Kingston upon Thames! - # 09/04

Looking down from Kingston Bridge we see a collection of house boats and derelicts awaiting repair and resale. In the brilliant December sunshine the garden screen looks more Mediterranean than "England in Winter".

Across the water we see where the old industrial quays have undergone the typical make-over that swept through Europe's derelict old industrial waterside areas in the 1980's and 1990's. New "luxury" apartments and "entertaining bars and restaurants" replace the old sites of grubby labour and toil.

We are looking at the next stage of Kingston's long history that stretches back at least 1,000 years to a time when Saxon Kings were crowned at Kingston before the invasion by the Normans under William the Conqueror transformed English society and established new systems and laws we recognise even today. This invasion transformed the language into the rich mixture of old French and Anglo-Saxon which today we know as English.

Nothing is permanent. Everything changes - quickly, and suddenly.

A walk through Time - # 08/272

This late evening scene in the Market Square of Kingston upon Thames (next town, 5 miles along from Richmond) shows us 1,000 years of unbroken history and the activities have not changed.

The buildings show us a 400 year span, just hidden behind the crowd is a spot where 10th Century Saxon Kings were crowned before the Normans arrived in 1066, and the trading has always been there, with river transport and quayside just a few steps away behind the buildings.

As a maritime and trading nation Britain has always been an island where many races are seen and many languages heard.

Townscapes like this fascinate me.

Looking back - # 301

Ham, of London Daily Photo will forgive me for stepping sideways. This is the view of London today from the gun site where my father served in WW II.......Shooters' Hill near Erith, Kent. It's about 30 miles east of Richmond.



Looking west-north-west the whole of London lies before you. The tall towers nearest are the new (less then 20yrs old) Canary Wharf financial district, built on what was then, in 1940, a vast complex of commercial sea docks and factories (the so-called East End). To the left of Canary Wharf, in the centre of the picture are the '60s and '70s towers of the older, original financial district of the City of London, and beyond, on the left edge, is the so-called West End, home of the Crown, Parliament, Civil Service and Theatre Land (perhaps in that order, too, or maybe the reverse?). We can see how London has transformed and how the "hardware" of industry and commerce has moved elsewhere, but the "knowledge and software" have stayed. In fact, this photo should be a 360 degree panorama, so as to explain it all.



Last Summer I visited the old gun site (for the first time ever) and saw the size, scale and strategic importance. The view is fantastic - 360 degrees panoramic from high up. Today it is a golf course, and all that remains of Britain's largest and most powerful anti-aircraft gun site is a small lump of rubble that was the foundation of the radar gunnery control centre.



My father experienced considerable danger on "bad nights" and came home deaf in the morning. He was one of the kindest and nicest men you could ever know.

Secret war work- # 299

During the war this church tower and the surrounding buildings of the church hall and village amenity rooms became a research centre for secret anti-aircraft radar systems; an advanced electronic science in those days. All that remains today are the graffiti carvings of the soldiers and radar experts who worked there. As an anti-aircraft gunner at a large and powerful gunsite defending the City of London and the Thames Estuary, my father made effective use of the new technology. He never saw his targets. They were radio co-ordinates who then simply "disappeared" shortly after he had "pressed the button".