Book Review - Notes on Old Chipperfield

The Two Brewers (Locke & Smith)

Helen Gordon Liddle was a suffragette who wrote The Prisoner: A Sketch. An Experience of Forceable Feeding by a Suffragette. Some time later (if you have details please comment below) it seems she moved to Chipperfield, near Kings Langley, and wrote a most interesting local History Notes on Old Chipperfield. 

Illustrated review of book.

The Grand Union Canal in the Apsley area 100 years ago

The Grand Junction Canal at Doo Little, Apsley End

Roy kindly supplied the above picture of the Grand Junction Canal (now called the Grand Union Canal) at Doo Little, between Apsley and Kings Langley. I have taken this opportunity to add four more pictures of the Canal in the Apsley Area. 

Newly built Paper Mill sold at Kings Langley in 1770 (Nash Mills)

More Information ...

Early Post Cards of Hertfordshire - by Wrench

Bishops Stortford

Sir John Evelyn Leslie Wrench (1882-1966) was actively interested in the unity of the British Empire and his post card activities only occupied a few years of a very active life. As a teenager he founded a post card publisher which expanded in a couple of years to become one of the biggest British publishers - and then went bankrupt because it had expanded too fast. He published a number of Hertfordshire view cards in 1903/4, all but one example seen so far having being printed in Saxony. All cards carry a negative number and those recorded so far are:

• 2195 The Parish Church, Watford
• 2196 The Fig Tree Tomb, Watford
• 2198 The Footbridge, Cassiobury Park, Watford
• 2199 The Swiss Cottage, Cassiobury Park, Watford
• 2664 Woodcock Lane, Hertfordshire (location uncertain)
• 2665 Beckhampton Place, Hertfordshire (location uncertain)
• 4919 Church [Interior], Kings Langley
• 4920 The Old Ruins, Kings Langley
• 4921 Church, Kings Langley (wrongly labelled)
• 4922 The Castle Ruins, Kings Langley ("Wrench" name/logo omitted)
• 4923 The Mill, Kings Langley ("Wrench" name/logo omitted)
• 4924 The Mill Bridge, Kings Langley (pub W. Baldwin)
• 5197 Pound House, Kings Langley (pub W. Baldwin)
• 6288 High Street, Bishops Stortford
• 6290 On the Stort, Bishops Stortford
• 6292 South Street, Bishops Stortford
• 6294 The George Inn, St Albans
• 6295 St Michael's Church, St Albans
• 6296 St Albans Abbey from S.W.
• 6297 St Peter's Church, St Albans
• 6303 French Row, St Albans
• 6304 Sopwell Nunnery, St Albans
• 6307 Town Hall, St Albans
• 7758 Congregational Church, New Barnet
• 7760 Hanley Church, Barnet
• 7762 Church & High Street, High Barnet
• 7765 Wesleyan Church, New Barnet
• 8584 Grand Staircase, Hatfield House
• 8586 View from N.W., Hatfield House
• 8587 South Front, Hatfield House
• 8631 Cassiobury Park, Watford
• 8632 The Chalet, Cassiobury Park, Watford
• 8638 Waterfall, Cassiobury Park, Watford

> > > See Pictures of Cards, etc.

If you know of other Hertfordshire cards in the series please let me have details.

I would be particularly interested if there were any on undivided backs, or cards with a style and number which suggests they were in the Wrench series but which do not carry the Wrench name/logo 

2nd London Heavy Brigade, Royal Garrison Artillery

When I was researching The London Gunners come to Town (of Hemel Hempstead) one of the artillery units involved was the 2nd London Heavy Brigade, who were bases at Kings Langley for Christmas 1914. I have recently discovered a press cutting which shows that about a month before they went to France the moved just over the county boundary to Ivinghoe - with their gun, which had been used in the Battle of Ladysmith, in the Boer War. 

Click here for more details.

School Memories of the 1940 -Priory School, Kings Langley

Coombe Hill School (or Priory School as it was later known) was a pretty unconventional school in its attitudes to children. I am therefore delighted to being able to add Paul's memories of the school as it was over 50 years ago.

A Progressive School at Kings Langley

When I saw the advert I thought I was buying just another Buchanan post card of a Hertfordshire school.  

But it was a school I hadn't previously come across. So I started to dig further and discovered a school which, a hundred years ago, believed it was important to bring up children in contact with nature.

The interesting story  of Coombe Hill School, Kings Langley (later called Priory School) starts with three school teacher sisters in Norwich, one of which set up Coombe Hill School in East Grinstead. The school moved to Westerham  and then in 1910 moved into the historic Priory in Kings Langley.  In the 1920s it adopted some of the ideas of Rudolph Steiner, and the old Priory building is now part of the present Rudolph Steiner School.