Vera Brittain

[BeppoSapone]

Can any Pals tell me the exact address of the Brittain family in 1914? The CWGC are using a London address for her brother, who was killed in Italy.

I know that they were living at Manchester Road, Buxton, but don't know the number.

At present, I am living a couple of streets away from Manchester Road and thought I might take some photo's before I move.

As she served as a V.A.D I assume that this is the right section for this query?

[Guest Hussar]

At the start of 'Letters from a Lost Generation' she gives it as 'Melrose', Buxton.

It was more commonplace, in those days, particularly in Villages and Provincial Towns, for houses to be known by a name rather than a number. Simply because there were fewer of them and everyone knew who lived where.

My Grandfather, on his leave and de-mob passes, gave his home address as 'Homewood', Gedling.

If you can find a Local Historian, or Group, or can check the land registry or something like that, you'll be able to discover which house used to be 'Melrose'

( Or which house currently stands where it used to be!)

[Guest Johnsonm]

The Brittains lived at High Leigh, Manchester Rd Buxton, in 1907 moving to Melrose, The Park, Buxton. Melrose is still there, at least it was a few years ago!

The name is still on the gate post. The Tennis club where Vera played still has the gate that she would have used.

Regards, Maurice and Michelle

[BeppoSapone]

The Brittains lived at High Leigh, Manchester Rd Buxton, in 1907 moving to Melrose, The Park, Buxton. Melrose is still there, at least it was a few years ago!

The name is still on the gate post. The Tennis club where Vera played still has the gate that she would have used.

Regards, Maurice and Michelle

Thanks for all help.

I have searched about half of Manchester Road so far, and seen nothing of the houses. The disused gate of the tennis club I know very well, as the tennis club is next to the cricket ground where I haunt the boot sale in the summer. This is reached via a road just up from the church mentioned in an earlier posting in "a place to play" - site of a memorial to a Lt. Col of the Sherwood Foresters.

I now need to follow Manchester Road, heading away from the town centre and past the Cavendish Hospital. I am waiting for a day when it is not raining!

I asked my partner's aunt if she knew the houses in question and am told that she has been in High Leigh hundreds of times in the past. It is/was converted into flats for "genteel old folk", and she had a good friend who lived there until she died.

Sounds as if there is no blue plaque, which does not surprise me. Vera Brittain seems to be disliked in Buxton, and my partner's aunt was less than impressed to be told that her late friend had lived in the house.

[Kate Wills]

Beppo,

Your best bet is to enquire of your local studies library/CRO if they have a Directory, such as Kelly's (although others existed too). A look at the appropriate page would locate the Brittains. Another route is to access the register of electors.

[Terry_Reeves]

Just out of interest, Vera Brittain's memorial at Old Milverton, near Leamington Spa.

Terry Reeves

[Guest Hussar]

Surely any 'Blue Plaque', if there is one, would be at their home in Newcastle-under-Lyme, where she was born?

[Will O'Brien]

Surely any 'Blue Plaque', if there is one, would be at their home in Newcastle-under-Lyme, where she was born?

Hussar

I don't think that the blue plaques are just erected at the places of birth. I believe they can be at any of a 'famous' persons residences & I think you can have multiple blue plaques for the same person

[BeppoSapone]

Surely any 'Blue Plaque', if there is one, would be at their home in Newcastle-under-Lyme, where she was born?

Well, maybe there is a plaque in Newcastle. I believe that, in London I have seen plaques that state that a person simply lived in the house. Hattie Jacques in Fulham springs to mind.

I think that these things have to be agreed by the local council, and need local support for that. Actually I have now found out that there IS some sort of plaque to Vera Brittain here. It is supposed to be in the Paxton Rooms in Pavillion Gardens. I must go and look.

However, I have yet to find anyone from Buxton who has ever troubled to go and see it!

The whole thing is extraordinary. Can anyone tell me exactly what Vera Brittain said or did to be so disliked here? People change the subject when I ask about her, they tell me about Tim Brooke-Tailor and Dave Lee Travis being "local heroes", but Vera is a definate "no-no".

[Michelle Young]

Hi Beppo

Maybe it is because she was so outspoken in her criticism of Buxton in Testament of Youth. She left Buxton during 1915 and didn't return there until 1935. She states that nothing much had changed and described it in her diary as a complacent little health resort. Edwards MC was not added to the Buxton War memorial until the 1980s.

Also I think that the Brittains were percieved in Buxton as social climbers, something that apparently still rankles-hence the reluctance to discuss her.

There is a memorial to VB in the crypt of St Martins in the Fields in Trafalgar Sqaure the church where she worshipped and was also the church of Canon Dick Sheppard, founder of the Peace Pledge Union which VB was heavily involved in.

Mr and Mrs Brittain lived in London from 1917.

(See Vera Brittain-a Life by Paul Berry and Mark Bostridge and Chronicle of Friendship edited by Alan Bishop)

Regards, Michelle