No.100 – Oxford: in the Fellows Garden of Exeter College

No. 100 – in the Fellows Garden of Exeter College. The tree has been cut down but we could see a mark in the lawn where it was. I have written to the archivist of the college to see if the removal of the ivy, the little wall in front of the tower and the tree can help to date the photo.  At the end and to the right are two flights of steps leading to a terrace which has a wonderful view of Radcliffe Square

The photographer may have been visiting someone at the college so if I get a good response from the archivist I’ll run our few names past him too. At the end of the garden there is a raised terrace which has fabulous views of other colleges and it was from here that our man took…

John Maddicott “I should say that the photo dates from about 1910 or a little earlier. The tree appears in many photos from that period. I don’t know when it was felled, but I guess around 1915. The present silver birch, just to the east of the former tree, was planted in (I think) 1908. It doesn’t show in your photograph, but the angle of the photo may preclude that (I can’t easily tell), or it may be that the new tree was as yet too small to appear. If you are in Oxford again you may like to look through the large collection of photographs of the garden – mainly postcards – which we have in the archives.” e-mail 28th Aug. 2008