Medlow Hotel to Medlow Court

[Geoff]

Looks like this was quite a grand hotel at one stage. Bit of a let down now
Note how the main entrance has gone from the middle and the top floor has been added on.

Medlow Hotel

Medlow Court

[Gerry Glyde]

The photo looks like 1955/1960. Yes it was one of the posh hotels that were lined up with sea views all the way along to Warrior Squ and beyond. The Queens Hotel and Royal Vic were considered the best. I seem to remember that the Queens was 4 or 5 Star.

My dad worked at the Alexandra and I used to help out, unofficially, in the kitchen and Still Room. If dad was working over Christmas the we would get the left over
Petit Fours that were on the tables at the end of dinner. The hotel trade declined in the early 70s with some of the hotels being turned into language schools.

[Geoff]

Great memories Gerry, were the left over petit fours any good?

I wonder just how many hotels Hastings and St Leonards had in it's heyday of visitors?

[Gerry Glyde]

"Oh 'twas a fine treat Sir, them fine ladies and gents let hus ave the scrappings from the table when they wus done hafter the gruel that mother had made special with extra vegtables and a little 'am"
Tiny Tim

[Gerry Glyde]

There were hundreds of varying description from the Public Houses such as the Manor at the junction of Manor Rd/St Mary's Rd (described on this site a while ago), the Granville on Whitefriars, I think the pub at the top of Havelock was described as a hotel. Ther were also establishments described as a "Private Hotel" although I am not sure what that meant, and the Commercial Hotels (? junction of Tower & London Rd) for salesmen and the like and then up to the more prestigious establishments previously named.

The newspapers of the time, Observer, Advertiser, and one other whose name escapes me, published lists of visitors who were going to be staying at these places in such terms as Mr & Mrs.....and Master and Miss...........; or Lady............ and maid; The Dowager ....and Companion and maid; Mr & Mrs ......and the Misses.........; some entries would also have "will stay for three months" or Mrs and The Misses........., Mr ......will join the party on.............

The extracts provide an indication of the level of wealth being invested and the nature of a holiday in Hastings of the time. There are also entries that show a wife and children staying full time and the father perhaps in business would join the family at weekends.
At the other end of the spectrum were the boarding establishments that would take people in a lower income bracket either on a semi permanent basis or the itinerant workers.

The old papers make interesting reading. Perhaps a local member can find an indicative number from a local directory.

[Richard]

When exactly were the 'Heydays' of Hastings?
I know the early 1900's saw a decline but there may have been more than one period of prosperity for the town,
I guess mid to late Victorian times, were good for business and probably sometime before WW2 - from which Hastings (among other resorts) never fully recovered.

[Gerry Glyde]

I suggest that the answer to this issue is first to decide the identity of the group for which the question is posed of "Heydays of Hastings". There may be some coincidence of groups and times but also divergence.

The Castle Hotel (now demolished) and the Royal Vic were built around 1840s. There were other similar hotels around Warrior Square at the same time, combined with the arrival of the railway would have seen an initial heyday as the services expanded. That will have brought employment and it will have been a period of growth. However those hotels primarily served wealthy clients who as decribed above, might stay for prolonged periods. In addition to the hotels there were also mansions that were rented out as apartments to similar folk.

Later on smaller hotels developed as establishments for middle class customers. As the expansion of the town continued other places and boarding houses will have opened to cater for those perhaps of the lower middles class for a week by the sea. The population stabilised around 1905 and at that time there will have been day or weekend trippers for each of the hotel types. I posted a 1905 South East/Chatham Rly poster on here awhile ago that advertised "cheap weekend or day tickets" and "First Class Hotels"

The late Victorian / Edwardian postcards show busy promenade a lot of whom will have been tourists rom those trains.

After the" lights went out over Europe" and the lament of "We will never see the likes of it again" (the glorious summer), the fortunes of the landed estates declined and along with it the ability of those people to take such holidays in the the plush hotels declined in Hastings (although perhaps to a lesser extent in Eastbourne & Brighton)

However the short break holiday maker continued to come until the 1950s although some of the larger establishments had possibly been coverted for ordinary residential use.

At the same time there were periodic times of poverty that went parallel to the heyday of some. In 1878 the Observer published an article "the Distress in Hastings" when sources of food for the poor were discussed; and as is more well known in the early 1900s when unemployment was high and children were given food at school. Some of the children did not have shoes to wear.

Heydays for some, along with less than heydays for others.

[Gerry Glyde]

Extract from Observer
Someone local may be able to look at the nature of the hotel trade at the time.

[Technique]

Intriguing article. I take it Mr Glyde is a relation of yours? Commendable actions.

Funny how things come around isn't it? Despite the fact we are allegedly emerging from a recession, the food bank, modern day equivalent of the soup kitchen, is more in demand than in any recent time.

Makes you wonder...

[Gerry Glyde]

George Glyde was a common name in the town at the time but this one was my 3X grandfather. There was also another family with a George Glyde and where they come in I do not know.