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The Mail said: The Winkle Club has not been in existence more than two years and yet already has a membership numbering 100. The club was originally formed with the idea of fishermen holding a jovial New Years Eve together, ...
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Distress Urgency
From the Hastings Mail of 04/01/1908
There was growing urgency over the Hastings distressed. Last year at this time, 930 men were registered with the Distress Committee; this year it is 691 names, and there is one woman. The number of children involved was put at ...
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Worst Road in Town
From the Hastings Mail of 04/01/1908
The upper portion of Down Road was recognized as the worst road in the borough.
The Workhouse Board of Guardians at their meeting on 2 January changed the rules by which tramps would be helped and controlled, following the example set in West Sussex. Mr C Coxeter JP said: "The object of [his] motion was ...
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The Small Holdings and Allotments Act came into force on 1 January 1908 and there was already considerable interest in Hollington and Silverhill. A committee of gentlemen ahd been formed, with Mr CE Kiefer-Bennett of Eversley, Eversley Road, Silverhill, the ...
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Death of Rear Admiral Marcus Lowther at his residence in Essenden Road, St Leonards.
The Hastings magistrates appointed their first-ever probation officer, implementing the Probation of Offenders Act 1907.
Mr JB Wild, schoolmaster of Highbury House, and Frederick William Richardson, bookseller and stationer of Mount Road, Clive Vale, were in the Bankruptcy Court.
The benefits of the new Small Holdings and Allotment Act 1907 were explained to a large audience of working class people in the Silverhill Schools on Friday 17 January, and it was agreed a borough-wide association should be set up ...
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The Council agreed on January 17 to apply for a grant for school meals. The Mail said in an editorial on distress in the borough: “It is still thought, we believe, by those who have hesitated to put into effect ...
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New Lord Warden
From the Hastings Mail of 18/01/1908
Lord Brassey had been appointed as Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports.
Work on raising the embankment of Shornden Reservoir was to commence at once, following a £431 loan being sanctioned by Distress Committee.
The number of inmates at the Workhouse was reported as being 433, against 425 last year, and the number of vagrants as 150, against last year’s 144.
The Independent Labour Party Hastings branch called on the borough and county members to support Ramsey Macdonald’s Right to Work Bill in the House of Commons.
Tram Figures
From the Hastings Mail of 01/02/1908
Hastings tram figures: The number of passengers carried on the Hastings, St Leonards and Bexhill trams during the week ended January 30 was 120,801; the number carried on the Front Line alone being 44,630. The amount taken was £650.
The Queens Hotel Company directors were sacked for poor management following a series of shareholder meetings. The first was the AGM, held on 5 February. Shareholders were told there was no dividend and a decrease in takings. Cllr Stanley Weston, ...
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The Mail reported a meeting on Sunday 2 February of the local branch of the SDF at the Market Hall, George Street. It discussed the twin causes of the workless worker and the hungry child. The meeting came soon after ...
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The Education (Provision of Meals) Act 1906 came into force in the borough on Monday 3 February. As a result,"necessitous" children had been given breakfast every day of the school week, and this was due to continue until 3 April ...
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Death of Mr Henry Green Fairman Wells, aged 68, manager of Messrs Barclay and Co’s Bank. He died at 42 Robertson Street.
Crowded houses at the Gaiety received Mr HB Irving and Miss Dorothea Baird with a rousing welcome when he appeared as Matthias in The Bells.
Scalded to Death
From the Hastings Mail of 22/02/1908
A three year old boy was scalded to death - Fred Arthur Thurgar, of 12 Hurrell Road, Broomgrove.
Robert Vernon Harcourt was the new Liberal candidate for Hastings. There was an enthusiastic reception at Wellington Square Lecture Hall on 25 February.
A lively suffragette meeting took place in Hastings in the run-up to the Parliamentary by-election (on 29 February). The suffragettes were the leading national figure Miss Christabel Pankhurst (daughter of Emmeline), Mrs Drummond and Mrs Martel. Their inaugural meeting ...
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A Distress Committee meeting on 24 February was told there were 1,020 registered, but only 841 men and 3 women were eligible. 549 men were engaged at present in three gangs. Mr Campling said that the average of the population ...
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Two more meetings were held to explain the new allotments law to interested working people, following the first at Silverhill on 17 January. At the meeting in Hollington Girls School on Tuesday 25th, Mr Horace Norton of the Eighty Club ...
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Two Beggars
From the Hastings Mail of 29/02/1908
At the magistrates court on Monday 24th, Frederick Ward, 'a robust looking young man', said "I must do something, I can't live on the wind" when he was charged with being drunk and begging at Breeds Place on Saturday evening. ...
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In the Parliamentary by-election on Tuesday 3 March, Arthur Du Cros succeeded his father as Hastings MP. He had a heavy majority of 1,018 due to the reduced Liberal poll. The vote was: Du Cros, Conservative, 4,495; Robert Vernon Harcourt, ...
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The low financial position of the Distress Committee was reported by the borough accountant. The Local Government Grant was nearly spent.
Thomas Southcombe, an ironmonger at 4 and 16 Castle Hill Road, and William George Quaife, of 32 Tower Road, a baker, appeared in the Bankruptcy Court.
Two Women’s Social and Political Union meetings were held at the Royal Concert Hall, Warrior Gardens, on Thursday 26 March to advance the claim of female suffrage. The main speaker was Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst, the leader of the national Suffragette ...
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The Hastings YMCA had secured premises at 41 Havelock Road, formerly the Windsor boarding house. Mr PJ Bateman was the honorary secretary and Mr AD Thorpe the treasurer.
Footballers Fined
From the Hastings Mail of 28/03/1908
The directors of the Hastings Football Club were fined and censured by the Football Association for disregarding FA rules. This followed a match between Hastings and Salisbury, the takings of which "had not been loyally distributed between the two clubs ...
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This was the last day of the Volunteers, for from 1 April they had the title of the Territorial Army, in pursuance of Mr Haldane’s scheme.
Robert Vernon Harcourt was welcomed by the Liberals at the Royal Concert Hall, Warrior Gardens, the 3rd. It was a great reception, as they learnt the lessons of his defeat in the by-election.
Brisco Estate Kursaal: A proposal was brought before the Town Council on 3 April and had a favourable reception. The site in the plan was on the land lying between St Margarets Road and Bohemia Road purchased some time ago ...
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A platelayer’s body was found in the tunnel at West St Leonards. The aged platelayer victim was James Selmes, who lived with his wife at Railway Cottages, Bexhill Road (by the railway bridge), and had been employed by the SER ...
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The Mail had a letter to editor on overcrowded tramcars: The cars are filled up with strap-hangers and dogs so that even the hard-working conductors have difficulty in moving about to take the fares. The cars are now permitted to ...
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Mail letter from Edward Cruttenden, secretary of the SDF, on the feeding of school children. The Hastings SDF branch wish to enter a protest against the action of the education authority for stopping the meals supplied to the necessitous school ...
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The Mail carried some impressions of local canteen work at the Old Town centre for school meals. Every morning from 7.45 to 8 o’clock a stream of little children of varying ages has travelled towards the Fishermen’s Institute basement door ...
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The Central Cricket Ground Committee recorded its first overdraft for many years due to improvements.
Some hundreds of members of the National Union of Teachers and their friends had already arrived at Hastings for the conference which opened on Monday 20th. On 17th evening the reception and other rooms at the Town Hall which would ...
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There was an exhibition throughout the week of the paintings of the late WH Borrow, held at 10 Carlisle Parade. He lived for many years at Blacklands in a house overlooking Alexandra Park.
A Tunbridge Wells car was wrecked in a collision with a No 4 Ore tram at Prospect Place.
Many Deaths
From the Hastings Mail of 02/05/1908
The Mail of 2 May said aged carman Robert Norton, of 16 Brook Street, was knocked down by another carman riding a bicycle and died of his injuries. The Mail of 16 May reported: On 10 May, a newly-born baby ...
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An application by Mr EG Hutchinson for a renewal of the license granted him to place 36 bathing tents for hire on the foreshore or sands opposite Carlisle Parade was made to the fortnightly Town Council meeting and granted.
Flags in the fishing fleet flew at half mast due to death of Henry Mitchell, who lived in the neighbourhood of Rock-a-Nore for 90 years. He was nicknamed Quiddy, was married and had 20 children. He had “never had a ...
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New Liptons
From the Hastings Mail of 16/05/1908
Liptons, the grocers, was to open a new branch at 32 Queens Road.
A horse ridden by Alfred Rawlinson and belonging to Messrs J & T Hickman, jobmaster, was killed in collision with a tram at the Memorial. It was put down by Mr Hickman's orders and carried away in a Corporation cart.
The Board of Guardians resolved to spend £3,000 on a new nurses home on the infirmary side of the Workhouse.
Kursaal Agreed
From the Hastings Mail of 23/05/1908
Hastings Council met in Committee to discuss the proposed Kursaal. Official information was afterwards refused to the press, but the Kursaal Report was at last submitted in public and accepted at the Council meeting on 5 June.
The annual meeting of the Ore Penny Dinner Fund was told that 14,498 dinners were given to deserving children during the last winter attending the Ore Provided Schools.
Considerable storm damage was done to Hastings property. Lightning brought considerable damage to a part of the Old Town near Bourne Walk, with lightning passing through the roof of Mr and Mrs Baker’s home at 2 Bourne Walk on Monday ...
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An amendment to old age pensions was supported at meeting of the Hastings Guardians. On 4 September, the town clerk’s official report on pensions was presented to the Hastings Cuncil meeting, and an Old Age Pensions Committee was appointed.
The annual congress of the South East Union of Scientific Societies gathered at Hastings for four days of lectures and excursions round about the borough, and a mayoral reception.
The Mail reported: On 8 June, London tailor Arthur Hill was found drowned in the sea at St Leonards, and John William Tutt, a partner in the firm of Messrs Tutt and Becket, coal merchants, died at his residence Park ...
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A Shed in the Park
From the Hastings Mail of 13/06/1908
The Mail ran a letter to the Editor complaining about “the wooden monstrosity which has been erected in Alexandra Park at the side of the bowling green. I do not know whether to term it a hut, a shed, a ...
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A collision between one of Plummer Roddis’s motor delivery vans and a tram car took place at West St Leonards.
The Electricity Committee considered the desirability of lighting the whole of the public lamps in streets in which electric mains were laid. It was informed that there were then 480 gas lamps situated within 60 feet of the mains and ...
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Mysterious Tunnel
From the Hastings Mail of 20/06/1908
A subterranean passage or tunnel had been discovered, 71 feet in length, in a garden at 39 St Marys Terrace, West Hill, owing to the removal of a water tank. It extended towards Plynlimmon Road, but did not appear to ...
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Four Pubs to Close
From the Hastings Mail of 27/06/1908
License renewal was refused for four public houses in the Old Town: the Ship Inn, Beehive, Alma Tavern and New Moon.
Amongst the local women attending today’s women’s suffrage demonstrations in London were Mrs Harlow Phibbs, Mrs F Strickland, Mrs Darent Harrison, Miss Lettice MacMunn and Miss Beatrice Wilson.
Fairs Too Popular
From the Hastings Mail of 04/07/1908
Public nuisance caused by the noise of fairs in the Central Cricket Ground was a recurring complaint, said the Mail. It was annoying to residents. The fairs also diverted a substantial amount of money from businesses and amusements organised in ...
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Many political meetings were held last weekend. No less than four SDF (socialist) meetings were held on Sunday (5th) in different parts of Hastings. Two speakers were engaged and a similar number of meetings were held in the afternoon and ...
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Library Catalogue
From the Hastings Mail of 11/07/1908
A petition was given to the Council asking that a new author and subject catalogue for the reference library at the Brassey Institute be published at an early date. But on 21 July the town clerk stated that the Corporation ...
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Letter to the Mail editor complaining about the over-use of inspectors on the trams. Seen on several occasions were two ticket inspectors on the same tram: one on top, another prowling about inside. Some were none too polite, some with ...
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Market Failure
From the Hastings Mail of 11/07/1908
The Council meeting on 10 July decided it was not possible to re-establish a public market in the old Market in George Street because only one stall was let when they experimented. They would therefore let it as single premises.
Twenty Hastings street hawkers were prosecuted on Thursday 9 July for causing an obstruction. The Mail said that the determined efforts of the chief constable and Corporation to keep Hastings free from the obstruction of hawkers will meet with general ...
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A gas explosion at a forge at 4 and 6 Fairlight Road, by the corner with Saxon Road, belonging to Ernest E Trinder, injured his servant, Arthur Charles.
Tragic death of William Henry Davison, the superintendent of the local branch of the respeted Prudential Assurance Company at 39 Havelock Road. He was found hanged, suspended by a rope from the beam of an office outbuilding. A crowd gathered ...
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The Mail of 18 July said there had been a week’s open air campaign in Hastings by the Suffragettes. Using the Women's Suffrage Van, it began on Tuesday 14th. The two orators were Miss Muriel Matters and Miss Eustace Smith. ...
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The Mail reported: There was a meeting on Monday evening, 13 July, of ‘persecuted’ street hawkers at the corner of South Terrace to protest about the 20 prosecutions on 9 July. Mr A Cobb as the hawkers’ leader spoke for ...
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Circus in Town
From the Hastings Mail of 18/07/1908
The Miss Ada Alexandra Circus was at the Central Ground.
Two socialists were summoned because their meetings caused an obstruction in the streets. The outcome of a socialist meeting on Friday 10 July 10 at South Terrace was seen on Thursday 23 July at the borough bench, when summonses against ...
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Battle of the brewers: The National Freedom League had an outdoor campaign in Hastings attacking the Licensing Bill. On 29 July, a nine days campaign to explain the Licensing Bill opened with a demonstration on the West Hill. Mr H Johnson, ...
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A meeting of the Education Committee discussed the medical inspection of school children. The MOH advised the appointment of one lady for the work, at £200 a year, but the advice was rejected, as the Committee decided to appoint five ...
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Hawkers and socialists: Further summonses were heard on Friday 31 July against hawkers for breaking bye-laws by obstructing the streets and for selling against regulations on the beach, and the adjourned hearing of a summons against Ernest Hunter for causing ...
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Normanhurst Court was to be restored, according to Lord Brassey’s interview with the Mail after the Court was seriously damaged by fire on Sunday 2 August. Normanhurst Court was now in the hands of the builders. The portion that was ...
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Hunger marchers reach Hastings: The Mail reported that 40 in number, led by Mr Cunningham, reached the town yesterday afternoon (Friday 7 August) from Bexhill. Upon arriving in Bulverhythe after a long interval at Glyne camp, they found chief constable ...
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John Thomas Dies
From the Hastings Mail of 08/08/1908
Death of John Wesley Thomas, born at Ore 77 years ago. He served his apprenticeship at the Ore Windmill (burnt down a few years since) and carried on business as a miller at the Black Mill (still standing in 1908). ...
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Mr Chubb, the Tory champion, roused the socialists, said the Mail: At an SDF meeting on the beach near the Fishmarket on 9 August, Mr JW Chubb, upholder of Church, Individualism and Toryism, had tried to haul the flaming SDF ...
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There was a collision just west of the South Colonnade between a tramcar and a landau. Two front wheels of the carriage were knocked off.
Hawkers Hit Back
From the Hastings Mail of 22/08/1908
Street obstruction: A number of hawkers were brought before the borough bench on Thursday 20th. Among them were Elizabeth Todd, a hawker of shrimps at Harold Place, in her second appearance, and Alfred Cobb, charged with causing an obstruction with ...
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The body of Miss Beatrice Emily Knight, who jumped from Eastbourne Pier, was found washed up at St Leonards.
Looming Distress
From the Hastings Mail of 05/09/1908
A Mail editorial said: “Although the tendency of the SDF is to exaggerate a normal condition into a special and pressing evil, there is a considerable number of unemployed in Hastings and the prospect for the winter is very gloomy. ...
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On Monday 7 th, James Read Martin, well known in Ore, was found drowned in a pond at Fishponds, Fairlight. He lived as a painter at 3 School Cottages, Ore. The next day, an inquest was held into the death ...
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There was an inaugural meeting of the Debating Society, with ladies now eligible for membership.
Old age pensions came into being for the deserving poor on Thursday 24 September. In the following days, there was a great demand for application forms, with a large number of them distributed at local Post Offices. Charity reform proposal: ...
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The hawkers: There were more fines for obstruction this week, with five charged.
A stained window was unveiled at All Souls Church, Athelstan Road, in memory of Mrs Elizabeth Mason, foundress of the church. [The church closed in the autumn of 1007.]
Sir George Truscott, a well-known resident of St Leonards, at 100 Marina, became Lord Mayor Elect of London.
A meeting of the Education Committee received correspondence on the feeding of school children from both the SDF and the ILP, but the letters were passed over and the socialists snubbed.
A Wesleyan campaign began in support of the Licensing Bill. There were bogus outcries from the brewers. An open air meeting in favour of the bill was held on the beach opposite the Royal Oak Hotel, on Saturday 3 October, ...
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A Distress Committee resolution earnestly requested the Council to reconsider their decision to postpone the sea defence work at Caroline Place and Beach Terrace, which could have given work to 50 or 60 unemployed. Councillor Chesterfield said he protested against ...
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The Board of Guardians at a meeting on 15 October rejected a resolution empowering them to advance the rate of outdoor relief to 5s to all deserving persons of 70 upwards who were disqualified from old age pensions because they ...
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The SDF had staged a week's propaganda events in the streets of Hastings and St Leonards in the run up to the Council meeting on Friday 16 October. The chief figure was Tom Kennedy, who addressed a meeting of the ...
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Sunday trams and employees: The company’s announcement that until the Council give a simple consent to the running of Sunday trams they would discontinue to run after Sunday 29 November had led to the Company’s employees protesting at open air ...
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A new Fire Station opened in Shepherd Street, St Leonards, on the site originally filled by the Corporation yard. The Kings Road and Mercatoria fire premises had been closed as a result.
A Hastings boy was the only survivor of the crew of the schooner Enterprise, a West Hartlepool vessel, which sank after a collision with the steamer Derwent off Harsborough. He was Fred Towner, son of HF Towner of 10 York ...
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At a Museum Association subscribers meeting there was lack of space at the Brassey Institute - the Hare purchases.
Feeding the children: There was an early inauguration of this winter's free breakfasts, with 180 children at the Sandown canteen on Monday 2nd, scantily clothed, pale faced and haggard. There was a diet variety. On Monday, Tuesday and Thursday: half ...
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