The photographer’s tour(s) in England

There are three private homes photographed. These could have been his residences whilst in England and could have been appropriate bases so I have included them in my conjectural tours.

His choice of subjects for photography was generally very conventional and one or two errors in labeling suggest that the photographer was a stranger to the country although not, I suspect, visiting solely for the purpose of tourism. Only the photograph of Stonehenge (93) features other people. On most visits he seems to have been travelling alone.

Whilst we cannot be certain that the order of photos in the album reflects the actual order in which he visited the sites, there does seem to be a good degree of consistency between the order in the album and the apparent seasons reflected in the photos. Bare branches on trees and mown stripes and daisies on lawns give some indication of what those seasons might have been. It is difficult to make distinctions between spring and summer, however, and the appearance of what looks like leaf litter in Tewkesbury introduces the possibility of autumn too.

A conjectural reconstruction could be as follows. The order of visits takes him progressively further away from the home base as if travelling by car (or by motorbike -check out 97!) and lodging on route but, of course, he could have travelled backwards and forwards to most of these places separately by train and returned within a day.

First set of visits: Winter (no leaves on trees)

LVC House, Betsham (87)

Nutley (88)

Arundel (91)

Chichester (92, 94)

Winchester (83, 85, 86, 390)

Salisbury (89, 90)

Stonehenge (93)

Second set of visits: Spring (stripes and daisies on lawns but leaves not thick)

CCS House, Purley (99) [actually this could be summer as all windows are open but it is adjacent to the Oxford photos]

Oxford (95, 96, 97, 98,100)

London (101, 104)

Stratford on Avon (102, 103) [could equally be winter or summer]

Third set of visits: Summer

WAA House, Rusper (105,107, 108, 110)

Tewkesbury (106) [could be autumn]

Gloucester (109,111,112,114)

Chepstow (113, 116)

What seems certain is that the photographer either spent a considerable time in England (possibly an entire year or longer) or visited more than once. However, he did not venture any further North than Stratford nor spend much time in London or photograph other obvious tourist sites in the South. His choice of subjects was generally rather perfunctory and sometimes (eg.92 and 116) inexplicable. At first sight he may appear to have been particularly interested in major ecclesiastical buildings (Winchester, Salisbury, Tewkesbury and Gloucester) but, in that case, why did he not photograph Chichester Cathedral or any of London’s churches? And when he photographed the Albert Memorial in London why on earth did he not turn the camera round and also photograph the equally impressive Royal Albert Hall? His pictures of the regional cathedrals are also lacking any real interest. There is nowhere near the same enthusiasm for photographing landscapes, daily life and events as he seems to have displayed in China.

PW 18-06-08