almost being caught by the obnoxious Mr. Lloyd, we find out the master's cottage in Mills's book has two floors. When Lloyd finally shouts for Mr. Gold, another master, we find: "After a few minutes interval Gold appeared at the top of the stairs. He was in a dressing gown and a bad temper."

While we can't necessarily assume Mills wasn't taking artistic license with this schoolboy yarn and conjuring up everything, we find that, after making the boys had made their way into the larder: "Luck was with them. The window yielded to a little persuasion, and two minutes later they were cautiously entering the school building."


While I'm certain nothing was clocked by a stop-watch, two minutes would seem about right for three frightened boys to scurry from the house across the street, back to Warren Hill, jump the low wall [beside the doorway, above], dart through the foliage, cross the playground, and enter the school.

Of course, we don't know the layout of Windlesham while in Portslade, but the escapade in Mills's book does fit neatly with the geography of Warren Hill.

Except for one thing.


In the page we've examined from an ELHS newsletter (No. 104), we find the troubling, yet very confident sentence [above]: "A house for masters was situated on the other side [of Beachy Hill Road] just below the Denton Road junction."

If I am interpreting "just below" correctly, it would mean across the street and down the hill from the school. The 1930 map shows us only two buildings "just below," or downhill, from the junction, across the street near Coltstocks Road, and they're indicated on the map below.


If one of these houses had been, indeed, the house in which the schoolmasters lived, then it may not have been purchased in the same transaction in which the school was, and Goodland's freehold registration may not have encompassed the residence of the masters. It's even possible Goodland owned it as his own home, with master's rooming there while in Meads. Its status as a rental is also a possibility.


In addition, if either of these two lower houses [seen above and below] was in fact the home of the masters, Mills was clearly envisioning the layout of a different school—perhaps Windlesham—in his 1933 text.

The Gardens and Sick Wing at Warren Hill

For our last "quick hit" regarding Warren Hill School (1885-1936) in Meads, Eastbourne, we'll take one last look at some of the exterior of the building that's visible but not prominent.

Last time we looked at the difference between a probably-just-before-the-turn-of-the-20th-century image of the school and compared the southwest corner of the building with a photograph taken circa 1930. In addition to providing a possible location of the "new" library, the opposite end of the former photograph mentioned above also seems to provide a location of the school's gardens.

In the promotional leaflet written by Bertram George de Glanville sometime in the mid-1930s, he states: "There is a large kitchen garden which supplies fresh fruit and vegetables for the School. Boys may, if they like, have small gardens of their own."


On the 1930 map and plan [above], the eastern facade of Warren Hill creates a "C" shape with an interior space that is not a part of the main building's foundation.

In the pre-1900 photograph [below], we see what appears to be a large green-house/conservatory structure extending a few yeards eastward of the school itself. This glass structure would have received morning sun entirely, and the portion of it extending past the building's southeast wall would have enjoyed southern exposure for much of the day.


Due to the substantial growth of a tree line, we cannot see it in the circa-1930 image, but according to de Glanville's brochure, this glassed arboretum must have remained.

Does a garden on that eastern side of the school imply it would have been near the kitchen, and the kitchen near the great room in which the boys and masters would have dined? If so, it would relegate the actual gymnasium to the other (west) side of the school as it seems unlikely that it would have been just inside the front door. Indeed, the western wing of Warren Hill is half-again as large as the eastern portion of the main building on the 1930 plan, implying the possibility of ample room for a gymnasium.


We do have another image of part of that eastern façade of Warren Hill [above]. It is taken from a post card (provided by the Eastbourne Local History Society) that was probably captured not long after the school was built in 1885.

The institution towers above seemingly everything from the high ground there, and we can see a slanted roof protruding from the façade to the left. That would mark the southern part of the "C"-shape we see on the 1930 map.

However, there is no corresponding protrusion to the right, the northern corner of the main building, below the turret/tower. Whatever was built there, at the northeast corner of the building was not part of the original structure of the school.

de Glanville's leaflet states: "There is a capacious sick wing which has its own kitchens, bathrooms, etc., and can be completely isolated from the main building in case of need."

Being near what we might assume to be the main kitchen, this addition clearly could have tapped easily into existing plumbing to construct a sick wing kitchen and bath. Given that visions of the epidemic of Spanish influenza less than a dozen years before still were established in the public's consciousness [flu patients receiving treatment, right], the availability of a facility to provide not only a comfortable respite for the ailing, but also protection for those not afflicted, would have been quite a selling point for the school.

The real question about all of this: Is my speculation correct? Time hopefully will tell.

Pieces of the proverbial puzzle continue to metaphorically fall into place regarding Warren Hill. Additional photographs taken on the grounds—whether or not they depict characters in the saga of George Mills—or of a "war memorial" that is distinct from the school's memorial library—would increase our knowledge even more.

Once again, if you have images, memories, or information regarding the history of Warren Hill School in Meads, please don't hesitate to let me know—and thanks!