Anke: Royal Tunbridge Wells

I received a tip many moons ago from regular readers Matthew Morrison and Mike Goode about a rather special shop on Camden Road (it's actually half in Quarry Road) which apparently had one of the most accurate clocks in the world inside. It turned out to contain a lot more than that.

Time to Remember is owned by Andrew, who you can see in the photo above, and his shop is a horologists dream.

Within a few seconds of saying hello we excitedly got onto the subject of clocks, obviously, and I had to ask straight off the bat "where's the most accurate clock in the world?"

Now, if you had to choose from the hundreds that surrounded you in this shop I guarantee that this one would have been very far from the top of your list because there, sitting high above a door frame, was a simple tiny little clock about four inches across.

"Is it really the most accurate clock in the world?" I hear you ask. Well, nearly, it's definitely the most accurate in Tunbridge Wells that's for sure, and it owes this accuracy to the NPL-CsF2 atomic clock at the National Physical Laboratory from which it receives a time signal every day. Astonishingly it is accurate to within 1 second every 138 million years. So yes whilst it is one of the most accurate clocks in the world, it just so happens there are many more like it. There is a rather nice video of it where you can hear it's thunderous ticking.

Now, what there isn't many more of is the much more interesting clock below. This one is rather special indeed.

The clock you see above is called the Shortt-Synchronome Clock No.3 and it is a part of one of the most important developments in timekeeping since the invention of the pendulum clock two hundred years before it. This clock is directly responsible for detecting that planet Earth had a slight wobble. That's right, this clock sitting on a wall in a shop in Camden Road helped discover that our planet wobbled on its axis. How amazing is that?

This clock began its life in Greenwich, the home of time, in 1921. It was the third clock made by English engineer WH Shortt who perfected the free-pendulum idea. In an ordinary pendulum clock the free swinging of the pendulum, on which timekeeping accuracy depends, is interfered with by the need to sustain the pendulums motion and to count the swings to tell the time. In Shortt's free-pendulum clock, these two functions are carried out by a subsidiary ‘slave clock’, therefore allowing the master pendulum to swing freely except for a fraction of a second each half-minute, when it receives an impulse from the slave. This enables the clock to have amazing accuracy.

This clock, when installed in Greenwich, was used to help keep GMT, and during its first year it was accurate to within 0.01 seconds. Three years later in 1924 the clock was moved to other duties as more accurate clocks were being produced by Shortt. It became the standard time bearer for what is known as Sidereal Time, that is the time the earth takes to revolve once on its axis, which is not exactly 24hrs but 24hrs and 4 minutes. This is used by astronomers to keep their telescope trained on a specific spot in the sky.

How about that? Amazing eh? There it is now keeping perfect time sitting unassumingly on a wall in Camden Road, and do you want to know something even more amazing about this amazing (too many amazings?) timepiece? It was found in a junk shop! One of Andrew's friends who happened to work at the Greenwich Museum discovered it one day whilst browsing and passed it onto Andrew.

I really recommend you pop by and say hello to Andrew and take a look at these clocks because they are masterpieces.

There are just far too many wonderful clocks in this aladdin's cave to go into detail about them all here but here are a few of the more interesting examples in Andrew's ever-changing display.

This clock above is made by local Tunbridge Wells maker called William Ruffell. He operated around 1874 from, and here's the spooky bit, a shop in Camden Road! It's a rather wonderful balloon clock and would look superb on any mantle. Alas I couldn't find enough money in Mrs Anke's purse to buy it right there and then. Andrew says that clocks from local makers fly out the door in no time (first clock joke), so if you buy this clock I want words with you.

This small odd-shaped clock is given to recipients of the Order of the Garter. It therefore could've been owned by royalty yet here it sits in a shop on Camden Road. Amazing!

This is a GPO clock and would've graced the walls of a telephone exchange. The red diamonds marking the 15 minute intervals generate the call timing pulses necessary to charge telephone subscribers for their calls. Callers in those days would've paid for 15 minutes at a time rather than today's per second charging.

This clock is on the outside of the shop and it's another of the "most accurate in the world" clocks so this is the one to set your watch to when you pass by. The interesting thing about this one is that it was made by Andrew himself and it's a direct replica of the clock onboard the Astoria studio that belongs to Pink Floyd. Cool eh?

Now, if you do visit Andrew's shop the first thing that strikes you (second clock joke) is the sound. It envelopes you. Tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock tick...well you get the message. It's rather lovely and actually quite restful after a while. We made a few audio recordings whilst we were in the shop, and Andrew was kind enough to set lots of the clocks of chiming. Take a listen below.

If you'd like to learn more about Andrew and his shop then head on over to Mrs Anke's blog where she has written a lovely piece. We'd both like to say a huge thank you to Andrew for taking the time to chat to us and for our lovely readers for dropping us the tip. Thank you all.

I just took a walk into the glorious sunshine to try and get some inspiration for a blog post when I was hit with one, not literally of course, that would've been terrible.

Some of you may know that today, Tuesday, is MiggyMag Day, one of the required elements of which is Autocar Magazine. So you can imagine the grin that appears on my face when I see an Autocar bus drive past, and that is exactly what I bumped into this afternoon, again not literally, that would've been tragic.

Anyway, onto the interesting portion of this post.

The very first bus service to run in the UK was Shillibeer's Omnibus in London in 1829 and the first to run in Tunbridge Wells was in 1842. It ran to Tonbridge to pick up the train service to London as our own station had yet to be built, that wasn't completed until 1846. The 40 mile trip to London by road before 1842 was a rather tiring affair as the roads were in very bad shape (ring any bells in 2013?), so the service to the train station to pick up the train was very popular.

The growth of the railways, and especially the completion of our own station, put pay to omnibus services to London and also to Tonbridge to a small degree. The rail was just far quicker and far more comfortable than the road so the horse-drawn buses just couldn't compete. The omnibus companies continued to run services to other nearby towns but it was the introduction of the motorised omnibus service in around 1900 that really gave the business the shot in the arm it needed. Now the buses could travel further distances with more passengers and much quicker than they used to.

One of the oldest of these companies is still sort of running today but only in name, and that is the Autocar. They first appeared in town in around 1913 and ran services to Southborough, Pembury, Rusthall, Langton, Speldhurst, Matfield, and High Brooms. It wasn't to last long though as the company was acquired by the Maidstone and District bus company in July 1933, it continued under the Autocar name until 1935 before being fully merged and disappearing from our streets. That was until 2001 when a new bus company was formed and decided to use the same name. Now they give me a smile every time I see them.

David and I spent an evening, a very cold evening, up on the Common taking photos of the rocks in the dark. If you think that's odd, keep reading.

One of my favourite images from the night. Click for much larger to really see those stars!

Whilst patiently standing there staring into the darkness and waiting for the camera to finish doing its thing my mind began to wander a tad. It wandered all the way back a few years to a letter I received that I never got around to writing about.

It was from a couple of gents called Geoff Crockford and Nigel Hughes who were researching ancient life in Tunbridge Wells, or more specifically druidic temples. According to the two men, Wellington Rocks are as important as Stonehenge in this regard. Weird eh?

They had been asked to investigate the rocks with their dowsing rods to see what they could find. They both assumed that the rocks were a natural outcrop until their divination unearthed iron wheel tracks going under them. It was then that they realised that the rocks themselves had been brought in by humans over 2,500 years ago on what they call Henge Giant Vehicles (HGVs). I'll let your brain soak that up for a while. OK? Done? Right, let's move on.

Their work extended to looking for postholes and other signs of ancient human habitation and it soon became clear to them that the stones had been "housed inside a large temple building" of which the evidence is "easy to identify". Still with me?

Now, I have had reason to use dowsing rods in the past, having learnt their use when studying archaeology as a youngster, so I do believe in their power a little. There is something rather otherworldly about the way they work. But.

The two dowsers investigated every inch of Wellington Rocks, and they supposedly also discovered gullies cut into the surfaces of the rock for blood to flow after human sacrifice!

Now, what do you make of that? I'm glad such a beautiful night reminded me of that letter now. Aren't you?

I am pushing the limits of the known Universe here but I thought this place worthy of a blog post after David and I paid it a visit for our Tunbridge Wells Project.

Interior of the Pembury Workhouse Chapel.

The building pictured above is a listed chapel that sits within the grounds of the new Tunbridge Wells Hospital. We were very kindly invited to document it by John Weeks who works at the hospital.

The chapel was built for the inmates of a workhouse. A collection of buildings where those unable to support themselves were housed and employed. It was seen as the final refuge for the destitute and desperate. This was not a place where you simply got free board for some chores. You were worked hard, fed poorly, stripped of your humanity and separated from your loved ones. Having to admit defeat in life and become an inmate was considered the ultimate degradation. The unfortunately deprived members of society were terrified of it. The chapel was probably a small haven of happiness nestled in the corner of a world of misery.

Exterior of the Pembury Workhouse Chapel.

The workhouse was built on this site in 1836 and was called the Tonbridge Workhouse, even though it's in Pembury of Tunbridge Wells. Those Tonbridgians, not content with having a castle and a river they take our workhouses too!

One of the many stained glass windows.

The chapel was constructed many years after the workhouse in 1863-4, at a cost of £650. It was built following The Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 which declared that “a Church of England chaplain should hold divine service at workhouses every Sunday.” It took the authorities quite a long time to get around to building a dedicated structure but they still would have held religious services on Sundays but these would have been in temporarily adapted rooms.

The original chapel organ.

The building was constructed with two entrances at the front, one for men and one for women, to make sure sexes we separate at all times. The Committee charged with constructing the building even stipulated that there should be an internal dividing screen but there is no evidence of it remaining today. These separation screens had fallen out of fashion by the time the chapel was completed so the likelihood is that it was never built. Workhouse rules by this time gave families one hour to spend together every week so it could be likely that they were together in prayer here.

Of course the workhouse has long since disappeared. It became Pembury County Hospital in 1938, which later became known as Pembury Hospital. All the buildings, with the exception of the chapel and some exterior walling, were demolished in September 2011 to make way for the shiny new £230m hospital. Some of the original walls surrounding the workhouse can still be seen if you park in the correct car park (see photo below). 73 inmates from the workhouse are buried in Woodbury Park Cemetery.

One of the old workhouse walls.

The chapel sits in nicely manicured grounds and looks very smart inside and out. Most of the interior is in fabulous original condition save for a few modern additions. The original pipe organ is still there as is much of the stained glass, although some of this is more modern too. Rather than go into detail myself I have quoted a passage from English Heritage below which is of interest about the interior:

“The south-east window, has probably original glass depicting Christ as The Good Shepherd, flanked by scenes appropriate to a workhouse of a baker giving bread to a pauper and a woman visiting the sick. Other windows have probably been brought in. The north-east central window has two lights, one depicting St Vincent de Paul with two children in early C20 dress, the other St Luke. The north window of the south-west aisle depicts The Good Shepherd and was inserted after 1938 in memory of staff members and surgical staff of Pembury Hospital. The south-west aisle contains two windows considered by the hospital chaplain in 1956 to be by C E Kempe (1837-1907). These comprise The Virgin and Child, dedicated to Edith Mary Myles (1874-1957), the first President of the League of Friends and Headmistress of Tunbridge Wells County Grammar School and the adjoining quatrefoil with an inscription of 1957 in memory of Philip Stewart Browning, a former hospital chaplain. A further stained glass window in the north-east aisle depicting the Baptism of Christ is to the memory of Amelia Scott with an inscription of 1955. There are also a number of small wall plaques to people connected with the workhouse or hospital. These include plaques dedicated to Thomas R McGill, Master of Tonbridge Workhouse between 1866 and 1893, John Francis Carter Braine, surgeon to the radiotherapy department 1939-1953, Ivor Elwyn Joseph Thomas, obstetrician and gynaecologist 1939-1953 and Constantine Lambrinudi, orthopaedic surgeon 1890-1943. Source: English Heritage.”

A plaque dedicated to Ernest Dudley Yarnold Grasby who is not listed in English Heritage's list but did great work at the workhouse.

It was a strange place to be, unlike any church David and I have been in before. Very hard to explain. If you happen to have to visit the hospital, go and have a look.

If you want to see the rest of the interior go check out our gallery.

David and I have been wanting to visit this building for our Tunbridge Wells Project for some time. Why? Well we had heard rumours that contained deep within its walls are one of our, and your, favourite things. Tunnels.

A section of the magnificent mosaic floor. Mosaics like these cover the entire ground floor, but are covered in carpet today.

We walked in to the entrance foyer be greeted by the most magnificent mosaic floor, then we looked up. Wow! Just look at that ceiling!

The wonderfully ornate ceiling that greets you on arrival.

Let’s jump straight into what you all want to read about. Legend has it that Charles II had a tunnel built from the cellars of Mount Ephraim House all the way under the Common to The Pantiles. The reason? So that he could ferry ladies of the night to his chamber without them being seen. With this is mind you can imagine how excited we both were on climbing down the cold narrow stone steps to the cellar and unlocking the door.

We crept around in the dark excitedly keeping our eyes open for any ethereal movement and tunnel entrances. The staff don’t like coming down here, there are too many tales of scary bumps and odd feelings. David and I revel in it though. Eventually we found it, at the end of a vaulted corridor was the entrance to Charles II’s tunnel. Sadly it was bricked up a long time ago. There was still a small gap in the side of the brickwork which fresh air was rushing through but we just couldn’t get any camera gear in there to see. Perhaps one day we will return when renovations are in progress to see if we can see what is behind the mysterious wall. Skeletons and treasure hopefully.

The bricked up entrance to Charles II's tunnel.

Looking at the landscape surrounding the house I think there are a couple more options for this tunnel. Perhaps it came out just across the road in the thick woodland of Bishop’s Down? Could it come out somewhere else on the Common? If it does go all the way to The Pantiles, where is the other end?

Anyway, back to our job of the day, exploring and photographing. No? OK, if you insist, back to tunnel stories. There is another myth about this cellar. It is said that Charles II hid in a secret chamber cut into the rocks below the house during his escape after the Battle of Worcester. This could possibly be true, but his documented escape route didn’t really venture anywhere near here. Our exploration of the cellar did reveal plenty of little nooks and crannies down here where he could hide though. Lots of strange passageways and odd-shaped rooms. So maybe this was one of the undocumented places he cowered from Cromwell’s army.

Another basement room, did Charles II hide here?

Right, back to the rest of the house. It was the site of one of the first substantial houses to be built in Tunbridge Wells and has a history that can be traced back to the early 1600s. Substantially altered over the past 400 years it is now a very impressive care home and the residents can sit and enjoy the classic architecture of painted and carved wooden ceilings, paneled walls and stained glass windows. The house sits in lovely grounds, with vegetables gardens, chickens, an art studio, and even a crenellated folly. David and I can even vouch for the tasty lunches that the residents enjoy as we were treated to a slap up meal whilst we were shooting. All in all a thoroughly pleasant place for the residents to live.

The luxurious lounge.

But of course it’s Charles II and Catherine of Braganza that are probably the building’s most famous occupants. They stayed here in the late 1600s whilst their court occupied tents on the adjacent Common, just as Queen Henrietta had done many years previous. They lodged here many times and Catherine once stayed for a entire month to drink the waters as a cure for her gynaecological problems. The Treasury spent £5,000 (£400,000 in today’s money) in transporting her vast cavalcade to Mount Ephraim in a bid to make her well again. Alas over her month’s stay she just became worse, unfortunately it seems that our spring water disagreed with her so the entire court upped sticks and moved on to the waters of Bath.

The front view of Mount Ephraim House.

The only publicly visible piece of the original building that Charles II and Catherine would’ve seen that still survives is the stone wall that surrounds the grounds. It is now a listed structure but strangely the main building is not listed, even with those magnificent floors and cellars. Now, please go and take a look at the galleries of the images we shot and tell me why it isn’t? Because I can’t see why.

Thank you very kindly to the residents and staff, and especially Karen the care manager, of Mount Ephraim House for their kindness and hospitality. Well, what do you think? Are there really tunnels under the Common from here?

See all the Galleries on our Tunbridge Wells Project.