January Pictures
From Dittopedia
31st January
In 1834 Theodore Hook composed the following lines while angling in a punt at Thames Ditton:
- 'Here, in a placid waking dream,
- I'm free from worldly troubles,
- Calm as the rippling silver stream
- That in the sunshine baubles;
- And when sweet Eden's blissful bowers
- Some abler bard has writ on,
- Despairing to transcend his powers,
- I'll ditto say for DITTON.'
30th January
29th January
The 25th Baroness de Ros was the only child of Dudley Charles Maxwell, 24th Baron De Ros. In 1878 she married Hon. Antony Dawson, afterwards 3rd Earl of Dartrey. He died in 1933.
28th January
In 1806 when Lady Charlotte Fitzgerald was successful in calling the title of de Roos (the spelling of the name was altered to de Ros in 1838) out of abeyance in her favour (see explanation below), she became suo jure 21st Baroness and added the surname de Ros on to that of Fitzgerald. The de Roos family has a distinguished lineage dating back to 1264 when the barony was created by writ of summons of Henry III. Robert de Roos, 1st Baron Roos of Helmsley or Hamlake, Yorkshire, then acquired Belvoir through his wife, Isabel, daughter and heiress of William d'Albini of Belvoir.
27th January
Hewett Watson edited the Phrenological Journal from 1837 to 1840 and the London Catalogue of British Plants from 1844 to 1874.
Watson, perhaps as a result of Alexander von Humboldt's writings, became interested in plant geography. In 1842 William Hooker persuaded Watson to go on a naval mapping expedition to the Azores in 1842; Watson published his botanical findings in Hooker's London Journal of Botany (1843–7). By 1834 he was also a Lamarckian transmutationist, and he hoped that close attention to specimens collected in different parts of a species' range might provide evidence supporting transmutation. He published his transmutationist beliefs in a phrenological polemic, An Examination of Mr Scott's Attack upon Mr Combe's 'Constitution of Man' (1836). This may have encouraged Robert Chambers, a friend of the Combe brothers, to write Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation (1844).
Watson led a fairly unremarkable life -- he only travelled once outside of Britain -- yet became regarded in early life as an authority on English botany after cultivating strong interests in phrenology and evolutionary theory.
Wealthy enough after an inheritance to not need a profession, he became involved with phrenology circa 1825 that only ended in 1840 when he failed as owner and editor to make the Phrenological Journal a success. In the following years, and while his reputation as a botanist steadily grew, he began collecting evidence for, and defending, the idea of species transmutation; later Charles Darwin acknowledged his debt to Watson as a source.
Watson's many writings on plant geography included a considerable number of innovations; for example, he organized incidence data by county-level aggregations, related environmental circumstances to distribution patterns, differentiated between natural and anthropogenic origins, and made effective use of the concepts of station and habitat. [2]
Eleocharis watsoni Bab ('Slender Spike-rush' -- now known as Eleocharis uniglumis Schultes) was named after him.
His manuscripts are housed at the Natural History Museum and also at Kew.
26th January
Hewett Cottrell Watson (1804-81) was a botanist, plant ecologist and evolutionist. He was born in Firbeck, Yorkshire, on 9th May 1804, and died at Thames Ditton, Surrey, on 27th July 1881, and is buried in St Nicholas churchyard.
He was the son of Holland Watson and Harriett (née Powell). He studied phrenology and natural history at Edinburgh from 1828 to 1832. He inherited a place in Derbyshire around 1836. He moved to Thames Ditton in 1833 where he lived in Fern Cottage, Manor Road North. Fern Cottage was demolished many years ago and replaced by Pine Tree Cottage (No. 128).
In 1852, Watson pioneered the study of the distribution of plants by dividing the whole of Great Britain into 112 areas, based on the then-county boundaries. These boundaries are unchanging and are unaffected by subsequent political and administrative changes. Watson's Vice Counties have been widely adopted by biologists. These fixed boundaries allow modern biologists to compare past records of species.
25th January
Canals did little for Thames Ditton's stretch of north-east Surrey.
But a remarkable effort was made in the mid-17th century to improve communications in Surrey. To make the River Wey navigable, from Guildford to the river's junction with the Thames, by way of locks. The Wey navigation enabled goods to be brought from the Weald and from Guildford to the Thames and to London.
Established by an act of Parliament in 1722, the Chelsea Waterworks was intended to take water from the River Thames for the Westminster area. A few years later in 1725, the company constructed a tidal inlet which later became the Grosvenor Canal. In the following century, the company was still using river water, but the product was not very pure. The House of Commons in 1827 received a petition from Sir Francis Burdett which alleged that:
- 'the water taken from the River Thames at Chelsea, for the use of the inhabitants of the western part of the metropolis, [is] being charged with the contents of the great common sewers, the drainings from dunghills, and laystalls, the refuse of hospitals, slaughter houses, color, lead and soap works, drug mills and manufactories, and with all sorts of decomposed animal and vegetable substances." As a result, the "said water [is] offensive and destructive to health, [and] ought no longer to be taken up by any of the water companies from so foul a source.'
Thereafter in 1828, the artist William Health published a scathing caricature reflecting the public's distaste for the water being supplied from the River Thames by London companies (see picture below). He did not mention the Chelsea Company per se, but his cartoon seemed aimed in its direction. A year later in 1829 under the guidance of company engineer James Simpson (see picture), Chelsea Waterworks Company became the first to introduce slow sand filtration in order to purify their river water. The filter was designed by Simpson and consisted of successive beds of loose brick, gravel and sand.
In 1856, under legislative decree (Parliament Act of 1852), the Chelsea Waterworks moved the intake up river beyond the reach of tidal action to Surbiton (then known as Seething Wells -- many miles up-stream along the Thames), adjoining those of the Lambeth Waterworks Company which had also moved its intake site. The new 1852 law gave most water companies until August 31, 1855 to comply, with one exception, Chelsea Waterworks, which was given an additional year to comply.
In Seething Wells (later known as Surbiton) the company had two settling reservoirs and two filter beds. In addition they built three new reservoirs on high ground at Putney Heath. Both of these sets of reservoirs were used by Chelsea waterworks to supply London water, which maintained an office near the original Chelsea location, but no longer drew water directly from the river. The Putney Heath reservoir water was distributed by gravity to Chelsea by two 24 inch and two 12 inch diameter pipes.
24th January
23rd January
SULLIVAN, Admiral Sir Charles (1789-1862): Son of the Irish writer and traveller, Sir Richard Joseph Sullivan. (Boase 3, Marshall 11, O’Byrne; BBA, DNB for the father).
Charles entered HM Navy in 1801, and eventually became an Admiral of the Blue. In 818 he married the only daughter of Robert Taylor of Imber Court, Sheriff of Surrey, and thus two well-known families and estates of the locality became inter-linked.
22nd January
1882 Post Office London Directory: Palace Gate, Kensington, (W.) WEST SIDE: 1 Mrs Robert Drummond - Charles Drummond - Mrs Forster (Palace Gate House) - 3 Mrs Dugald Dove - 5 Charles Scarisbrick - 7 Henry Moser - 9 Lady Bisshopp - 11 Unoccupied - 13 T. Gurney Little - 15 Herbert de Renter - 37 Sir Edward Robert Sullivan, bart (The Red House) - EAST SIDE 2 John E. Millais, RA artist - 4 Paul Hardy - 6 Hon. John Fiennes Twistlton W Fiennes, and Lady Augusta Fiennes - 8 Henry Francis Makins, FRGS
21st January
20th January
19th January
18th January
There has been considerable argument as to just where Wharf Road, the general opinion being that it ran close to the river, almost like a barge-walk. There is however a curious document in the archives of the Surrey Record Office, which settles the matter.
This was a map showing the two estates, as they were in 1830 and on which has been added in red ink the former position of the old Wharf Road.
It shows Boyle Farm which replaced Forde's Farm and also Ditton House built after St. Leonard's Road was finished. Dotted lines show the position of Queens Drive and Kings Drives although these, of course, were not on the original map. [2]
To straighten the entrance into High Street near Picton House, Mrs Digby purchased a small triangular strip of land from Mrs Thomas Bracey as shown at B on the map.
17th January
- Red = Course of original road (Wharf Road)
- Blue = Substitute road (St. Leonards Road)
In September 1763, the Hatton family sold Forde's Farm to the Hon. Charlotte Digby. This estate, known in Henry VIII's time as Stringhaw, was bounded on the north by the River Thames, on the west by the ferry approach near Swan Inn, on the east by the Rythe near Winters Bridge and on the south by High Street, the present Home of Compassion wall being built on the boundary as far as Boyle Lodge. From here the boundary was the old Wharf Road, which ran in a straight line to Claremont Wharf, crossing the Rythe near to its outlet into the Thames.
At that time the road from Thames Ditton village to Kingston ran from the High Street by where the Fountain now stands, eastward in more or less a straight line, crossing the river Rythe and passing close to Long Ditton wharf, to the Portsmouth Road behind where the City Arms public house now is. And was known, as one might expect, as Wharf Road .
The garden of Fords stood adjacent to the northern side of this road, right up to the Rythe.
As Charlotte Digby owned farming land on the other side of the Wharf Road, she decided to absorb this into the estate by embracing it with a new road, and doing away with Wharf Road.
This would approximately double the acreage of the land on which Forde's Farm stood and, by dividing it in two, one portion could be sold for a second residence, both having ample grounds and gardens.
So in 1771 she made an application at Quarter Sessions for powers to close Wharf Road, undertaking to construct and maintain a 'new high-way, convenient and commodious for carriages and passages which she, her heirs and assigns, would maintain.' Permission was granted, the old road closed and the new highway constructed. Called initially the Kingston Lane, later Boyle Farm Road, today it is St. Leonards Road.
Part of the land purchased by Mrs. Digby was on the further side on this road, and was known as "The 15 Acres". Thinking that it would be distinctly advantageous to throw this land into the curtilage of the house and make it part of the garden, with the additional benefit of moving the road further away from the house, she obtained from the crown a writ of Ad Quod Damnum, which obliged the sherriff of the county to hold an inquiry to ascertain if any harm would arise to anyone if she was allowed to divert the road to a new alignment.
On 11 January 1771, therefore, the sheriff of Surrey, Sir Richard Hotham, called together on the site twenty 'honest and lawful men' from the district. They decided that no harm or prejudice would occur from such a diversion; and at the next general quarter sessions Mrs. Digby was granted permission to 'completely and substantially make another Road or Highway - in her own Land and Soil - of the Breadth of Thirty Feet in the clear from Ditch to Ditch' . Beginning 'at the stable in the occupation of the Reverend Mr. Dry' across to 'a certain Bridge in the King's Highway leading from Kingston to Esher opposite a Blacksmith's shop in the occupation of Thomas Window' . Which she, her heirs and assigns, were required hereafter to 'well and sufficiently repair and maintain' . This substituted road is, of course, the present St. Leonards Road, although this is a comparatively new name. It was originally called Kingston Lane.
Having thus extended the grounds adjacent to the house, the land at the eastern end, which had been the kitchen garden, was hived off, splitting the area into two more or less equal parts, and on the further portion another large mansion was built, which came to be called Ditton House. This also stood facing the river, with lawns gently sloping down to the water's edge. Its site is now occupied by King's and Queen's Drives.
We will see tomorrow an alternative view of where Wharf Road ran.
16th January
In Victorian times, the slipway, with its riverside inn, provided a useful dock for the passage of goods and people up and down the river. Large sailing barges from the Port of London would moor here to load or unload, their crews and attendant waggoners taking rest and sustenance at the inn.
The Island was then not much more than an overgrown, muddy, tree clad hump, but the skiffs of the day trippers from Kingston would be moored there to allow their occupants to enjoy a riverside picnic. In the early part of the 20th Century came the fad for riverside weekend bungalows: the idea spread and a number of holiday chalets were built on the Island. Life there must have been a matter of indoor camping, as there were no facilities of any kind: water and paraffin had to ferried over in cans, and only the smarter sheds had a roof over the earth closet.
As time passed, the attractions of the waterside location drew more and more people, so that by 1930 the whole of the perimeter was covered in wooden bungalows, with the owners' boats moored at the bottom of their gardens. It was the building of the suspension bridge in 1939 that really opened up the Island as a place for permanent occupation.
As well as providing passage on foot, it also carried the water, electricity and gas in, and the sewage effluent back out to the town drains. Originally leased from the island's owner, the publican at the Olde Swan, by 1963 all the houses had passed into freehold ownership and a limited company was formed to take over the bridge and adjacent gardens and to provide maintenance services.
15th January
There are three islands in the River Thames near Thames Ditton. Thames Ditton Island, the largest of the three, is 350 yards long and has 47 houses and a population of around 100. On the second largest, Boyle Farm Island, is a single house, home to just one family. Swan Island, between the two, is the smallest.
14th January
13th January
The Swan Inn is said to have been visited often by Thomas Hood (1799-1845). The well-known Song of the Shirt may have been written there:
- With fingers weary and worn,
- With eyelids heavy and red,
- A woman sat, in unwomanly rags,
- Plying her needle and thread--
- Stitch! stitch! stitch!
- In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
- And still with a voice of dolorous pitch
- She sang the "Song of the Shirt."
12th January
In 1676, William Hatton, a would-be patriarch and village squire, had a family burial chapel built alongside St Nicholas Church. It was boldy labelled DORMITORIUM HATTONIANUM, and some of the Thames Ditton Hattons were buried in it. But it decayed and was rebuilt as a vestry in 1781. A Hatton bequest gave financial support to several vicars of Thames Ditton.
- The bells were mentioned in an inventory of 1552 and were increased to six in number in 1753. They were recast in 1962 and re-hung in a new frame in 1981.
- The East Window is 20th century, set in 14th century tracery by Geoffrey Webb and depicts St Nicholas.
11th January
St Nicholas contains a fine monument and brass to Erasmus Forde. The monument is of stone, with two bays in the forms of a six-poster, possibly designed to contain two kneeling effigies. The Forde brass was previously attached to the monument but is now alongside it. It depicts the kneeling figures of Erasmus Forde in armour, his wife Julyan, and their 12 daughters and six sons.
10th January
Above the chancel arch are painted boards depicting the Day of Judgement known as Doom Pictures, dated around 1570, a rarity as very few survived the Reformation. It consists of 11 oak panels of different sizes and shapes, crudely painted in tempera in red, green, black and white. A central crucifix, among other parts, is missing. They were discovered in about 1893 when a Mr Birtles bought them from a carpenter's yard in Kingston. At the time they were obscured by whitewash and paint. They were further restored in the 20th century by Alastair Stewart. The church would have been full of colour at the time the rood was painted, with striped and chevroned columns, and walls with paintings of the Passion and other religious subjects.
9th January
The building of St Nicholas Church has undergone a great many changes, and very little of the original structure survives. The oldest elements are likely to be the north wall of the chancel and the walls of the broad and low tower. St Nicholas Church was originally a long narrow Norman building from the Bell Tower to the Chancel. The tower walls and the north wall of the chancel are part of the original Norman structure and contain lancet windows. Additions came with a 14th century chapel on the north and a 15th century north aisle. The vestry was originally a burial vault built in 1676. The north aisle was enlarged in 1836 and a south aisle added in 1864.
- The church has one of the finest fonts in Surrey, dated around 1120 and having unique sculptures. On the four faces of the Norman font are depicted an Agnus Dei, a goat, a star and an unusual cross. A pillar piscina -- 72cm high -- also dating to the first half of the 12th century, was dug from the floor of the chancel when the foundations for a new south aisle were made in 1864.
8th January
After the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the advowson of St Nicholas passed into private patronage, and so from 1538 the canons of Merton Priory ceased to have the patronage of Thames Ditton Church. For centuries, the great tithes rested with Kingston rectory. But from the 16th century, the principal beneficiaries tended to be the landowners who owned Imber Court.
7th January
The Normans after the Conquest gave the land to the monks of Merton Priory, who planned to build a church.
During the reign of Henry I (1100-1135), Gilbert the Norman, High Sheriff of Surrey, gave the advowson of Kingston -- i.e. the right to appoint the incumbent of a church -- together with four chapelries (at Thames Ditton, East Molesey, Sheen and Petersham) to Merton Priory.
Gilbert died in 1125, so this implies a functional chapelry at Thames Ditton around 1120, with higher levels of ecclesiastical control at Kingston Church and Merton Priory. A certain William was Vicar at Thames Ditton from 1179.
6th January
St Nicholas Church in Thames Ditton is an ancient parish church that dates back to the 11th century.
5th January
The Portsmouth Road has a great tradition and history, taken by kings such as Charles II, and by the wealthy such as Arthur Onslow, by admirals, religious leaders and writers such as Samuel Pepys. Rocque's map of Surrey (1768) shows the road (once known as the Portsmouth Turnpike-road) running from Kingston and close to Surbeton, through Ditton Marsh, with Thames Ditton slightly to the north, and on towards Esher. Commons, and farms with access tracks, lay on both sides of the road. The village could be reached by Wharf Road from Claremont Wharf (not far from what is now called Winters Bridge) to a point near the High Street.
The Road and surrounding commons were notoriously dangerous -- there was the serious risk of both footpads (i.e. unmounted robbers) and highwaymen. Tom Waters, Jerry Abershawe, Evan Evans, William Hawke and Thomas Banks were all hanged in the 17th/18th centuries for banditry on the Portsmouth Road. Towards the end of the 18th century, an amateur police force of about 80 men was formed at Weston Green. In 1792, a group of vigilantes was formed and based at the Harrow Inn. Their backers included William Speer of Weston Grange, Thomas Bracey and William Chauncey.
4th January
The Portsmouth Road A307 runs from Kingston upon Thames to Cobham, via Surbiton, Long Ditton, Thames Ditton, and Esher. At nearly every point along this route, it is named the Portsmouth Road. At Cobham, the A307 joins the A3, which is generally also known as the Portsmouth Road.
The A307 follows the route of the old Portsmouth Road. Since the invention of the motorway, the Portsmouth Road has been diverted away from towns and instead routed through countryside.
Robert Clive was one of the first to divert the Portsmouth Road. (He believed it ran too close to his house at Claremont.)
3rd January
In February 1816 Cesar Picton moved again to Thames Ditton, where he bought a property for the then huge sum of £4,000. This house was also known as Picton House (or Cottage) but was later renamed Sunnyside House.
Picton lived there for 20 years and his will tells us more about his lifestyle. He had a hone and chaise, two watches with gold chains and seals, brooches, gold rings and shirt pins. There was a tortoiseshell tea chest, silver spoons, and tongs. He had paintings of his friends and his dogs and, intriguingly, a portrait of himself. He left this to a friend, Thomas Bushell, but its present whereabouts are unknown.
When Cesar was living in Thames Ditton, the remaining Philipps daughters died, both in 1820, Joyce left him £100, and Katherine left him £150 plus £30 a year for life. Cesar died in 1836, aged 81. He was buried on 16th June in All Saints' Church, Kingston. In his will he asked to be 'plain but decently buried within the Parish Church, Kingston', and that mourning rings costing no more than £5 each be distributed to 16 named friends. Nevertheless it was to be a remarkable occasion, as Cesar was then a man of immense bulk, and had to be brought to the church on a four-wheel trolley, and lowered into the vault down an inclined plane of planks on rollers.
His last resting place is marked by a floor plaque in the south aisle inscribed CP 1836. A wall plaque to Cesar was unveiled at Picton House in Kingston in 1998.
2nd January
Sir John and Lady Philipps had one son and three daughters. They also owned Picton Castle in Pembrokeshire, South Wales. Sir John died in 1764, and his son inherited the title of Lord Milford. Two years later Lady Philipps made her will. This went through several revisions and when she died in 1788 she left £100 to Cesar, a very substantial sum. Their son sold Norbiton Place, and their daughters went to live in Hampton Court.
Cesar, now on his own, spent bis legacy on renting a coach house and stables in High Street (then West by Thames), Kingston, known today as Picton House. Giving himself the surname Picton (after Picton Castle), he set up as a coal merchant. He was not a freeman of the Town, so he had to pay Kingston Corporation £l0 to trade.
By 1795, at 40, he was a much respected businessman having made enough money to buy Picton House and other property, including a wharf and a malthouse. In 1801 one of the Philipps daughters died and left Cesar a further £100, although he was by now wealthy by his own efforts. In 1807, when he was 52, Cesax let the Kingston properties and went to live in Tolworth in a rented cottage, and was described in deeds as a 'gentleman'.
1st January
Cesar Picton, a native of Senegal, was brought from Africa in 1761 at the age of six. He was presented to Sir John Philipps of Norbiton Place, Kingston, Surrey, by Captain Parr, a British army officer who had been serving there. The reason for the gifts is unknown.
Probably born a Muslim, Cesar was baptised into the Christian faith on 4th December 1761, and was christened Cesar. His original Senegalese name is not known. He was dressed in the servant's attire of the time, including a velvet turban, which cost 10s 6d (53p). It was fashionable then for aristocratic households to have richly dressed black retainers.
It would have been customary for Cesar to become a servant to the male member of the family, but they became so attached to him that he became Lady Philipps's protege. He seems to have mixed on virtually equal terms with the family, which had a long tradition of supporting education and Christian missionary work. In 1788, in a fetter to a friend, Horace Walpole noted:
- "I was in Kingston with the sisters of Lord Milford; they have a favourite black who has been with them a great many years and is remarkably sensible".
