Portslade Village in 1840, the same year that Portslade Railway Station opened and sparked urban development south to Copperas Gap and north to the Old Shoreham Road, eventually engulfing the village itself. The viewpoint appears to have been the Easthill.
By 1881 Portslade Farm, seen in the middle distance, was occupied by Martin Broomfield, his wife and 8 children, and the farm was being turned to market gardening to supply the burgeoning conurbations of Brighton, Hove & Portslade. Martin, descended from Sussex yeoman farmers had moved to Portslade in 1868 from Crawley Down, where he had been a Farm Bailey. He was a church worker, a keen cricketer and became a respected member of the Portslade community. His eldest son Martin opened a greengrocer's shop in Sydney Street, Brighton where he died early by falling through a trap-door. His youngest son Percy became a brick-layer, and was employed on the construction of Shoreham A Power Station. Percy's son Reginald also became a brick-layer, was employed on Shoreham B Power Station, and lived to see its last chimney fall from the viewpoint of his back garden in Southwick. Such is life. . . . .
The painting which is on display in Hove Museum was by William Henry Earp, b.1831, who lived in Brighton and died in 1914.
You're going to have to stop this "then and now". I'm all for progress, but in my book architecturally we're in terminal decline. I so wish I was a wealthy land owner in 1810 or there abouts.
ReplyDeleteAll things considered I think I'll stick with the 21st century. And not all our architecture is bad. What about this:- http://brightonbits.blogspot.com/2009/11/van-alen-building.html
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