I recently took members of the Society on a walk round some pubs of St Leonards, both those still existing and some which have been closed. I enjoyed it and I think the members did too. Here is me holding forth with the Railway and the Royal in the background. As a followup, here is […]
Category Archives: Blog
St Anne’s church in Chambers Road, Hollington, is in Pevsner, the architectural guide. It is also under serious threat of demolition. In 2022, planning application HS/FA/22/00028 was submitted, to redevelop the site with market housing. Hastings Borough Council Planning Committee rejected it 9-1, for being not good enough. Other applications followed, the latest being HS/FA/24/00239, still to be […]
This is a brief followup to the talk I gave last Sunday at the Royal Victoria Hotel, which was largely based on the research of Christopher Maxwell-Stewart. The catalogue of The Keep, which has East Sussex’s archives, contains AMS6247/1. This reference has a very detailed catalogue description of the mortgages related to 22-23 North Street. […]
22 May 1833, Brighton Guardian HAROLD HOTEL. H. EDLIN begs to return his most grateful thanks to the nobility and numerous families who have honored him with their patronage since opening the above established Hotel in 1830; and in respectfully soliciting a continuance of their favors, he takes the opportunity of announcing that in consequence […]
I recently discovered that Pike’s Directory for Hastings and St Leonards has a lengthy section recording deaths in the annual editions for 1884 to 1889. 1890 is missing from the Hastings Library set, while the section is absent in 1891. Servants and labourers are included as well as the toffs and merchants, and my impression […]
I recently came across John Kenwood when I found an advertisement for numerous houses being sold from his estate. The newspapers give much detail on his activities, though it is possible that many of the named properties were not built by him, as I cannot find specific details of which houses he actually built. He […]
Many local branches of national societies urging temperance or total abstinence flourished in St Leonards on Sea in Victorian times. This article gives an idea of the scale of the local movement, and is based on the detailed coverage given each week in the Hastings and St Leonards Observer, which often quoted from speeches, or […]
25 April 1832, Brighton Guardian The ball at the Assembly Rooms on Tuesday, under the auspices of the Stewards, Captain Jelf Sharp and A. Burton, Esq., was numerously attended.The elegant science of archery, for which the delightful environs of this spot are so well adapted, appears to be the present prevailing amusement amongst our younger […]
In transcribing the 1861 census for St Leonards I noticed that the very last household is an “omitted” entry, though we are not told from where the details had been missed. The household is: Charles Batstone, head, married, 31, builder & carpenter, born Surrey Newington Frances S. Batstone, wife, married, 30, do wife, born Sussex […]
This post’s title is the headline of a case before the Hastings Bench, as reported in the Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 7 September 1878. I was astonished that billeting soldiers was still going on as late as 1878. The account given below is an insight into how billeting worked in practice. The North Star […]