The newspaper article describing the opening of the Peasant Shop was I believe dated 1907, as in my previous post here. I believe that the 1907 shop opening was on the High Street. The postcard below shown in Winter & Collyer's Around Haslemere and Hindhead (Allan Sutton Publishing Group, 1991) was dated 1913, and yet the building on the right, identified in later photographs as the Peasant Arts Shop, does not appear to have any signage outside. It looks to have the curtains drawn. Winter (ibid.) explains that "the first pair of tile-hung cottages on the right were once known as Goodwyns and it was here that Will Morley, surveyor responsible for two eighteenth-century borough maps, lived." Perhaps the postcard photograph originated from earlier than 1913, and was actually earlier than 1907.
In The Vineyard (Issue 3, 1910) the The Peasant Arts Society depot was advertised as "High Street, Haslemere", as seen here. The E. Hosslin notice of opening a "small Show Room in the High Street" does not refer to the property previously being used by the Haslemere Peasant Arts Society, which if it was taking over the old premises seems to be a puzzling omission. The two old photographs of the shop with the Three Shuttles sign hanging outside clearly show tape over the window panes. This places the photographs in the World War 2 period I believe, so during the period when the shop was being operated by Ms E. Hosslin, and after the Peasant Arts Shop time.
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| Haslemere Weaving and Handicrafts Shop Haslemere High Street c.1939 from Around Haslemere, Winter, T., Tempus Publishing Limited, 2002 |
Peasant Arts Society shop,
No. 1 The Pavement, High Street
c.1930
The Haslemere Educational Museum holds photographs of Peasant Arts goods being sold in another building. After some snooping, I have been able to located this building in the grounds of what was once the garden of Wildwood on Weydown Road. Wildwood was the home of Greville MacDonald, who retired there in 1919. This would seem to suggest that the Peasant Shop/ Peasant Arts Society depot on Haslemere High Street was moved to Weydown Road sometime after 1919. As Wildwood is next to St Cross where Godfrey Blount was living, it might be possible that the building was in place and in use prior to that. However, due to some very useful hints that local residents have shared with me, it seems certain that this building was one of the Canadian Hutments from the Bramshott camp. More of this in a future post. These hutments were auctioned in 1920, which would suggest that the building, and at least one other erected in the grounds of St Cross were established in 1920, with the Peasant Shop whose interior is photographed below being open from perhaps as early as 1921.Perhaps then the shop on the High Street remained owned by the Peasant Arts Society, maybe it was rented out to a third party, and hence E. Hosslin was able to use it as part of her take over of the weaving industry when she took over the Weaving House at 113 Kings Road in 1933.
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| Peasant Shop, Weydown Road, c.1919 reproduced courtesy of Haslemere Educational Museum |
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| Peasant Shop, Weydown Road, c.1919 reproduced courtesy of Haslemere Educational Museum |
Another brilliant and such an interesting post-well done!
ReplyDeleteThanks Dunc!
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