Bulletin 194

PRESIDENT:
VICE PRESIDENTS: Eric Montague, Judith Goodman
CHAIR: Keith Penny

BULLETIN No. 194 JUNE 2015

‘The New Fair – Mitcham (c.1930) by Kenneth Broad – see page 9

CONTENTS
Programme June – October 2015 2
‘Recent Researches’ 3
‘Seven Streets, Two Markets and a Wedding’ 5
‘Past and Present: How Merton, Morden and Mitcham have changed’ 6
Local History Workshops:
30 January: Morden documents in SHC; Nonsuch Palace model; some family photographs;
‘Blake’s Folly’ map; 1916 air raid bombs; MHS digs; Dewey Bates 8
13 March: Moated sites in Surrey; Merton Park Film Studios films; a family Bible; MOLA
report on priory wall; a Mitcham tram route 9
1 May: Dr Pailthorpe of Mitcham; Mitcham in Hansard in WW1; houses in Wandle Road;
memories of Wandle Industrial Museum and Singlegate School; Hadfield paint factories photos;
cholera in 1866 9
A Letter from World War 1 – Peter Hopkins 11
Correction: Enzeli Expedition – David Haunton 11
Anthony Toto, Tudor Artist and Lessee of the Manor of Ravensbury – Peter Hopkins 12
Merton Heritage Discovery Day – Keith Penny 16

PROGRAMME JUNE – OCTOBER 2015

There is no visit planned for June

Thursday 23 July 10.45am British Library, 96 Euston Road, NW1 2DB
Tour of the Library

Max 15 people. Book with Bea.
Group cost is £85, so cost per person is £85 divided by how many attend.
Meet at Library Entrance. Nearest Underground Station King’s Cross / St Pancras
[NB. Magna Carta exhibition will still be on, but is not included in tour]

Thursday 20 August 10.45 for 11.00am Nonsuch Park, Ewell Road, Sutton SM3 8AL
Tour of House, Gardens and Museum (with model of Palace)
Led by a member of the Friends of Nonsuch

£3 per head. Book with Bea. Meet at the Mansion House.
Parking nearby – enter at the Cheam Village entrance on Ewell Road (SatNav SM3 8AP), then
follow The Avenue and Fir Walk – and off London Road (A24), with a walk across the Park.
Nearest bus 293 at London Road.

Wednesday 23 September 1.45 for 2.00pm Southside House, 3-4 Woodhayes Road, SW19 4RE
Tour of the House

£9 per head. We join a public tour. Book with Bea.
The house is next to King’s College School. Buses: 93 to Rose & Crown stop, or 200 to Edge Hill.

Saturday 10 October 2.30pm Christ Church Hall, Colliers Wood
‘England’s Immigrants – aliens in Southwark & Surrey 1330-1550′
Illustrated talk by historian Dr Andrea Ruddick

Christ Church Hall is next to the church, in Christchurch Road, 250m from Colliers Wood
Underground station. Limited parking at the hall, but plenty in nearby streets or at the Tandem
Centre, 200m south. Buses 152, 200 and 470 pass the door.

Visitors are welcome to attend our talks. Entry £2.

A programme folder for the coming 12 months is enclosed.

STILL WANTED – Volunteer for Membership Secretary

The task is not difficult or too time-consuming: (1) to enter subscriptions in the membership books;

(2) to keep an up-to-date membership list of current members, so that they receive the quarterly Bulletin;
(3) to liaise with the Treasurer, who is responsible for banking cash and cheques; (4) to provide members’
addresses for the Publications Secretary for Bulletin distribution; (5) to ensure that all attendees at meetings
are recorded in the attendance book (for fire safety purposes) and to collect the £2 from visitors.
Records are also kept on a personal computer, so ability to use one is important.

Most subscriptions arrive in September / October by post or are paid at the meetings, although a large
number of members now pay by standing order. A few new members join throughout the year.
Audrey King, the present Membership Secretary, will be available to help during the first few months.
Interested? Speak to Audrey or a member of the Committee or call Keith

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 2

‘RECENT RESEARCHES’

At our meeting on 12 January, three members of our Society each gave us a talk on a different subject.

Michael Child spoke on Volunteering at Polesden Lacey. Interested in history from his schooldays, Michael
decided on his retirement to become a National Trust volunteer, and chose Polesden Lacey because in the 1970s
he had attended performances of plays by Sheridan (one of the previous owners) in the garden of the house.

There has been a house on the site since
the 11th century, and the associated estate
is largely unchanged since then. The name
is due to ownership by the Polesden and
Lacy [sic] families. The present house was
built between 1902 and 1905 by Sir Clinton
Dawson, but the central character of the

house in the next decade was Mrs Margaret

Greville. She was the illegitimate daughter
of William McEwan, a millionaire brewer,
who bought Polesden Lacey in 1906 as

a weekend party house for her. She had

married ‘old’ money – Ronnie Greville,
aristocrat, MP and Life Guards officer

– and lavishly redecorated the interior
between 1906 and 1908 (when Ronnie
died), demanding the best and most modern

of everything.

Mrs Greville used the house as intended, and it became the place where upper class Edwardian society partied
at weekends. Her guests included royalty, both British and foreign, politicians, writers and intellectuals. The
then Duke and Duchess of York spent part of their honeymoon at Polesden Lacey. They had no country house
of their own, and Mrs Greville had no children to inherit it, so Mrs Greville offered to leave them the house
after her death. However, after the Abdication and their accession to the throne, they had enough royal palaces
of their own and didn’t need Polesden Lacey as well.

Subsequently, Mrs Greville left the house to the National Trust, together with an endowment for upkeep. She
died in 1942, during WW2, and the Trustees had to amalgamate the contents of her town house and of Polesden
Lacey and sell off the surplus. Rightly or wrongly, the Trustees thought the visiting public would not be interested
in the kitchen or bedrooms, and sold off their contents, so only the grand rooms remain as they were.

Michael gave us a few statistics – 300,000 visitors per annum, 800 staff, of whom more than 400 room guides
are volunteers – and a swift recap of the training (and perks) available for volunteers, and urged us all to come
and see the house for ourselves. In finishing, Michael assured us that becoming a Volunteer was ‘the best
decision of his retirement – apart from joining Merton Historical Society, of course’, which earned him a loud

round of applause.

David Haunton cheerfully admitted that his talk about Dewey Bates was an extended advertisement for a
forthcoming Society publication: the reprint of an 1889 magazine article entitled On the Wandle, written and
well illustrated by the artist. Very little has been published about this gentleman’s career, and most of the few
obvious snippets on the internet turn out to be wrong. He was an American, born c.1851, died 1898, and his
name was not hyphenated, as the magazine has printed it.

He was born and brought up in Philadelphia, and attended the Central High School there (1866-1870) where he
was noted for his drawing ability. Family money took him to study in Europe for three years (1873-1876), first
to Antwerp, then to Paris, and then briefly to London. In Antwerp he met the subsequently famous artist George
Clausen, joining him on a tour of the Low Countries. They studied together in Paris and remained life-long
friends. Dewey then returned to America, sharing a studio in Indianapolis (1877-1878) with another friend, John
Washington Love, whose portrait he painted. The picture is still held by the Indiana Museum and Art Gallery.

Dewey moved back to England in mid-1878, staying with friends in Streatham, apparently for about two years.
This was Leonard Blake, a photographer, and his family, at No.1 Holmfield Villas. [Since the talk, John W
Brown has kindly identified this house, which was later renumbered 592 Streatham High Road, and demolished

Polesden Lacey from the National Trust website

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 3

in the 1920s.] Dewey’s portrait

of Blake was shown at the

RA Summer Exhibition in
1879, and The Times critic
was quite rude about it. After
some initial successes, fewer

and fewer portrait commissions

came Dewey’s way, and he

took to writing and illustrating
for monthly magazines to
supplement his income. The
English Illustrated Magazine
and The Leisure Hour (‘suitable
for all the family’) published

various of his pictures and

illustrated articles, which

mostly touched on life in
village and countryside. While

he was evidently beginning to struggle professionally, in 1887 he did marry Kate Mary Fleetum, a Camden
Town girl some ten years younger than himself. They seem to have moved around the southern counties, at
one point in a small cottage on the common of Cookham Dean, near where Dewey’s friend George Clausen
was living in rather grander circumstances. In 1885 Dewey published an article in The Studio on Clausen’s art,
while in the same year Clausen commented in a letter that Dewey was an old student friend and very hard up.

Kate and Dewey had spent some time in Rye in 1892, and moved to the town in 1896, where Dewey painted
some views of Romney Marsh, but died on 24 August 1898. Cause of death was cirrhosis of the liver, so he
died of drink, which may help to explain his gradual artistic decline.

Tony Scott gave us an impressive account of Some Lost Rivers of Mitcham, without benefit of notes. He
began by pointing out that waterways depend on geology and geography, and then traced the courses of four of
the surface streams that run off the clay of Pollards Hill and eventually find their way over sands and gravels

to the Wandle.
The Norbury Brook arises on the ridge at Norwood and then crosses London Road, where it becomes the
Graveney, running in a concrete channel, which is about 2m wide and 1m deep, but normally holds only a
30cm depth of water. That waterway is easily seen, but we can also trace three smaller streams, not just from

the occasional surviving open ditch and culvert entrance, but by observing lines of manholes and inspection
covers, and making close note of a few wells.
The Little Graveney is now totally culverted. It rises near the Pollards Hill roundabout, runs northwest along

the rear access-way of Greenwood Road and across the Streatham Park cemetery. The stream flows across
Eastfields Estate, where it formed the boundary of the Lonesome School playing field, and then passes under
the railway. The Little Graveney then follows the boundary of the present Mitcham Industrial Estate, runs
alongside Streatham Road to its junction with Sandy Lane, follows the footpath across Figges Marsh, and at
Tooting station joins the Graveney.

Going north along Carshalton Road there is a ditch on the left, which turns west at Mitcham Garden Village,

runs under the railway and then alongside Cranmer Road. The houses there are set back because the ditch used

to run down the Common boundary. It now runs underneath the Catholic Church, and, when a manhole cover
is removed, the water may be seen running in a U-shaped glazed earthenware channel. The stream runs under
the pub cellar of the Queen’s Head (and occasionally floods it), along the south side of Cricket Green, and turns
and runs down Church Road, past the now-closed Bull public house, giving it the name the Bull Ditch, to the

Wandle near Phipps Bridge.
The Western Ditch drains Commonside East and the Pollards Hill springs and feeds Three Kings Pond at its

southern end. The outlet of the pond at its northern end takes the drain under Commonside West, and fed
ornamental lakes in the garden of The Elms, later called Langdale, an old house situated roughly where the
centre of Langdale Avenue is today. The stream crosses London Road by Raleigh Gardens, and runs down
Western Road (probably the origin of its name) to the Wandle, perhaps joining the Bull Ditch on its way.

DH

‘Beddington Church and House, From a Drawing by Dewey-Bates’
published in The English Illustrated Magazine 1888-1889

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 4

‘SEVEN STREETS, TWO MARKETS AND A WEDDING’
London snapshots 1932-1980

Ben Benson brought the Touring Local Cinema to Merton on 14 February. This is a not-for-profit social
enterprise, providing access to cinema, normally for limited-mobility groups. The programme for the day was
a varied collection of short films, each featuring a part of London. Some were made by professionals, others
by amateurs. Most were in 16mm and colour, the exceptions being East Lane Bridge and Wedding (black and
white) and Lambeth Walk (in 8mm). And Ben brought popcorn.

East Lane Bridge, Wembley (1932) contrasted a modern (colour) view of the bridge with a few minutes of the
1932 traffic over it, filmed with a fixed camera. There were no pavements, so crowds of pedestrians, coming in
waves from the station in the background, shared the road space with bicycles, private cars, commercial vans
and even a steam-driven road roller.

These Can be Yours (1949) was an odd mixture from Wembley Road Safety, which gave us motorcycle speedway
racing, featuring world champion Tommy Price, and a warning to ‘Look Out!’ with a scripted accident and

response by emergency services.

Wedding (1944) was an amateur sequence of guests arriving at a church in Kingsbury (now Brent) and partying
afterwards in daylight; obviously a wartime unit ‘do’, everyone was in battledress (smoking!) with flowers in

their buttonholes.

All on a Winter’s Day (1952) was a complete contrast. Shot by an amateur around St Marylebone, obviously
on a Sunday, it featured many static scenes of buildings (National Schools, BBC in Portland Place, scaffolding
for repairs of wartime damage) or picturesque alleys and courtyards, with an artistic eye to composition. Hardly
a moving person appears. One wonders about the cost of colour film in 1952.

Green Islands (1954) was a very didactic little film made by the LCC to emphasise that public parks are for

use, and the point of the Green Belt.
Various Views in Hackney Housing (c.1950) again by the LCC was to show off the new housing of its Mapledene
Estate in the East End, but without a commentary. Bright and new and open, and almost uninhabited – only a
few pre-school children or babies in prams were on view – no adults or cars or inside views. Very odd.

Lambeth Walk (1962) was shot by Mr Meiklejohn, a
toyshop owner, mostly inside, or from inside, his shop,
and showed passers-by in the busy street and children with
yearning faces pressed to his shop window, all without
realising they were being filmed (see still on the right).
Astonishing close-ups, lovers, arguments, street market.
The most enjoyable film of the afternoon.

Walworth Road (c.1960), filmed in SE17 by Patricia and
Stanley Davies, showed the heavy traffic on this road –
buses, taxis, lorries, cars, intrepid motor-cyclists, and

occasionally groups of pedestrians.
Plumstead Road (1960), subtitled Impression of a
London Suburb (Woolwich), showed a random selection
of usually lively scenes – a public market, a ferry, a ladies

gym, gamblers on Ernie, bouffant hair styles, a street market, fruit on display, bakers’ shop fronts, boys singing
in a pub with microphones, a coffee bar. Very Impressionist.
Tower Hamlets Carnival (1979) Shot in and near Grove Road, E3, this raised many memories for some of our

members who used to live there. The carnival procession featured regional floats (the Isle of Dogs one being
mainly of Booth’s Gin, another of Truman’s Beer), the Town Crier, dance routines, Morris men and marching
bands, with youngsters running alongside collecting charity donations in buckets. All very cheerful, and a most

satisfactory end to a very varied show.

Most of our comments were about how things have changed – health and safety, telephone boxes, privacy
considerations, and the like. Ben was delighted with MHS as a most appreciative and responsive audience, and

as a result will advertise around other local history societies. He confessed that his usual bookings are for care

homes and community centres, where quite often many of the audience go to sleep during a session!

DH

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 5

‘PAST AND PRESENT: HOW MERTON, MORDEN AND MITCHAM HAVE
CHANGED’

On 14 March, members and visitors were treated to a visual feast by the Society’s photographic record project
team, who compared present-day scenes with older photos, many from the Merton Memories website. We were
shown so many pictures (over 230) that only some can be mentioned to give a flavour of the occasion.

David Roe reminded us that the main objective of the MHS project (which he leads) is to establish a photographic
record of our area, for the benefit of future historians. David’s first photos were of Christ Church in Colliers
Wood, viewed across watercress beds in 1912, and then behind newer buildings in 1975; he then compared
Colliers Wood High Street in 1910 and today (below).

In 1910, with tram lines and the Victory pub The only building remaining is the pub, renamed the Charles Holden
We then proceeded westwards along Merton High Street, seeing much that has changed over the years – the
Grove Tavern (now a Tesco Express with flats above), the Wimbledon College of Art School of Foundation

Studies (now flats), and the level crossing with trains (now trams). Dorset Hall and Long Lodge remain, but
Merton Film Studios, the Nelson Hospital and the Deas Home have all been redeveloped.
Further south, John Innes’ brickworks clay pit is now the rather safer Mostyn Gardens. On the St. Helier estate,

we followed the changing fortunes of the Grange (Hospital, Convalescent Home, Rest Home, offices). The
family of Bill Rudd has kindly donated his collection of historical material to the Society, including all his
photos of Morden and St. Helier, so David ended by showing us two of Bill Rudd’s photos, of Easby Crescent
(where Bill lived when young) in 1957, and of St Helier Station in 1969, and the same scenes from the same

viewpoints today.

Mick Taylor began by emphasising the importance of the information that should go with any photograph, and
of the need to record it accurately, citing his experience of trying to document some of the Merton Memories
pictures. He noted that sometimes buildings change but the location remains the same – Raynes Park Library
in Approach Road has been housed in at least three different buildings on the same site.

He took us to the roundabout where Cannon Hill Lane meets Martin Way, showing some subtle changes (below).
Note the building on the left and Youngers Mini Market, in 1967. In 2014 the building on the left has been
extended, so we can no longer see the spire of St James church. The Mini Market remains.

1967 2014

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 6

Mick showed development in Lower Morden by comparing an RAF aerial view of 1946 with a Google Image
from 2014, and pictures of the Beverley Roundabout (1940s, 2013) where one of the few constants is a tree.
Since the Tudor Estate was developed in the 1930s, many shops have come and gone, but some still sell the
same merchandise (if under a different name) such as the newsagents at 8 (now 27) Tudor Drive. Change also
came to central Morden: fields disappeared under shops and houses in the 1920s; the underground arrived
in 1926; and Crown House in 1961; the Crown pub was replaced by a Caters supermarket, and then by a
Presto store; now it is the Civic Centre. Morden cinema was replaced by Lidl and Iceland. The bus terminal

is the sole constant.

Mick then took us to Mitcham Cricket Green, where modern changes are few and far between. There have
been some during the last 100-odd years, such as the Methodist church (1877, replaced 1958), the Cricketers
inn (c.1799, replaced 1930s, bombed 1940, new post-war) and the village cage (demolished 1887, replaced
by Vestry Hall). The horse trough has been moved a few yards, but remains. More recent changes include the
move of Mitcham Fire Station from Lower Green West to a new building on the site of the former Mitcham

or Surrey Brewery.

Keith Penny looked at changes in Mitcham, starting with ‘the most-travelled clock in London’, the Jubilee
Clock at Fair Green, and moving on to one of our more notable transformations, the café that was once the
public conveniences. The Majestic cinema became a Sainsbury’s in 1980, Gutteridge’s Seed Merchants (closed
1969) an unimaginative Barclay’s Bank, and the Fair Green shelter (1929) has been removed.

Western Road’s grimy industrial landscape, with chimneys and gas works, is now cleaner, but not so much a
place of employment, though sprouting satellite TV dishes and a mast for mobile phone communication. In
1975 Greyhound Terrace became a flagship in the slum clearances of the time, as also was Ebenezer Terrace
or Allen’s Cottages, another insanitary terrace of small houses, with front doors that opened directly on to the
road. In Rowan Road, Marco’s decaying Refrigerator Works was eventually replaced by Lidl, and, further
along, the stylish Smith Meters factory (1999), a source of employment for many female workers.

Housing: the industrial Towers Creamery was replaced by The Meadows, a development with no architectural
sympathy for its surroundings. However, the developers did provide a replica of the Home Guard memorial
on the Creamery (the old one being kept by the British Legion). High-rise Council flats were built and in turn
replaced by low-rise terraces. Elsewhere new private developers have been hard at it, like their predecessors
in Beckway Road (Fulfords) and Manor Way (Joseph Owen’s Tamworth Park Construction Company).

Churches do not change much, but an exception is the Roman Catholic church of St Michael in Pollards
Hill, whose internal arrangements were turned through 180 degrees, so what was the front is now the back,
and vice versa (below).

New front of St Michael Old front of St Michael

Our theme today has been one of change, but it is not always very great. In 2014 the equipment of the
Bolstead recreation ground has changed, but not all that much, except perhaps for the skateboarding slope.
And some places do improve – Rowan Road Recreation ground looked rather dowdy in 1999, but now,
in 2014, is clean and bright and used by lots of parents with children. The level crossing at Eastfields,
with little space for road traffic, was much improved in 1990, and the new Mitcham Eastfields station was
opened in 2008.

Each of our speakers was deservedly applauded for a most enlightening and entertaining presentation.

DH

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 7

LOCAL HISTORY WORKSHOPS

Friday 30 January 2015. Five present (in the cold). David Haunton in the chair

.
Peter Hopkins has been exploring the Surrey History Centre database at the Exploring Surrey’s Past website
(http://www.exploringsurreyspast.org.uk). He had found 1777 Morden entries, among which he had identified
several documents which he found well worth looking at when he went to Woking. Amongst them were
two collections of documents relating to the George inn in Morden, which filled in many of the gaps in his
records between 1598 and 1736. He has researched the site as far back as the 1290s. Peter mentioned related
entries from the 17th, 18th and 19th century and even the 1910 Valuation records got a mention.
.
Rosemary Turner had rediscovered some information about Nonsuch Palace that a friend who worked
at W S Atkins had sent her some years ago. It was about a virtual model that had formed part of a display
at SHC in 2005. The idea was first suggested in the late 1990s, when SHC got some private funding and a
sponsorship from W S Atkins. It was thought that the programme allowed you to walk through the building.
She had also an article about the palace and excavation from The Illustrated London News 23 May 1960.
Rosemary had been going through a box of family photographs

and found some of herself, when very young, in the back
garden of her family home in Faversham Road, Morden. In the
background is the Morden Recreation Ground woodland where

the remains of the medieval hall are situated.

Two other photos were used in the Merton Memory Bank Project.

Rosemary had given them a copy of a Coronation Street party

and it had appeared on a bookmark. The other appeared on a

Sutton Archives leaflet, which had been taken from a newspaper.
Rosemary had found the original photo (right). It shows a fancy
dress competition at the St Helier Ideal Social Club in 1954.

Rosemary was an honorary member as she used to go there after

school. The photo also shows her mother and aunt.

.
David Luff showed us some recent photographs of the state of the Merton priory wall, and discussed some
proposed courses of action.

.
Keith Penny brought this map copied from the 1910 Inland Revenue
survey that showed the ‘Blake’s Folly’ houses (see Bulletins 190 and
192). One of the detached houses was used as dressing rooms by football
players, but the floors were so uneven and in such dilapidated condition
that the house was unfit for habitation. A corner of one house was ‘strutted
up’. Some of the surrounding land was marked as ‘swampy’. The survey

books for Lonesome were well supplied with sketch maps and details of

building layouts.
Keith had also been reviewing the evidence of what bombs fell where

during the air raid of 23/24 September 1916. The War Office and
Metropolitan Police reports disagreed about the kinds of bomb, whilst the locations specified did not accord
with what Percy Gwyer, who grew up in Lonesome, had been told. Although an unexploded bomb was
discovered some weeks later by Alfred Mizen, it was not clear where he had found it; according to the 1910
Survey, the main Mizen fields were not under the flight path of Zeppelin L31.

.
David Haunton has been looking at archaeological reports in early Bulletins. MHS quite often ran rescue digs
between 1962 and 1975, but thereafter, with the rise of professional archaeology, was reduced to watching
briefs and commenting on chance finds. This seems to have led to a major fall in membership (from 230
in 1977 to 85 in 1982) which was only slowly reversed as more and more articles on local history were
published, separately or in the Bulletin.
On Dewey Bates the painter, John W Brown has kindly decoded the 1871 Census address (‘Ackworth Villas
401 Holmfield’) as ‘Ackworth’, No.1 Holmfield Villas, Streatham High Road. This was situated opposite the
junction with Green Lane and later allocated the number 592, but the house was demolished in the 1920s.
An obituary for Dewey has been found in the South Eastern Advertiser for 27 August 1898. This confirms
that he was very poor (though ‘well known’in Rye), gives useful addresses and a birth date, and promulgates
several of his self-dramatizing tall tales.

Rosemary Turner

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 8

Friday 13 March 2015. Six present. David Haunton in the chair

.
Peter Hopkins brought along some panels he had prepared for an exhibition at a Medieval Studies Forum
day on ‘Moated Sites in Surrey’ organised by Surrey Archaeological Society. The late Dennis Turner, a
leading light in both MHS and SyAS, had produced provisional lists of moated sites in 1969 and 1977, which
included seven possible sites across Merton, Morden and Mitcham. Eric Montague had suggested another,
and Peter briefly wondered about one more. He has drafted a booklet examining the evidence for these nine
sites, which we hope to publish later this year.
Peter had also come across a copy of a letter at Surrey History Centre [QRWS/30/NEW/1] sent from Morden,
in November 1916, by a war widow, describing her difficult journey home from South Africa with her children
(see page 11).

Surrey History Centre also has correspondence from 1913-1914 from Arthur Ling to his fiancée Nellie Dillon,
who was in service at Morden House in London Road, Morden. Peter wondered whether anyone would like
to research this archive [8917/1].

.
David Luff had discovered a photo of Bill Rudd in 1988 manning an MHS stall at a Civic Society event at
the old Morden Library.
David has been researching films produced at Merton Park Studios in the 1950s and 1960s. Many are now
available in digital format. There are occasional glimpses of Merton Park, Wimbledon Chase and Wimbledon
Theatre, and Michael Caine made an early, if unsuccessful, appearance in a 1962 Edgar Wallace mystery,
Solo for Sparrow. Judith Goodman commented that she had watched all these films again recently and
wondered why she had enjoyed the originals so much! Cyril Maidment pointed out that there was an article

on the studios in the March Wimbledon Society Newsletter.

.
Madeline Healey brought along her family Bible, given to her relative Elizabeth Soane in 1820 by Mrs
Langdale of The Firs, Mitcham. The Langdales were Roman Catholics, and the Bible was the 1784 edition
issued under Pope Clement XIV, and included a surprisingly modern ‘Prayer for Moderation on Religious
Opinions’. Elizabeth had recorded many family events on the flyleaves of the Bible, and later generations
had continued the practice, giving Madeline plenty of material for family history research. [Peter apologised
that he had recorded the name as Searle instead of Soane in the last Bulletin.]

.
Cyril Maidment showed a Museum of London Archaeology report of September 2014 which includes photos
of the surviving lengths of the Merton priory wall. He also updated us on the National Trust’s plans to repair

and protect the wall, with the intention of creating public access by 2016/17. However, Cyril highlighted
some confusion about what land the Trust owns, or leases, in the vicinity of the wall as the Pickle Ditch was
diverted more than 80 years ago, but is not shown with the diversion in the relevant drawing.

.
David Haunton has discovered more about artist Dewey Bates, having been told by member Anne Ramon
of the American Ancestry website. Dave now has Bates’ description from his passport!
He has been enjoying a 1975 book by a London train-, tram- and ‘bus-spotter born in 1905, which mentions
a one-carriage horse train operating within Millwall Docks. It also mentions a tram route known as the
Klondyke in the 1920s, ‘on the wilderness of the Mitcham/Streatham border’, where part of Southcote Road
was only defined by the tramway’s granite sets among the tall grasses!

Dave had recently purchased a print by Kenneth Broad depicting The New Fair at Mitcham, around 19251930
(see front page). He wondered what the tall red and white poles might be for. Can anyone help?

Peter Hopkins

Friday 1 May 2015. Five present. Peter Hopkins in the chair

.
Keith Penny had interviewed Mrs May Edwards, who moved to Leonard Road, right on the edge of the
borough, in the late 1920s. Her father was buying the house, in the Borough of Wandsworth, but the terraced
cottages on the other side of the road, in Mitcham, were rented. She recalled the local doctor’s approach to
charging for services in the days before the NHS: ‘There used to be a doctor down here called Dr Pailthorpe,
and he was a very upright sort of person. He had a chauffeur-driven car. And I was taken ill with – well, I
can’t remember what I had … he charged my parents half a crown a visit, but the people on the other side of
the road he attended, he only used to charge a shilling because he used to say if we were buying the houses,
we’ve got more money than those over there. It probably was the other way around, really.'[This Dr Pailthorpe
supported local football teams and the Good Shepherd Mission; he was one the first two churchwardens of
St Olave, Mitcham.] ‘He was a very upright man, and he’d sort of go with his rolled umbrella and all that.
Yes, he was very much the village doctor.’
MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 9

Keith had also looked at the online Hansard (record of proceedings in Parliament) for the First World War,
to see if there were mentions of Merton, Morden or Mitcham. Only Mitcham appeared: a Member asked the
Under-Secretary of State for War if he knew about the rates being paid to a Mitcham firm for making khaki
coats and haversacks and suggested that sweated [grossly underpaid] labour was being used. He was assured
that ‘all War Office contracts contain the Fair-Wages Clause.’ A pacifist MP asked the Under-Secretary of
State for War if he knew of two cases where men clearly unfit for military service had nevertheless had to
go before medical boards. One had been passed for general service, a decision that Dr Love, the Chairman
of the Mitcham Tribunal, thought absurd.

.
Rosemary Turner had discovered the photocopy of the drawing of the river Wandle that she had mentioned
previously (to be published in a future Bulletin). She was still trying to find out where her husband had
found it. She noted that the only landmarks shown on the map were in the Merton area, including the land
purchased by Capt. Bidder to build his mansion. She had identified the poem round the map as ‘Tide River’
from Charles Kingsley’s Water Babies.

The map was drawn by H M Ellis in 1910; the artist may have had a connection with Merton. The 1910
Valuation Records also show the purchase of land by Capt. Bidder, and Herbert Moules Ellis owning houses
at nos.1-6 Wandle Road (named Riverward, Meadowland, Woodside, Broadlands, Longmead and Maybank).
The Valuation shows these houses as semi-detached, with three bedrooms, box room, bath, WC and store
cupboard above, a hall, sitting rooms, kitchen, scullery and food cupboard below, while outside there are
Coals, WC, yard, front and back garden ‘not planted’. They are built of brick, with tiled roof, rough cast and
part hanging tiles externally, but inside they are not papered, nor is painting finished. They are not included
in 1909 assessment, so were probably completed after 30 April 1909. The houses were all leased to Miss
Mary Parton for 99-years from 1908 and she then leased them to individuals for a term of three years. Among
the addresses where Mr Ellis lived was Garbrand House, Ewell, which later became Bourne Hall. Judith

commented that the father of Herbert Moules Ellis was a great friend of William Morris.

Rosemary had also found an Official Programme for the Victory Celebrations 8 June 1946. It details the

order of procession and other entertainment throughout the day and evening at several locations.

.
David Luff recalled that in 1983 he got a place on the Manpower temporary job scheme. He worked in
the Wandle Industrial Museum which at the time was run by team leader John Cook. The scheme gave
fourteen months employment and paid £65 every two weeks, funded by North Sea Oil revenue. David kept a
scrapbook diary of newsletters, newspaper cuttings and photos taken during his time there. In 1984 he spent
a week at Singlegate School giving talks to the classes on Libertys and the Merton Abbey Printworks. The
children dressed up in Liberty dresses and scarves from his collection. This was the first time that they had
been worn. David also took them to visit the Liberty site. David really enjoyed his time there and at the end
of the week they presented him with a book of drawings that the children had done showing what they had
learnt. He also has some 8mm film of that week. David
has shown his scrapbook and the book of drawings to
the museum.

.
Judith Goodman had received a number of photographs
of the Hadfield paint factories. Only two are dated
(1915) and show women in the workforce at the Varnish
works in Phipps Bridge, Merton (right). There are also
photos of the paintworks in Western Road, Mitcham.
She said that William Sleath, the artist of the

watercolour of Christ Church Colliers Wood on the

front of the December 2014 Bulletin, was a tapestry

weaver at the Morris works.

.
Peter Hopkins spoke about the display that he was putting together for the Surrey History Symposium
[report forthcoming]. One board used information from the Bulletin article by Eric Montague on the 1866
cholera outbreak in Mitcham (June 2004). With the help of Steve Turner’s burial register transcription and
Dave Haunton’s searches in the 1861 census he had been able to trace six of the people mentioned in the

article who died of Cholera. Several victims lived at Blue Houses, Mitcham, while others lived in Phipps
Bridge and Fieldgate Lane.

Rosemary Turner
Dates of next Workshops: Fridays 26 June, 7 August and 25 September at 2.30pm
At Wandle Industrial Museum. All are welcome.

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 10

PETER HOPKINS has come across
A LETTER FROM WORLD WAR 1

Surrey History Centre has recently obtained a copy of a letter [QRWS/30/NEW/1] sent from 2 Park Cottages,
Morden, in November 1916, by Alice Mary Newman, to her husband, Sergeant Cecil Robert Newman.

The text of the letter is reproduced verbatim below:

2 Park Cottage
Nov 9th 1914 Morden
Nr. Mitcham
My Own Darling Husband

a line to let you know I arrived safely after a very trying voyage. I will tell you all about it dearest.
First of all we were in the Heights 3 weeks after you had gone, & then 3 week on the boat before we
sailed, at Cape town, & then we were on the water 7 weeks, & we had 2 German spys on it but they took
one off at Cape Town & the other one was Cook on the Dover Castle & the Captain mistrusted him with
something, & they had his boxes searched, & found all plains of the boat & how many troops there was
on board, so they took him off at Southampton, & I had all the Children down with measels & Bronchitis,
& there was 380 down with measels & we lost eleven children at sea. I have had a rough time of it &
worried that I hardly know what to do with myself.

I have had Gwennie with Broncho pneumonia as well as measels & I was up with her 5 nights & 5 days,
& never took my cloths off. Darling I can tell you I feel quite run down, I had to give her 1 teaspoon full
of Champagne every 2 hours & 4 drops of something else every hour & milk & egg water another hour
& poultice her every hour, & darling you can just see what I have gone through.

Hoping to see you soon darling
xxxxx
God Bless you dearest.

I first learned about this letter from an article in the latest edition of Surrey History describing some new accessions

at Surrey History Centre. This gave additional information, and more can be found in the SHC catalogue.
Sergeant Newman was a regular soldier who had enlisted in 1906, aged 18, with the 2nd Battalion, The Queen’s
Royal West Surrey Regiment. When WW1 broke out he was serving in South Africa, and Alice and their three
children were living there as well. The Battalion and officers’ families travelled back immediately, arriving in
Belgium on 27 September. Alice and the children, and no doubt other families, had to travel in steerage on the
Dover Castle. They reached Southampton on 1 November, and young Gwennie died shortly after.

Sergeant Newman was in the 22nd Brigade of the British Expeditionary Force in Belgium, and died in action

in the first Battle of Ypres on 21 October, before this letter was written.
Paul Howard, who has been researching those listed on the Morden WW1 Memorial on the lych gate of St
Lawrence church, tells me that Sergeant Newman is not listed there. His own researches have revealed that he
was born at Twickenham in 1888 and married Alice Mary Norman in Colchester in 1909. The family address
in 1914 was 2 Park Cottages, Morden. Alice remarried in 1916 in the Croydon registration district, and signed
for his medals as A M Stannard.

Can you help?

Paul is still trying to find information on five names on the lych gate memorial: W Bullin, G Hickling, J Newell,
W Newell and W J Welsh. If anyone can help, do contact editor@mertonhistoricalsociety.org.uk.

CORRECTION: Enzeli Expedition

I must apologise for inserting the wrong date, of 1918, into Mavis Priestley’s letter on p.16 of the March
Bulletin. The unfortunate Royal Naval Enzeli Expedition that she referred to took place in 1920, when a party
of 31 officers and men set off for Enzeli on the Caspian Sea, to assist the Persians with an impounded White
Russian Flotilla. En route, they were captured by Red forces at the oil town of Baku, where they endured six

months as prisoners of war until released under a prisoner exchange scheme.

This was but one small incident in the post-Revolution chaos of South Russia, where Reds fought Whites, and
local interests shifted alliances between them. Tiny units of British Army, Navy and Air Force men were sent to
assist White forces, starting in August 1918, when a party led by Lionel Dunster (prototype for Kipling’s Stalky)
reached Enzeli from Iraq. David Haunton

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 11

PETER HOPKINS has been surprised by the amount of information available about
ANTHONY TOTO, TUDOR ARTIST AND LESSEE OF THE MANOR OF
RAVENSBURY IN MITCHAM AND MORDEN, SURREY

At the end of the April 2014 Workshop I asked David Haunton if there was any way of tracing a Tudor artist
called Anthony Toto, and he kindly provided me with Toto’s entry in the Grove Dictionary of Art (1996,
Macmillan), which referred me to a 1954 book called Tudor Artists, which in turn supplied me with references

to a multitude of learned articles and original sources.1

In December 1542 Henry VIII granted to ‘our servant Antonie Toto’a 40-year lease of the manor of ‘Ravesbury’,
which had come into the king’s hands following the attainder and execution of Sir Nicholas Carew.2 In June
1545, one of the Ravensbury tenants was brought before the Privy Council for beating two servants of Anthony
Tote with a forked staff – though the case was dismissed as one of the servants was a Scot – thought to be a spy!3

In 1546, Toto brought an action in the court of Star Chamber against many more of his tenants and neighbours,
accusing them of ‘unlaufull assemble & riott’ against him, including various encroachments on common land
of the manor, unlawful occupation of demesne land, non-payment of rent, diversion of the river causing flood
damage, poaching of trout, deliberate destruction of crops by livestock, stealing and killing of his sheep and
shooting his spaniels. In addition there were many instances of threats of violence against Toto, his family, his
servants, and those few tenants who supported Toto.4

One man in particular, Nicholas Spackman, ‘came to yor Orators howsse in London and raylyd uppon his wyff
& with great othes threthynyd your Orators servants to have a legge or an arme of theym yf he cowd mete with

theym and thus sent three severall tymes his sonnes & servants to the parisshe of Mich’m and there lodgyd and

lay in waytt for yor Orators servants yf they cowd have mete with theym. … And the said Spagman also seyd
theis words in effect: “I have three Sonnes that shall cut any man as small as flesshe to the pott that comes to any
ground that my vicar or fermer hathe, to tak a distres”.’ Of course, all the accused denied all charges, claiming

that any disputed land was not within Ravensbury manor.5

Who was this man who had managed to upset so many people in such a short time, and who provoked such
anger and violence from some of the leading inhabitants? Surprisingly, there is a great deal of information
about Anthony Toto in the extant records of the Tudor monarchs, for he had been a serjeant-painter to Henry
VIII, Edward VI and Mary I.

He is also mentioned frequently by his younger contemporary Georgio Vasari, artist and author of Lives of

the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, who did not, however, devote one of his Lives to Toto.
Toto was born and baptised Antonio del Nunziata d’Antonio in Florence on 18 January 1498/9, and the record
of his baptism in Florence cathedral is still extant, though I have no idea which of these Antonios he is!6

More commonly known by the diminutive ‘Toto’, Antonio was the son of an artist described by Vasari as ‘a
puppet-painter, … in some things a person of distinction, and above all in preparing fireworks’and as ‘an amusing
and facetious person’.7 Vasari informs us that young Toto was ‘a disciple of Ridolfo [Ghirlandaio] … who
always kept many young men painting in his workshop: which was the reason that not a few of them, through
competing one with another, became very good masters, some at making portraits from life, some at working in
fresco, others in distemper, and others at painting readily on cloth. Making these lads execute pictures, panels,
and canvases, in the course of a few years Ridolfo, with great profit for himself, sent an endless number of these
to England, to Germany, and to Spain. … Toto del Nunziata, was summoned … to England by the King of that
country, … after having seen some of [his] work.’8

In his Life of Perino del Vaga, Vasari further explains that Toto, ‘likewise attaining in time to equality with the
finest intellects, departed from Florence and made his way with some Florentine merchants to England, where
he executed all his works, and was very richly rewarded by the King of that country, whom he also served in
architecture, erecting, in particular, his principal palace’.9

Vasari clearly thought highly of Toto’s work. In his Life of Masaccio he lists Toto among 25 of ‘the most celebrated
sculptors and painters, who have lived from [Masaccio’s] day to our own’ including Botticelli, Leonardo da
Vinci, Michelagnolo [sic] and Raffaello da Urbino.10

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 12

In September 1519 Toto, together with two sculptors, was recruited by Pietro Torrigiani, the Florentine artist
as famous for breaking Michaelangelo’s nose in a youthful fight as he is for his monument to Henry VII at
Westminster abbey, created between 1512 and January 1519. Under the contract, printed in the Italian edition
of Vasari’s works, Toto bound himself to work for Torrigiani for four-and-a-half years, and practise his arts in
Italy, France, Flanders, England, Germany, or in any other part of the world, with a salary of three gold florins
a month for the first year, and forty ducats a year afterwards, besides the cost of food, lodging, and horse hire.
Torrigiani was working in Spain by 1522, and died there in 1528, but may well have returned to England in the
meantime to complete the altar in Henry VII’s chapel.11

It is not known if Toto went to Spain with Torrigiani, or remained in England. One modern authority states that
he was ‘named with Giovanni da Maiano among others in the building records for a banqueting hall in the royal
palace in Greenwich’ in 1527, but close inspection of these records has not revealed any mention of Toto.12

It has been suggested that he worked for cardinal Wolsey –
who had been one of Torrigiani’s patrons – and that he may
have been the artist responsible for the series of long narrow

panels, painted in oil – the Last Supper, the Scourging at the
Pillar, Christ bearing the Cross, and the Resurrection – in
‘Cardinal Wolsey’s closet’at Hampton Court (right),13 but this
proposal has not met with universal acceptance.14 He certainly

produced work for Hampton Court, but the earliest extant
record is from a royal account book of November 1530, by

which time Wolsey was dead and Hampton Court had passed

to the king. The 1530 accounts reveal that Toto had produced
five ‘tables’ or paintings:15

‘To Antonye Tote, payntor, for the payntynge of 5 tables stondyng in the Kynge’s Lybarye:

Ffirste, one table of Joachym and Sent Anne.

Item, another table how Adam dylffed [delved] in the grownde.

Item, the third table how Adam was droven owght of Paradyce.

Item, the fourth table, of the buryenge of our Lord.

Item, the fifth table, beynge the last table, of the buryeng of our blessyd Ladye.
The saydAntonye takynge for the sayd 5 tables, by a bargain in gret [ie. at an agreed price for the set] – £6 13s.4d.’

In 1532 a similar entry appears:

‘The Payntynge of 4 tables in the Kynge’s Closet:

Item, To Antonye Tote, paynter, for the payntyng of 4 great tablys – that is to say,

one table of our Lady of Petye;

another table of the 4 Evangylysts;

the third of the Mawndy …16

The fourth … [illegible]
the sayd Antonye takyng for the sayd tables, by a bargen wyth hym made by great – £20’.
Toto provided similar tables as New Year ‘gifts’ for the king – ‘a depicted table of Calomia’ at Hampton Court
in 1539,17 ‘a goodly table’ at Greenwich in 1540, and ‘a table of the story of King Alexander’ at Hampton Court
in 1541, for each of which he received a ‘reward’ of 6s 8d.18

But these ‘rewards’ were not the only payment Toto received from the king. A volume of royal household
expenses from 1529 to 1531 records that Toto and another painter from Florence, Barthilmewe Penne, had each
received a royal warrant dated 4 June 1530, whereby they were each to receive an annual wage of £25, paid
quarterly, the first payment being paid retrospectively as from 2 February 1530.19 As Wolsey had surrendered
all his properties to the king on 22 October 1529, it does seem likely that Toto and Penne had transferred their

services from the cardinal to the king.

Thereafter Toto is regularly associated with Penne in the extant household accounts of Henry VIII and Edward
VI, usually as the joint recipients of £12 10s a quarter, though sometimes entered separately.20 They also received
joint payments of 45 shillings for livery coats twice a year, first recorded on 8 November 1530.21

Although Toto’s main work had been to produce these ‘tables’ or paintings he, like his contemporaries, was
also expected to turn his hand to any artistic enterprise within the royal household. Thus, accounts relating
to the funeral of Jane Seymour in 1537 list over 3000 religious or heraldic items to be produced, within a
fortnight of the queen’s death at midnight on 24 October, by a team of nine named painters, including Anthony

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 13

‘Tawte’.22 Toto was responsible for 200 ‘schochons’ or escutcheons depicting the king’s and queen’s arms (out
of a total of 1906) and 100 ‘pyncils’ or pennons depicting their badges (out of 1000), but he was the only one
identified as producing a ‘pycture of the quene wich to be redy within 4 dayes ensewing’ – probably a painted
effigy – a task ‘only entrusted to an artist who had special skill in the presentation of likeness’.23 He delivered
his contribution on 28 October.

On 26 June 1538 Toto was granted denization by letters patent of the king.24 Later that year he established his
first link with Mitcham, being granted by the king two cottages and 12 acres land in Mycheham, by payment
of a red rose at St John Baptist’s day annually.25 As we have seen, this link was strengthened in December 1542
when he was granted a 40-year lease of the manor of Ravensbury.26

Toto’s improving financial situation is reflected in the Subsidy Roll entries relating to his London home in the
parish of St Bride, Fleet Street; in 1536/37 he was taxed at 10 shillings on goods assessed at £20, whereas in
1540/41 he was taxed at £5 on goods assessed at £100.27At his death in 1555 he had still been leasing a messuage
in Fletestrete ‘and a garden adjacent next the manor or capital messuage called Bridewell place’ – probably one
of the buildings depicted on the Agas map c.1562 (detail below).28

On 14 April 1541, Toto received licence to export 600 tuns of beer. 29 That he actually made use of this grant
is confirmed by proceedings which took place in Chancery. According to the court records, Bartholomew
Compaigni, merchant of Florence, a deputy of Anthony Toto, servant and painter to the King, complained against
Robert Archebell, gentleman, John Jamys and Thomas Hylles, who had boarded a hoy, attacked the boatmen,
wounded them and taken away 42 barrels of beer, of the value of £10 13s 4d which were to be exported from
London to Flushing. Bartholomew Compaigni was a well-known Florentine merchant resident in England.
Toto’s more famous contemporary, Hans Holbein, had similarly received a licence to buy and export 600 tuns
of beer in May 1538.30 I suspect Henry VIII’s grants of export licences were convenient alternatives to cash
payments for work done, rather than special treats for his favourite painters!

On 18 October 1543 Toto was granted life appointment to the office of serjeant-painter, at an annual wage of
an additional £10.31

(To be continued)

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 14

1
Erna Auerbach Tudor Artists (University of London, The Athlone Press, 1954)

2
The National Archives (TNA) C 66/712 m.28(4): Letters and Papers Foreign and Domestic Henry VIII 17 (1900) 1251
(13), p.688

3
John Roche Dasent Acts of the Privy Council of England n.s.I (1890) pp.182-3, 186-7: British Library (BL) Add MS
5476 ff.38 & 44: Letters and Papers … 20.1 (1905) 876 p.439, 899 p.446

4
TNA STAC 2/17 (169); STAC 2/22 (298); BL Add Roll 23642

5
TNA STAC 2/17/169 mm.9, 36

6
Florence, Archive of the Opera del Duomo, San Giovanni Christening Records Archive reg 6: http://archivio.operaduomo.
fi.it/battesimi/visualizza_carta.asp?id=6&p=220; Dominic Colnaghi A Dictionary of Florentine Painters (1928) p.191:
‘Flor., b. Jan 18 1498/9’; AE Popham ‘Hans Holbein’s Italian Contemporaries in England’in The Burlington Magazine
for Connoisseurs 84.490 (1944) p.13. No Antonios are listed under 8 Jan as given in Milanesi’s 1880 edition of Giorgio
Vasari Lives of the most eminent painters sculptors and architects vol. 5, p.543 n.1+: ‘nacque Antonio chiamato Toto,
agli otto di gannajo 1498 [Antonio called Toto was born 8 January 1498] (Libro de’Battezzati in Firenze nell’Archivio
dell’ Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore, ad annum)’; Milanesi’s 1881 edition of Vasari vol. 6, p.543 n.1+: ‘Aggiungeremo
qui che egli nacque l’otto di gennaio 1498′ [We will add here that he was born on 8 January 1498].

7
Giorgio Vasari Lives of the most eminent painters sculptors and architects, trans. Gaston du C de Vere (in 10 volumes
1912-15) vol. 8 pp.61-2. John Gough Nichols’ interpretation of this phrase as a maker of ‘crucifixes and madonnas’

– ‘Notices of the Contemporaries and Successors of Holbein’ in Archaeologia 39 (1863) p.32 – is rejected by R W
Carden ‘The Italian Artists in England during the Sixteenth Century’ in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of
London 2nd series 24 (1911-12) p.179.
8
Vasari op cit 4 p.280

9
Vasari op cit 6, pp.191, 196

10 Vasari op cit 2, p.190

11 Alfred Higgins ‘On the Work of Florentine Sculptors in England in the early part of the sixteenth century; with special
reference to the Tombs of Cardinal Wolsey and King Henry VIII’ in The Archaeological Journal 51:1 (1894) pp.141,
142, 144-5. A copy of the contract between Torrigiani and Toto is reproduced as a footnote in Milanesi’s 1879 edition
of Vasari vol. 4, p.262.

12 Hans Volmer ‘Toto, Antonio del Nunziata’ in Ulrich Thieme & Felix Becker (ed) Allgemeines Lexikon der Bildenden
Künstler: Theodotos–Urlaub (1939) p.318. I am grateful to Katharina Mayer Haunton for drawing my attention to this
article and for translating it from the original German. TNA E 36/227 ff.1-35v, 48-61v: Letters and Papers 4.2 (1875)
3104, pp.1394-7, 3563, pp.1603-4; TNA SP 1/45 ff.20-41: State Papers Online 1509-1714: Letters and Papers 4.2
(1875) 3564, pp.1604-6

13 Ernest Law The History of Hampton Court I: Tudor Times (George Bell and Sons, London, 1903 edn) p.54

14 A E Popham op cit p.14

15 Ernest Law op cit p.129, citing folios 16 and 160 of the accounts, presumably TNA E 36/236; R W Carden op cit p.181

16 Toto’s successor as serjeant-painter presented queen Mary with a similar ‘table painted with the Maundy’ at New
Year 1556 (Erna Auerbach op cit p.55, citing J Nichols Illustrations of the Manners and Expences of Antient Times in
England in the Fifteenth, Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (1797) pp.1-28: ‘New Year’s gifts presented to Queen
Mary in 1556’)

17 John Gough Nicholls op cit in Archaeologia 39 (1863) p.36, citing BL Arundel MS 97. The subject was The Calumny
of Apelles, a favourite with artists of this period. Toto’s table may well be that described in a Whitehall inventory of
1547: ‘A table of walnut-tree [i.e. a panel, not a canvas] of King Midas and Misery, raised with liquid gold and silver’

– A E Popham op cit p.13, citing Richard Forster ‘Die Verläumdung des Apelles in der Renaissance’ in Preussisch
Jahrbuch viii (1887), p.110, which in turn cites Wornum Some account of the life of Hans Holbein (1867) p.385, from
which this description is taken. Apelles was a Greek painter of the Hellenistic period, whose painting of Midas and
Slander/Calumny is described by Lucian in his On Calumny.
18 BL Arundel MS 97 ff.108b and 165: Letters and Papers 16 (1898) 380, p.178, 1489, p.699; for Toto’s New Year’s
rewards 1548/9 and 1549/50 see John Gough Nichols (ed) Literary Remains of King Edward the Sixth I (1857) p.cccxvi
19 TNA E 101/420/11 f.103: Letters and Papers 5 (1880) 685a, pp.319, 321: Erna Auerbach op cit p.55; J Payne Collier

(ed) Trevelyan Papers prior to 1558 (1857) p.167; John Gough Nicholls op cit in Archaeologia 39 (1863) p.38

20 J Payne Collier op cit pp.170 (September 1530), 177 (March 1531: £12 12s),

21 John Gough Nicholls op cit in Archaeologia 39 (1863) p.38

22 The Archives of the Duke of Northumberland at Alnwick Castle, DNP: MS 467, ff.46-47: Third Report of the Royal
Commission on Historical Manuscripts (1872) p.113; Erna Auerbach op cit p.56

23 The word ‘picture’ was used of a three-dimensional effigy at the funeral of Edward VI: Erna Auerbach op cit pp.78-9

24 TNA C 66/678 m.17: Letters and Papers 13.1 (1892) 1309 (35) citing P.S. Pat. p. 1, m. 17; Latin text printed in Thomas
Rymer Foedera 6.1 (3rd edn 1841) pt 3 pp.16-17; English summary: The Volume of the Walpole Society 20 (1931-32)

p.10, from Vertue’s Notebook A.g BL Add MS 23,070 [V.6, BM 13b]
25 TNA C 66/680 m.1: Letters and Papers 13.2 (1893) 967 (46) – P.S. Pat. p. 3, m.1
26 TNA C 66/712 m.28(4): Letters and Papers 17 (1900) 1251 (13), p.688
27 TNA E 179/144/103 and E 179/144/117; Lists of Aliens Resident in London, Henry VIII to James I (Huguenot Society

X) i, 56; Erna Auerbach op cit p.55
28 TNA C 66/884 mm.21-22: Calendar of Patent Rolls, Philip and Mary II, p.75; Agas map: Harry Margary A Collection
of Early Maps of London 1553-1667 (1981)
29 TNA C 76/206 m.6 = TNA C 82/779: Letters and Papers 16 (1898) 779 (18), p.382 citing PS; Fr ’22’ Hen VIII, m.6
30 TNA C 82/740: Letters and Papers 13.1 (1892) 1099 & 1115 (65) – SB; Arthur B Chamberlain ‘Holbein’s Visit to

“High Burgony”’ in The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs 21.109 (1912) p.27
31 TNA C 66/731 m.24: Letters and Papers 19.1 (1903) 80 (43), p.42 – P.S. Pat. p.10, m.24

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 15

MERTON HERITAGE DISCOVERY DAY
Saturday 28 March at Morden Library

This day was an undoubted success for Sarah Gould and her volunteer team: around 900 visitors sampled the
displays and talks provided by Merton’s heritage groups. The theme was the fiftieth anniversary of the creation
of the London Borough of Merton, though this was not easily followed by every organisation present. More
‘active’ stalls introduced children to archaeology, or showed the way in which rivers form and the effect of the

Wandle on the environment; visitors could listen to audio clips matched to some ‘Merton Memories’ pictures.

A photo display recalled the experiences of nurses and patients at Morden Hall military hospital during the First
World War. Other heritage groups had stalls to advertise their interests and activities: the Society’s one stocked
a selection of publications and for the first time included a slide show of photographs, including some from the
1960s, mixed with advertisements for present and forthcoming books. Sales were better than at last year’s event.

photo: David Haunton
Useful for the committee members present was the opportunity for informal meetings with representatives of
other societies. Talks were well attended and of a high standard, and David Luff kept his audience intrigued by
his collection of Sindy dolls and other Lines Brothers items, despite having the last slot of the day for his talk.

Feedback is already being gathered for the improvement of next year’s event.

Keith Penny

Merton Local Studies Carved in Stone project: War Story Days

Sarah Gould’s team are staging a number of these Days, where they will film short interviews with Merton
residents whose relatives fought in the First World War, or supported the local war effort. If you have family
stories that you would like to share, or wartime photos or memorabilia that they can record for posterity, they

would love to hear from you.

The War Story events will also feature a range of talks, photographic displays, children’s crafts and access to

wartime documents and objects. [Day 1 has already passed.]
Day 2: June 20th, 10am – 4pm. Acacia Centre, Grove Road, Mitcham CR4 1SD
Day 3: August 1st, 11am – 5pm. Wimbledon Studio Theatre, The Broadway, SW19 1QG

If you would like to be interviewed please call:

Kelvin Shewry or Sarah Gould on 020 8545 4038/3239, Email: local.studies@merton.gov.uk

Letters and contributions for the Bulletin should be sent to the Hon. Editor by email to
editor@mertonhistoricalsociety.org.uk. The views expressed in this Bulletin are those

of the contributors concerned and not necessarily those of the Society or its Officers.

website: www.mertonhistoricalsociety.org.uk email: mhs@mertonhistoricalsociety.org.uk

Printed by Peter Hopkins

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY – BULLETIN 194 – JUNE 2015 – PAGE 16