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Can You Identify These Locations? (9)

Published on: 28 Feb, 2012
Updated on: 28 Feb, 2012

by David Rose

The mystery house featured in the previous ‘locations’ post is indeed in Waterden Road – as correctly identified by Caroline Reeves.

It is called Ravenscroft, and is the last house on the right before the junction with Epsom Road.

Although the caption is a give away, where is this exactly?

I parked my car at Christ Church and the house is nearly opposite. Although there are a good deal of trees and bushes in the front garden today, many of the features as seen in the old picture postcard remain the same.

We now think the ‘View from the Mount’ card is from The Mount in Guildford.

Roger Nicholas writes: “My guess is that it is the view from the vicinity of Booker’s Tower looking south/south-east.  The photograph would date from the early 20th century when the only building in Beech Lane was the ‘Hermitage’, but the main clue is the wooded area in the distance which would be Blackheath and neighbouring areas.  The view has changed somewhat in the intervening period but not vastly – if my guess is correct!”

I had a drive up Guildown Road to see if this view can been seen today. Again, lots of trees, and of course, houses with their gardens making it difficult to spot.

The river picture, seen last time, is a stretch of the River Wey as it winds beyond what is now Parkway, and through the woods near to the Spectrum leisure complex.

Back when the photo was taken, it was all part of Stoke Park, then a private estate. The school, as mentioned, was Stoke Park Mansion, now a car park behind Guildford College.

That piece of woodland stretches to the water meadows that are near Stoke Lock. The woods were kind of cut in half when the new part of time A3 was created in the early 1980s. However, it is still a pleasant walk with some interesting features although they are now becoming overgrown. Apart from the remains of the boathouse, there are a number of Second World War concrete anti-tank traps (also known as dragon’s teeth) there, as well as traces of ditches and trenches.

If Hitler’s invasion had taken place and the might of the German army had come up the Guildford Bypass, this spot would have seen a good deal of fighting, as the Canadian army, acting as the defence force of London, would have been pressed into action.

On to this week’s mysteries….

Again from Chris Quinn’s collection of picture postcards, one is of Echo Pit, off Shalford Road, but where exactly?

The other is a general street scene – no clues as it should not prove that difficult to identify.

A road out of Guildford – shouldn’t be too difficult to identify.
  1. Sarah Baldry says:

    The second one looks like the back of Hurst Croft, off Warwicks Bench. The views would be similar if you were at the top end of Echo Pit Road. (If you zoom in to Google maps Street View of Hurst Croft you can see it.)

  2. Bernard Parke says:

    Sorry, the first rail tunnel before the lines were laid!

    There is nothing “fishy” about this. The first tunnel collapsed. One wonders whether the existing tunnel might suffer the same fate given all the extra weight of traffic on The Mount these days.

    We never learn !

  3. David Rose says:

    Where exactly was (or is) the Guildford tunnel? Do you mean the caverns that had an entrance from Racks Close? Is this another of these fishy tales about mysterious tunnels running under the High Street connecting locations as far apart as Abbot’s Hospital, Guildford Castle and even St Catherine’s Chapel?

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