Engels and The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists – Eastbourne’s Radical History Tour

If you have just alighted the train to begin this walk, then welcome to Eastbourne. This town was designed and developed by its landowners from the 1850s, built as a new resort for the rich thus greatly expanding the population from less than 4,000 in 1851 to nearly 35,000 by 1891. Many of the higher echelons of society would arrive from London to take up residence for the summer, bringing along their servants of course. Many of those grand houses, built for the elites and the Lords and Ladies, have since been converted into flats for the hoi polloi. I lived in such a flat, in a house converted into 8 flats which was once solely owned by Lady Someone-or-other.

Eastbourne was designed as a new resort built “for gentlemen by gentlemen”. The working classes of the town were kept hidden from the sight of our elite visitors (“don’t go east of the pier, dear”). And so too nowadays has much of our radical history been hidden. So, this walk will give you a flavour of just some of Eastbourne’s radical history. There is much more to uncover, and this walk is one attempt to bring some of this important history back to life. We hope you enjoy.

1. Eastbourne Station

Directions: Please start this walk at the station entrance to the left as you alight the train (looking out onto Terminus Road).

The railway first came to Eastbourne on 14th May 1849 when 90% of the town was owned by just 2 families, the Davies-Gilbert family (notably Carew Davies-Gilbert), who owned about a quarter of the town, and the Cavendish family (notably William Cavendish, the seventh Duke of Devonshire), who owned about two thirds of the town. From 1859, plans were laid out to build an entirely new town to attract the higher echelons of society to either live or to holiday here. A new resort built “for gentlemen by gentlemen”. This Eastbourne Station Terminus was the 4^th station to be built over a 37-year period. The Davies-Gilbert family paid for the Terminus Road to be built and did not want their estates in the Upperton part of Eastbourne to be cut off by the rail track. So, the railway terminus was re-sited from its previous position at the site where Prezzo now stands, over the mini roundabout to the right. Before the new road was built there was only a track from the station going across cornfields to the Seahouses area.

Directions: You will see Terminus Road ahead of you. It is the partly pedestrianised shopping street leading to the pier. We will re-join this road later via Cornfield Road. Cross over the road to the estate agents on the corner (with the pub on the opposite corner), then follow round to the right towards the mini roundabout. Navigate your way across the roundabout to a road on the other side of the library called Southfields Road.

3. The Town Hall

Why did a crowd of 3,000 working-class Labour supporters gather outside of Eastbourne Town Hall on a cold November evening, eagerly awaiting the results of the 1913 municipal elections?³ Well, despite much negative campaigning condemning “Labour extremists” as unfit to hold office, postal worker F.J. Huggett and railway driver A.J. Marshall became the first Labour councillors in the borough’s history. Local Liberal George Chambers had turned to the Eastbourne Chronicle to express his abhorrence that such an eventuality might occur:

Be it always remembered that a town like Eastbourne depends for its permanent prosperity on capital and capitalists, and, for its local management to fall into the hands of nobodies with nothing to lose would be fatal.

George Chambers, Eastbourne Councillor, Liberal Party

Well, they did not lose. The Labour victory was celebrated by the newly elected working-class councillors driving along in a horse drawn carriage with the campaigners bursting into the campaign song, “March of the Men of Hardnecks” to the tune of “Men of Harlech”. Victory was theirs.⁴

Directions: Follow round to the left down South Street. Not far down on the right you will see the Dolphin pub.

5. 112 to 114 South Street

Before World War II, this address was used as the headquarters for the Trade Association and the Labour Party. A lot of the upper floors were used by Plummer Roddis (later acquired by Debenhams), a very high-class department retailer in the town which used it as a hostel for unmarried female staff (think Are You Being Served?). After the war, with Clement Attlee’s government, the building was used by the Department of Labour. With the creation of the NHS, the Department of Health moved in. Local families could go there to collect the free cod liver oil and concentrated orange juice for their children.

Find out more about the Evolution of Eastbourne’s ‘Little Chelsea’ area.

Directions: Carry on to the end of the road to Memorial roundabout with Victory Angel statue (note this statue faces south for some reason, instead of the usual east). Turn left into Cornfield Road and carry on to Terminus Road at the end. You will find yourself at “Bankers Corner”, which locals use for this spot. You will see why when you get there. But before Bankers Corner you will pass the site of the “Little Spain” shop.

7. Bankers Corner

This is where many left-wing groups in the town hold their street events. It is not the same since the blue railings were removed → These railing were wonderful for displaying our many banners. They were a final reminder of days when this section was called Sussex Gardens and was full of grand houses, whose front gardens later became shops. Besides what is now Barclays is the spot where street vendor William Washington King, or “Daddy King”, had a pitch. He sold matches and bootlaces and other useful items. He was a committed fundraiser and champion of the poor, holding regular events for local children and giving financial aid to penniless widows and the sick. He was interviewed on BBC radio in 1936 about his contribution to the local community. Many of the local bars and clubs had a “Kings Cup” on the bar, collecting money for his work. When he died, in 1938, it is reported that 6000 local people attended his funeral.

Directions: Walk along the fully pedestrianised section of Terminus Road up to number 114 on your left.

9. Engels in Eastbourne – Afton Hotel, 4 Cavendish Place, formerly Astor House

Built in 1850, Cavendish Place was one of the first streets to be built as part of the seventh Duke of Devonshire’s grand plan for the town.

During the last 15 years or so of his life, Engels adopted Eastbourne as his favourite “go to” English seaside town. He was so fond of Eastbourne that whenever he had time to spare, he would hurry down, usually accompanied by a member of Marx’s family and/or close friends.

Engels regularly visited Eastbourne in the summer and sometimes other months, particularly after he took early retirement from the family business. He often stayed at Astor House, i.e. here, where the Afton Hotel now stands. (“…Near to the promenade and opposite the pier” – Letter to Laura Lafargue, second daughter of Marx, dated 19^th August 1883).

Engels’ favourite walk (as it is for many of us in Eastbourne today) was along the seafront and over the downs to Beachy Head.

On 18^th March 1893, Engels wrote to Sorge that he had spent two weeks in Eastbourne and “had splendid weather”, coming back “very refreshed”.⁵ As this letter suggests, it is most likely that Engels’ time in Eastbourne was his down time, for relaxation. But you never know, after Marx’s death on 14th March 1883, Engels may have worked at this address on the completion of volumes 2 and 3 of Das Kapital. (Long shot here!)

As Engels became sick with throat cancer, he sought the peace of Eastbourne more frequently. It was on his doctor’s orders that he stayed at 4 Cavendish Place during the last weeks of his life. He wrote his last letter from this address dated 23^rd July 1895, addressed to Laura Lafargue. The letter ended, “I do not have the strength to write long letters, so keep well”. The next day he returned to London and died on August 5^th, having added to his will a codicil that his ashes be scattered in the sea off Beachy Head.

The 1976 Engels Plaque at 4 Cavendish Place

On May Day 1976 an Engels plaque was unveiled here at 4 Cavendish Place. This occasion was celebrated with the brass band first playing at the bandstand then marching down to Cavendish Place, where they played extracts from “Hello Dolly” before the unveiling at 3pm. The unveiling was attended by: Mayor Clifford Scott; the Cuban Ambassador, Lionel Sotto; Len Caine, who was the Labour Party prospective parliamentary candidate for the 1974 and 1979 elections (he was a prominent trade unionist in the town); and finally, and most importantly, the German Democratic Republic Charge d’Affaires, Herr Heinz Birch, who did the actual unveiling. Many dignitaries and visitors from both the German Democratic Republic and the Cuban embassies came to town for the ceremony, along with their families and friends.
Lionel Sotto, the Cuban Ambassador, had been imprisoned during the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, released in 1959. He held positions within the Communist Party of Cuba and the Cuban Government.

Locals complained about the number of embassy cars parked on double yellow lines. The fines were not paid as diplomatic immunity was claimed. This annoyed some locals even more. I am also told the after-party in the basement of Astor House was a fine affair.

The Conservative and Liberal politicians in Eastbourne were unhappy about the Cubans and the Communist Party coming to town. Remember, this was before the fall of the Berlin Wall in the days of the Cold War. But the plans for who would do the unveiling and who would be invited had already been settled by members of the Communist Party (associated with the National Museum of Labour History in Limehouse – opened by Harold Wilson in 1975), before Eastbourne Trade Council was ever approached. So, the town was presented with a fait accompli, and they went along with it despite their reservations. (“Build it and the people will come”). And perhaps there was good cause for some degree of reservation considering what happened next.

There was quite a crowd for the unveiling ceremony. But also present were a large group of members of the National Front (“from Brighton and Hastings”, according to the local newspaper report). They came to demonstrate. They were kept separated from the unveiling by a line of police. Their threats to damage the plaque were taken seriously and the plaque was taken down for the night. In fact, the plaque did not remain in place for long. Due to the owner’s concerns over the ongoing threats of criminal damage, it was only up for about 6 months. The plaque is currently in the archives of the Pump House People’s Museum in Manchester, complete with red paint vandalism. So, we have unfinished business with the fascists here in Eastbourne. The good people of Lewisham may have seen off the National Front at the Battle of Lewisham, 1977, but they got the better of us. We must put this right. We must get the plaque re-installed.^{6 7}

For a full account of the story of the Engels plaque and plenty more it is worth visiting Engels in Eastbourne.

Directions: Carry on to the very end of Cavendish Place to the Pier. It is not far ahead, but before reaching the pier you may wish to stop at the Grade II listed statue of the Royal Sussex Regiment Soldier.

11. The Pier

The Bath Chair Ranks at the Pier, Beside the Carpet of Flowers.

You were first introduced to George Meek, the bath chairman, at No. 3 above. Meek wrote about what life was like for bath chairmen. It was grim.

Among the chair-men I have known since I first began to work at the calling seven have gone mad, many have taken to drink, others have died in the workhouse or are still there. The work demoralises everyone in some way. It sets man against man. Some will do the meanest things to get work away from others. For instance, men have gone to my customers and told them that I could not see, or that I was a Socialist, or that I drink. It is quite a common thing for me to get passengers and then suddenly lose them.

George Meek, in his autobiography

“Don’t go east of the pier, dear”

Standing with the pier behind you, if you look east,, you will see the Queens Hotel. Opening in 1880, it was the last of the grand hotels to be built in the town. It is thought it was deliberately positioned to provide a visual marker of the end of the Grand Parade to the west. The rich visitors to Eastbourne were warned, “don’t go east of the pier, dear”. This was where the working classes lived. The conditions they lived in were deplorable. Poverty and disease and all else associated with oppression. There is a whole lot of radical history I could dedicate to this alone, but for now, I will reference that Eastbourne was not built with workers in mind. It was an afterthought almost that they would need to be accommodated; and this only as it became apparent that the servants of the elite classes (that Eastbourne was built for) would not be able to service all their needs.

There were “special tours” set up for the more curious amongst the upper-class visitors. A bit like the Bedlam Tours when elite visitors were shown around Bethlem Hospital, gawping in horror at the inmates as some sort of macabre entertainment. Image the indignity of this. Anyway. Let’s continue.

To the east of the Queens Hotel there were smaller hotels and boarding houses built largely between 1790 and 1840. There was no road along the seafront on this side of the pier. When he could not get rooms at Astor House, Engels stayed in one of these smaller hotels, namely Regency Villa:

“Tomorrow, Louise (divorced wife of Karl Kautsky, famous German Social-Democrat) and I are going for a week to Eastbourne (address as before, 28 Marine Parade) as I need to regain a little strength before my journey to Germany”. (Letter to Lafargue, Marx’s son-in-law, 20^th July 1893).

27 and 28 Marine Parade are Grade II listed and stand on the site of an earlier building where the “Society of the People Called Methodists” was founded in 1803. The present buildings were built in 1840.

We are not going east of the pier today, but there is some fabulous history that I urge you to check out. There are many information boards around the area, and you can also download a dedicated heritage trail.

Engels’ ashes and Eleanor Marx

Before the formation of the seafront, the beach directly east of the pier was the loading point of the early coal barges. A little further along is where the fishermen beached their vessels. Gradually, some of the vessels were turned to use for tourism. It is likely that the boat that took Engels’s ashes out to sea was hired from east of the pier. And so, on 27^th August 1895, on a very stormy day, four set off in a boat carrying the urn containing Friedrich Engels’ ashes. The four were Eleanor Marx (the youngest daughter of Karl Marx) and her ‘cad’ partner Edward Aveling, Eduard Bernstein and Frederick Lessner. According to the wording on the 1976 plaque, they dropped the ashes into the sea 5 miles off Beachy Head. However, this is unlikely to be correct, as in indicated in an article by Frederick Lessner. A moot point, you may think, but before coming across this article it had long baffled many of us as to how anyone could endure 5 miles in a small boat on a very stormy day – whereas hugging the coast for 2 miles up to Beachy Head and back would have been do-able?

Back to Eleanor Marx, to whom we simply must dedicate a few words. She was the youngest daughter of Karl Marx; she and her sisters Helen and Laura were often invited to join Engels in Eastbourne. Marx once said of his daughters, “Laura is like me, Eleanor IS me”. This tribute from Marx was well deserved. She was a determined political agitator, organiser and writer who threw herself into the struggles of her time against imperialism, racism, and sexism. She was a champion of the oppressed. She had a resolute recognition of the importance of workers’ unity. Whilst Eleanor supported the women’s movement’s call for reforms (e.g. women’s suffrage, higher education for women and so on) she was a revolutionary socialist. She contributed to a Marxist understanding of woman’s oppression with class being central to women’s liberation. She believed that working women’s struggles had more to do with working men than the middle-class leaders of the woman’s rights movement.

Directions: Proceed along the promenade west towards Beachy Head (clearly visible from all along the seafront). Stop before the band

13. The View Hotel (formerly the Transport and General Workers’ Union Convalescence Hotel and Conference Centre)

The View Hotel is distinct, the concept of a British architect. News was put about that the design was based on the Communist Party Headquarters. But this was a rumour started by some of the locals who were not impressepaneld and were a bit suspicious, no doubt wondering what was going on behind that plentiful dark glass. (Look out, look out, shady communists about!)

A main theme of the design was that all the materials in the hotel’s build and furnishing would be of British origin, thus supporting British industry and workers. Hence the use of ceramics from the Staffordshire Potteries; aluminium windows and framing by British Alcan; and the much maligned but beautiful heather slate on the frontage. The slate quarry was saved from closure by the size of the order, with slate used extensively on the ground floor and first floor both inside and out. Sadly, much of this has been covered over as part of the “modernisation”. Even the cutlery was specified as being of British manufacture despite its higher cost.

In September 1974, the first stone was laid by Jack Jones for the TGWU’s new purpose-built convalescence holiday hotel and educational centre at Eastbourne. The Eastbourne Centre was then opened by Jack Jones in October 1976. Now called The View Hotel, the Centre was used as a workers’ recuperation and holiday centre, and a Conference Centre for the union.  The hotel is still owned by Unite the Union. The mezzanine level at The View shows some of the hotel’s union history.

Jack Jones left school at 14 and after a few jobs joined his father as a Liverpool Docker. He became an active member of the Transport and General Workers’ Union, and later served as General Secretary of this union from 1968 until 1978. He was a great trade unionist, having been converted to socialism by reading The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists. Jack once explained how that book “was passed from hand to hand among people in the Labour movement and had a remarkable effect on our thinking”.

At the time of its creation in 1922, the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU) was the largest and most ambitious amalgamation brought about within trade unionism. Later, following various talks between unions, a merger with Amicus was agreed and Unite the Union was created in 2007.

The International Workers’ Mural

In the dining room of the Centre there used to be Eastbourne’s International Workers’ Mural. It was a full sized, very colourful, and was created by the Art Workers Co-operative – Michael ‘Mick’ Jones, Christopher Robinson, and Simon Barber. Mick Jones was the son of Jack Jones, a trade unionist. The mural is an artistic tribute to international trade unionism and the importance of solidarity amongst workers. For example, part of the mural illustrates “the union’s struggle through depression and war from which emerges a victorious procession with banners of the amalgamated unions. Support for the Spanish Republic in the 1930s is shown by the inclusion of the graffiti, ‘SOLIDARITY WITH SPAIN’.”

The mural was dismantled during the renovation of The View Hotel. It is stored safely in boxes in Birmingham. The plan was for it to be reassembled in the National Unite Conference Centre and Hotel (Birmingham). But it is difficult to display a mural in a building with so much glass. So, for now, in boxes it remains!

Unite Community Eastbourne have been in discussion with the Manager of The View and the Director of The Towner art gallery working on ensuring the story of the mural is not lost from Eastbourne history. Work is in progress for a pull-out brochure showing the mural in all its colourful glory. Also, for an exhibition of the mural somewhere in town. The Campaign to bring the mural back to Eastbourne has been a difficult one and is very much ongoing. The aim is for it to be permanently archived safely in Eastbourne and for regular public viewing to be arranged. The quest to find a permanent site in Eastbourne has been marked with disappointment and frustration. 89 foot long of permanent space does not come easy. The mural contains many references to Eastbourne and was likely inspired by our Sussex coastline. Certainly, one section of the mural shows the Beachy Head lighthouse. Another panel contains a bus with Eastbourne as the destination. This mural belongs in Eastbourne. Not in boxes in Birmingham!

Directions: Proceed westwards a little way. Turn right into Carlisle Road and proceed to the end. (You may wish to pop into Favoloso for an ice cream treat – many varieties.) The Winter Garden is opposite the end of Carlisle Road.

15. Wilmington Square

On the corner of the square is an “anonymous” pillar box (anonymous because it does not carry the VR cipher). It is on this spot where George Meek was granted a rare act of charity from one of our elite visitors.

On one Sunday at the turn of the century Meek had been waiting on the corner of Wilmington Square for twelve hours from 8am onwards without a single fare. He was just moving off home when a gentleman hailed him and not as it turned out for the hire of his chair but merely to ask him for a light. “Very busy?” he asked Meek whereupon the latter told him how he had spent the day. “That’s hard lines, here’s half a crown”, and on learning that Meek had a family he added, “Here’s another five shillings.”

Bill Coxall and Clive Griggs in their biography of George Meek

Bear in mind here that George Meek had to pay rent for the bath chair. No fare equalled debt to the rentier classes.

Opposite, the Wish Tower Slopes lead up to the Wish Tower, one of the 74 Martello towers built along the south coast to defend against Napoleon in the early 1880s. The Wish Tower Slopes are the final rallying point of many of our local marches and demonstrations e.g., the Trades Council May Day Rallies, Youth Climate Day Strikes etc.

17. Beachy Head

Engels so loved Eastbourne that one of his final acts was to write a codicil into his will to ensure his ashes were scattered off Beachy Head. It is worth taking a hike up to Beachy Head, a real beauty spot that marks the end of the South Downs Way. We are lucky that the area is so unspoilt, but it could have been very different. Twice in our history, Beachy Head has been in danger of falling prey to developers. PEOPLE POWER prevented this from happening on both occasions. In 1926 a “mysterious group of property developers” wanted to build a new town on the Seven Sisters cliffs, where Beachy Head sits. Opposing them was a group of early environmentalists, including poet Rudyard Kipling. There followed the Eastbourne Corporation Act 1926 and in 1929 the compulsory purchase of 4,100 acres was completed. The Corporation became the owners of the whole of Beachy Head, and the 4,100 acres northwards and westwards of it, at a cost to the town of nearly £100,000 (an absolute bargain!). 

At the 1926 Parliamentary Select Committee, the Mayor of Eastbourne, Charles Knight, was asked: “Is it the deliberate intention of the Corporation, in promoting this clause, to secure the public the free and open use of the Downs in perpetuity?”

The mayor replied: “Absolutely.”

90 years later, Eastbourne Borough Council tried to backtrack on this assertion, when early in 2016 they decided to sell the four farms in the South Downs National Park, without most residents being aware.⁸

But the people were having none of it. The Keep Our Downs Public Campaign was set up, launching a cross-party fight for a reversal of this decision. We won. The decision was abandoned, and our much-loved downland remains in public ownership. And long may it last. It may have not been a revolution of the Marx and Engels sort, but we were proud of our efforts, and I am fairly sure Engels would have been delighted, too.

Power to the people, in Eastbourne, no less!

Directions: You may wish to make your way up the slope besides the café and carry on walking up around to the left behind the café until you re-join the seafront road. You can make your way from here into Meads Village where there are 2 pubs, The Pilot Inn, and The Ship. A well-deserved pint might go down well.