I have been unkind to Elizabeth Terrace for which I am sorry.
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| Elizabeth Terrace, 1911 |
It's that tiny thoroughfare that runs from the High Street down to Philipot Path.
I had described it as an “unimpressive thoroughfare sandwiched between Boots the Chemist on one side and WH Smith’s on the other” and assumed that the set of cottages in this 1911 picture had vanished, which is a lesson in checking your facts and a warning about scholarly arrogance.*
Some of the cottages do still exist, and for this I have our Theresa and Valerie Daniels to thank.
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| Elizabeth Terrace, 2021 |
Theresa has told me that “when l left , there were still about 10 house left”, and intrigued by the story Valerie walked down the Terrace and took a picture of the cottages.
In my defence I left Eltham in 1973 and apart from occasional trips back have not really spent much time in the place I grew up, all of which leaves me realizing that Street Google is not in itself enough to base conclusions about an area.
Added to which when you are writing about Eltham it is a good idea to go back to our two historians, R.R.C. Gregory, and John Kennett. Mr. Kennett has written a series of books on the district as well as being a regular contributor to SE Nine.
And yesterday during a conversation with him where I was asking for permission to reproduce the 1911 photograph he alerted me to his article on Elizabeth Terrace in the September edition of SE Nine.**
The article confirms my research that some of the cottages date back to the 1840s and numbers 18-22 were demolished a century and a bit later because they were “unfit for human habitation”.
So mindful of that simple rule that if someone has done it already, and done it better it would be daft for me to attempt to represent Mr. Kennett’s work, so I shall just point you to the link to his article.
But the census returns do offer fresh avenues of research, one of which is the possibility of identifying individuals in the 1911 picture.
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| Looking for Mr. Foot, 1911 |
Of these I am intrigued by the two men staring out at us. The elder of the two might be Samuel Foot who described himself as a “Jobbing gardener”, while the younger of the two could be one of his four sons, who were Ernest aged 26, Hebert, 19, Percy, 16, or Reginald 13.
I say might be, because I cannot be sure that the house is number 19 where the Foot’s lived in April 1911, or that they were still there in July when the photograph was taken.
But I can be a little more certain of the composition of Elizabeth Terrace a decade earlier.
In 1901 there were 25 houses which were home to one hundred people whose occupations were a mix of skilled and unskilled jobs.
These included a variety of different labourers, including one agricultural farm worker, a number of laundresses, and the new jobs of the 20th century including a “Telegraph messenger boy” and junior clerk.
Above all it was a place of youth, with 31 of the inhabitants under the age of 16.
That said some were already at work. Louisa Griffiths at number 6 Elizabeth Terrace was assisting her grandmother taking in washing while others were working as messenger and errand boys, or holding down junior clerical posts.
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| Elizabeth Terrace, 2014 |
In time I will go back thought the census returns looking at those that called the street home in 1851, but for now that is it.
Location; Eltham
Pictures; Elizabeth Terrace, 1911, by permission of John Kennett, Eltham A Pictorial History, 1995, Elizabeth Terrace, 2021 courtesy of Valerie Daniels, Occupations of the residents on Elizabeth Terrace, 1911, and Elizabeth Terrace, 2014, from the collection of Elizabeth and Colin Fitzpatrick
* Lost and forgotten streets of Eltham …… no. 1 Elizabeth Terrace, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2021/03/lost-and-forgotten-streets-of-eltham-no.html
**Elizabeth Terrace, John Kennett, SE Nine Magazine, https://indd.adobe.com/view/04c8920d-0f5e-4317-8247-1416287e88da
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