The Cuckmere Railway The Cuckmere River (never the River Cuckmere!) has always decided its own route to the sea. This map shows the various places where the mouth of the river has been since the eighteenth century. The map shows something else of interest, a thin black line at the top marked ‘Tramway’. Cuckmere Haven once had its…
Category: Eastbourne
A Butcher’s Car Discovered
A couple of years ago Sue Jones of The Real Car Limited contacted the Eastbourne Local History Society regarding a Rolls Royce they had acquired. Real Car Limited is based in North Wales and specialise in selling early Rolls-Royce and Bentley Cars. The car in question was a 1928 20-horsepower Rolls Royce registration HC8815. ‘HC’ was…
The Canadian Farmer mentioned on a Sussex Grave
David James McCurdy was born in Winnipeg on 5th December 1886. His father was a farmer and he became a farmer too. His name is recorded on two graves – one in Canada and another thousands of miles away in Sussex On 14th August 1914, soon after war was declared, David enrolled in the Canadian Expeditionary Force at…
The Eastbourne Chair (Part 2 Finding Fanny)
One of my recent history items concerned the inventors of the ‘Eastbourne Chair’, an invalid chair patented in 1899 by Dr Astley Roberts and Fanny Sophia Smith of Eastbourne. It was not difficult to find details about Astley Roberts as he was a prominent local doctor but I couldn’t find any information about Fanny Smith,…
The Eastbourne Chair
The Eastbourne Chair was a style of invalid chair invented by a Sussex doctor, Astley Carrington Roberts and Fanny Sophia Smith. They were both named in the patent which was granted patent number 22,790 in 1899. The chair had wheels but also curved rear brackets which made it easier to get up and down stairs. (Easier but…
Ebenezer’s Bonfire Speech – 1894
The Bonfire Season started a month ago with the Uckfield Bonfire Society hosting its parade and displays on 7th September. Tonight (5th October) it is the turn of the Eastbourne Bonfire Society. I have marched with the bonfire boys and belles on many occasions and wish them all luck and favourable weather! My great-grandfather Ebenezer…
27,000 MILES TO SUSSEX
In my family archive I have a small cutting titled “27,000 MILES TO VISIT FATHER’S GRAVE” This is just the thing that piques my interest and encourages me to find out more. Well here is the story! Ernest Alfred Berry was born on 10th December 1870 in Taunton, Somerset , the son of an umbrella-maker Alfred…
The world’s top policeman lived in Sussex and everyone knew where!
The 1950s editions of the Kelly’s Directory for Eastbourne show the occupant of 50, St John’s Road, Meads as “SILLITOE. Sir Percy K.B.E.” This is remarkable considering that Sir Percy was the head of MI5 and was a noted opponent of violent street gangs. Percy Joseph Sillitoe was born in London on 22nd May 1888 and was educated…
Church Vergers for 202 years!
Simeon Hart was born in Old Town, Eastbourne in 1844. He was born in an ‘old-fashioned tumbledown cottage’ that until 1898 stood on the corner of the High Street and Star Lane. (roughly were the front or Waitrose is now) He was the son of George and Mary Hart and his family had a long…
The Road-Poet of Black Robin Farm
There is plan to spend millions of pounds of government funding to create a second Towner Art Gallery at Black Robin Farm at Beachy Head. I don’t know what my ancestor Ephraim Mitchell would have thought of that, as he lived at Black Robin Farm. However I do know how he would have responded to…
Quirky Sussex History by Kevin Gordon 