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Here is the text of a talk given by Celia Clark to the West
Southsea Neighbourhood Forum on 18 November 2002.
The history of Southsea is presented via its buildings and green spaces.
Southsea is mentioned in the Domesday Book as part of the manor of Froddington
(now Fratton): Froddington Heath was rough grazing. David Niven in his
autobiography: The Moon's a Balloon describes much the same: furze bushes, haunt
of lovers and children. To defend Portsmouth Dockyard, instigated by his father,
Henry VIII built Southsea Castle on the southern-most point: a low fortification
to prevent its becoming a target for bombardment. Southsea Castle is unusual in
being a Scheduled Ancient Monument which contains a Listed Building, the
lighthouse, which has a fox weathervane in memory of Admiral Fox. The castle was
enclosed in later walls by Dutch Engineer in Chief to Charles II, Sir Bernard de
Gomme. Henry VIII saw his flagship Mary Rose capsize in the Solent off the
castle; in 1982 many local people watched the giant crane Tog Mor raise her from
her watery bed in a cradle designed by the Royal Engineers.
We have military forces to thank for Southsea Common: unlike Brighton our
building line is a long way back from the seafront. What is now our large green
lung was used by assembling armies before the battle of Crècy. The War Memorial
is identical to those in Chatham and Plymouth Hoe. The Fitzclarence Monument in
front of the hotel in Pembroke Road and the many war memorials and Victory's
Anchor embody Portsmouth's military and naval history. The military use of
Southsea Common continued until 1922, when Portsmouth Corporation purchased it
from the War Department. They planted the Ladies' Mile and built leisure
pavilions, some of which stood near to where the floral clock is now, their only
reminder some lovely pine trees. Now the assemblies on the Common are peaceful:
the Fabians, the Co-op, fairs and sporting events as well as public occasions: a
Russian naval band making music with the Royal Artillery, the Queen's Jubilee
visit. In the 1970s the Common was sacrosanct: apart from the bandstand (now
skating rink), the tennis courts, bowling greens and mini-golf course, no
parking was allowed. Recently the Common's big spaces have been exploited for
bus rallies, military vehicle events, with charges being made for parking. The
Rock Gardens pavilion, rebuilt, is a successor to the earlier leisure pavilions.
If we regard the funfair as part of Southsea, it too is changing. I regret the
loss of the big wheel, particularly at night.
The earliest buildings in Southsea are in Castle Road: the core of the old
village. Southsea Lodge dates from about 1750. It was completely derelict in the
early 1970s and might have been demolished. In 1810 the Terraces were built to
face the faceted ramparts of Portsmouth. An area first known as Croxton Town,
with streets named after precious metals - the Mint - developed to the east of
the terraces. Castle Road, with its Wheelbarrow pub at the seaward end - from
which the governor of Southsea Castle was once wheeled back - still has a
distinct character. Its antique and militaria shops remain individual. Many
older buildings still exist behind later shopfronts. At the apex of the Y formed
with Great Southsea Street is the Clocktower, built as a pub, but soon taken
over by antique dealer Ernest Smith, whose initials are on the clockface instead
of numbers. Brewery House is a reminder of Long's Brewery in Hambrook Street,
where girls wore clogs since making beer was a watery process. It was restored
by the City Architect's Department in 1973 with a new frontage, as a community
building: gunclub in the basement, band practice rooms and scouts above. There
has been some rebuilding in Castle Road, including a post-modern block of flats
and the High School labs and university hostels to the west. One distinctive
feature I'm rather fond of are the murals on the walls of the fish and chip
shop!
Leisure and pleasure is another important strand in Southsea's history: from the
mid-nineteenth century hotels such as the Queens and the Royal Pier Hotel and
guest houses catered for seaside holidays, and Clarence Pier provided both
amusements and Solent and harbour trips.
One of the makers of Southsea was architect and developer, Thomas Ellis Owen
(1804-1862). His father, Jacob Owen (1778-1870), joined the Royal Engineers
Department of Ordnance in 1804, the year his fourth child, Thomas Ellis was
born. In 1820 Jacob was appointed Clerk of the Works at Portsmouth. He and his
son Thomas Ellis who had been trained as an architect in London surveyed Portsea
Island for the Board of Ordnance. The curious water tower in Sussex Road may be
part of this process. Thomas Ellis saw the potential for developing the farmland
near the sea. He bought land, made bricks from brickearth on site, planned,
designed and built what we would now call a garden suburb, with St. Jude's
Church as its centrepiece. The ingenious use of curving roads, tight planning
with semi-detached villas, rich planting of trees and shrubs, and romantic
names: The Thicket, The Shrubbery are distinctive and special. Thomas Ellis Owen
served as Mayor of Portsmouth and was a prime mover in the coming of the
railways to Portsmouth and the development of the Camber Docks. The Friary is a
rare example of philanthropic housing for his workers on St. Jude's Church and
other developments, modelled on Prince Albert's model dwellings.
In the early 1970s he had been forgotten, until two architectural students,
Preedy and Stewart, noticed the unusual street pattern and the classical villas
and terraces. Their work was published by the Polytechnic School of
Architecture, and the Owen industry began! Dr. Ray Riley had already published a
Portsmouth Paper on the growth of Southsea as Naval Satellite and Victorian
Resort (1972). With Barry Russell, I wrote a leaflet of four guided walks around
Owen's Southsea published by the City Council to celebrate European
Architectural Heritage Year 1975. The dates were revised after rate book
research in Ray Riley's second Portsmouth Paper on The Houses and Inhabitants of
Thomas Ellis Owen's Southsea. Prices of houses by Owen went up by a thousand
pounds, an Outstanding Conservation Area was declared, and City Conservation
Architect, Brian Young, restored his own house in Sussex Terrace in 1972,
followed by others in Netley Terrace and elsewhere. Documentary research is now
going on to celebrate Owen's bicentenary in 2004. We need to think about
restoring and renewing his special landscape, including planting new trees where
the old ones are dying. After a thirty year battle, when the parochial church
council twice tried to pull down the building and replace it with a modern
building, English Heritage contributed to the restoration of the tower, damaged
by inappropriate repair. The structure is demonstrably sound: it withstood the
Second World War bombing which destroyed the Portland Hall opposite and the
shopping area of Palmerston Road. Thomas Ellis Owen's own house, Dovercourt in
Kent Road, has the largest garden in Southsea. Owen had the chutzpah to put his
own face on the tower, alternating with another rather cross-faced individual!
The house became the junior Girls' High School. The temple and other landacape
features survive on the boundary of Portland Road. The High School has adapted
the building by adding a large hall, which looks like a double gable from
outside. Less happily, the brickwork of Swiss Cottage, one of Owen's earliest
villas has been painted by the senior school.
Portland Terrace, Owen's grandest composition, reminiscent of Nash's Regent's
Park in London was in danger of demolition in the 1920s. In the 1980s it was
rescued by Portsmouth Housing Association and converted into flats. Owen's very
early use of cavity wall construction, with bridging 'great bricks' was
discovered when the basements were excavated. After Owen died in 1862 other
architects added more flamboyant buildings such as those in Queens Close, and
Branksmere in Queen's Crescent in brewer's tudor for Sir Rupert Brickwood,
designed by Alfred Bone in 1899. This has been a girls' school, police
headquarters, and currently Social Services for Southsea. Hampshire County
Council excellently restored the house and garden, but unfortunately not the
entrance gate. The recent loss of the cedar tree, originally brought by horse
and cart from another location is very sad.
Change is normal in any city, though one would prefer that redevelopments were
always an improvement on what has gone before. Rees Hall, once the Royal
Spithead Hotel, was redeveloped in a pastiche which has many more student rooms.
Waitrose and its carpark replaced several small streets of cottages and St.
Jude's school, which was rebuilt in Old Portsmouth. Large roads and roundabouts
at Bradford Junction put paid to 400 houses including one listed building in
Froddington Road and Britannic House. I regret the loss of the 1930s Modernist
garage in Grove Road South, and the Odeon Cinema. Ken Russell's film cables
overheating destroyed South Parade Pier by fire one hot August day. He had the
bad taste to put shots of the flames into the film: Tommy, a rock opera starring
Roger Daltrey.
Our decorated terraced houses in Southsea and elsewhere in Portsmouth are quite
special, and we should look after their pretty ironwork, brick patterns, moulded
plaster, terracotta finials and tiled entrances. A reminder always to look up if
you want to enjoy Southsea's history is the late eighteenth or early nineteenth
century farm room at the eastern end of Marmion Road at the junction of Victoria
Road North. Our Minton tiled glazed street names are also special and should be
cherished - though the city engineer took some convincing that large white
letters on black were better than the conventional type! The future of Southsea
is in our hands, as the inheritors of those who shaped it up to now.
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