Looking at Eltham in 1930 with the drawings of Llwyd Roberts

Way to the Palace

Today I received a wonderful collection of drawings from my friend Margaret whose husband like me grew up in Eltham.

There are 27 of them in all and they were drawn by Mr Llwyd Roberts and published in the Kentish Times in 1930 and then republished in a slim book in 1966.

And as you do I went looking for copyright permission but given that the Kentish Times has now ceased to publish and the pictures are over 85 years old I think I should be OK.

Mr Roberts was born in Borth in Cardiganshire in 1875 and was articled to a Derby architect later spending  seven years as a draughtsman in Burton Upon Trent before working for a series of Welsh newspapers.

After war service and a period in the British army of occupation he settled in Eltham at Bloxham-gardens working as a topographical artist and concentrating on drawings of the ancient buildings of Kent.

And it will be during this time that he produced the drawings in the book.

Now I have to say that they fascinate me.  Some are quite clearly drawn from his direct observation of the buildings while others may be from earlier pictures and a few are a careful attempt to reconstruct a scene from an earlier period.

All of which may mean that some at least may not be an entirely accurate depiction of the past, but that said I suspect they are as close as we going to get.

And they can be judged against surviving photographs as well as maps and other documents.

At the crossroads, as it might have looked in 1870

So I am for once not going to get too hung up about historical accuracy, after all Mr Roberts was a professional draughtsman engaged in serious representation of  buildings and I doubt that he would have invented much more than the figures who inhabit the pictures.

Added to which there is that simple observation that he was there in Eltham in 1929 and 1930 when the pictures were made and would have known the buildings well.

That should be it but history is an odd and messy subject and does throw up all sorts of coincidences.
So many of us will have stood exactly where he stood and indeed I bet some of his drawings will have graced the walls of our homes.

And it doesn’t end there, Margaret’s husband and I both grew up in Eltham. Margaret was born in Ashton-Under-Lyne where I began my married life, and they were married in the Methodist Church in Waterloo in Ashton having met in Borth while studying.

Added to which when Mr Roberts began his career in Derby my great grandparents were also living in the town.

But that I think is the point to stop and instead promise more of his work over the next few days with a bit more explanation of each drawing.


Locarion; Eltham, London

Picture; the old bridge over the moat of Eltham Palace, and At the crossroads, Llwyd Roberts, circa 1929-30, from Old Eltham, 1966, courtesy of Margaret Copeland Gain

Eltham from the pen of Llwyd Roberts ....... nu 6 the White Hart 1930

Now I am a great fan of the work of Mr Llwyd Roberts.

He was during the 1930s our artist in residence and during that time produced a heap of line drawings of Eltham and the surrounding area.

Some were reproduced from old photographs while others  were as he saw them at the time.

This is the old White Hart which according to Mr Roberts "the White Hart, picturesque with its weatherboard and partly pantiled roof, was the last(first) house in the High Street on the western side."

Picture; the White Hart, 1930, Llwyd Roberts

Eltham from the pen of Llwyd Roberts ....... nu 5

Now I am a great fan of the work of Mr Llwyd Roberts.

He was during the 1930s our artist in residence and during that time produced a heap of line drawings of Eltham and the surrounding area.

Some were reproduced from old photographs while others  were as he saw them at the time.

This is the old Rising Sun which according to Mr Roberts "this old building stood for two centuries on the  site now occupied by the L.E.B. showrooms.  When it was demolished the Rising Sun rose again to the east, on its present site."


Picture; The Rising Sun, 1930, Llwyd Roberts

Eltham from the pen of Llwyd Roberts ....... nu 4 the Tudor Barn Farm Offices 1930

Now I am a great fan of the work of Mr Llwyd Roberts.

He was during the 1930s our artist in residence and during that time produced a heap of line drawings of Eltham and the surrounding area.

Some were reproduced from old photographs while others  were as he saw them at the time.

This is old Brewery which  which dates from 1928 in a building which according to Mr Roberts "three farm buildings, connected with Well Hall, were built in 1586 - two years before the Armada. The building on the left, the Tudor Barn, was restored in the 1930s."


Picture; Tudor Barn Farm Offices, 1930, Llwyd Roberts

Eltham from the pen of Llwyd Roberts ....... nu 3 the old Brewery 1929

Now I am a great fan of the work of Mr Llwyd Roberts.

He was during the 1930s our artist in residence and during that time produced a heap of line drawings of Eltham and the surrounding area.

Some were reproduced from old photographs while others  were as he saw them at the time.

This is old Brewery which  which dates from 1928 in a building which according to Mr Roberts "originally a brewery, the upper floor of this building was later converted into the Baptist Meeting Room.  The brewery stood at the entrance of Jubilee Cottages, and the building was pulled down in 1928."


Picture; old brewery drawn 1929, Llwyd Roberts

Back on Pound Place a long time before now

Pound Place was always somewhere I tended to walk past and looking down it now I can’t even remember what stood on the site of the Council Offices.

I have written about  it in the past not least because of its old cottages which once occupied the site and because part of it was the village pound or pinfold which was used to accommodate stray animals and.*

Now a few photographs of Pound Place from the beginning of the 19th century have survived, but today I thought I would feature another of those drawings by Mr Llwyd Roberts who was living in Eltham in the early 1930s.

During his stay here he drew many pictures and some of these appeared in the Kentish Times in 1930 and were reprinted in Old Eltham sixty-six years later.

Picture; Pound Court, Llwyd Roberts, circa 1929-30, from Old Eltham, 1966, courtesy of Margaret Copeland Gain

*Pound Place, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Pound%20Place

Eltham from the pen of Llwyd Roberts ....... nu 2 St Mary's School 1929

Now I am a great fan of the work of Mr Llwyd Roberts.

He was during the 1920s and 30s our artist in residence and during that time produced a heap of line drawings of Eltham and the surrounding area.

Some were reproduced from old photographs while others  were as he saw them at the time.

This is St Mary’s School which dates from 1928 in a building which was in its time both an academy  for young gentlemen and before that a private residence.

According to Mr Roberts, this was "the convent chapel and St Mary's Diocesan Orphanage garden are replaced by the pavement in the now widened High Street.  The nun's house on the left has gone.  St Mary's School in its present form was founded in 1928."

And if you want more I suggest you follow the link.*

Picture; Eltham Parish Church; drawn circa 1929, Llwyd Roberts

* St. Mary's (Eltham) Community Complex, http://www.stmarys-eltham.co.uk/history.php

Eltham from the pen of Llwyd Roberts ....... nu 1 the old parish church circa 1840

Now I am a great fan of the work of Mr Llwyd Roberts.

He was born in Borth in Cardiganshire in 1875 and was articled to a Derby architect later spending  seven years as a draughtsman in Burton Upon Trent before working for a series of Welsh newspapers.

After war service and a period in the British army of occupation he settled in Eltham at Bloxham-gardens working as a topographical artist and concentrating on drawings of the ancient buildings of Kent.

And it will be during this time that he produced the drawings in the book.

Now I have to say that they fascinate me.  Some are quite clearly drawn from his direct observation of the buildings while others may be from earlier pictures and a few are a careful attempt to reconstruct a scene from an earlier period.

All of which may mean that some at least may not be an entirely accurate depiction of the past, but that said I suspect they are as close as we going to get.

Many were published in the Kentish Times in 1930 and as you do I went looking for copyright permission but given that the Kentish Times has now ceased to publish and the pictures are over 85 years old I think I should be OK.

I featured some of my favourite deawings earlier in the year and over the next few days I shall show so more.

According to Mt Roberts this "was the old parish Church.and the Kings' Arms as they might have loked between 1840-1860."

Location; Eltham

Picture; Eltham Parish Church; drawn circa 1930, Llwyd Roberts

Walking back in time through Eltham, Charlton and Greenwich with the pictures of Llwyd Roberts

Now anyone with an interest in Eltham’s history will have come across the pictures of Mr Llwyd Roberts. *

They first appeared in the Kentish Times in the 1920s and 30s have reappeared in collections since and regularly pop up accompanying  descriptions of Eltham in the past.

My own collection comes from a book published by the Kentish Times in 1966 which was sent to me by Margaret Copeland Gain whose husband like me is an Eltham exile and like me derived great pleasure from Mr Llwyd Roberts’s work.

He was a fine artist and draughtsman and some at least of the pictures will have been drawn from firsthand knowledge while others were inspired by watercolours, drawings and photographs.

What I didn’t know but should have done was that his work extended to other parts of south east London and for that I have to thank Tricia Lesley who came across a catalogue for an exhibition of his “Watercolours and Drawings of Places in the Borough of Greenwich.” from 1976.**

Included in the catalogue are places I never knew existed and which have long gone.

Of these I was drawn to Morton’s Theatre which Mr Roberts’s drew in 1934 and Charlton Village sometime around 1870..

And as you do I went looking for the story of the theatre and found it at that wonderful site dedicated to the music hall and theatre history.***

So I will leave you to follow the link and instead just say that the catalogue lists 168 of his pictures which along with another 58 can be viewed by appointment at Greenwich Heritage Centre.****

Now the Centre is one of those places which if I lived locally I would never be away from, because along with Mr Roberts’s pictures it has an extensive collection of material covering the history of the area.

And as I know next to nothing about Charlton where our Ian grew up I might well look up the background to the picture of the village.

I am not sure when it was drawn but it is based on a source dating from the 1870s.

Pictures; Morton’s Theatre, 1934, Greenwich High Road, and Charlton village circa 1870s, from Watercolours and Drawings of Places in the Borough of Greenwich, 1977

*Llwyd Roberts, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Llwyd%20Roberts

** Watercolours and Drawings of Places in the Borough of Greenwich, Llwyd Roberts, Woodlands Art Gallery, December 1976-January 1977.

*** The Prince of Wales Theatre, Greenwich, arthurlloyd, co.uk http://www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/Greenwich.htm

****Greenwich Heritage Centre, heritage.centre@rght.org.uk

On the High Street with Mr Rideway in 1933

I am standing outside numbers 116 & 118 Eltham High Street in 1933.

And this I know because in that year our old friend Llwyd Roberts painted the two properties which were just up from the old Castle pub.

At 118 there was the saddler William Barnes who had occupied the property from at least 1919 while nu 114 was the business premises of Charles Rideway who ran a dairy.

I can track Mr Rideway back to 1901 on the High Street selling his milk and by 1933 he seems to have diversified into sweets, chocolate and tobacco.

His immediate neighbour had been Arthur Moody who in 1919 described himself as a picture framer, and may still have been there when Mr Roberts painted the picture.

All of which just leaves William Barnes who had taken over the business from George French around 1919.

Now I don’t know whether the saddling business of Mr French was not doing so well but sometime between 1901 and 1911 he began renting out some of the building.

In room there was Charlotte Eliza Rose who at 71 described herself as a widow and in another were Mr and Mrs Brading.

So there are a lot of leads to follow up, including when the French family moved on, why Mr Rideway decided to diversify and how long his dairy continued to deliver the milk to Eltham residents after 1933.

I know that he died in 1954 and by then was living in Park View which is now Passey Place and given that he had seven children they may be much more to be revealed.

And the children do help place when the family arrived in Eltham.  The first three were born in Somerset between 1892 and 1896 while their fourth was born in Eltham in 1898.

And the key too much of the research will be the yearly street directories along with the electoral registers which are available down at the Heritage Centre and which will allow us to follow the movements of Mr Rideway, Mr Barnes and Mr Moody.

In the course of which we may come up with advert for Mr Rideway's business.

But for now I am interested in Mrs Charlotte Eliza Rose who was born in Eltham and had been married for 51 years, but that is for another time.

Picture; 116-118 Eltham High Street 1933, Llwyd Roberts.

Source material, census returns, 1901-11, Post Office London Directory 1909, 1919, and Electoral Roll 1932

An unfamiliar view of Court Yard around 1900

Now I have written about Court Yard several times and in particular about Annie Morris who lived there at the turn of the last century.

Court Yard circa 1900

And here is Court Yard from the pen of   Mr Llwyd Roberts who was living in Eltham in the early 1930s.

Many of his drawings appeared in the Kentish Times in 1930 and were reprinted in Old Eltham sixty-six years later.

He was a fine artist and draughtsman and some at least of the pictures will have been drawn from first hand knowledge others like this one were probably drawn from picture postcards and photographs taken at the turn of the last century.

Picture; Court Yard, Llwyd Roberts, circa 1929-30, from Old Eltham, 1966, courtesy of Margaret Copeland Gain

*Court Yard, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/so-what-fate-for-crown-on-court-yard.html

**Annie Morris, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Annie%20Morris

***Llwyd Roberts, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Llwyd%20Roberts

The history of Eltham in just 20 objects ........Nu 6 the artist and Pound Place

The challenge is to write a history of Eltham in just 20 objects which are in no particular order, and have been selected purely at random.

These cottages have long gone but once they were the subject of this drawing by Mr Llwyd Roberts who lived in Eltham in the 1930s.

During his stay here he drew many pictures and some of these appeared in the Kentish Times in 1930 and were reprinted in Old Eltham sixty-six years later.

So here you get two for one.  A reminder of an artist whose pictures are still popular and the memory of the village pound or pinfold which was used to accommodate stray animals.

Location; Eltham, London

Picture; Pound Court, Llwyd Roberts, circa 1929-30, from Old Eltham, 1966, courtesy of Margaret Copeland Gain

*Llwyd Roberts, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Llwyd%20Roberts

**Pound Place, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Pound%20Place