No. 9 Spencer Street – History of the Occupants from 1875-2006
February 18, 2013
1875-1880 Mr Charles Pratt Charles Pratt was a Picture Dealer who had been born in Leicester in 1825. In 1871 Charles was living at 10 London Road Leicester were he owned an old China and Earthenware shop, Working for him as a servant was Elizabeth Ann Westbury, aged 22. She had come to Leicester to
Herbert Mansfield Jenkins: December 1889 – February 1989
February 18, 2013
Many people refer jokingly to discoveries, inventions, memoirs, as jottings ‘on the back of an envelope’. This is the real thing. In 2011 Leamington History Group inherited an intriguing little archive from local historian Toby Cave. At first sight it was just a small brown cardboard box full of all kinds of scraps of paper
James Hill
February 16, 2013
James Hill bought the plot of leasehold land in Bath Street and the buildings thereon from the Surcombe estate in 1832, and built numbers 21 to 23 Bath Street. Hill also purchased Elizabeth Surcombe’s land at Newbold Comyn which had been mortgaged to Robert Campion. James Hill was born in about 1801 in Warwick, the
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864)
February 16, 2013
Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer. In July 1853 he was appointed US consul in Liverpool by President Franklin Pierce, and during the ensuing 5½ years in England spent 2 periods in Leamington, in 1855 and 1857. At the end of his term of office, the family toured France and Italy,
Surcombe and Heard – Owners and Occupants of 21/60 Bath Street
February 16, 2013
Elizabeth Surcombe the Elder The Surcombes came from the village of Lifton near Tavistock, Devon. William Surcombe married Mary Crocker and they had four children: Mary, Ann, William and Elizabeth who was born about 1766. It is not known when Elizabeth Surcombe came to Leamington Priors but an early rate book of 1813 shows her
Toby Cave and the fox
April 16, 2012
Lyndon F (Toby) Cave (left), former architect and noted local historian, who has now relocated to Dorset, presenting a parting gift to Jeff Watkin of Leamington Art Gallery and Museum. The fox is one of the earliest surviving artefacts associated with the ‘new town’ built north of the river in the early 1800s and was
