On this day in 1906 John Ireland was in Littlehampton, taking part in the annual St Luke’s choir summer outing. Littlehampton was at that time a thriving harbour and popular destination, as seen in surviving historic photographs. The day began early with a 6am train from Victoria. After changes at Arundel and Ford, the party arrived at the seaside at 9am. The morning was spent in the sea. 12.30pm saw the group assembled for lunch and a commemorative photograph (tantalisingly lost). The rector, Henry Bevan, joined them from London at this point. In the afternoon some went rowing, some for a drive, bathed again and met for tea. The return journey commenced at 8pm with 4 boys missing. Charles Hindes, the vestry clerk, had to stay behind to locate and bring home the miscreants.
started early. He was a regular visitor to the coast (Littlehampton, Brighton, Seaford) with the choirboys of St Luke’s. In the 1920s he took a pied-à-terre in Ashington, close to where he would eventually live in Rock Mill. The place was Ivy Cottage, on the edge of the village, as seen on the map below. Still there, the cottage now stands on the busy London Road (the A24). The road just below, with the Rectory shown, is where Ireland lived in a room on Meiros Farm in the early 1950s, before buying his windmill.
The two lads with identical hairstyles, one standing, one seated at the front, are Edward and Reginald Motley. It’s possible to identify them through census records and by judging their ages from the photograph. In the picture the older boy, Edward, is 12, his younger brother Reginald 10. Edward stands next to Ireland’s favourite chorister, Charlie Markes. The two Motleys lived in Fulham, at 69 Rostrevor Road, not that far from John Ireland in Gunter Grove.
