| Garden
Party at Matlock Rectory |
| People who lived in the Matlocks : Photographs, Postcards, Engravings & Etchings |
| |
The four photographs below are from the album of
Mrs. Robert Wildgoose who lived at The Gables on Chesterfield Road
and then at Stoneycroft, the house she had built on Cavendish Road.
The album now belongs to the Ash family and was in the possession
of Ray Ash's step-grandmother Ash (Dora May Wheeldon before her marriage),
who was for many years companion and housekeeper to Mrs. Wildgoose
at Stoneycroft. A selection from the album is published here with
kind permission of Ray Ash.
The images you see are reproduced from tiny amateur photographs, three
inches wide, which are also very faded. They really are quite hard
to date but from other photographs in the album were probably been
taken around 1900-1905, and maybe even slightly before that. Unfortunately
Marian Wildgoose was not very good at putting dates in her album,
so some of the dates are only approximations. They were certainly
in the time of Reverend Canon James William Kewley, for many years
Rector of Matlock, as he appears in photographs 2 and 3 and probably
in photograph 4.
|
|
1 Large group,
dressed in all their finery, in the Rectory garden with Riber hillside
behind.
Ray Ash comments that the absence of blouses and skirts for the women
in this series of photographs seems to be a strong pointer to this
being just before, or at latest, very early in the Edwardian period,
when this became the most popular costume.
|
2 Canon Kewley,
on the far right, with his guests. Matlock Rectory is the building
behind the group.
Pevsner* describes the Rectory as a late eighteenth century building.
The Rectory is in Old Matlock and is close to St. Giles' Church.
*Pevsner, N (1953) "The Buildings of England,
Derbyshire", Penguin Books, London
|
3 Taken from a similar position,
Canon Kewley is in the centre of the picture.
|
4 Guests strolling through the
gardens on what looks to be a beautiful summer day.
 There is more
information onsite about Canon Kewley and his family |
Image scans Copyright Ray Ash and
intended for personal use only.
If you have any further information about the identity of anyone in
the photographs, or know who maintained the Rectory's gardens at that
time, we would like to know. Please contact both the webmistress
and Ray Ash
|
You may like to view more
onsite information
Matlock Churches
Rectors of
St Giles from 1300
St Giles Church
about 1904
St. Giles
Church Hatches, Matches & Dispatches
Memorial Inscriptions,
a Surnames Index
Matlock St
Giles, MIs in the Church
|
