RootsChat.Com

This site gives some clues as to date by the style of the ladies dress. Have a look, but I would go for 1898 as a start. I think I got this like from another rootschatter a few years ago.

http://www.cartes.fsnet.co.uk/date/main.htm

By the look of the children, I would asume the parents to be 40 ish. The man is bald but young faced, his wife not yet old, but clearly out of her 20s.

Hope this is of use.

Rod

Peter,

just a thought, but if you look at the "Oldmap" site you can have a look at the layout of Battle.
http://www.old-maps.co.uk/indexmappage2.aspx (I hope this is the right link, if not have a look at the other maps on the site)

Battle Police station is at the northern end of the main street, but the workhouse is a further mile away to the west of the town. The Police station is still there, but the work house became a hospital and is now flats. If a woman was going to the work house to give birth (as was not uncommon with an unmarried woman disowned by her familly) but went into labour on the way out of the town and could not be moved, the Police Station might have been the only choice.

Hope this is of use

Rod

Kerry,

I sometimes do a guided tour of Lewes for small groups of friends. There is so much histroy to see and so much that can be missed if you do not know the town. Send me a PM if you would like me to contact you next time I am doing one. If anyone else would be interested, I might even do a Roots Chat tour one weekend!

Rod

Can I correct what is a longstanding myth please? The martyrs were not held in the cellars of the Star Inn, now the Town Hall and there is no historical basis for any prisoners to have ever been held in the Inn’s cellar. I seem to recall that this was an advertising scam by the owner of this old coaching Inn in the Georgian period. They were more likely to have been held in the West Gate tower that was used in the 1550s as the town lock up. But it is a good story that has improved with the telling and retelling over the years! The old West Gate tower is a few hundred yards down the High Street, in the narrows by Pipe Passage.

Dr Graham Mayhew, a local historian, had met one of the ancestors of Derrick Carver some 20 years ago, when he was giving a talk on the Lewes history. I cannot remember all the details as it was over 15 years ago that he told a group of us when he referred to this in another talk he was giving.

Hope no one minds me correcting this!

Rod