Borin Van Loon: Ipswich Historic Lettering: Russell Villas

Russell Villas

and other named houses

The capstone outside an unassuming semi-detached house (or more aptly two attached houses which have been sliced off an 1896 terrace, due to the bend in the road) in Belle Vue Road displays the word 'VILLAS' (close-up below).

For years this white-painted composite/concrete shaped capstone was covered with ivy and creeper. When this was cleared away, the battered surface was found to proclaim the second word of the name 'Russell Villas'. There is no name and date plaque on these two houses as there often are on others in the road. They - and their companion semis at the bottom of the plot, facing Woodbridge Road: 'Shaftesbury Villas', being built somewhat out of the main sequence of housing in the late Victorian development on the east of Ipswich. Quite where the capstone bearing the word 'Russell' is, or where it could have been sited, is a mystery, but it may be significant that the same state of affairs exists with the capstone of Shaftesbury Villas, too! Perhaps there wasn't enough money left in 1896 to commission the lettering.

And here is the picture of Shaftesbury Villas in Woodbridge Road, similarly bereft of its title capstone:

Incidentally, this part of town boasted at least two asylums. Halfway up Grove Lane on the left was 'The Grove Retreat', parts of which survived until about 1990 when the bell-tower disappeared and the high strip of land along the ridge of the hill was developed as new housing. Nearer to the above house once stood 'Belle Vue Retreat'. These were both probably early Victorian privately-run workhouses (rather than Union Workhouses see Links for a splendid site on them) which also doubled as mental hospitals; cases of 'lunatics' being admitted are common. The driveway off Woodbridge Road to the remote house in a wooded area atop the hill overlooking the town probably formed the first part of Belle Vue Road. This was later cut through in a steep serpentine downward hill to meet the earlier Alexandra Road opposite the junction with Nottidge Road. Some of the gardens at the top bend of the hill still see many crocuses springing up every year behind the late Victorian houses and it is thought that these are the only traces of Belle Vue Retreat and its gardens.

Here's a citation from a Norfolk Rossbret Institutions Website(see Links).
"Belle Vue Asylum, Ipswich
Pleasantly situated on the Woodbridge Rd, is a
private establishment, for the reception of persons afflicted with insanity. It was commenced in 1835, by its present proprietor, Mr James Shaw, surgeon, & has accommodations for 40 patients.
Source: White Directory 1844 - p 84
Submitted by Betty Longbottom"
and this from a later edition:-
"BELLE VUE ASYLUM, on the Woodbridge road, has accommodations for about 40 patients and was opened in 1835, for the reception of persons afflicted with insanity by the late Mr James Shaw, surgeon, whose widow now conducts it. THE GROVE, the residence of Dr Chevallier, is another private retreat for a select number of persons afflicted with that worst of human maladies - insanity. Both establishments have large gardens and pleasure grounds and are under excellent management."
HISTORY, GAZETTEER, AND DIRECTORY OR SUFFOLK By WILLIAM WHITE, 1855.

The area opposite the house above is called Post Mill Close to commemorate one of the local windmills which stood near the site; the Mill Cottage still stands there. These were collectively known as Albion mills as the Woodbridge Road hill at this point is called Albion Hill (probably itself named after the large Napoleonic barracks which once stood on or around Parade Road and Khartoum Road). The pub on Woodbridge Road called 'Albion Mills' was itself an echo of these windmills; while the pub was demolished in the early nineties, the bus stop nearby is still called Albion Mills. The windmills would have benefitted from the stiff prevailing south-westerly winds which come up the Orwell valley and strike the Belle Vue hillside.

The whole area to the east of Belle Vue Road is called California because of the 'gold rush' frontier feel to the American-style grid system of roads which were imposed and developed as smallholdings by the Ipswich and Suffolk Freehold Land Sociey (which became Ipswich Building Society) around the same time. Tenants raised livestock, dug stone, gravel and brickearth, made bricks, market gardened and made a small living in many ways from the sizeable plots around their modest cottages.

The widespread evidence of the involvement of the Ipswich and Suffolk Freehold Land Society is provided by these rather grand scrolled name plaques. This is 'DEANS VILLAS, A.D. 1869' above the shop fronts at 113 Felixstowe Road. The designs of the scrolls are quite varied.

Another even more florid example of a Freehold Land Society property, carefully tended by the owners, 'PERCY COTTAGES' (sadly no date, but 1860s/1870s is most likely). Location: Crabbe Street. We know of no other 'pleated scroll' name plaque in the area.

This surprisingly ornamental moulding encompassing the date '1900' is above the bay window of Kunnan Singh's grocery and off-licence at the corner of Cauldwell Hall Road and Freehold Road (opposite the Lion's Head public house). A similar decoration appears above the windows fronting Cauldwell Hall Road.
Now a departure. There are many examples of house names on pillars and plaques in the town, but 'BEAUFORT BUILDINGS' at 133 Norwich Road takes pride of place, if only for its scale and unreadability. Easily mistaken for 'Branfort Buildings', the spidery lettering painted in this specially recessed white rectangle above the two front porches doesn't quite do the job for which it is intended.

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Copyright throughout this site belongs to Borin Van Loon, 2003.