CHIS Plaques
This plaque is at the bottom of Sion Hill, by the lookout.
New Plaques
In 2015 CHIS has still to put up plaques to (having 5 plaques to commemorate people this year):- 3 Dec 4:30pm James Johnson (l764-l844), famous fossil collector who lived at 12 Dowry Parade. Press Release by Sue Stops.
Together with the University of Bristol, The City Museum and the Hotwells History Group.
There will be a lecture on William Smith, father of English Geology by Professor Hugh Torrens of Keele University at Tyndall Lecture Theatre, University of Bristol at 7:30pm. - Saturday 21st May 2016 Eveline Dew Blacker (architect) at 20 Victoria Square – 60th anniversary of her death.
Merit Plaque
Our green paques commemorating notable past residents which adorn many houses in Clifton and Hotwells are appreciated by visitors and locals alike. We have decided to recogise not a person but a building, with a new oval plaque; Award for Excellence, for a fine new construction (great or small) or an impressive restoration or improvement.
Plaques Unveiled
- 3 October 11am: William Pennington (1740-829), Master of Ceremonies of the Hot Wells who lived at 12 Dowry Square 1821-1823.
Master of The Ceremonies at The Bristol Hotwells
for Thirty Years.
Number 12 Dowry Square is a Grade II* listed Georgian building set well back from the bustle of Hotwell Road,
in this attractive and peaceful square. The building has been beautifully restored by the current owners to retain its 18th century elegance, but is now home to comfortable serviced offices.
Press Release by Chris Stephens.
Brian Worthington and Chris Stephens
- 8 August 11am Charles Richardson, the eminent engineer who was born 200 years ago and who lived in 10 Berkeley Square.
It was his place of residence from 1860 until his death on the 18th February 1896.
Press Release by Trevor Thompson
Trevor Thompson (historian and Richardson researcher), David Greenfield (Panel for Historic Engineering Works) and Brian
Nice to see two celebrated engineers lived at the same house
Dedication speech by Trevor Thompson
Planning application: 15/03992/CPLB. Type of Application: Cert of Lawfulness - proposed - Listed Building Consent. Case Officer: Guy Bentham-Hill (Conservation Officer). 8-10 Berkeley Square, Bristol BS8 1HG
Commemorative plaque to be affixed to the front of buiding.
This submission was a matter of interpretation regarding the need for a formal application for Listed Building Consent. The requirements of the need for Listed Building Consent are set out in section 7 of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 in that works that will affect the special interest of the building should be authorised. In this case it is clear that the resultant affect of the proposed works on completion will result in no descernable affects on either the architectural of historic values or the designated heritage asset as the works are minor in nature and therefore have little impact. - 29th July 2015 Merit Award ceremony.
The University of Bristol received an award from CHIS in
recognition of excellence in building and garden design for the external realm of the Life Sciences building.
A plaque was unveiled by the Ivy Arch in Royal Fort Gardens by the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Bristol, Professor Sir Eric Thomas in the presence of University staff and representatives from CHIS.
- 9 May 2015 Dorothy Brown, the indefatigable campaigner at 6 Buckingham Vale who died in 2013
- 7th March 2015 First CHIS Award of Merit plaque at 1, The Avenue (joint two day-houses
commissioned by Nicholls Brown Webber on the site of undistinguished 1960s dwellings. Its Victorian Clifton style has received much favourable comment and Clifton College is delighted to be
the first winner of the award.
- Saturday 7th February 2015
Dedication of the plaque to C. R. Burch at 11 Percival Road, Clifton.
Cecil Burch (always known as Bill) was a very remarkable man whose inventions were vital to vacuum technology which included radar, radio design, television, and modern drug manufacture, but who also turned his hand to complex optical lenses.- In 1937 he was appointed as a lecturer at the Department of Physics, University of Bristol. Here he continued to work to improve lenses that were used in aerial photography, so important in WW II.
- In 1943 he was elected to the Royal Society.
- He died in 1983 with over 100 patents credited to him.
- 26 May 2012: Plaque unveiling to
Sir Archibald Russell (British Aerospace Chief Engineer whose designs include the Blenheim, Britannia, Type 188.
He also served as the vice-chairman of the BAC-Sud Aviation Concorde Committee that produced the Concorde).
At Glendower House, opposite Christchurch crypt.
Julian Russell his son and his wife came to unveil it - MONDAY 14th MAY 2012 on the grassy slope above Goldney Hall the dedication of the seat
given by CHIS in memory of Margaret Floyd.
Friends of Margaret Floyd joined us when
Dr Martin Crossley-Evans dedicated the seat donated by CHIS to her memory.
For many years Margaret was a very active member of the CHIS committee. As social secretary she organized some memorable events, but her spirit was very much into the improvement aspect. As a society we continue to support her main project which was to re-instate the swivel bridge in the Cumberland Basin. - 15 october 2011: Replacement Plaque to Professor Cecil Powell who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1950
"for his development of the photographic method of studying nuclear processes and his discoveries
regarding mesons made with this method". At the Old Vic Theatre School, Downside Road.
Cecil Frank Powell, FRS (5 December 1903 – 9 August 1969) was a British physicist, and Nobel Prize in Physics laureate for his development of the photographic method of studying nuclear processes and for the resulting discovery of the pion (pi-meson), a heavy subatomic particle. In 1928 he took up a post as Research Assistant to A.M. Tyndall in the H.H. Wills Physical Laboratory at the University of Bristol, later being appointed lecturer, and in 1948 appointed Melville Wills Professor of Physics. In 1932 Powell married Isobel Artner, and the couple had two daughters. Unveiled by Powell's daughters Jane and Annie. Address given by Professor Michael Berry, himself who holds the same chair that he occupied (the Melville Wills Professorship of Physics) and holder of 2000 Ig Nobel Prize in Physics
- 4 June 2011: Edward St John Daniel VC.
Born at the family home 1 Windsor Terrace, Clifton, Bristol on 17th January 1837.
Just before his 14th birthday, Daniel joined HMS Victory as a Naval Cadet. For three separate acts of bravery, Daniel was awarded the newly instituted Victoria Cross in the very first list of citations (London Gazette, 24th February 1857).
Daniel's citation reads: "Sir Stephen Lushington recommends this Officer: -
1st. For answering a call for volunteers to bring in powder to the Battery, from a waggon in a very exposed position under a destructive fire, a shot having disabled the horses. (This was reported by Captain Peel, commanding the Battery at the time.)
2nd. For accompanying Captain Peel at the Battle of Inkermann as Aide-de-camp.
3rd. For devotion to his leader, Captain Peel, on the 18th June, 1855, in tying a tourniquet on his arm on the glacis of the Redan, whilst exposed to a very heavy fire.At the time, Daniel was the youngest recipient of the Cross (being just 17 when he won it).
He also received the Crimea Medal with clasps for "Sebastopol" and "Inkerman"; Turkish Crimea Medal; Sardinian Crimea Medal; Turkish Order of Medjidie, 5th Class; Legion d'Honneur; and Indian Mutiny Medal, with clasps for "Relief of Lucknow" and "Lucknow".
Unfortunately he was accused of a dreadful offence and court-martialled, stripped of the Victoria Cross and pension rights (Only 8 people have lost their VC).
He died in 1868 at the age of 33
plaque
Unveiling by Christopher Daniel, a descendant. Accompanied by the Lord Mayor's trumpeter - Saturday 23 October 2010: Keith Floyd (28 December 1943 – 14 September 2009) was a British celebrity chef,
television personality and businessman, who hosted numerous cooking shows for the BBC and published many books
combining cookery and travel.
His style of presentation endeared him to millions of television viewers worldwide.
The plaque was mounted at 112 Princess Victoria Street (site of Floyd's Bistro- currently Clifton Kitchen).
raining but a good crowd turned up
Richard Hope Hawkins unveiled it - Friday 12 March 2010: plimsoll.jpgSamuel Plimsoll returned to Hotwells (Hotwell Rd, south of the Jacobs Wells Rd roundabout) looking out at SS Great Britain. CHIS has donated £250 towards costs. Pauline Barnes of Hotwells spearheaded the campaign.
- Saturday 14 November 2009 11am: William Budd,
13 Lansdown Place. Physician and Epidemiologist
(born in 1811 in North Tawton, and died on 9 January 1880 in Clevedon, Somerset).
In 1849 he stated his belief that cholera was water-borne. When the 1866 cholera epidemic reached Bristol, he demonstrated that limiting the contamination of a town's water supply could stop a cholera epidemic. Much reduced death figures showed that he had largely won the grim fight to improve the nation's health.
Unveiled by Professor David Speller, Emeritus Professor of Clinical Bacteriology at the University of Bristol - Sunday 28 June 2009, 20 Sion Hill: Hester Lynch Thrale (born Hester Lynch Salusbury and after her second marriage, Hester Lynch Piozzi ) (27 January 1741–2 May 1821) was a British diarist, author, and patron of the arts. Her diaries and correspondence are also an important source of information about Samuel Johnson and eighteenth-century life. She died at 20 Sion Hill in Clifton.
- Sunday 13rd july 2008, 2 Royal York Crescent
Empress Eugenie de Montijo (1826-1920). Wife of Napolean III. Attended school here in 1836.
Unveiled by Annie Burnside, South West honorary consul for France - Sunday 3rd February 2008 (noon)- Pam Maclaren and Burnaby Portal (great-great grand children) unveiling the new plaque as part of a ceremony in front of the Clifton Club to replace the CHIS plaque in memory of Francis Greenway who designed the then Hotel and Assembly Rooms for the Clifton Spa and became known as the father of Australian Architecture
- The plaque to Thomas Guppy (Brunel's friend and investor in the Gt Western ship and the GWR) at 8 Berkeley Square was unveiled by Adam Hart Davis on 30 September 2006.
- One to Sarah Guppy at 11am on Wednesday 8th March 2006 (7 Richmond Hill)
by Nicholas Guppy - a descendant.
Beautiful and intelligent, inventor and mother of Thomas Guppy (engineer). Her 19th century patents included a bed with built-in exercise apparatus. In 1811, Sarah Guppy proposed improvements for a suspension bridge which predated the works of both Thomas Telford and Brunel, but her name does not appear in the histories of engineering and bridge-building.
Sarah Guppy and Thomas Guppy (mother and son) lived in Richmond Hill for the longest period of time of their residence in Clifton. - The memorial unveiled by the wife of the vice-chancellor of Bristol University on 7th December 2005, marks the date - September 11, 1645 - when Prince Rupert surrendered Bristol to Parliament's army towards the end of the first Civil War, and marked the imminent end of the war. Bristol was the country's second city after London at the time and a Royalist stronghold loyal to King Charles. Prince Rupert, King Charles' illustrious cavalry commander, agreed a treaty with Fairfax and surrendered the city from his castle, where the Royal Fort now stands.
- The tablet put on the railings at the corner of Canygne Road was paid for with a legacy from Barbara Thorne, and dedicated on Saturday 16 July 2005, followed by a reception at the house of Dudley Fromant. Duncan Ogilvie made the speech.
- One to Sir Fabian Ware (1869-1949) (Glendower House) was unveiled on 5 November 2005 (close to Armistice Day) at 11am by the War Graves Commission. He was responsible for originating the Imperial (now Commonwealth) War Graves Commission during World War One
- Rear Admiral Sir Doveton Sturdee lived at 13 Sion Hill. He was the victor at the Battle of Falkland Islands in December 1914 and would merit a plaque.
- On Thursday Sept 8 at 47 Hampton Park a plaque to Adolph Leipner, put up by Redland and Cotham Amenity Society, will be unveiled. Adolph Leipner taught science at Clifton College in 1862. He became the first Botany Professor at the then new Bristol University and created first botanical garden in Bristol at Clifton. He founded the Bristol Naturalists Society.
Plaques put up by CHIS in recent years.
| Erected | Who/What | Details | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| - | Revd Professor Archibald Sayce | Biblical Translator and Assyriologist | Somerset House, Canygne Road |
| - | Revd John Percival | Educational Pioneer. | Somerset House, Canygne Road |
| 1989 | Randolph Sutton (1888-1960) | Music Hall Star, was born here. He recorded songs with particularly infectious tunes (for example Good 'Eavens, Mrs. Evans, My Canary has Circles under his Eyes) | 29 Anglesea Place |
| 1990 | Walter Savage Landor (1775-1864) | Poet, lived here (1836-37). "Epicurus, Leontion, and Ternissa," Imaginary Conversations (1824-1829) etc. O what a thing is age! Death without death's quiet. | Penrose Cottage, Harley Place |
| 1992 | Dr W.G Grace (1848-1915) | Father figure of cricket, lived here (1894-96). His huge stature and characteristic beard made his presence felt immediately as he walked upon each cricket ground. The number of years he played the game and the records he achieved was a marvel of the game in the 19th century | 15 Victoria Square |
| 1992 | E.H Young (1880-1946) | Novelist, lived here (1907-18). All the novels share a trenchant observation of Clifton’s inhabitants and have been compared with Jane Austen’s or more recently Barbara Pym’s writing. | 2 Saville Place |
| 1995 | Conwy Lloyd Morgan (1852-1936) | Psychologist, First Vice Chancellor University of Bristol, lived here (1886-1903). He wrote a textbook on animal biology and published a number of papers on local geology. He decided that he could make a more significant contribution to knowledge in the study of psychology, and began to direct his research effort to the field of what he called "mental evolution", the borderline between intelligence and instinct, where he developed his reputation in experimental psychology and animal behaviour | 14/16 Canynge Road |
| 1996 | Hannah More (1745-1833) | Author, playwright, educationalist lived here (1829-33). This evangelical philanthropist provides an indispensable link between the Georgian and Victorian periods. Born in Fishponds, just before the last Jacobite rebellion, she lived to see the beginnings of the railway age. In her youth she was the friend of David Garrick, Samual Johnson and Horace Walpole. At the age of seventeen she wrote a play, The Search after Happiness, for the girls at the school where she taught, to perform. She herself was closely involved with the Theatre Royal Bristol and became a particular friend of the actor William Powell. In middle age she was closely connected with William Wilberforce and his fellow Evangelicals in the Clapham sect. As well as working among the poor, Hannah More continued her connections with polite society, and produced a series of conduct books, of which the most famous was Strictures on the Modern System of Female Education (1799). In her retirement she welcomed two promising children to her home in Somerset, William Ewart Gladstone and Thomas Babington Macaulay. | 4 Windsor Terrace, plaque |
| 1996 | Cecil Powell (1903-1969) | Physicist, Nobel Laureate, lived here (1954-69).
At the University of Bristol from 1927 to 1969, first as Research Assistant to AM Tyndall, then appointed lecturer, and, in 1948, established as Melville
Wills Professor of Physics.
He contributed numerous papers to learned societies on the discharge of electricity in gases, and on the development of photographic methods in nuclear physics. He was a co-author of Nuclear Physics in Photographs (1947) and The Study of Elementary Particles by the Photographic Method (1959). Prof. Powell was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1949: he was awarded the Hughes Medal in the same year and the Royal Medal in 1961. |
12 Goldney Avenue |
| 1996 | Clifton Spa Pump Room | Part of the Clifton Grand Spa Hydropathic Institution (opened in 1898) | on side of Avon Gorge Hotel. Entrance to baths |
| 1997 | Thomas Beddoes (1760-1808) | Scientist, lived here. He established the Pneumatic Institution for Inhalation Gas Therapy in Clifton in 1798. The influence of its work on gases and vapours was to prove seminal in the development of inhalation anaesthesia. | 11 Hope Square |
| 1998 | John Addington Symonds (1840-93) | Poet, critic, historian of the Renaissance, lived here (1865-71). His many writings include travel books, Sketches in Italy and Greece (1874) and Italian Byways (1883); literary essays, Introduction to the Study of Dante (1872) and Studies of Greek Poets (1873–76); biographies of Shelley (1878), Sir Philip Sidney (1886), Ben Jonson (1886), and Michelangelo (1893); a masterly translation of the autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini (1888); and several volumes of verse, notably Many Moods (1878) and Animi Figura (1882). Symonds's major work, The Renaissance in Italy (7 vol., 1875–86), is a classic collection of sketches in cultural history. | 7 Victoria Square |
| 1998 | Samuel Jackson (1794-1869) | Painter, lived here (1843-69) | 8 Canynge Square |
| 2000 | Susanna Winkworth (1820-84) & Catherine Winkworth (1827-78) | Susanna (Philanthropist)/ Catherine (Hymnologist), lived here (1862-74) | 31 Cornwallis Crescent |
| 2000 | Sir George Oatley (1863-1950) | Architect (designed University of Breistol's Wills Building, Bristol Baptist College, Wills Hall), lived here (1902-34) | Bishops House, Clifton Hill |
| 2002 | Paule Vezelay (Marjorie Watson-Williams) (1892-1984) | First woman abstract artist, lived here (1939-42) | 2 Rodney Place |
| 2003 | Eliza Walker Dunbar (1849-1925) | Pioneer doctor, lived here (1882-1925) | 9 Oakfield Road |
| 2003 | Ellen Sharples (1769-1849) & Rolinda Sharples (1793-1838) | Artists, lived here (1821-32) | 37 Canynge Road |
| 2004 | Gertrude Hermes(1901-83) | Wood Engraver & Sculptor, died here (1983) | 5 Sion Hill |
| 2004 | Sir Henry Newbolt (1862-1938) | poet of Clifton College (most famous poem Vitai Lampada with its first line, There's a breathless hush in the Close tonight ... used to be included in every anthology of poetry) | south end of Clifton College Close unveiled by Barbara Janke, our local councillor. There was another plaque unveiling 28 May by the Old Cliftonian Society |
| 2005 | Jeremy Rees | visionary arts administrator who founded the Arnolfini Centre for the Contemporary Arts in Bristol, and was its director for the first 25 years | 20 Canynge Square |
| November 2005 | Sir Fabian Ware (1869-1949) | responsible for originating the Imperial (now Commonwealth) War Graves Commission during World War One | Glendower House, opposite Christchurch crypt |
| December 2005 | Prince Rupert | Marks September 11, 1645 - when Prince Rupert surrendered Bristol to Parliament's army towards the end of the first Civil War. | Royal Fort House, University of Bristol |
| March 2006 | Sarah Guppy | Beautiful and intelligent, inventor and mother of Thomas Guppy. Her 19th century patents included a bed with built-in exercise apparatus. In 1811, Sarah Guppy proposed improvements for a suspension bridge which predated the works of both Thomas Telford and Brunel, but her name does not appear in the histories of engineering and bridge-building. | 7 Richmond Hill |
| September 2006 | Thomas Guppy | Brunel's friend and investor in the Gt Western ship and the GWR. Son of Sarah Guppy | 8 Berkeley Square |
| February 2008 | Francis Greenway | designed the then Hotel and Assembly Rooms for the Clifton Spa and became known as the father of Australian Architecture | Clifton Club The Mall |
| July 2008 | Empress Eugenie de Montijo (1826-1920) | Wife of Napolean III | 2 Royal York Crescent |
| June 2009 | Hester Lynch Thrale | British diarist, author, and patron of the arts | 20 Sion Hill |
| November 2009 | William Budd | Physician and Epidemiologist | 13 Lansdown Place |
| March 2010 | Samuel Plimsoll | creator of the Plimsoll Line | Hotwell Rd, south of the Jacobs Wells Rd roundabout |
| October 2010 | Keith Floyd | British celebrity chef, television personality and businessman | 112 Princess Victoria Street |
| June 2011 | Edward St John Daniel | VC | 1 Windsor Terrace |
| October 2011 | Professor Cecil Powell | Nobel Prize winner in Physics | Old Vic Theatre School, Downside Road |
| May 2012 | Sir Archibald Russell | British Aerospace Chief Engineer | Glendower House, opposite Christchurch crypt |
| February 2015 | C. R. Burch | Scientist and Engineer | 11 Percival Road |
| May 2015 | Dorothy Brown | indefatigable campaigner | 6 Buckingham Vale |
| August 2015 | Charles Richardson | Originator and Engineer of the Severn Tunnel | 10 Berkeley Square |
| October 2015 | William Pennington (1740-1829) | Master of Ceremonies of the Hot Wells for 30 years | 12 Dowry Square 1821-1823. |
