[vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]The very idea of sitting in a records office ordering up old maps and census documents was completely alien to me five years ago. I never really got on with History at school and dropped it in favour of Economics at GCSE (what was I thinking!). In hindsight, I think the problem was that I found it such a vast and unrelatable subject\u2026I couldn\u2019t find a way \u2018in\u2019.<\/p>\n
Not long after we moved into this house, the BBC launched a new series called A House Through Time, in which the history of a single house and its occupants through the ages was told. The story would often head off on tangents and link to the wider history of the city, country and beyond. I think it\u2019s a brilliant series because it draws in several disperate strands of world history and ties it to the lives lived out in one building. Suddenly I found a way \u2018in\u2019 and I was inspired to start researching the history of our own house.<\/p>\n
Our neighbour who lives in the other half of the building had done the same thing a few years back and she kindly shared her research with me. The first thing I wanted to find out about was the building itself: how old it is and how it has changed over time.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Age and evolution of the building.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n It seemed to me that the best way to start would be to find all the maps that have ever been made of the area, as far back as possible, and see which ones the house features on. I absolutely love maps and I think the Ordnance Survey is excellent but it only goes back so far. The Bristol Know Your Place website (https:\/\/maps.bristol.gov.uk\/kyp<\/a>) is an incredible resource where you can overlay various historic maps and compare them with the present day but frustratingly, being right on the edge of the city, we fall off the edge of maps made before the OS 1st<\/sup> Edition of 1844.[\/vc_column_text][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”50679″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center” edgt_css_animation=””][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]The house is right on the boundary of the Ashton Court estate in the hamlet of Bower Ashton, so I presumed it formed part of that estate and spent an afternoon in the Bristol Records Office looking for maps in the Ashton Court archives. This was quite an experience. Some of the older maps were huge rolled up sheets of vellum or linen over 6ft long including a beautiful hand painted map of the estate, the oldest map I could find, which according to the records was surveyed in 1730. It did feature our house on it, but as a long oblong shape rather than the square footprint it has nowadays. This suggests that the front half, or front pile, of the house existed in 1730 but not the rear pile, which is consistent with the architecture. This is definitely a house of two halves with 3 low-ceiling floors in the front half and two high-ceiling floors in the rear half clearly added at a later time.[\/vc_column_text][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”50680,50672″ img_size=”” column_number=”2″ grayscale=”no” hover_icon=”magnifier” images_space=”gallery_with_space”][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]There was an equally impressive large map of The Manor of Long Ashton dated 1789 which also featured only the older half of the house. This map was a lot more detailed and a bit more accurate, with the oblong shape of the house orientated correctly and the teardrop shape of the boundary walls, which still exist in parts, more accurately rendered than in the 1730 map. It is interesting to note that the lane down to the Rownham Ferry used to pass right next to the end wall of the house, underneath where our kitchen is now built. Also, if you look carefully, you can see pencil marks made tracing the path of the current Clanage Road. I can imagine members of the Smyth family up at Ashton Court poring over this very map, planning the building of this new road and the position of the toll house for it, possibly as a response to the announcement of the competition to design the Clifton Suspension Bridge (famously won by I.K.Brunel).[\/vc_column_text][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”50674,50673″ img_size=”” column_number=”2″ grayscale=”no” hover_icon=”magnifier” images_space=”gallery_with_space”][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]The next map that the house shows up on is another of the Manor of Long Ashton, but this one was accompanied by a series of small A6 (ish) survey cards, each with a coloured map of a section of the manor accompanied by details of the tenants and presumably their rent. This was dated 1826 and the maps on the cards had decent detail, enough to show that by this time, our house has had the rear pile added to it making the footprint much squarer.<\/p>\n I assume there is something about the engineering involved making a pitched roof which limits the width of most vernacular buildings to about 4m (although there would be no constraint on the length, hence the abundance of \u2018long houses\u2019). In order to make a building deeper therefore, you\u2019d have to add another pitched roof meeting at a valley in the middle and creating a zig-zag \u2018M\u2019 shaped gable-end profile. This is known as a \u2018double pile\u2019 house, sometimes also called a \u2018double house\u2019, so perhaps this is when the house got its name.<\/p>\n It isn\u2019t clear whether the house was one large dwelling at this time or whether it had been split down the middle. We can see that Clanage Road had been built and the old lane to the ferry had been removed with the section running past the house now turned into a parcel of land simply referred to as \u2018Yard\u2019. According to the survey cards, this \u2018yard\u2019 and the associated \u2018house and garden\u2019 were both tenanted by Ann Edgell, so perhaps it was one complete house\u2026it must\u2019ve been massive!<\/p>\n A much more detailed tithe map dated 1841 shows that the house had been divided down the middle by this time, which is how it remains to this day.[\/vc_column_text][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”50677,50678,50676,50675″ img_size=”” column_number=”2″ grayscale=”no” hover_icon=”magnifier” images_space=”gallery_with_space”][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]So in conclusion, it seems the history of the building is briefly as follows:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Occupants.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The day we first moved in, there was a wooden box waiting for us in front of the fire place. It was full of all sorts of treasures: coins dating back to George I, marbles, toys, letters and a random glove. It turns out these were all found above the ceiling in our house, presumably when the previous occupant removed the lath and plaster ceiling in the lounge. No doubt these things had fallen through the floorboards from the room above and have sat there through the ages waiting to be rediscovered. It was really thoughtful of the previous occupant\u2019s daughter to leave it for us; our children love it and they call it the \u2018Box of Treasure\u2019.[\/vc_column_text][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”50687,50690″ img_size=”” column_number=”2″ grayscale=”no” hover_icon=”magnifier” images_space=”gallery_with_space”][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]The producers of the House Through Time program approached us a year or so ago (as well as many other houses in Bristol) as potential candidates for the current series. They did not choose our house but they did kindly send us their preliminary research. Much of this confirmed the research my neighbour had already done but there were one or two new snippets that have inspired me to go off and look a little deeper into the lives of the people who have lived here, and to try and link them to some of the objects in our box of treasure.<\/p>\n Broadly then, the timeline seems to be as follows:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n So far, this is consistent with the 1861 census, except there is no mention of the oldest son George. Instead there is the addition of:<\/p>\n It seems that in the intervening 10 years, two daughters have moved back home. Elizabeth is listed in the 1861 census as a servant (aged 12) in the household of Charles Gillet in nearby Bedminster, a slightly odd arrangement as he is her uncle (Judith\u2019s brother, possibly father of Alice Ann Gillet now living with the Gough family). Oldest son George, who was an agricultural labourer, has married a Mary Wellstead in 1866 and died in 1867. This throws up the following questions:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n In the Box of Treasure was a letter addressed to \u2018Master Georgie Gough\u2019 and dated February 1881. It was sent from the Lamb and Lark Hotel in Keynsham and although much of the letter has perished, the parts that remain legible seem to describe a shipwreck:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u2018\u2026the harbour at the time and the waves dashed over the ship with such fury that her hull began \u2026. to break up. It was a awful scene crowds looking on \u2026.. and the shore quite \u2026\u2026.but a brave sailor\u2026.the fall and plunging into the waves he picked up the child\u2026in life and restored it to its mothers arms Then she clasped it\u2026..and soon her husband\u2026.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Dramatic sounding stuff! I can\u2019t tell who wrote the letter but it was clearly intended for George the grandson (13 at the time)\u2026perhaps, given the affectionate use of the name \u2018Georgie\u2019, it was sent by his mother? Perhaps she works and lives at the Hotel in Keynsham?****<\/p>\n Sadly, young Georgie died two years later at the age of 15, his obituary appearing in the Western Daily Press on March 19th<\/sup> 1883.<\/p>\n Judith Gough herself dies on 14th<\/sup> September 1888 and thus ends the story of the Gough family in this house.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n * Judith\u2019s husband Edward Gough had died in 1854. George Gough was his son from a previous marriage so was in fact Judith\u2019s stepson.<\/em><\/p>\n ** I cannot find any record of George\u2019s baptism. I can only assume that he is George\u2019s son given that he has his name and was conceived in the first year of George\u2019s marriage to Mary, shortly before his death.\u00a0 He probably never met his son, may not even have known Mary was pregnant. \u00a0I\u2019m guessing that Mary was in a difficult position, widowed with a newborn son, and so the son has been sent to live with granny and aunts?<\/em><\/p>\n ***Mary Gough shows up in the 1871 census living on Catherine Mead Street in nearby Bedminster with her sister Martha Wellstead and William Gough, presumably a cousin of George\u2019s.<\/em><\/p>\n ****Actually, it is probably from the boy\u2019s aunt Mary Ann Gough who has married Henry James Cox and together they run the Lamb & Lark Hotel.<\/em>[\/vc_column_text][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”50689,50688,50692,50686″ img_size=”” column_number=”2″ grayscale=”no” hover_icon=”magnifier” images_space=”gallery_with_space”][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The reason I think this is because later on, in 1910, a valuation survey states that number 3 is occupied by \u2018Wm Evans\u2019 and number 4 by \u2018Chas Froud\u2019. At this time, the Ashton Court Estate owned a nearby colliery which I assume is where William Evans worked.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The seven Evans children are all still listed as single so the question is; whose daughter is this?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n At number 4, the Kerrs have moved out and there are two families in separate entries claiming to live at Double House:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Alfred Charles is presumably \u2018Chas Froud\u2019 on the valuation survey of 1910 and on his census entry, it states that he is living in a dwelling with five rooms. Meanwhile Herbert\u2019s entry states he is in a dwelling with two rooms. I assume Alfred and Herbert are brothers** and the two families live at number 4 in a total of seven rooms, though I\u2019m not sure why this would require two separate entries. It would add up because at number 3, the Evans state they live in a dwelling of eight rooms and because of the way the house was divided, number 3 does have one room more than number 4 even to this day.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n * The 8th<\/sup> surviving child is Blanche Anne Evans, William and Harriet\u2019s oldest surviving child, who married Thomas Baker Oliver about 1895. It seems that May was their first born child but I cannot work out why she was sent to <\/em>Bristol<\/em> to be raised by her grandparents. Blanche and Thomas went on to have four more children who are all living with them in London in the 1911 census whilst May remains with her Grandparents in Double House. I also cannot find any further trace of May Oliver after 1911, but the publication of the 1921 census in 2022 might shine some light on that.<\/em><\/p>\n ** They are two of five brothers and one sister living with their parents in Long Ashton in the 1891 census.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Joyce and Ronald Farrow were most probably evacuees from London\u2026the rest of their family are living in West Ham at the time. The redacted entries are possibly two more evacuees. The Wedmores next door are all listed as single so are presumably brothers and sisters with two evacuees of their own. This would make sense as there would have been plenty of spare room in the houses at this time, though I don’t know why some of the entries have been redacted.\u00a0 Douglas Ashford is also listed as an ARP Warden on the register.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Perhaps the most charming find in our Box of Treasure is a small 1943 pocket diary. In the front is the following name and address:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Jeffrey Hordle, <\/em>6 Ruby Street<\/em>, Bedminster, <\/em>Bristol<\/em>.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n We used to live in Pearl Street, next to Ruby Street, and it is near to Bower Ashton but it doesn\u2019t quite explain how the diary ended up here. The picture becomes a little clearer on the pages for August where we come across details of \u2018The Horse Shoe Club\u2019. The members\u2019 names are: Jeffrey Hordle, Kenneth Williams and David Ashford<\/strong>. On the same page are the club rules written in a blend of capitals and lower case lettering as follows:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n I\u2019m not sure how long the Horse Shoe Club would have lasted under its regime of cleaning and clean language\u2026it doesn\u2019t sound a whole lot of fun. It does however sound like a rainy day amusement for three boys who I guess must be between 8-10 years old at the time. Perhaps the infamously clean club room is my daughter Lucy\u2019s current bedroom, which I\u2019m sorry to say frequently fails to live up to the expectations laid out by the founding members of the club 70 years ago.<\/p>\n I assume David Ashford is the son of Douglas and Sarah but he isn\u2019t in the 1939 register. I did find a David William Ashford in the records who was born in 1941 so my guess is that this was an old diary given to Jeffrey by his mother or father, which he and his friends are using to start their club some time around 1950. There are other entries in the diary in different handwriting, including a poignant entry on March 3rd<\/sup>:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u2018Mary went from home for the first time to her first job to Harefield House in Exmouth\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Then on the 5th<\/sup> March: \u2018note from Mary\u2019<\/em> and again on the 10th<\/sup> March: \u2018letter from Mary\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n This is written in neat handwriting which I don\u2019t think belongs to Jeffrey. Given that these are date specific entries, I think these were made in 1943 when the diary was current, possibly by Jeffrey\u2019s mother and referring to Jeffrey\u2019s sister?[\/vc_column_text][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”50700,50701,50702,50707″ img_size=”” column_number=”2″ grayscale=”no” hover_icon=”magnifier” images_space=”gallery_with_space”][vc_separator type=”transparent” up=”5″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n We have the conveyance documents detailing the sale of Number 3 to Douglas Ashford for \u00a3950 in 1948. I\u2019m guessing the trustees of the Ashton Court Estate approached the various tenants and offered to sell them the properties they were living in. I imagine there were sizable death duties to be paid on Dame Esme\u2019s passing.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n [\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [vc_row row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” oblique_section=”no” text_align=”left” triangle_shape=”no” css_animation=”” box_shadow_on_row=”no”][vc_column][vc_column_text]The very idea of sitting in a records office ordering up old maps and census documents was completely alien to me five years ago. I never really got on with History at school and dropped it in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50663,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[91,92,90,87,86,89,59,88],"class_list":["post-50671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-house-history","tag-bower-ashton","tag-bristol","tag-double-house","tag-historic-building","tag-history","tag-house-history","tag-listed-building","tag-old-house"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50671"}],"version-history":[{"count":37,"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50671\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50871,"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50671\/revisions\/50871"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jamesosmond.co.uk\/doublehouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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