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From 290 to 296 High Street, Old Brentford

This part of the High Street was known as ‘High Ground’ (important in an area where flooding was common?). In Mason’s 1853 trade directory, Henry Richards at no. 295 and Miss Saunders at no. 296 are both given an address of ‘High Ground’ rather than ‘High Street’.

The tithe apportionment 1839/1841, shows 4 properties in this section of the High Street owned by ‘Killick’. 70 years later the 1909/10 Valuation returns show 5 properties numbered 290 to 294 owned by Arthur Killik, 13 Duke Street, London Bridge. See links to two postcards showing this block in the early 1900s.

A photo from the 1940s (see link below) shows a substantial 5 house terrace and the 1909/10 Valuation describes them as ‘old’ properties. Each 3-storey house had a shop, parlour and kitchen and/or scullery and/or washhouse on the ground floor, and two rooms on each of the first and top floors. The properties had a wider frontage than average, varying from 17’2” to 18’4” and were valued between £550 and £700.

Properties

Notes prepared for numbers 290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 295 and 296; also a list of photos, ephemera and maps

Number 290

No. 290 was a bakers from 1851 to at least 1940; run by Charles Stephens (1851), William Stephens (1861), Benjamin Skinner (1881), Jacob Wickert* from Germany in 1890/1891, Edwin Gregory (1901, 1913, 1928); Edwin Simmons (1933. 1940). In the 1909/10 Valuation returns the ground floor is noted as having a bakehouse (6 bushel oven) and a stable at the rear for one horse and one van. The premises are on the eastern corner of Albany Place.

* Debra Sellen from Australia writes 'Apparently after the Wickerts left 290 High Street Brentford they went back to their home town Schenkenglsfeld in Germany and started another Bakery which they ran for many years when they retired their 2 youngest sons took it over. They are buried in the local cemetery and there is still family there today.'

Number 291

Montague Price, ‘window glass mt’ is recorded here in the 1841 census, aged 25 (to 29) with Strother Price & Augustus Price, whose occupations are ‘Ind(ependent)’. They had two live-in servants, John & Elizabeth Evens.

The property was uninhabited in 1851, then in 1861 Alfred Bissell, marine store shopman, aged just 17 lived here. In 1861 the property was shared by two households, headed by Joseph Huggetts, milkman & James Sansom, cooper.

William Borer, clothier, was recorded as having a business on the High Street in 1874 and was at this address in the 1881 census. He was aged 40 and living with his wife, Mary Jane nee Bowyer (41), whom he married Wandsworth Registration District in 1873, and two small children aged 3 & 1: Frederick Herbert & Mary Emmelia; his mother in law Sarah Bowyer, 73 and servant Eliza Sarah Richardson, 18, completed the household.

William Borer’s business continued under his name at this address until (at least) 1928, although he and his family had moved to 27 Boston Park Road by the time of the 1901 census: in 1901 no. 291 was occupied by Henry G Mullens, detective metropolitan police.

1933 and 1940 trade directories show E A Borer & Sons, clothiers, at this address.

Number 292

By 1891 Ralph Randall, stationer, and his wife Alice Maud (nee Card) and two daughters lived here with Mary Maclaren, a housekeeper and Steven Hobbs, a printer and lodger who presumably loved on a separate floor. By 1901 the Randalls had five daughters aged 1 to 16. Ralph Randall died in 1906 and his wife was running the stationers shop in 1913.

By 1928 no. 292 was a newsagents run by Alex Field, then Walter Weymouth (1933 & 1940).

Number 293

See Len Cox’s memories of Hortons. Yvonne Carter wrote to say Hortons later re-located to Windmill Road and ‘the grandson of the Mr Horton who ran the shop in the early 1900s is married to my sister-in-law’.

The 1909/10 Valuation Records describe the property as a terrace house and shop of three storeys with a High Street frontage of 17’ 8”:

• Top: 2 rooms
• 1st: 2 rooms
• Ground: shop, parlour, kitchen, private entrance, washhouse & shed

Number 294

William Mountford, excise officer lived next door to Henry Richards in 1841. Excise officers moved to new areas every few years and by 1851 he was living in Chelsea and Thomas Moffitt, clerk & collector of Inland Revenue, born Northumberland, headed a household of 9 here.

In 1861 Richard Vound and his wife Elizabeth (both born Barnstaple, Devon) were living here with a niece Elizabeth M Richards (born Barnstaple) and nephew William H Vound, aged 4 and born locally: he was visiting.

By 1871 Alfred Metcalfe, a draper born Driffield Yorkshire was living here with his wife Eliza (born Downham Norfolk) and their assistants Harriet Burn, from Glasgow, Scotland and George Shrimpton from ‘Dorcet’ Oxfordshire. Numbers 290 to 294 were described in this census as numbers 1 – 5 Albany Terrace. The Metcalfes remained here in 1881.

A 1890 trade directory shows Thomas Harlow, draper at this address. The census the following year shows he, his wife Elizabeth and eldest daughter were born in Burton on Trent, Staffs, their next two children in Derbyshire and their baby May, aged 1, in Brentford. They had a servant, local girl Emma Rye.

Ten years on, 1901, no. 294 was still a drapers, but run by George F Edmett, from Brighton. His wife Eleanor was from Stowmarket, Suffolk and they had a housekeeper Susan Payne. The Edmetts were still at this address in 1913.

In 1928 Joseph C Fisher ran the draper’s shop, in 1933 and 1940 Mrs M Wing.

The Doctors' House - Number 295

The tithe apportionment records Henry Richards owned and occupied property ref. 321. In the 1841 census Henry Richards, aged 35, a surgeon is recorded here. Next door to Henry lived Elizabeth Hazell.

By 1851 Henry and Elizabeth were married. Henry retired to his birthplace of Epsom by 1861 and no. 295 is occupied by Edward Davis, Kings College London GP, who headed a household of seven including a nurse. He remained here for at least another 10 years.

Henry Bott, aged 28, widower, a surgeon born Bourne, Lincolnshire with a 10 month daughter had moved in by 1881. ‘Dr Bott had a chimney fire put out at his home on the High Street, 1888' (N).

The 1890 directory records Henry Bott as ‘surgeon, medical officer of health to local board’ and in the 1891 and 1901 censuses he remained at no. 295, a widower in 1901 (the death of a Mary Ann Bott, aged 38, was registered at Brentford in 1899).

The 1909/10 valuation records provide a description of the property:
‘295 High Street (property ref 1281) House & premises, stables & garage. Ratable value: buildings: £44, stabling £8 Owner: Henry Bott, in occupation. Freehold. Former sales: 1902, freehold, £820; subsequent expenditure: £40

• Terraced house of 4 storeys
• Top floor: 3 rooms, bathroom, WC
• 1st floor: large drawing room, bedroom
• Upper ground floor: double dining room, library, consulting rooms & surgery
• Opening on to High Street: ½ basement: kitchen, larder, scullery Washhouse; conservatory, WC & fountain in large garden at rear.
• Front garden.
• Premises in excellent repair.
• At the side of the back garden is an old brick built garage & 2-stall stable.

A 1913 trade directory records: ‘Henry Bott, MRCS, LRCP Lond., surgeon, & medical officer to Brentford urban district council & hospital superintendent’ at no. 295.

By 1928, Reginald Cavan Neil and Alan Dakers Gowans, physicians were using the premises.

A 1933 trade directory shows Richard Malam Moore had joined the practice and by 1940 Reginald Cavan Neil had left.

A couple of people have written with memories of the doctors: ‘Dr Moore was my doctor from 1933 … Dr Gowans was a surgeon at Brentford Cottage Hospital ... Dr Moore served in the army during the war and at that time Dr Gowans became our doctor.’ ‘they were the company doctors for employees and families of the Gas Light & Coke Co.’ (Pauline Chidwick); Len Cox remembers ‘the waiting room furniture was all Victorian’.

See Photos/Ephemera/Maps for a link to a 1945/6 photo of this property.

Number 296

At the time of the 1909/10 Valuation (in fact the date by the entry is January 1915) J T Taylor of Pine House, Isleworth owned the property and it was let at 12 shillings / week rent. It is described as ‘a semi-detached house of 4 storeys, gardens back and front …substantial dry area was built in front and at rear of house and new drains put in about 1 year ago. Basement damp before dry area made. Fairly old property and in poor repair’. It had a frontage of 19’.

See Photos/Ephemera/Maps for a link to a 1945/6 photo of this property.

Photos/Ephemera/Maps

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