The Dreaded Pox In Marlow.

 Smallpox (not for the squeamish!)

You are feeling a bit tired, and at the back of your mind there is the thought that you might be going down with a cold. You check the funds in your purse or pocket and contemplate a visit to the reliable Mr Foottit in the High Street or perhaps good old Mr Cannon. Those chemists always have some promising pick-me-up when you feel yourself sagging. I'll go later, you think, it might pass. Save my money for now.

By the afternoon there's no doubt that you are sick. You ache all over. Your head throbs. You stand shakily on the threshold of your home. The shops are only a couple of streets away but suddenly such a walk feels too far. Standing up worsens the growing pain in your back. You call to one of the neighbourhood children playing nearby and send him to the nearest chemist with the promise of a coin for his trouble. See what there is for a cold, you say. No, say influenza. This can't be only a cold.

You receive a powder, and the bill from the boy, dose yourself and retire to bed. There you remain for days, feverish. The powder is doing nothing for you and your throat feels raw. Pushing up the sleeves of your nightshirt you notice spots on your skin. A fearful possibility has entered your mind. With all the strength you can muster you get out of bed to find your looking glass. With a little prayer you raise the mirror to your face, opening your mouth. The bursting sores you see inside leave you in no doubt. There are no other disease rashes like this. You have smallpox and within days there is a one in three chance that you will be dead...

Few diseases were the source of such terror as smallpox or "the dreaded pox" as it was known. Those that didn't die from it frequently bore deep scars on their faces for the rest of their lives to the degree that some covered their faces in public or refused to go out at all. The marriage possibilities of numerous young women and even some men were felt to have been destroyed by the pox's ravages on their complexion. Scarring also occurred elsewhere on the body as the pox spots would spread from the initial mouth area to much of the body including the soles of the feet and palms of the hands. These spots started flat before hardening and filling, bursting open, and then scabbing over.

In 1837 nearly 100 people died of smallpox in Marlow. Two years later the town suffered another outbreak which killed 164 people and infected many more. Periodic smaller outbreaks occurred regularly in the 1800s. In the closing years of the 1800s a Marlow magistrate recalled a time within living memory when as many as a third of those you met in the streets carried smallpox scars. At the time of his speaking you would still meet similar people but nowhere near as regularly. 

The above magistrate was speaking well after the introduction of a smallpox vaccine. Marlow was a place known throughout the Victorian age and into the 1900s for vaccination reluctance. In 1859 Marlow doctor Robert Colbourne lamented that forty nine out of fifty children he met had not been vaccinated against smallpox. The vaccines were suitable even for babies. This was critical as at least half of the children under the age of one who caught the disease died from it. In some outbreaks that figure was even higher. A foetus could, it was reported, contract the disease from the mother in utero and thus be born with it.

Vaccine refusal was usually on the grounds of safety concerns but perhaps was also sometimes on religious grounds, as local non-conformist Christian families seem especially likely to have refused all vaccinations, not just the smallpox one. They may have felt vaccinators were wrongfully "playing God". Vaccination did not necessarily prevent smallpox infection, far from it, but it made death less likely. Also counting against the arguement for vaccination was the fact that some of those who received the vaccine came down with a form of pox as a direct result of it. This was not typically fatal but it could still cause disfigurement and days of illness (and thus unemployment) which poor families could not afford to endure. 

In 1920 in a council meeting it was stated that about 1 in 7 Marlow children still had not had their available childhood vaccinations, smallpox or otherwise. Councillor Harvey said that he thought vaccines were largely a money making scheme for doctors, which caused the present Dr Dickson, a smallpox survivor himself, great offence. Smallpox vaccines were free to the patient but doctors received money from health authorities for giving them out. They would come to your home to inject you and also visited places such as schools. 

While Drs Dickson and Colbourne were firm advocates for vaccination the efficacy of the smallpox vaccine received a more lukewarm response from other local medical men. In 1894 the Wycombe Union district number one chief medical officer said that he couldn't really say whether smallpox vaccines worked to prevent smallpox though he thought they were worth persisting with until they were conclusively proved to be ineffective. This was just after the town's last major outbreak of the disease in the 1800s, when 28 people were infected. Thankfully this was by a milder form than usual and no deaths were recorded.

As a survivor Dr Dickson would have got reasonable though not absolute protection from reinfection. For this reason women who had pox scars to prove that they had been infected were much in demand to nurse the newly infected, saving members of the patient's household running the risk. Even if there was no active outbreak in their home area some people in the 1700s and 1800s decided to employ smallpox survivors as servants as a matter of routine as they were unlikely to bring the pox into the family.

Families also liked their doctors to have had smallpox previously if possible. You didn't want to arrive at his house with indigestion and go home with the pox. There is evidence that during outbreaks people held back from consulting doctors on other matters for fear of infection. This had a bad effect on their businesses. Dr Culhane during the 1893 outbreak was estimated to have lost £50 of his expected income through his, heroic and dedicated, serving of patients effected by smallpox and the reticence of others to be seen by him as a result. The authorities compensated him slightly over half of his losses which is all he asked for. This was somewhat begrudgingly given by the local poor law union, especially by one member who asserted that smallpox was a big fuss over nothing and could be cured by the application of cream of tartar!

A two month closure order on the schools also brought unintended financial consequences for the town's educational staff. Teachers were unable to collect the usual fees from their pupils if the children weren't allowed to come to school and to add insult to injury the dim-witted education authorities threatened to cut funding from Marlow schools for their "poor attendance rates" during the time they were officially closed. The mistress of the Bovingdon Green School didn't know how she was going to keep her school going.

Who got the pox?

Children often seem to have brought smallpox into the home of affected Marlow families. Once there it spread easily between people by way of shared bedding (most children shared beds with their siblings), or by the affected person talking in close proximity to, coughing near, or otherwise being in close contact with others. The responsible variola virus wasn't sufficiently contagious to affect those not in very close contact and contagion usually flowed from patients who had reached a stage of feeling quite ill (and thus not likely to be out and about) rather than from those still in the earliest stages of smallpox.

It was understood that isolation of patients should occur but that was a hard ask for families living in one or two room homes which was the case with some Marlow households in the early and mid Victorian era and of course earlier. 

Being in the overcrowded workhouse also increased your smallpox risk. Marlow Workhouse in Munday Dean Lane had no ability to isolate the sick from the well. Skin infections and lice were a routine problem as a result and in 1841 came smallpox to add to the woes of the inmates. The Wycombe Union houses where Marlow paupers were sent after our own workhouse closed in 1843 suffered their own regular outbreaks. Fourteen inmate children were found to have smallpox in 1864. The workhouse used two rooms at the top of the main building to contain the infected and all inmates were banned from leaving the premises for a fortnight as a precaution. It isn't known whether any Marlow children fell ill during this outbreak though Marlovians were at several other times blamed for bringing the pox into the union house.

Infected domestic homes would be disinfected, the patient's clothes burned and everyone within the household offered vaccination. As I stated above, vaccination did not bring complete protection from the disease. It was thought wise to re-vaccinate someone every time they were suspected of having come into contact with the disease, rather than trust to the continued effectiveness of any previous vaccinations that they had been given. Some people's arms became so marked with vaccination scars that they joked that they were more disfigured by the cure than the disease. Vaccination within 4 days of exposure was considered best for protection. 

Supplies of lymph from calves infected with cowpox were sent from London at a cost in 1893 of two shillings for a tube that could vaccinate three against the related smallpox. Those three people were then used as human wells for vaccine and the next three people to need it were vaccinated using lymph drawn from their arms once the initial vaccination was thought to have sufficiently "taken". The bodies of the second lot of people would then be used as a source of vaccine for three more people and so on. This "arm to arm" programme was cheaper then using bought in calf lymph for each potential person to be vaccinated but it could be fiercely resisted. Outside of times of outbreaks the main people to be vaccinated were very young children and many parents took a dim view of this repeated cutting of their children. It was painful and left scars. 

Technically from 1852 receiving vaccination against was compulsory for children who did not have poor health or whose parents did not get an exemption on the grounds of ethical beliefs against vaccination. This was little enforced before the 1870s and even then parents often secured exemptions if they wanted them and a great many local authorities simply refused to prosecute refusers right into the 1900s.

Eventually a permanent isolation hospital was built for the Wycombe district at Booker. A temporary hospital had been erected earlier at Marlow Common in order to contain the 1893 Marlow smallpox outbreak. On that occasion a milder form of the disease predominated and of 28 infected Marlow people (all from Dean Street) sent to the hospital, none died. Dr Culhane treated the 28, plus 2 sent from Wooburn, and monitored the families of the patients who had to isolate in their homes with the help of nurse Mary Menday, sent from the Wycombe Board of Guardians.

Servants living in the homes of their employers stood at great risk of being dismissed or at least temporarily sent away if they were so much as suspected of having the disease. In 1870 smallpox suspect Miss Jones was paid off and told to leave by her panicking employers when she began to feel unwell at her job in London. She did indeed have the disease and her return to her parents in Bovingdon Green caused an outbreak in Marlow. The poor girl almost collapsed with exhaustion in trying to reach the care of her parents. She walked home to Marlow from Bourne End station after catching the train from London Paddington where she had had to endure a five hour wait, alone and unwell, for the right train. Understandably this abandonment of a young, very sick girl by her employers caused outrage. Not all employers were so unfeeling. The girl's father worked for Wethered's Brewery* and they continued to pay him during his enforced isolation at home with her. Without such payments rental obligations could not be met and eviction and homelessness was a very real possibility for families stricken with the disease. The local guardians of the poor promised to cover the rent of some families while they isolated but there was, with good reason, often distrust that sufficient money or any money at all would indeed be given to them. A case in point was Mr Bowles of Marlow who suffered illness for six weeks during the 1893 outbreak. His wife did not become ill but couldn't go out to work as she was required to isolate and the family were pushed to the brink. They had been promised in front of witnesses money to cover their rent and to replace the contaminated clothes they had burnt but received nothing. 

Miss Jones wasn't the only person to bring smallpox home from London. The same month Jones returned, a man with smallpox did the same and started his own small outbreak in Marlow. A decade earlier five female rag sorters at Temple Mills fell ill with smallpox after handling London rags which were noticed too late to "smell of smallpox". The peculiar and distinctive smell which clung to smallpox patients, their clothing and bedding, mostly in the late stages of the disease, was reported quite often by ordinary people but medical journals rarely mention it.

The 1893 outbreak in Marlow also began when a rag sorter handled contaminated rags. She passed infection on to her little daughter who then unwittingly spread it further. The little girl and her mother had the last name Ford but lived in the household of the mother's employer Mr Simmonds, the rag and bone man. 

The perception was that smallpox in London began most often in the autumn and then spread out to the nearby counties by way of travellers packed tight into stagecoaches or, later, railway carriages. There seems some evidence to suggest infections were at their most severe around April and May. 

We can't blame London for all Marlow infections. You can bet the severe outbreaks at High Wycombe in 1870 and at Reading back in 1772 affected Marlow too. 

There was a belief that rubbish and dirt could harbour the pox and that bad smells could make you more vulnerable to infection. James Beckett in complaining to the Marlow Urban Council council in 1898 said that he believed that the piles of refuse dumped in an old gravel pit next to his marlow home had caused a smallpox outbreak in the immediate vicinity. 

Treatment 

Symptom management was the best that could be hoped for from doctors. Either your immune system could cure the disease or it could not and there was nothing that anyone could do about it. 

Cooling drinks such as chilled milk and lemonade (non fizzy in those days) were recommended for those in the grip of the fever which was such a prominent early symptom of the disease. Eating wasn't easy for small pox patients so liquid strengthening foods like the ubiquitous "beef tea" (the water beef has been cooked in, no tea involved) or gruel had to be resorted to. Opium was proscribed for pain. Severe back ache in the lumbar region was one of the diagnostic features of small pox. A lesser known complication of the disease is blindness so the eyes of sufferers needed careful bathing and care if the conjunctiva became inflamed. The rest of the body was gently sponged to clean the patient and to soothe them. Olive oil was dabbed onto your skin sores if the person nursing you was a gentle soul, carbolic acid if they had more a more savage approach to patient care. Both the oil and the acid had their advocates as means of decreasing smallpox scarring.

You will note that too many of these remedies were well out of reach for the poorest patients, the very ones most likely to suffer the disease. Beef, lemons for making lemonade and olive oil were all rare luxury items for them. If they had no well or water supply at home (and during the earliest most severe outbreaks most would not) they would be dependant during their isolation period on kind neighbours bringing them water with which to wash the patient or make up gruel. In cases where diarrhoea and vomiting accompanied the disease maintaining the hygiene of the patient without a domestic water supply must have been impossible.

Once isolation hospitals, temporary or permanent, became available, life for the affected poor became somewhat easier as while in hospital they were fed and treated at taxpayer expense not according to their own meagre means. If room ran out in the hospital the patients forced to isolate at home instead were delivered the necessities that they would have received in hospital. 

Smallpox is now extinct worldwide so that vaccination occurs only with those working in places such as research labs. The last cases locally were apparently in the 1920s. 

Written and researched by Charlotte Day. ©Marlow Ancestors. You are welcome to use my research for family or local history purposes with credit to this blog .

*A biography of Miss Jones' characterful mother Emily is available on the blog here

You may also interested in=

The 1890s flu epidemic in Marlow here Romantic troubles for Doctor Culhane here. Dr Dickson biog here

Selected Sources=

The World Health Organisation.

A Treatise On The Theory And Practice of Medicine by John Syer Bristowe of London. 1879 edition. Published by H.C Lea.

Transactions Medico-Chrirugical. The Journal of the Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society, London. 1896. Volume 79.

The Lancet, April 2nd 1870. Google Books.

Reports to the Medical Officer of Privy Council 1866.

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/10855-smallpox

Bucks Free Press 15th April 1859, 5th February 1864, 22nd Dec 1893, 11th April 1894, 30th December 1898 and 7th May 1920. Bucks Free Press Archives.

Buckingham Express 28th January 1871. South Bucks Standard April 13th 1894. British Library Archives accessed via the BNA.

Marlow in World War Two 1944-45

This is the last in a series of posts about Marlow during WW2.

Part One dealt with preparations for, and the early months of, the war here

Part Two covered 1940-41 here.

Part Three Covered 1942-3 here.

February 1944

Mr Ball of Westfield Medmenham is calling for local farmers to donate animals to a charity auction at Reading in aid of the Red Cross.

April 1944 

In the last 12 months, 43 Marlow families have experienced their family members being held as prisoners of war.

The Marlow Red Cross commanded by Julia Wethered of the High Street, plans to open a medical supply depot in the coming weeks.

The Ministry of Fuel reduces the amount of coal and coke that households can order, acknowledging that for some the new limits will not be enough for their needs.

Expectant mothers can now order an additional rational book for their unborn child so that they can access extra eggs, milk and meat (when available) during their pregnancy.

May 1944

A series of fundraising events take place in the town as part of the national Salute The Soldier Week fundraising drive. The aim is to encourage both cash donations and (in particular) investment in war bonds and savings bonds. To sell such savings products the savings committee hut in Marlow Bottom will open every day. The village has set its own target of £300 raised. Dwight D Eisenhower sends a letter to the town as a whole wishing Marlow luck with their efforts. His letter is itself auctioned off as part of the fundraising and is sold for £3 9 shillings. Novelist Rebecca West takes part in a charity quizz event at Court Garden as part of the week. A town parade to mark the week is joined in by 1300 people. The villagers of Marlow Bottom raise more than double their £300 target, while Marlow as a whole raises an astonishing £290,000. Later in the year the government gives Marlow a plaque to commemorate this success but where this was put we do not know (somewhere in town centre was the planned place).

June 1944 

Marlow Bottom's Red Cross volunteers arranged a fete to raise money for interned British residents of the Channel Islands.

July 1944 

Marlow Urban District Council has a target of collecting 10,000 books from the town for paper recycling. Children from the Girls, Boys, Roman Catholic and private Dial Close schools are all dispatched to do door to door collections. Books of educational or antiquarian interest are not desired. Before the end of the month this target is exceeded by 2,000.

The volunteers at the British Restaurant in Marlow have been so overworked in recent months that there has been a fear that some will breakdown. The restaurant has had to stop serving suppers as a result, and is making a loss but at first refuses to follow official guidance as to raising their prices as some Marlow people cannot afford to pay more. In November losses are so great they are forced to increase prices against their wishes.

August 1944

Harry Belcher of West Street is fined for missing 5 Home Guard drill sessions (he was compulsorily enlisted into the Guards). His wife has been ill and in need of attendance plus as a private hire car driver his business is dependant on him being available in the evenings when drill practice is held. Harry feels he will lose his business if he keeps being called to practice when he needs to work and points out that he is hardly a war shirker - he joined up to fight in the last war when underage and suffered captivity as a prisoner of war then. Him and his wife have already lost their son in the current war and clearly with his grief and financial worries he has had enough. He tells those trying him that he has done enough for his country. 

October 1944

Leading Aircraft woman Betty Sweetman of Oak Tree Avenue has been working at RAF Fighter Command as an operations room "plotter" but has now been posted to similar operations in France. 

November 1944

Mrs Allen of Holland Road writes to the Bucks Free Press complaining about the terrible food in the British Restaurant at Marlow. Her veg was undercooked and her treacle tart dry and hard. Wycombe and Maidenhead she says have fine restaurants but not Marlow.

December 1944

Helga Stene, an escapee from Norway, gives a talk on life under the Nazis to a large audience at Court Garden.

 

Quarry Laundry organizes a Christmas Quizz to raise funds to buy every Marlow P.O.W 200 cigarettes. Any leftover funds are to go to their employees away serving in the war.

January 1945

The British Restaurant closes for good. Later this year it reopens as a canteen for schoolchildren.

The Marlow Bottom.W.I resolve to knit warm clothes for children in liberated countries.

February 1945

Marlow Urban District Council are on the urgent hunt for the blankets they gave out to the evacuees who came to the town, most of whom have now gone home, some probably with their blankets. The Ministry of Health has told the council that they will be charged for any blankets not collected and returned to the Ministry.

Car headlights can now be unmasked in a lifting of blackout regulations .

May 1945

May 7th - Germany unconditionally surrenders with the surrender coming into effect on the 8th, known as V.E Day. The official announcement comes over the radio. However everyone knows about the Allied victory already, and before the King's public address the town is festooned with flags and bunting and the churches have already hosted thanksgiving prayers.

The official announcement is broadcast in the cinema in Station Road and to the dancers at Court Garden at a quickly organized celebration event. A collection is made at the dance for POWs. Impromptu street parties spring up around the town before the surrender announcement, followed on V.E Day by more organized ones. One of the latter is in Glade Road and involves not only a tea in the street but sports and games in a nearby field for the children, a magic show, singing and dancing. Another tea is organized for  children jointly by the mothers of lower Newtown Road and Dedmere Road. Mr and Mrs Hodges of Victoria Road organize a party to which those of Station Road are also invited. Poor Mrs Hodges, falls over in one of the associated running races and fractures her arm.

A hundred children from upper Newtown Road and Little Marlow Road attend a celebration tea in the church hall followed by games in the park.

At Whitsun a victory fete is held at the Red Cross hut at Marlow Bottom. 

Prisoners of war returning home to recuperate after their release from medical treatment will temporarily get double rations every week to help them rebuild their strength.

Salvation Army band member Arthur Furmston returns home after over 5 years as a POW and is given a welcome home tea and social by other church members.

A special church service at All Saints gives thanks to the civilian volunteers that have helped during the war, as they are about to be dismissed. These and various youth groups gather and parade to the church beforehand.

Land girl Miss J Duncalffe gets a scarlet armband in honour of her four years continuous service at Seymour Court Farm.

July 1945

The parents of some of the last few child evacuees in Marlow have proved untraceable so they will need to stay for now.

August 1945

Victory over Japan is announced by the Prime Minister on the radio. The next two days are declared holidays but some Marlow people haven't heard the news and turn up for work anyway on the first day. Flags and bunting are again brought out across the town and people dance on the lawns of Court Garden. Thanksgiving services are held in the parish church and the Baptist church. Residents of South Place and Platts Row in Mill Road have a joint V.J Day street party complete with fireworks and a bonfire. The town's children are treated to a tea, sports competitions along with more informal games like pillow fighting and more fireworks. There are similar treats for children at Little Marlow.

Wethered's brewery have their own celebrations for their employees and families.

William Perry of Berwick Road dies after celebrating in the pub with his friends, drinking and dancing. When he gets home a little worse for wear he vomits and chokes as a result.

At Medmenham there is a garden party at the Vicarage, a dance in the village hall and a tea for the village children for V.J Day celebrations.

September 1945

Councillor Kibblewhite, hopes the Ministry of Agriculture will be able to give back Gossmore Recreation Ground as the town sorely needs space for football etc. At the moment a crop of clover is growing in it.

Mr Whalley of the Lawn is told by the council he must postpone plans to extend his home as due to the war labourers have been in very short supply and are more needed elsewhere in the town. In particular they are going to be building some long planned council houses in Seymour Park Road, which have had to be put off repeatedly because of labour and material supply problems.

October 1945

Marlow residents visit High Wycombe Guildhall to view a display of crucial war items secretly made in Wycombe during the war. These include tank and bomber plane parts.

November 1945

Memorial services are held as usual for the dead of the previous war. The Vicar in his address acknowledges that the recent war has robbed many of their last faith in God and they have turned from the church.

Late in 1945 

Marlow building company Y.J Lovell is building "prefab" accommodation in Reading. These are an emergency response to war-derived housing shortages.

Some Sources=

Bucks Free Press 25th August 1944, 25th May 1945, 16th November 1945. Bucks Free Press Archives.

Personal Interview.

Bucks Herald 18th February 1944, British Library Archives, Via the BNA.

British Journal of Commerce, Post War Trading Edition, 1945. London.

A Man Called Florence - the life of Rev F T Wethered

If you thought that the Victorian postman in charge of rounds at Hurley has quite an easy and peaceful job, you would be reckoning without the Rev F T Wethered. That man certainly knew how to write letters. He probably would have kept the post service going in the village single handed. He fired off letters to national papers on religion, politics and history, to academic, sporting and natural history journals, to his parishioners who had gone far afield and of course personal correspondence. The local press was treated to his advice on everything from gardening to teaching children to swim and the evils of motor cars. As such we've learnt a lot of the Reverend's opinions on a whole host of subjects and so now it's the turn of the polymath to feature in a post of his own. 

A man called Florence 

The future Rev F T Wethered was born in Hurley Vicarage in 1840. He was called Florence as was his father* the then incumbent. You would be right to think the gentlemen shared an unusual first name. However this isn't because they bore what was then regarded as a typically female name, rather it was usually male if not that common overall. Our Florence spent his childhood in the lanes and meadows of Hurley, before going away to a school for young gentleman at the vicarage of Stratfield Mortimer. He was following the well worn path of sons of better off clergymen who were routinely sent away to their colleagues to receive an education before entering public school and university. For Florence university was Christ Church Oxford and a career following in his father's footsteps beckoned. In his late 20s he married Mary Josephine Bonsor at Hurley church. 

Born to rule at Hurley? 

When Florence was 8 his father bought the "advowson" of Hurley. This meant he was buying the power to nominate his successor there. Perhaps he was already thinking of placing his young son in the pulpit, or he just wanted to ensure his legacy would be carried on by someone he approved of. The nominations were subject to the diocese approving the person as a fit candidate. After his father's death in 1867, Florence inherited the advowson, and used it to advance himself to the living at Hurley. This was around 5 years after his ordination. Later on when debate was raging about how or if the advowson system should be changed, the case of the vicar of Hurley was often mentioned as an example of how it could advance nepotism. But Florence was hurt by being singled out in this way. He said he wanted to serve the parish that was his home and where he knew the people whose souls he would have care of. The inheritance of the advowson had allowed him to do that and he felt his family did nothing wrong. Regardless of how he came to the role, F T certainly served the parish with diligence for decades. 

Get the corks out

Florence had an affinity with the river. If he wasn't swimming in it, he was fishing or casting a critical eye at Sunday boaters who maybe should have been in church - at least according to FT.  In 1873 he wrote to The Field to weigh into the debate about the best way to teach boys to swim. He dismissed the usual practice of giving the children floats of bound rushes or belts of cork for example. The secret he said was to engage a waterman with a punt and a large pole. The would be swimmer would have a length of webbing placed under their arms and fastened over their back via a hoop to the pole. Perhaps he tried this method when teaching his own sons to swim. If so, his boys would certainly not have got out of lesson if the water was cold. Their father was a firm believer in daily swimming whatever the weather. In 1894 he said he'd bathed everyday before breakfast from December - February for the last 3 years, bar 3 days that the Thames was in high flood. He believed that doing so kept his iron constitution going, and he continued the habit well into old age - until a few months before his death in fact. 

When not swimming, Florence enjoyed fishing. He was involved with the various angling associations and bred trout for them in troughs at the Vicarage for future release into the Thames. 

Florence sued for libel 

Moving away would not necessarily mean the Florence's watchful eye did not follow you. In 1887, two of his former parishioners went away and married. Florence discovered that they had done so by the calling of banns in a parish where they were not legally resident. So Florence said the marriage was invalid. The vicar who conducted the marriage exchanged letters with Florence and revealed that the bride was heavily pregnant on the wedding day and that her sister had also been illegally married. FT was shocked. The couple had both been lodging with the girl's grandmother in Hurley and the vicar blamed her for failing to keep a sufficiently close eye on the goings on under her roof. She had worked for him as a washer woman and was promptly fired. The groom said the couple hadn't wished to marry in Hurley for the sake of quietness. (And avoiding Florence probably!) A little later Florence wrote an article in the parish magazine that referenced the fact that two parishioners had been illegally married and explaining the rules of banns. This resulted in an action of libel against Hurley's vicar. He said the case was motivated by a personal grudge as it was funded by someone who refused to be named. He lost, and had to pay a modest sum in compensation. The judge obviously disagreed with the juries verdict, cautioned the couple against their conduct and denied them the payment of their costs. Many other vicars spoke up in defence of FT who they said was doing only what every vicar did  - advising their flock as to their conduct. They considered their job would be impossible if they couldn't  call out "sinners". They raised a collection fund to pay Florence's legal costs. 

*Rev Florence senior was Florence James, the son of Thomas Wethered of Remnantz in Marlow. His wife and FT's mother was Esther nee Peel. Both are buried at Hurley. Esther's sister Anne also married a Wethered.

Councils mail bag gets bigger 

One of the most frequent recipients of Florence's missives was the local council. Pot holes, dusty roads and bad drainage were his particular bete noirs. When one of the councillors was reported to be rather dismissive of the volume, frequency and length of the correspondence (they'd just received a 20 page letter about the state of Hurley's roads from him) , Florence acted with fury. Another councillor said they "laughed" at the vicar and added his letters should always be read at the end of meetings so those who had important business could leave beforehand.  Florence regarded the comments as a personal insult to both him and his wife.  And so he wrote more letters. The road that most angered FT was repaired after all, although the council did say they were always going to do it eventually. 

The devils transport 

If you really wanted to get FT riled, the subject to raise was the motor car. In 1904 he suggested they shouldn't be allowed on the roads but instead should be given trackways like rail roads to travel upon. He expressed the same view the following year when addressing the High Wycombe Mutual Improvement Society.  This scheme was necessary as "most drivers are utterly selfish" and "life is already unbearable and the nuisance gets monthly worse and worse". Car travel was an emotive subject in Hurley at this time as a little boy from the village (Tommy Overall) had been run over and killed. 

When discussing the horrific automobiles, he recounts an interesting story he had found record of regarding an earlier form of transportation. This was an 1832 visit to Hurley by a "steam coach". It was due to stop at the village blacksmith to take on water. On doing so it drained the well. But it also needed some repairs. After this, watched by a large crowd, it limped off but had to stop every 20 yards or so. It was described as a "great unwieldy monster" and noisy to boot. 

History man

 Florence was a keen historian and antiquarian. He loved nothing better than delving through the parish records to find interesting old documents to share with the local press (by letter of course.) He made a great effort to track down items related to the history of Hurley. When the council asked him to hand over certain parish records as a recent law entitled them to, he flatly refused. He did not trust them to preserve them carefully. I do not think they ever managed to force him to do so. All his research cumulated in a book on the history of Hurley church in the middle ages which was published in 1898. He also wrote papers and gave many lectures on this subject. 

Man of many talents

Florence did not spend all of his time at his writing desk or in the pulpit. He was fortunate enough to spend much time in Switzerland pursuing his hobby of Alpine climbing. Regarded as an authority on certain routes and climbs, correspondence from FT often filled the columns of the Alpine Clubs journals. In 1918 they politely called him "as vigorous a correspondent as ever". He retained an affinity for the Swiss communities that he visited and led fundraising efforts for the relief of those affected by avalanches and rock slips. 

I have not mentioned much about Florence's family, which would make this post too long. But I will mention that Hurley church bears a memorial to his soldier son Lieutenant Harold who died of enteric fever in Lucknow, India in 1898. The plaque was put up by the officers of his regiment. Florence himself passed away in 1919. 

N.B if you were wondering what horticultural advice Florence had I will pass on an example tip. If you need to get snow off conifers without damaging them, use a long handled hay rake for the task. Now you know. 

Written and researched by Kathryn Day 

More information:

To find other posts about Hurley see the index here

To read about how the "horseless carriage" was received in Marlow see the post here

© Marlow Ancestors. You are welcome to use this research with credit to this blog.

Sources :

Ten Days Hard Work In The Zermatt District BY THE REV. F. T. WETHERED. Read before the Alpine Club, December 16, 1875.

Conway, William Martin - The Zermatt Pocket-book: A Guide-book to the Pennine Alps, Edward Stanford 1881  

The Ecclesiastical gazette, or, Monthly register of the affairs of the Church of England. United Kingdom, n.p, 1867 & 1868

Wethered, Florence Thomas. St. Mary's Hurley in the Middle Ages: Based on Hurley Charters and Deeds. United Kingdom, Bedford Press, 1898.

Reading Mercury January 20th 1894, March 30th 1918. Via the BNA from the British Library Archives.

South Bucks standard 24th December 1887, 28th Jan 1898, 1st December 1905 . Both via the BNA and the British Library Archives.

Maidenhead Advertiser 9th October 1872, 28th December 1887, 18th March 1903 & 20th November 1904. 

Hurley census record returns from the transcript by Jane Pullinger. 

Newspaper cutting 1st June 1894 (Reading Mercury?) with thanks to Enid. 

The Field, September 1873. 

 

 

Early History of Wethered Road Marlow

Wethered Road first existed as an unnamed foot way and cart track that led from Dean Street round to the back of the cottage and pub at the top of Trinity Road and the nearby fields. Access on foot could continue via paths all the way to Marlow Bottom eventually, the sand and a gravel pits of Sandygates (Sandegate) and Hillside, down Trinity Road (apparently blocked to vehicle traffic in some way, the rights or otherwise of carts to use it were much disputed! ) or around to Chapel Street so although nobody lived in the road itself it would not have lacked a certain busy feeling.

A pound is mentioned as being beside the road there in 1896. There were various pounds in the town during the 1800s for the purpose of containing stray animals. 

The first few homes pop up in Wethered Road in the early 1900s. The road was then called Church Road after nearby Holy Trinity church. Because Marlow people loved nothing more than being confusing when it came to street addresses, Trinity Road was also at that time often referred to as Church Road (not to mention Trinity Lane). To make things even more confusing early properties in the future Wethered Road were numbered as if they were part of Dean Street rather than a separate address. Marlow postmen of the past, we salute you. You must one and all have had the patience of saints.

Some of the earlier residents were the Austin family, headed by Thomas and Anne  ("Annie"). Thomas was a domestic gardener at an unknown house in Marlow. He was originally from Upton cum Chalvey near Slough, she from Windsor according to the census. As a young man in Chalvey Thomas found himself unwittingly involved in a murder case that was the talk of the county at the time. A Chalvey coal dealer had been robbed and brutally murdered on his premises. Drops of blood were found outside the chief suspect's lodgings and his landlady observed blood on his feet. Thomas Austin gave evidence that he had seen the suspect near the coal premises on the night in question, wearing a coat matching the description of the one later believed by police to have been worn by the killer. He also testified that the suspect had been out of money on the night of the murder but had predicted that he was about to have some. The accused was acquitted and went off to sea to escape the scandal. Thomas was not the only prosecution witness to appear against him but as he had been on friendly terms with the suspect his having given evidence was deeply resented by him. When some months later the acquitted man returned home again he attacked and threatened to kill Thomas whilst under the influence  of alcohol. For this he was fined 21 shillings. You can see why Thomas might have wanted to leave Chalvey, which he swiftly did. First he went to Eton as a gardener and then came to Marlow. By then he had lost his first wife Elizabeth and married Annie Cannon. When they first arrived in Marlow the couple lived in a cottage behind the Verney Arms pub in Dean Street. Thomas was soon winning prizes for the vegetables, fruit and flowers he grew at home just as he had done when he lived elsewhere.

Another resident family in the 1910s and 20s were the Moodys headed by Kate and William. He worked as a builder's labourer and a fruit gatherer at different times. Because of the latter important occupation application was made for him to be exempt from the draft in 1916 but the application was unsuccessful. Earlier in his life he had been convicted like so many working class Marlow men of poaching. William's mother Jane features in this post. The post celebrates her resilience throughout what was a very hard life - please be aware that the post contains content that may distress you, particularly if you are related to her. Jane and her husband lived in Wethered Road themselves in 1916.

In 1913 a new Church of England Boys' School was opened in Wethered Road following some time of fundraising by local people including Lucy Winters. The buildings alone cost £4000 and were built by Marlow builders Thomas and William Sellman. It is now Holy Trinity, a middle school for both boys and girls. Princess Christian who was staying at Medmenham Abbey performed the opening ceremony after which she took tea in one of the classrooms. Some 900 local schoolchildren lined up outside the school to welcome her. A portrait of the then king and queen was presented to Princess Christian who then presented it back to be put up in the school premises. 

The new school was quick to harness the technology of the day for the purposes of education. The head invested in a gramophone in 1923 to help music teaching and a radio in 1924 so educational programmes could be listened in to. It also enjoyed a garden for the pupils to gain practical experience at growing vegetables. 

The school was not the only important facility to arrive in Wethered Road in the Edwardian era- the town cemetery opened in 1910. A post about the first person to be buried in the new cemetery and their link to Peter Pan is a available here. Originally different denominations were to have different parts of the burial ground to use but that idea soon gave way to a mingling of one and all.

                   

In 1916 Mr Owen Wethered of Seymour Court donated some land in celebration of his 60th wedding anniversary to enable the road to be widened. Who needs diamonds or flowers for their anniversary when they can have a road widening scheme? (We hope you got something else too Mrs O). After this donation the road was officially renamed Wethered Road.

Further reading:

Landlords of the pub that formerly existed near the top of Trinity Road here.

1833 Parochial Assessment Great Marlow High Street East Side Part Two

 I am slowly transcribing the original handwritten assessment working notebooks which are held by my family. Additions and corrections were made to some of the records up to circa 1840 in the same notebooks.

©Marlow Ancestors. You are very welcome to use this transcription for family and local history purposes with credit to this blog.

Format for transcription:

Name

Property occupied

Annual value of property

Square brackets hold any comments or further research by me

High Street East Side continued

David Nichols [aka Nicholls. David later crossed through in pencil and the name James substituted faintly. This was in 1851 the home of James Nicholls blacksmith who probably worked for Burrells blacksmith and ironmongers, a near neighbour. James was probably already in occupation of the property in 1835 when he is recorded as an independent voter of the High Street. Frederick the son of James later took over Burrells]

House £7

*****

Ralph Clark [a tailor and independent  viterin 1835, this property later John Collins Clark / Clerk the tailor]

House and garden £11

*****

? Haynes [first name altered and illegible as a result, looks like James after alteration, possibly formed from original entry "Francis". A James Haynes / Haines was a carpenter - see here for a biography. He did later than the assessment live definitely in this house]

House and garden

£11

Workshop, garden and yard at wharf

£5 (occupied part of the old "tithe barn" by the bridge.) 

*****

Elizabeth Palmer

House, garden, lawn, stables, coach houses, offices and yard

£50 (Palmer House/Palmers)

*****

Josiah Clark [a grocer. Robbed of bacon and butter the previous year. More about his illustrious family here and a photo of his grave here]

House and garden

£15

*****

Thomas White

House and garden

£8

*****

Charles Clark

House and garden

£9

***** 

John Cozens [a John Cozens senior died 1836 aged 81. Had moved to the town from Oxfordshire]

House, yard, chaisehouse, stable, garden and house and garden adjoining

£25 (A beautiful stucco and bow fronted house now demolished) 

*****

Late Charles Wethered

House

£18

*****

Thomas Hardy 

House, garden and yard

£14

*****

George Creswell [barge owner, inn keeper, constable and farmer. Long post about him here]

House and garden

£10

*****

Henry Badger (the Parish Clerk) 

House and garden

£10

*****

End of High Street East Side

Transcribed and researched by Charlotte Day.

A Manly And Scientific Pursuit - History of Cricket In Great Marlow

In 1829 the local papers included a charming description of a "manly game of cricket" in Marlow between the "Knights of the thimble" of Marlow and their fellow tailors of Maidenhead. The latter were seemingly brim full of confidence (or bravado) and marched into town complete with a band playing "See the conquering hero come". They lost and made a somewhat muted departure. This was the earliest match I could find between teams formed of those following a particular occupation, but it would be the first of many. And 1829 was usually given in the Victorian era as the start date for Marlow Cricket Club although it ebbed and flowed and was re-organised several times and finally so in 1854. (I've also seen a mention of a Marlow Cricket Club in 1828 so it may have a few false starts even before 1829.)

. 

Above programme for a fundraising dramatic and musical performance by the Marlow Popular Promenade Pierrot Party in November 1907. Profits were shared with the Institute. Expect banjo performances, comic songs and dramatic sketches and humourous "absurdity in one act". 

The Aldermary

Where did our early teams play?  It was said in the 1880s that the Cricket Club had used the Crown Meadow as their first cricket ground (Riley Recreation Ground), and I believe this is correct although many reports do not give a location for their matches and they may have used more than one field at times. However by the 1870s the vast majority of matches I can find location details for describe play at "the Aldermary" or Alder Meadow as it was later known. This is roughly where the Marlow Cricket Club is now but the ground was smaller.  Note you can find several examples of the club playing at the Aldermary on occasion from the 1840s and it also hosted casual matches so has a longer heritage as the cricket ground than may be realised. 

A Gents Wager

An early descriptions of cricket matches at Marlow refer to games organised by a couple of unnamed gentleman to settle a wager. They may or may not have actually played themselves. The location in 1776 was Alms House Close - probably Crown Meadow again or nearby, as this was adjacent to the original Brinkhurst almshouses. 

A popular type of cricket spectacle in the early Victorian era was a one wicket match between two teams  gentlemen aside. Sometimes these preceded a team match but a lot of people turned up to watch them anyway. Usually some kind of forfeit was at stake - not including any unofficial wagers. The loser often had to stump up a dinner for the victor and his friends for example, or at very least a round or two. No doubt some of those participating took these matches seriously but generally they seem to have been held in a spirit of fun with some questionable techniques and rule bending hinted at. My favourite one wicket match is one played in 1842 between Messrs Hyatt and Brooks. [Henry Hyatt was the keeper of The Greyhound Inn* and Brooks was the baker occupying the premises now known as Burgers.] Hyatt's puffing and blowing was said to have reminded the spectators of an "old steam engine nearly exhausted". Henry Hyatt's exertion was worth it as he secured victory in 30 minutes flat. 

Any Excuse For A Match Will Do 

If your ancestor wasn't playing for Marlow Cricket Club, they might well be playing often in one of the huge number of  casual games organised, and almost always still hosted at Alder Meadow and Crown Meadow before. Games were arranged between the residents of different streets, workers from one employer versus another, men in the same or different occupations eg waiters v waterman in 1898, the choir and clergy, pupils at rival academies..the list goes on. Sometimes an additional element was added such as players performing in fancy dress, or in old fashioned costumes, or one team may have to play left handed or with some unusual instrument replacing a proper bat. An 1897 match between ladies on one side and men on the other saw the men playing left handed (or right handed if they naturally played left normally) and with a piece of  rough hewn wood instead of a bat. (Result was declared a diplomatic draw.)

The bigger private boys schools in the town had their own teams throughout the Victorian era such as Prospect House Academy and Marlow Place School. I should also mention the popular team of the Marlow Institute* who usually used the Crown Meadow for practice and matches - or sometimes the Alder Meadow. Formed 1896, they later amalgamated with Marlow Cricket Club with the members allowed a reduced subscription in return for playing fewer matches as a sort of B team. And lastly the Brewery had a formally organised cricket club from 1895 (but had fielded many teams before that) whose home ground was regarded as Star Meadow. 

Cricketing Whites ...Or Purples Or Stripes..

James Cranbourne Strode of Court Garden (then a private house) was a definite cricketing enthusiast.  He hosted a match between two invited teams of  Marlow boys aged 12-14 at Court Garden in 1828. The sides were distinguished by wearing different colours - purple and orange. Probably these colours were represented by sashes, hat/armbands or belts. Purple were the victors, with a young Strode amongst their members. After much "scientific" play the youngsters retired to a large tea on the grounds. It was the highest praise to have your play described as scientific then..technically skilful and considered rather than successful through brute force or so they thought. 

In 1843 the boys of Prospect House Academy* played in nifty blue and white striped shirts with white trousers and a straw hat finished with a blue ribbon. 

The Clayton's of Harleyford were another family of gentry who patronised local cricket matches, especially in the mid Victorian  era. They were hosting matches within Harleyford Park with the home team usually formed out of Harleyford estate employees/tenants or Marlow tradesmen. 

Fear The Men Of Beaconsfield 

 After an enthusiastic start around 1829, things became a little more complicated for the early members of the Marlow Club. It seems our nemesis was the Beaconsfield club. I can find a few reports of consistent defeats at their hands in 1830 and a little later but at some point prior to 1843 we received such a thrashing by the team that apparently Marlow Cricket Club was entirely broken up in despair. Before then the Club was described as as "good a club as far as funds were concerned as any in the country".  I suppose the well off benefactors were not keen to subsidise a team that was getting publicly trounced. Afterwards, according to contemporaries, a few informal games were held a year until 1843 when the club was revived to meet a challenge from the fellows of Waltham. But before long the matches begin to fall off again (although not due to those skillful Beaconsfielders as far as I know)  and by 1853 the club was described as fallen into decline. In September 1853 someone decided to organise a match between the residents of Chapel Street and those of West Street. It was hoped this would generate enough popular enthusiasm to encourage the revival of the club. West Street were the happy victors. In April the following year a meeting by the "youthful supporters of athletic sports" saw a resolution to re start Marlow Cricket Club passed. The curate Rev George Taylor was subsequently credited as being one of the main driving forces for getting funds and practical support pledged. 

The Married v Single gentleman of the club match was one of the most long standing features of the Victorian club, and so ended the inaugural 1854 season. After a game played with "considerable spirit" the  married team were victorious. Dinner at the Crown usually  followed - also the location for most early AGMS. 

In 1859 a juvenile club was established by William Brooks. It looks as though their first match was against the boys of Marlow Place school who won. All then retired to the National boys schoolroom for ginger beer, as gifted by supporter Peter Borgnis. I can find a few mentions of the juvenile side after this throughout the 1860s. 

Who Were The Players? 

As regards the Cricket Club, the earliest members listed as playing are familiar names from amongst the better off traders, inn keepers, clergy, school masters and gentry. There was much less of a set regular team than later. Complaints were made in the 1850s and 60s that few of those selected for the team actually lived in the town. The Club replied that while they had many townsman members, few turned up often for practice and so this was why they were not regarded as amongst the best players  from which the team would be selected from. To be fair, most of the teams I traced were in fact then present or former Marlow men and most that weren't were not quite from a million miles away - Little Marlow, Bisham etc. The press frequently complained about the selected sides performance in those two decades - for example the "miserable exhibition" versus Maidenhead in the August of 1860. Hard to say if the criticism was fair, as they did notch up a fair few wins too! 

As regards other casual teams, the players are more mixed in terms of economic background. And the "Night School and Juvenile Cricket Club" set up in 1861 was mainly formed of lower income youths. (Set up by the vicar and curates of Marlow, the Night School catered for young men and youths mainly from the Dean Street area. Read more here) Later the Great Marlow Working Mans Cricket Club was set up after a meeting in the Crown in 1906. The then Crown landlord offered the use of the rear Crown Meadow (Riley Park) to them for both matches and practice free of charge, and the use of a room in the inn for committee purposes, also free. A local paper hoped this new club would encourage a spirit of friendliness between the "better class working men" in the town. They subsequently played at the Star Meadow, Porter's Meadow and Marlow Football Club before arriving at Higginson Park and changing their name to the Marlow Park Cricket Club. 

A Pavillion 

By 1873 the Cricket Club was doing well for itself and so of course they needed a pavillion. Local engineer Edwin Clark (see link below for more about him) had promised a £35 donation towards the costs, at least according to some reports. It was resolved to fundraise in order to build a "substantial pavillion"  - no mention of whether it needed to be bigger than any Beaconsfield might have! In 1879 it was referred to as "somewhat elaborate" in design. Marlow builder Thomas Corby* won the contract to construct. Costing just over £117, it was newly completed in August that year, topped with a traditional thatched roof. The cost had not been fully paid off the following year as many promised subscriptions were late, although an influx of donations had reduced the deficit to £30 by April 1875. At least they now had somewhere of their own to host an AGM - and to sell luncheons plus wine and beer from. Catering was available when the ground hosted a bigger match at least. The proprietors of the Greyhound and George and Dragon inns would take care of the sales there. 

By the mid 1890s the pavillion was described as in a poor state or even "dilapidated" as they put it in 1897. Repairs had been made almost every year but it was now considered beyond remedy. They had started sporadically fundraising for this purpose around 1895/6 but at the time of the 1897 AGM, the work had not started and the scheme doesn't seem to advanced to the stage of anyone drawing up plans for that matter. Hopes that the structure would be imminently ready nevertheless were not realised and in November 1898 the old roof had partially fallen in. It was decided to get the pavillion scheme properly started and an official subscription list was opened. Three members of the Wethered family immediately pledged £70 between them, including the then Club Captain F O Wethered.  A committee would decide where the new pavillion should be - as the ground had been enlarged in the years since the first was built it was felt the old position was no longer the best one. Moving it would make available a larger or better area for play. I don't know where the old was in relation to the new though. Initial plans were also to raise enough for the construction of a residence for the caretaker / groundsman but I don't believe this was achieved. By March it was reported work had begun on the new pavillion even though not enough funds had yet been raised to pay for it. (Due to cost about £300, the contractor was local man Thomas Lunnon.) It was ready for the start of the new season that year. 

Problems In Play

As mentioned above the Alder Meadow ground was smaller at first and dissected by footpaths, official and otherwise. It sometimes suffered substantial flooding. There were frequent late Victorian complaints about groups of children, mostly little boys, who congregated in a field or two next to the cricket ground and got up to mischief. They had been seen climbing the wooden fence of the Club and it looked as though attempts had been made to wrench out some iron railings adjacent. Obviously the youngsters were feeling strong on that occasion! Police patrols were requested to make extra passes through the area on the evenings. Of course some children hanging about during the daytime just wanted to watch the play, and could not necessarily do so legitimately. It was actually debated whether children should be allowed in the ground at all. In the early years youngsters had been allowed to play on part of the ground, except on match days. After some serious vandalism in 1873 of both the fencing and new pavillion, this permission was withdrawn. But in 1899 they formalised the rules to state that while no perambulators or very young children would ever be permitted entry, well behaved youngsters who had applied in advance for a ticket of admission from Mr Lovell* could pass through the gates on match days. However if any of these lucky youngsters should misbehave they would be banished from the ground for ever! They stood no chance of getting into the pavillion it seems, which was restricted on match days to players and members and their one adult guest each. All had to sign a visitors book. 

Money Woes

The Victorian Marlow Cricket Club had to fund all the expenses you'd expect, and a few you perhaps wouldn't such as that of thatching the first pavillion roof. Routine costs include payments to the umpire and boys to "scout" on match and practice days, to a professional bowler for practice purposes (on a regular basis from 1879) and to the groundsman of course. And there was the rent of the cricket field from first the Davenports and Higginsons, and then from the Wethered family too. (The latter remitted the rent during the First World War.) Although the earliest version of the club was said to have a high level of financial support from the local gentry, this was less to be relied upon as time went on. The Wethereds of Remnantz and the Brewery were consistent in their support though and one or other of the family fulfilled the role of club captain from the time of the club's re organisation in 1854 throughout very many years of the Victorian period. Most importantly the family purchased the cricket ground when it was offered for sale as part of the Court Garden estate in the 1890s. It was feared that as the Club could not afford to buy the ground themselves, they would be evicted from their home by a new purchaser perhaps hoping to put up a riverside villa. (Although the ground was described as water logged in winter, it was believed conversion to residential use was likely.)

Frequent appeals were made to pay subscriptions on time, whether you were a playing or general member.  Sources of income included selling the grass cut from the field, rights to graze sheep** there when not in use for play,  and charging the Lawn Tennis Club for use of part of their ground, at least until the two organisations merged in 1908. They offered a joint membership then for a guinea a year or less if you didn't want to support both sports. 

The Wethered brewery bought the cricket field in 1920 for the sum of £1200 as the Marlow Cricket Club had sadly not re started after the war. It was to be used rent free by the Brewery Employees' Recreation Club for leisure purposes. So while Marlow has one of the oldest established cricket clubs, it does not have a continuous history.  

This post would be too long to feature individual players, umpires, score keepers etc especially as many get a post of their own. Search cricket using the blog search to find all mentions, or use the A-Z person index to find a specific individual. 

** In 1868 Arthur Brown, Augustus, Sidney and an otherwise unnamed young East were fined 5s each for cruelty to the grazing sheep - they had been seen attempting to ride them like a horse! 

Written and researched by Kathryn Day. 

©MarlowAncestors

Further information:

All the people and places marked * have more detailed posts of their own eg Henry Hyatt. Find them in the A-Z person index on the top drop down menu. 

Other posts related to sporting history :

Athletics meetings at Harleyford 1870s and in Marlow generally here

Biography of Charles Miller Foottit- one of the founders of the Football Club, Rowing Club and Regatta, cricket player etc here

Football Clubs - more than 20 you've probably never heard of dating from Victorian and Edwardian times (with many players mentioned) in a post here. Easter matches of Marlow FC here

Gymnastics in Edwardian and Victorian Marlow - here

Marlow Horse Races- comprehensive history, updated October 2023 here

Nellie Creswell amateur Victorian sportswoman here

Richard Smith, amateur cricketer who played in front of a French prince here

Regattas  - here

Skating on the Thames and meadows here

Sporting opportunities in 1700s Marlow here

Victorian Marlow Athletes here

See also the general Great Marlow history index here

Sources include:

Dolby, I E A (ed) - Journal of the Household Brigade - Household Brigade, privately printed,  1875. 

Lillywhite, Frederick - Cricket Scores and biographies from 1746 to 1826, Vol 11. (1878)

The Badminton Magazine of Sports and Pastimes, Vol 43. (Longmans, Green & Co, 1915)

Kelly's Directory 1883, 1903, 1911 (Kelly's Directory Ltd)

Marlow town guides 1903 & 1905. 

Windsor and Eton Express - 2nd August 1828,  3rd October 1829, 4th April 1874 -  Slough Borough Libraries. 

Berkshire Chronicle, 24th September 1842, 9th September  1843, 15th June 1861 - Archive.org. 

South Bucks Standard - 31st Aug 1894, 5th July 1895, 23rd April & 27th August 1897, 27 May & 18 November 1898, 10 March & 2 June 1899, 2oth April 1906 British Library Archive, via the BNA. 

Bucks Gazette 26 July 1830, as above. 

Bucks Herald 26th April 1873, 16th & 30th August 1873, 3rd May 1879, 20th April 1889 as above

South Bucks Free Press 21st May 1859, 27th August 1859, 18th August 1860 as above. And South Bucks Free Press 6th August 1920, Wycombe library. 

Reading Mercury, 17th July 1776, 24th September 1853, 29th April 1854, 10 May 1873, 24th March 1917    - British Library. 

A Social History Of Marlow Train Station Part One -Up to 1889

 This is a two part post about the experience of our Victorian Marlow residents when  travelling to and from Marlow by train. 

I'm sure the average residents of Marlow were divided about whether they actually wanted a railway to come to Marlow at all. Would it bring in visitors with coins in their pockets or take people away to spend their money elsewhere? Would the visitors be of a good class or "beanfeasters" who would crowd out the better heeled tourist asked some traders. Would it help local businesses get their raw materials and goods in  more cheaply and quickly? Would the noisy and dirty railway destroy the peace of the countryside? Would Marlow be left behind if it didn't have a station? 

Whether it was wanted or not, the locals could read about plenty of false starts regarding the rail arriving here. In 1845 it was proposed that the Midland Grand Junction Railway line could go from Reading to Northampton via Henley and Marlow amongst other places. And there was the 1866 Marlow, Uxbridge and Wycombe railway that also never arrived. 

One line that definitely did get laid was between Maidenhead Boyne Hill and High Wycombe which opened in 1854 with a stop tantalizingly close to Marlow at Bourne End or Marlow Road as it was then known. Immediately the local carriers and coach services made sure to offer services to meet the trains there. In 1855 the papers confidently reported that the line would be extended to Marlow itself as there was no engineering difficulty preventing that, with a proposed station near the bottom of the High Street. But no, that didn't happen either. Travelling from Marlow-Road sounds a bit hair raising as in 1866 it was mentioned that the wooden bridge there had for a long time been in a dangerous state and "it is evident that before long the bridge will give way". Not conditions to reassure the nervous train passenger. 

Great Marlow Railway Co

A group of local landowners decided to start the Great Marlow Railway Company, with a station at Marlow, in 1867 although selling enough shares to finance it took time. The first general meeting of the shareholders took place at the Crown in 1869 chaired by Peter Borgnis. The gentlemen expressed regret that they had not met their initial expectations which were to have began construction by this time but they said if more people came forward with capital to invest things would soon be under way. The following year they were still hopeful that construction would start soon. Additional costs had arisen as Great Western had decided that some good sheds at Marlow Rd would need to be moved to the other side to avoid the new line having to cross their various sidings for safety reasons. Move on another year and only 12 subscribers turned up at the Crown meeting to discuss progress (or lack of it.) The increased projected costs this time round were put down to problems negotiating a price for the land the rail line would travel through. But at the end of 1872, the first sod of turf was ceremonially turned over by Mrs Owen Peel Wethered who was presented with a silver salver to mark the occasion. (Her husband was amongst the biggest share holders). 

I don't know how many men from Marlow itself might have been involved in some way with the construction of the line. Local engineer Edwin Clark* had offered to build it for £8000 and some shares, or to oversee the same for a commission based on the outlay plus more shares. He did win the contract. Whoever was involved, the work sounds very cold and wet as you imagine a project started in December on a flood plain would be.  Within a couple of weeks it had to stop altogether due to unusual levels of rain turning the site into a mud bath. But in March it was reported that some of the rails had arrived on site and the workers were nearly ready to lay them. (By 1878 the rails had had to be raised in parts by 15" in total to deal with flooding.)

The new station

Obviously the station at Marlow also had to built. The Windsor and Eton Express said the brick and bath stone building would be a place of "elegance, utility and comfort" which makes it definitely different looking from the current Marlow station! The plans showed a 240ft platform, a 31ft "covered veranda" and 150ft engine shed and tool sheds. The pressure was on to have the line open in time for the Regatta which they did, but actually the station buildings themselves were not quite finished on day one. 

There's a good chance that if your ancestor lived in Marlow in the summer of 1873 they were at the station to see the first public train come in. Before that the first engine to come over the line, driven by Mr Thomson of the Great Western Railway, bought a few officials to and from Bourne End on a trial run. They made the journey to Marlow  in 5 minutes. Peter Borgnis travelled on this journey as the first official passenger, although not a fare paying one. The engine was taken up the sidings too. Following this a heavy goods engine put the line through its paces on behalf of the Railway Inspector. It naturally passed.

  Mr Porter the station master at Marlow Rd/Bourne End transferred to Marlow - you can read more about him and his family who ran the Railway Hotel here. 1,700 tickets were sold in the first 10 days and within the month of August 10,000 passengers travelled on the Great Marlow Railway according to the Reading Mercury. 

The station operated with oil lights* but in 1874 it was proposed to light up the station building and signals by gas. There was no licensed  refreshment room (although it appears it was planned that there would be as a beer selling licence was originally applied for) so for that you'd have to pop across to the Railway Hotel where you could also hire a fly to take you onward if necessary. If you travelled to the new Maidenhead Station (where the current one is) surely you'd find a refreshment room in this smart modern premises? Unfortunately not. It was then the only main junction  station built without a licensed refreshment room. The landlord of the Maidenhead Railway Hotel was quite happy about that but Marlow's Wethered's Brewery did their best to get one installed. It was tiring for ladies and invalids to have to walk out of Maidenhead station and up the front steps to the hotel they said, especially in wet weather. But by the time Marlow station opened the refreshment room at Maidenhead was still a dream of the thirsty traveller.  

The platform at Marlow sounds crowded in these first few years. This is probably why it was announced in 1875 that only passengers intending to travel on the next train would be allowed on the platform prior to departure. But it seems this was generally ignored! 

Danger on the railway

Railways bought some danger to the residents here. There were near misses when people decided to cross the line where they could. The 78 year old Elizabeth Hester of Little Marlow was knocked down and killed in 1878 at the Spade Oak Crossing. The driver sounded his horn but she had crossed close to the train and there was no possibility of avoiding a collision. Was Elizabeth perhaps deaf or partially sighted? It was reported she'd had more than one narrow escape doing the same thing before. 

The first accident involving train passengers on the Marlow line did not happen until 1883 and it was thankfully a minor one although some travellers had slight injuries. The train from Bourne End was in a collision with the stop blocks at the dead end. The following year the engine used on the Marlow line fell over onto its side while being shunted, minus any carriages. No serious damage was done and no one was hurt. A crew from Slough came to move the engine and services resumed later the same day. With the wooden Bourne End railway bridge considered to be in a dangerous state again, there was probably a good take up for the option of adding insurance against calamity to the cost of your train ticket. 

Using the train in the 1880s. 

Two annoyances were reported by the passengers waiting to travel at Marlow. One was that "crowds" of "urchins" met every train and pestered the arrivals for coins. As the children were supposed to be in school, the parents were blamed. The second grievance was that many thought the carriages were in a shabby old condition. But in 1886 these long neglected essentials had been done up and now presented a "trim and tidy appearance". 

A lot of improvements had been made at the station soon after it opened, including a new siding in 1879 which was lamented as expensive but necessary because of goods traffic out doing expectations. (At the same time a general trade depression was reported to have resulted in a slight fall in passenger numbers which must have alarmed those who thought the railway would help local trade. But in the long term they were right, and numbers crept up again.)

From 1889 the Marlow station was in telegraphic communication with the main line. (Marlow Road station and Marlow town were linked by telegraph in 1870 so it took a while.) The other main work was to replace the iron rails with steel ones, which was done gradually over a period of 18 months. Some of the iron rails were sold to GWR. 

Part 2 coming next week deals with the 1890s +, the "disgrace to the neighborhood" otherwise known as Bourne End Station, the proposed new station in Riley Park, flooding, and the perils of travelling in cold weather. Read it here

*I believe it's possible the station was lit by gas for its initial opening but the Bucks Free Press reported that roughly 4 months after the line open Messrs Meakes** of Marlow had "just" completed the installation of lighting on the Silber system (E.g oil fuelled) to the platform and station buildings. It must have been lit before that, but whether by gas or a different form of oil lighting is uncertain. The same article mentions the difficulties of maintaining a good gas supply locally. It could be the GMRC considered gas and decided against it at first or had tried it and found it insufficient. As mentioned above, gas lighting did succeed the Silber system at Marlow before very long. More information on the travails of the Marlow Gas Works can be found here

**More information on the Meakes who were the local Silber agents, can be found here including a picture of their premises. 

Related posts:

For posts related to the station, and other historic transport in Marlow from stage coaches to cycling clubs  see the transport section of the index here

Timeline and proprietors of Railway Hotel: here

To look for information on a particular person or family, use the A-Z person index on the top drop down menu. 

Written and researched by Kathryn Day. 

For sources see part 2  here

© Marlow Ancestors.

 

Maldah, Institute Road

 

Above is a photo of the house Maldah in Institute Road Marlow. Maldah is a place in Bengal India. It isn't yet clear to me why the house was named after it. Quite a few properties in old Marlow had names reflecting places in the British Empire. We are hoping to write posts on their history to go along with this one.

The first resident I can definitely identify at Maldah was living there in 1898- William Popham, an electrical engineer at a time when electrical engineering was still very new, exciting and marvellous in the eyes of the average person. Though English William was an associate member of the American Institute Of Electrical Engineers (founded by Thomas Edison and Nicholas Tesla amongst others). This organisation had international links and an international outlook. William was connected to and may have worked directly for electrical engineer R.H Barnett of Newcastle, England. In 1899 at the age of about 30 he married at St Margaret's Westminster Rose Hervey. She then lived with her parents in Powys Square London but had been born and raised in colonial India (so perhaps suggested the name Maldah?). The couple split their time between London and Maldah, Marlow. I feel that the latter was perhaps mostly their summertime or weekend residence. It does not appear that they had any children.

Rose Popham was clearly a great admirer of the British Empire. She gave many public speeches in London urging English women to go to South Africa so that British men could find brides there after the South African Wars and was Secretary of the British Women's Emigration Association. She also helped English schools to find schools in the colonies to exchange letters with so that the children could learn about each other's different lives. Whether the foreign schools approached were those catering for European emigrant children or local ones or a mixture of both isn't clear. Rose offered help to any British teachers that were working in Colonial schools who wanted to return to Britain for rest or medical treatment but could not afford to do so.

When he wasn't working William was reading up on the latest research into the Vikings for whom he had a great passion. He was a member of and for while the Honorary Auditor of, the national Viking Club group of enthusiasts.

The couple kept Maldah until 1904 when the house and some of its furniture were put up for sale. After they left Marlow William became a stockbroker. In 1914 he volunteered for service in the Air Force. He survived World War One, not dying until the 1940s.

By 1914 the occupiers of Maldah were Beryl and William Onslow Secker who moved there from Wood End House near Marlow. Beryl had attended a meeting at Danesfield, Medmenham in 1912 of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies. This was an organisation opposed to violent methods of gaining emancipation for women. More on suffragettes in Marlow and opposition to their cause see Kathryn's post here.

In 1916 the couple were paying £80 a year rent on the property. That year the freehold was put up for sale with them as sitting tenants but failed to attract sufficient bidding for a sale to go through. 

William was a soldier who had become a successful tea planter at Kandy Sri Lanka before returning to England in 1906 -07 with enough money to need no further employment. The First World War however disturbed the peace of rich and poor alike and William volunteered to rejoin the Army.

In 1918 William successfully sued for slander former Marlow police constable Edward Trim who had, whilst home on leave from military service during the war, spread about the completely false rumour that poor William was a German spy who had been paid hundreds of pounds through secret channels to betray his country. Trim bragged that he had played a major role in identifying and arresting William as a spy. William was he insisted languishing in the Tower of London as a result. Actually William was serving in the army as a loyal soldier. When he got wind of the slander he obtained leave to go home and launch legal action against Trim. The judge in the case said that he felt that Trim had lied because he had wanted to make himself seem important to those he spoke to in the Crown public house and an unnamed Marlow stationery shop. The slander against William was not merely untrue it was highly dangerous. Given the intensity of feeling such allegations would have aroused William's life and even that of his wife, not to mention the security of their home would have been at risk from angry mobs. 

William survived the war. He and Mrs Secker was still resident at Maldah in 1939 when she exhibited a tapestry of nearby Bisham Abbey. Their son Gerald left Marlow and became a rubber planter in Sri Lanka in 1920. 

The Seckers may have been related to the local Wethered family as Alice Wethered, elderly widow of Owen Peel Wethered of Tenerife died at Maldah in 1918.

Our blog focuses on the period up to the 1930's so I'll leave it there! 

All mentions of any person on this blog can be found by consulting the A-Z Person Index -there is a Harry Secker on there for instance who may be of interest. Thousands of people are listed on the index. More posts related to Institute Road or surrounding streets can be found on this index 

Written and researched by Charlotte Day. Photo by Kathryn Day.

©Marlow Ancestors. You are welcome to use this information for family or local history purposes with credit to this blog.

Sources

Country-side: Monthly Journal of the B.E.N.A. (British Empire Naturalists' Association).. United Kingdom, n.p, 1908.

"England and Wales Census, 1911," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XW2N-XRK : 16 May 2019), W Vyvyan M Popham, Kensington, London, England, United Kingdom; from "1911 England and Wales census," database and images, findmypast (http://www.findmypast.com : n.d.); citing PRO RG 14, The National Archives of the UK, Kew, Surrey.

J.A. Berly's Universal Electrical Directory and Advertiser. United Kingdom, Wm. Dawson & Sons, 1900.

Saga-book of the Viking Club. (1980). United Kingdom: Viking Club.

The Electrician Electrical Trades Directory and Handbook. United Kingdom, Benn Brothers., 1893.

Bucks Herald 11th June 1894. Reading Mercury 8th July 1916. Reading Mercury February 11th 1939. Evening Herald (Dublin) 20th February 1918 British Library Archives.

South Bucks Standard. 18th January 1912. British Library Archives, via the BNA.

Proceedings of the Planters' Association of Ceylon. Sri Lanka, The Association, 1907.

"England and Wales Marriage Registration Index, 1837-2005," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:26M8-K64 : 13 December 2014), Beryl Brunton, 1897; from "England & Wales Marriages, 1837-2005," database, findmypast (http://www.findmypast.com : 2012); citing 1897, quarter 3, vol. 1A, p. 1005, St. George Hanover Square, London, England, General Register Office, Southport, England. 

Blue Flag / Old Blue Flag Handy Cross

Today we would probably call this near High Wycombe but Handy Cross was historically in Great Marlow parish.

Property owned by the Clayton family and leased by Wethered's Brewery of Marlow. Sometimes referred to as The Blue Standard. 

 Landlords listing and history timeline:

1833 - William Earis. Premises consisted of a house, adjoining cottage and shoeing forge for a blacksmith. The surname Earis is a very Handy Cross one. It also occurs as Earys, Ayres, Eyres, Ayris, Airis, Aris etc.

1840-Mrs Earis keeps a shop at Handy cross (beer shop?)

1841 - The scene of a meeting of Liberal supporters (known as the Blues) after the election at Great Marlow. Clayton who owned the property was the successful Liberal candidate. The name of the beer house is definitely not a coincidence! The celebration was however premature as Clayton had a majority of just 1 and the  election result was over turned when some of the votes were considered invalid. A Tory candidate then overtook him in the polls and he lost the seat. 

1842 Susanna Earis widow of William of the Blue Flag died age 64. She may be the Mrs Earis who was a shop keeper at Handy Cross in 1840. In this instance "shop" may mean beer shop. Though in 1844 a Joseph Earis, (her son?) was running a grocers shop at Handy Cross and getting in trouble for selling alcohol in it without a licence.

1845 "Old Blue Flag"  - Joseph Earis. Wife Mary Ann nee Beesley. Joseph wants to press charges against three men who he says assaults his wife, her brother and her father at the beer shop. However the case is dismissed as it's considered all were as much to blame as each other. The Bucks Advertiser and Aylesbury News adds they considered that this was a "beer shop quarrel" caused by the "bad temper" of the landlord and wife. [October 25th 1845]

1863-64 = James Clarke / Clark.  James was an inveterate poacher! In 1863 for example he was fined for being in possession of a pheasant which he said he'd come across on the side of the road. Such things were happening to James a little too often go convince the authorities! In a previous case the same year he was accused by the magistrates of keeping his house open "for the purpose of concocting robberies".   They lamented they did not have the power to take away his licence. On the 1861 census he was a shepherd at Handy Cross with his wife Elizabeth who was a dressmaker.

1868 - William Harper

1869- Brewery were struggling to find a licensee sufficiently respectable for the magistrates to approve of. Sam Beasley has to try three times for the transfer before it's accepted. 

1869-72 Samuel Beasley / Beesley. Wife Mary. In 1870 Samuel's gun, knife and handkerchief were amongst other articles stolen from his premises (Bucks Advertiser and Aylesbury News 23rd October 1870). The thief was caught and earned 18 months in prison.  Samuel may have sold groceries on the premises too. The Beasleys took over the Royal Oak High Wycombe in 1874 and remained there until 1877.

1873- the police try to get the premises closed, saying it did not meet the minimum size requirements for an alcohol licence. Two adjoining cottages were being used for the business but their combined size couldn't be allowed to count, the police argued, as there was no door or other communication between the two cottages. The magistrate at the licensing hearing offered the brewery (Wethereds of Marlow) a chance to have the property surveyed and revalued but they said they were not bothered about keeping it open as they had the bigger Blacksmith's Arms also at Handy Cross. Yet the Blue Flag at Handy Cross is still mentioned as late as 1902. It is possible it continued as a lodging house only. Many of these had pub-like names and signs. 

1875- premises used for an agricultural auction.

1902- Last known mention of the Blue Flag, Handy Cross as existing (South Bucks Standard 4th July 1902).

Landlords and history of the nearby Blacksmith's Arms, Handy Cross here

Index of pub related posts on this blog here. Contains pubs Great Marlow, Little Marlow, Lane End, Medmenham, Well End.

Written and researched by Charlotte Day.

©Marlow Ancestors. You are welcome to use this research for family or local history purposes with credit to this blog.