1
Memorial to Mr and Mrs F W Gill and the German air crew
This stone is in a small memorial garden in Clacton, on the northern corner where Victoria Road and Albert Gardens intersect. On 30th April 1940, a German Heinkel bomber carrying sea mines crash-landed on the house in Victoria Road belonging to Mr Frederick W Gill (b. 1888), a retired wool merchant, and his wife Dorothy (b. 1894). The house was utterly destroyed and they were both killed. They were the first civilian casualties of World War II on the British mainland. The memorial commemorates both them and the four members of the German air crew.
The crash also made fifty houses uninhabitable and 156 people were injured. The Gills' 19-year-old son William survived with head
injuries.
The memorial was refurbished and a new memorial stone added in April 2017, paid for partly by money remaining from an air disaster fund set up in 1940 following the crash by the Rev H G Redgrave, the chairman of Clacton Urban District Council.
[Sources: bbc.co.uk; Chelmsford Chronicle, 3rd May 1940, from the British Newspaper Archive and courtesy of the British Library Board; National Register 1939 entry for the Gills].
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 20 Feb 2018
0.03 miles
2
Memorial garden to Mr and Mrs F W Gill and the German air crew
This is a small memorial garden in Clacton, on the northern corner where Victoria Road and Albert Gardens intersect. On 30th April 1940, a German Heinkel bomber carrying sea mines crash-landed on the house in Victoria Road belonging to Mr Frederick W Gill (b. 1888), a retired wool merchant, and his wife Dorothy (b. 1894). The house was utterly destroyed and they were both killed. They were the first civilian casualties of World War II on the British mainland. The memorial commemorates both them and the four members of the German air crew.
The crash also made fifty houses uninhabitable and 156 people were injured. The Gills' 19-year-old son William survived with head
injuries.
The memorial was refurbished and a new memorial stone added in April 2017, paid for partly by money remaining from an air disaster fund set up in 1940 following the crash by the Rev H G Redgrave, the chairman of Clacton Urban District Council.
[Sources: bbc.co.uk; Chelmsford Chronicle, 3rd May 1940, from the British Newspaper Archive and courtesy of the British Library Board; National Register 1939 entry for the Gills].
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 20 Feb 2018
0.03 miles
3
Lancaster Gardens - northern section
Picture shows the northern section of Lancaster Gardens, which lie between the two streets Lancaster Gardens West and Lancaster Gardens East. The photograph was taken from the entrance on Albert Gardens (a street bisecting the northern and southern gardens).
Lancaster Gardens are the first in a series of ornamental gardens running east to west between streets along this section of Clacton's seafront, the others being Albany Gardens and Connaught Gardens.
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 8 Jul 2018
0.04 miles
4
Lancaster Gardens entrance looking south
Picture shows the southern section of Lancaster Gardens, which lie between the two streets Lancaster Gardens West and Lancaster Gardens East. The photograph was taken from the entrance on Albert Gardens (a street bisecting the northern and southern sections of the gardens). The picture looks south in the direction of the sea (though the winding path and vegetation mean it is not visible).
Lancaster Gardens are the first in a series of ornamental gardens running east to west between streets along this section of Clacton's seafront, the others being Albany Gardens and Connaught Gardens.
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 8 Jul 2018
0.07 miles
5
Albany Gardens - northern section
Picture shows the northern section of Albany Gardens, which lie between the two streets Albany Gardens West and Albany Gardens East. The photograph was taken from the entrance on Albert Gardens (a street bisecting the northern and southern gardens).
Albany Gardens are the second in a series of ornamental gardens running east to west between streets along this section of Clacton's seafront, the others being Lancaster Gardens and Connaught Gardens.
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 8 Jul 2018
0.12 miles
6
Albany Gardens entrance looking south
Picture shows the southern section of Albany Gardens, which lie between the two streets Albany Gardens West and Albany Gardens East. The photograph was taken from the entrance on Albert Gardens (a street bisecting the northern and southern sections of the gardens). The picture looks south in the direction of the sea.
Albany Gardens are the second in a series of ornamental gardens running east to west between streets along this section of Clacton's seafront, the others being Lancaster Gardens and Connaught Gardens.
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 8 Jul 2018
0.13 miles
7
St Paul's Church, Clacton-on-Sea, Essex
Image: © Peter Stack
Taken: 29 Aug 2009
0.14 miles
8
St Michael's Convent and Care Home
The convent, owned by the United Sisters of Mercy, was built in 2012.
It replaced the former convent, which stood on the site of the landscaped gardens in front of the present building. The old building was demolished the same year because it was too cramped for the nuns' needs.
Photograph taken from the promenade on the opposite side of Marine Parade East.
[Source of information: Clacton Gazette, 13 Jan and 19 Jun 2012].
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 9 Jul 2018
0.15 miles
9
Clacton-on-Sea: St Michael's Convent and Care Home
This is a recently constructed building, at 93 Marine Parade West, that replaced a 100 year old structure, that is variously shown on old large scale Ordnance Survey maps as a convent and an orthopaedic hospital.
A local newspaper reported in 2009 that "St Michael’s was founded by three Sisters of Mercy, who came to Clacton from London in 1908 to set up a Roman Catholic convalescent home for women and also took some children with infantile paralysis or spinal TB as patients. The whitewashed building dominates Clacton’s east cliff and is one of the few turn-of-the-century buildings remaining in Clacton."
Streetview has images of the quite striking old building in May 2009, and the new one in September 2012.
The mobile phone mast on the right is evidently newer than September 2012.
Image: © Nigel Cox
Taken: 29 Oct 2018
0.16 miles
10
Lancaster Gardens entrance looking north
Picture shows the southern section of Lancaster Gardens, which lie between the two streets Lancaster Gardens West and Lancaster Gardens East. Lancaster Gardens are the first in a series of ornamental gardens running east to west between streets along this section of Clacton's seafront, the others being Albany Gardens and Connaught Gardens.
Image: © Duncan Graham
Taken: 2 Jun 2018
0.16 miles