Architect - Abingdon on Thames Town Council

Harry Redfern

Henry Redfern – always known as Harry – was an important Edwardian architect with strong Abingdon associations. He was born in April 1861 at Berwick St John, Wiltshire, the son of George and Mary Redfern. His father was a surveyor and clerk of works to architect Henry Woodyer during his restoration work at St Helen’s, Abingdon. Harry was educated at Abingdon School, attending from 1871 to 1876.

In 1876 he was articled to Woodyer who was based in Guildford, but left a year later to join William Butterfield in London. By 1889 he had an independent architectural practice in Derby, but in 1896 went into partnership with John James Stevenson in London until the latter’s death in 1908. He became a Fellow of the RIBA in 1903.

With Stevenson, Redfern designed a number of houses in London, and in Abingdon he rebuilt in 1901 the former malthouse and adjacent premises at 58-60 East St Helen Street as a house and offices for lawyer Charles Alfred Pryce. Other work in Abingdon included the lodge at Abingdon School in 1897 and an extension to Lacies Court for Mrs Richard Chamberlain in 1902. In the same year, with J J Stevenson, he designed the new Board Schools in Bostock Road (now Carswell Community Primary School) and an eclectic Arts-and-Crafts house, Summerfield in Wootton Road, for Thomas Skurray, a director of Morland’s Brewery. This was sadly demolished in 2012. In 1911 he designed the altar for St Michael’s, Park Road. He was an active member of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings and was involved with the restoration of the Roysse Room (1911) and the former Abbey buildings in 1896 after the brewing business moved out.

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The Lodge, Abingdon School (1897).
(© D. Clark)

Redfern’s major work can be seen in Cambridge, at Christ’s and Magdalene Colleges, four university laboratories, and houses for Cambridge dons, some of which were later incorporated into Wolfson and Robinson Colleges. In Oxford, he designed the old biochemistry laboratory. He was also responsible, as chief architect for the State Management Districts of the Home Office from 1915 to 1945, for building fourteen public houses in Carlisle to cater for the large number of workers attracted there by the new munitions factories at Gretna Green. The government took control of the pubs in the area in order to ensure that the workforce – largely single men – stayed sober enough to work safely with explosives. Redfern’s pubs were light and airy with Arts-and-Crafts features, but planned so that the barman could see what was going on in every corner. They often had bowling alleys and gardens but also had kitchens so that food could be served – aspects of pubs that took until the late twentieth century to be common nationally. His work was commemorated by the pub in Etterby (1938) being named the Redfern.

In his last year he wrote Some Recollections of William Butterfield and Henry Woodyer (1950).He died on 8 March 1950.

© AAAHS and contributors 2013

William Wilkinson Wardell

At the intersection of the Oxford and Radley roads in Abingdon is a group of buildings – church, cloister, presbytery, school and former convent – that have developed over the years for the benefit of Abingdon’s Catholic community. They have their origin in an organisation or ‘mission’ which was created in the 1850s largely by the efforts of three men. William Wilkinson Wardell was one of them and was the initial architect. The other two were Sir George Bowyer, the generous donor, and Father John Paul O’Toole, the first minister to the mission.

Plans for the Abingdon mission were made at a time when the Catholic community generally was faced by an unprecedented demand for the means to provide adequate facilities for meeting religious, educational and social needs. The task of designing the mission buildings at Abingdon was entrusted to William Wilkinson Wardell, a young architect who had already completed a number of churches, chiefly in the Home Counties. As a young man he went to sea, training later as an engineer. Yet it was as a designer of buildings that Wardell would achieve distinction. For the church at Abingdon he chose the decorated style of Gothic, the influence of another architect, Augustus Welby Pugin, being all-pervasive at this time. Encounters with Pugin and a shared interest in religion helps account for the two men eventually becoming members of the Catholic Church. Work began on the Abingdon commission late in 1854; the presbytery, cloister, and chancel were opened and dedicated in 1857. It has been surmised that this group of buildings was sufficient for the time being; it was not until 1865 (by which time Wardell was in Australia) that the original plan was completed by Wardell’s successor George Goldie.

St Edmund’s presbytery and the east end of the church with the cloister buildings in between.
(Photo: M. Harrison, 2014)

Biographers of Wardell suggest there are two features about the man that were significant. The first was his family. He married Lucy Butler of Oxford in 1847 and there were eleven children of the marriage. Both had been reared as Anglicans, though in 1846 they became members of the Catholic Church. According to the biographer Denis Evinson, a happy marriage and a staunch commitment to the Catholic faith proved to be formative influences on Wardell.

Wardell started experiencing health problems in the late 1850s. Whatever the cause of this, he was recommended by his medical advisers to settle in a new climate. Having decided on Australia he arranged to settle there with his family. Before their departure he disposed of his growing practice to Messrs Hadfield and Goldie of Sheffield. It would be left to George Goldie to complete his work at Abingdon. Wardell left behind him a promising reputation and an impressive list of commissions. All told he had designed over thirty churches mainly in the London area, in addition to which he was responsible for a number of other religious buildings.

Britain’s loss was Australia’s gain. Locating first in Melbourne, Victoria, he received the commission to build St Patrick’s cathedral; other work, both religious and secular followed. Later on moving to Sydney, Wardell gained the commission to build St Mary’s cathedral, a remarkable accolade for any architect. He was awarded numerous other commissions, many being secular projects and not all in the Gothic style. In Australia his health improved to such an extent that he remained professionally active until a short time before his death in 1899 at the age of 76.

© AAAHS and contributors 2014

John George Timothy West

John George Timothy West – known informally as Timothy West and professionally as JGT West – was a well-known local architect and a popular figure in the town.

He was born in December 1861, probably at The Beehive public house on the corner of Broad Street and Stert Street (an Indian restaurant in 2014). His maternal grandfather, the landlord of The Beehive, was William Honey. His father was John West, who built coaches, and his mother was Sarah. By the time Timothy was nine the family were living at The Beehive.

He was sent to Roysse’s School (now Abingdon School) soon after it moved to its present site in Albert Park. By 1881 he was recorded as living with an aunt in Aldershot and was described in the census as an ‘architectural pupil’. He became articled to the Abingdon architect Edwin Dolby. By about 1885 he had set up his own practice in his home in Stert Street, a house now known as The Knowl.

The Knowl in the early twentieth century
Courtesy of Mrs. Anne West

In addition to designing buildings he undertook other work. An advertisement published in the local trade directory also offered his services as a surveyor and debt collector, as well as a house agent and auctioneer. This may have been because at that time architecture alone was rarely profitable enough to support the standard of living appropriate to a gentleman.

Like many people at that time he owned a horse, which he called Business; when he was out of the office riding his staff learned to tell enquirers that he was “out on business”.

Timothy West and his daughter Mary on horseback, with his father, John, outside The Knowl in about 1905 Courtesy of Mrs. Anne West

His architectural projects were sited not only in Abingdon and Oxford but as far afield as Nuneaton. His first major commission for which a date is certain was for an extension to house the boys’ school at the Convent of Mercy in Abingdon in 1892. Among the many designs in his home town in which he had a hand was the Free Library in the High Street (1895-6), which has been converted into flats but retains its distinctive frontage.

The Isolation Hospital in Marcham Road (now Abingdon Community Hospital) was also planned by him in 1900 and added to in 1916. However, much of it was later replaced and now only the building facing the road remains of his work.

Among the houses which he designed was an attractive row called Tesdale Terrace in Bostock Road, commissioned by the local charity, Christ’s Hospital, as accommodation for workmen. He made a distinguished contribution to his old school in the design of the chapel and the gymnasium in 1899; subsequently he added classrooms and a sanatorium.

In 1926 JGT West & Son won a competition to design the Community Hospital at Wantage.

Perhaps the firm’s most unusual commission was the organ blowing chamber in Abingdon’s St Helen’s churchyard which was erected in 1927. This was built to house the machinery that supplies air for the church’s instrument and now it also accommodates the central heating boilers for the church.

Organ blowing chamber in St Helen’s churchyard.
The style of the building echos that of the neighbouring Brick Alley Almshouses of 1718 that are just visible on the left in the background.
© Michael Harrrison

Timothy West took an active part in the life of the town. He served as a Borough Councillor from 1896 to1905 and was mayor in 1903-4. He was for many years a churchwarden at St Nicolas’ Church and also the honorary secretary of the Abingdon Horticultural Society. He served as a magistrate and was a Freemason.

In 1884 he married Louisa Maria Johnson, the daughter of a local draper. They had three children: Archibald Buller, John Lacey and Mary. The eldest, Archibald (known professionally as A B West), began his career as a government surveyor but later joined his father’s practice and eventually took it over. His own son, Duncan Buller West, followed in his father’s footsteps.

Timothy West died in May, 1931.

In 1986 the firm, under Duncan Buller West, was merged with the young local practice of Philip Waddy to become West Waddy ADP, thus bringing the independent West company to an end.

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