Hove in the Past: Westbourne Villas, Hove.

Judy Middleton 2003 (revised 2022)

Landowners

The land on which Westbourne Villas was later built was in the hands of the Ingram family by the 1860s, having previously been owned by Edward Knight, both elder and younger, and by Hugh Fuller. There followed a series of transactions until 1880 when the land was owned jointly by George Gallard, J. H. Stretton, Evan Vaughan, and William John Williams. (See also the Cliftonville Estate). On 2 October 1880 the first three men sold their land interests to Williams.

There was a stipulation that the houses must be set back from the road by a distance of at least 5 feet, and each house must cost in both labour and materials at least £1,700. The houses must be private dwellings or professional residences.

Since the houses were set back from the road, the Victorians took great delight in providing a superior pathway to the front door composed of decorative tiles in various patterns. The workmanship was such that many of the paths remain in good condition to this day. (see also Victorian and Edwardian Tiles).

In January 1894 the road was declared a public highway.

Trees

In October 1903 it was decided to plant trees in Westbourne Villas at a cost of £58.

House Notes

Number 1 – Camille Wixler lived here. It was in this house that Miron Grindea came to interview Wixler, and Grindea regarded it as one of his greatest scoops. Grindea was a leading wartime broadcaster with the BBC European Service – he also founded the Anglo-French literary magazine Adam. The reason why Grindea was anxious to talk to Wixler was because he knew the great French novelist Marcel Proust (1871-1922).

Wixler was employed at the Ritz becoming maitre d’hotel. At the time he first met Proust, he had just completed a three-year apprenticeship in his craft. It was of course an honour to be asked to cook for Proust but it also had its drawbacks because Proust kept unusual hours – his working ‘day’ ended at dawn. Therefore at 11.30 p.m. he liked to order his ‘lunch’. Wixler cooked each item for him. On one occasion, Wixler was at home in bed with his mistress, when Proust knocked on his door. Although Proust apologised for disturbing him, he said he was hungry because he had been hard at work for a long time. Wixler said that sometimes Proust managed to consume some fifteen small cups of coffee.

Numbers 8 & 9 – (old numbering) According to the 1887 Directory, Mr Bentley ran Aldrington College at 8 & 9 Upper Westbourne Villas.

Number 8 – In 1992 there was a restaurant here that specialised in cooking English dishes. The establishment was called the Knucker’s Hole. Today Adastral Hotel occupies the premises.

In April 2016 it was reported that planning permission had been sought to covert the 21-bed guest house into eight flats. (Argus 14/4/16)

Number 13 – According to the 1887 Directory, Miss C. E. Johnston ran a girls’ school at this address.

Number 27– From around 1927 to the 1940s St Bride’s School occupied the premises. The principals were Miss Cecily L. Tompson (Oxon) and Miss Watson. The establishment was advertised as a day school with special nursery classes for children of three years and upwards; a home school for a limited number of boarders; a place for the care of delicate children, and a nursery home for children under four years of age.

There was no upper age limit for the girls, but there was for the boys. Although the junior department was mainly co-educational, the older boys undertook certain activities on their own. Older girls were prepared for the Oxford local exams.

(Raphael Tuck & Sons
‘Real Photograph’ postcard no. 8)
Madeleine Carroll, described in this
postcard as a Gaumont-British star,
once taught at St Bride’s

St Bride’s chief claim to fame is that the famous film star Madeleine Carroll (1906-1987) was once a teacher here in her youth. She was born in West Bromwich as Marie Madeleine O’Carroll. She read French at Birmingham University and became a teacher at St Bride’s. Biographical details about her life refer to her teaching at a school in Brighton, but it was Hove, actually. Photogenic Madeleine also modelled hats, and by the 1930s she was a popular film star in Britain.

In 1934 she went to Hollywood to appear in the film The World Moves On directed by John Ford. Other films she appeared in included Lloyd’s of London with Tyrone Power; My Favourite Blonde a Bob Hope comedy, and The General Died at Dawn.

Her best Hollywood film was The Prisoner of Zenda in which she shared a starring role with Ronald Coleman. Coincidentally, also a Hove resident was Sir Charles Aubrey Smith who co-starred in the same film playing the part of Colonel Zapt.

She is also remembered as the leading lady in two Hitchcock thrillers – The Secret Agent and The Thirty-Nine Steps. The later film included a daring scene where the hero played by Robert Donat, helped to remove her wet stockings. At one time Carroll was the highest paid female film star in the world.

Carroll’s sister was killed in the London blitz and in 1943 Carroll interrupted her film career to undertake war relief work in London. She was married twice, but only had one daughter. By the time Carroll died at the age of 81 in Marbella, she had become something of a recluse.

Number 28 – This splendid house is called Morningside, and has some lovely plasterwork. Not content with swags, roundels, and supports under the eaves, there are additional decorations on the pillars flanking the front door, and above the bay windows.

George Gallard (1809-1889) lived in this house for a couple of years. He was the prime mover in the development of the Cliftonville Estate, as well as purchasing land from the Stanford Estate, and developing other roads.

copyright © J.Middleton
George Gallard, responsible for several of the housing developments at Hove, lived at Morningside, number 28

He was responsible for the building and running of the brewery at the top of Osborne Villas as well as being the proprietor of the ‘horse waterworks’ supplying water to parts of Hove. He was an active member of the West Hove Improvement Commissioners from 1858 to 1874, and the Hove Commissioners. He was firmly in support of the growth of building societies because he believed they conduced to the ‘advancement of the working classes to become property owners’.

He lived in various addresses in Hove – at 3 Ventnor Villas, and at 44 Albany Villas where the 1861 census recorded him as being aged 53, a brewer employing eleven men, living with his wife and daughter (both called Harriett) and one servant.

In 1885 he was living in a property called Aldrington Mansion that must have possessed a productive garden. Henry Hughes, aged 15, of Southern Cross, Portslade, was caught stealing from this garden three nectarines, three peaches, three pears, and a quantity of plums, value 2/6d.

In 1887 Gallard moved to Morningside where he died of dysentery on 22 June 1889, just eight weeks short of his 81^st birthday. He was buried three days later in the churchyard of St Andrew’s Old Church, Hove.

Number 30 – Hormuzd Rassam (1826-1910) lived in this house. He became an important archaeologist and fittingly, he was born opposite the ancient site of Nineveh.

He belonged to the Chaldean Christian community, and he was in his teens when he became a Protestant. Rassam greatly admired England, and enjoyed wearing the full panoply of an English gentleman – wing-collar and cravat, stiff shirt-front, waistcoat and double-breasted jacket. He sported Prince Albert-style sideburns and a thick, dark moustache. He also set great store by the English sense of fair play, although it is sad to record that he was treated unfairly in later years.

Rassam had an intense loyalty to Sir Austen Henry Layard (1817-1894), his friend and mentor, whom he first accompanied in his twentieth year when they went to Nimrud. When Layard retired, Rassam was appointed as the British Consul’s agent in 1852 to continue with the excavations. He was proud of this position because it enabled him to secure wonderful treasures for England. One of the first objects he despatched back to England was a set of stone wall panels depicting the capture of the Biblical city of Lachlish by the Assyrian King Sennacherib. At Nineveh Rassam’s team excavated the Temple of Ishtar, goddess of love and war.

Basalt obelisk now known as the 'Rassam' obelisk; erected by Ashurnasirpal II (883BC-859BC); carved low relief; broken in antiquity; was a public monument; shows deputations from Syria and the west bringing tribute to the Assyrian king.

It was entirely fitting that Rassam, who was of Assyrian descent, should excavate the Palace of Ashurbanipal, the powerful and feared king of Assyria in the 7^th century BC. He felt that he had rescued the king from undeserved obscurity. Rassam’s workmen undertook their digging at night because the area was a disputed concession. Rassam feared their French rivals might try to stop them, and thus the great lion-hunt of Ashurbanipal was uncovered by moonlight – the building dating back to c 645 BC.

copyright © Trustees of the British Museum
This is just one of the wonderful objects unearthed by Hormuzd Rassam from the Palace of Ashurbanipal at Niveveh dating back to c 645 BC and shows Ashurbanipal killing a wounded lion

Soon after this discovery Rassam was given an official post in southern Arabia. In 1864 Rassam was sent to Abyssinia to deliver a protest letter to King Theodore about the imprisonment of British missionaries. But the king consigned both him and them to the rock fortress of Magdala. It was not until 1868 that a relief force under Sir Robert Napier arrived at the fortress. Napier sent Rassam an ultimatum to be handed to the king. But Rassam very sensibly decided that to deliver such a missive would only inflame the situation, and so he suppressed it. His wisdom was justified by the fact that all the hostages were released safely. By a strange coincidence, the rescue party included Edmund Vallance, whose home was at 38 St Aubyns, Hove. King Theodore eventually committed suicide by shooting himself with a little pistol given to him by Queen Victoria.

In 1869 Rassam married Anne Eliza, daughter of Captain Spencer Corby Price, late 72^nd Highlanders, and the couple had five daughters, and one son.

By 1877 Rassam had retired from the Consular Servives, and the Trustees of the British Museum re-engaged his services. The following year Rassam initiated excavations in Assyria, and Babylonia or Armenia. Among the objects Rassam sent back were the bronze gate coverings from Balawat depicting scenes with Assyrian chariots and infantry in relief – commissioned by Shalmanesser III to commemorate victories won between 858 and 848 BC.

Another famous object was the Cyrus Cylinder – a document giving the official justification for the conquest of Babylon by the Persian King Cyrus in 539 BC.

Excavated by H. Rassam a clay tablet,

c.600-500BC, Sin-kashid king of Uruk

recording his restoration of Ekankal.

Rassam was responsible for the uncovering of many tablets from the Temple of Marduk, the supreme god of Babylon – some of the tablets were still being pieced together many decades later. There were also some 70,000 clay tablets from Sippar, Abu Habbah. Rassam had the unnerving experience of seeing many of them crumbling to dust in front of his eyes. Therefore, he asked the British Museum to send out a linguist so that copies might be made in situ. But the Museum was in a parsimonious mood and refused his request, stating that there was no money for a linguist, or even a camera.

The artefacts that Rassam uncovered caused great excitement in Victorian England at a time when most people were familiar with the contents of the Bible, and saw the finds as confirmation of the evidence in the Old Testament.

Rassam was the Grand Old Man of archaeology, and he should have spent a retirement heaped with honours. Instead, he was subjected to spiteful criticism, and even attempts to diminish his achievements by attributing his finds to other people. In Julian Reade’s opinion, Rassam was made a scapegoat, and vilified as being nothing more than a treasure hunter. A particular issue was Rassam’s lack of precise documentation, but these practices only came into operation long after Rassam had ceased his endeavours. One abrasive critic was Ernest Wallis Budge (1857-1936) and Rassam became so exasperated that he sued Budge for slander. Unfortunately, Rassam lost the case. But this was not the end of the matter because when Budge became Keeper of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities at the British Museum in 1894, he systematically set about trying to obliterate Eassam’s real achievements – so much for the esteemed English sense of fair play – and Rassam could not help becoming a disappointed man.

Rassam lived in the Brighton and Hove area for the last 30 years of his life. His home at Westbourne Villas was decorated with shields, spears, pistols, plus the heavy iron fetters he was forced to wear when imprisoned by King Theodore III. He continued to enjoy playing chess. During these years he sported a short white beard and flowing silver hair. He presented Hove Museum with some relics including a tile labelled ‘from the palace of King Nebuchadnezzar’. Rassam died in 1910 at Westbourne Villas, leaving instructions that there should be no flowers at his funeral – believing this to be a heathen custom. Rassam’s widow Annie continued to live at Hove and died in July 1924 and was buried in Hove Cemetery on 1 August.

(This house is no longer standing, having been demolished in recent years).

In present times, when some countries are demanding that the British Museum return artefacts to their place of origin, it is instructive to note what has happened in Rassam’s old stamping ground. Rassam came from Mosul, and in 2015 during the Iraq Civil War occupying anti Government forces destroyed valuable archaeological treasures regarding them as ‘statues and idols excavated by Satanists’. Thus, the famous winged bulls were destroyed while bulldozers were despatched to flatten Nimrud. Antiquities of national importance in Mosul’s Museum also suffered the same destructive vandalism.

In November 2018 the British Museum mounted a tremendous exhibition I Am Ashurbanipal; King of the World, King of Assyria. The closing date to view these treasures is 24 February 2019.

Number 39 – In the 1940s Percy Sharman lived in this house. He was a former music master at Charterhouse. Sharman bequeathed paintings, etchings and aquatints to Hove Museum.

Number 42 – The famous soprano Isabel Jay (1879-1927) once lived in this house as a child. In those days the house was called Glencairn, and the family lived there from 1886 to 1890. In 1881 the family was to be found living at The Terrace on the Lancing coast, where Isabel’s father was a dentist. But Isabel was actually born in Wandsworth.

It is interesting to note the strong musical gene in her family because she was the great-grand-daughter of noted musician and composer John George Henry Jay (1770-1849) while her great-aunt and uncle were also composers. Moreover, Isabel’s eldest daughter Cecilia (1903-1997) also enjoyed a successful musical career under the name of Celia Cavendish.

The ‘Cavendish’ derived from Isabel’s first marriage to Henry Sheppard Hart Cavendish (1897-1948) who became the 6^th Baron Watermark. He was a man of diverse interests because as well as being a noted big game hunter in Africa, he also took a keen interest in the arts, which is how he came within Isabel’s musical orbit.

The couple married but it was an unhappy match. Did he perhaps regard Isabel as something of a trophy from the musical world? The interior of his home was festooned with stuffed heads of the various animals he had killed, and so it is an interesting analogy. Unfortunately, he was violent towards young Isabel, and her testimony provided such distressing evidence of his behaviour that a divorce was granted in 1906.

copyright © National Library of Australia
The Telegraph (Brisband) 9 March 1906
(After Henry's divorce from Isabel, he was to remarry a further four times, three ending in divorce)

Isabel Jay’s talent was such that she began to sing in public at the tender age of twelve. She later studied at the Royal Academy of Music with which J. G. H. Jay also had connections. She joined the D’Oyley Carte Opera Company on a trial basis but within a very short time she became the leading soprano of the main company. One great success was her portrayal of Mabel in The Pirates of Penzance. A critic writing in The Era was quite carried away by her performance, commenting not only upon her ‘accomplished performance’ but also stating she won ‘all hearts by her freshness and earnestness.’

In 1910 Isabel married theatre manager Frank Curzon and although she was only 31 she decided upon retirement, only venturing on the stage once more in 1923. She gave birth to her second daughter Pamela in 1915. It seems likely that Isabel had begun to experience ill-health stemming from a childhood attack of scarlet fever. She died at the early age of 47 at Monte Carlo while she and her husband were enjoying a cruise.

Isabel’s daughter Celia married Dr Anderson, and the family lived at Courtenay Beach in Hove for many years.

Number 50 – According to the 1887 Directory Miss Palmer ran a girls’ school called Orissa on the premises.

Number 63 – In January 1915 the Women’s Wartime Club opened for wives and mothers of serving soldiers and sailors.

Miscellaneous

copyright © Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton & Hove
A Brighton Herald 1906 report of Hove Council's decision to allow
mixed bathing on Hove beach between Fourth Avenue and
Westbourne Villas.

In the 1970s a Bridge School was run in Westbourne Villas by Freddie North, international Bridge Master, and his wife Elizabeth.

At 7 a.m. on Sunday 22 June 2003 a thunderbolt struck the roof of a house in Westbourne Villas, blasting its way through three floors, burning floorboards, and causing a gas pipe to burst. Claire Grove, 32, knew something was up when she heard water boiling in her radiators. It was fortunate she was home at the time, and she promptly called the fire brigade.

Sources

British Museum
Lowerson, J. editor Cliftonville, Hove, a Victorian Suburb (1977)

Middleton, J. A History of Hove (1979)

Middleton, J. Encyclopaedia of Hove and Portslade
National Library of Australia
Reade, J. Hormuzd Rassam and his Discoveries (1989) The 8^th Bonham Carter Memorial Lecture.

Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton & Hove.

Sunday Times magazine Culture (11 November 2018) Holland, T. The Lion King Rides Again.

03 December 2018

Westbourne Villas, Hove.