Pictures of East Coast health resorts / edited by Arthur Peaton.

Date:
[between 1880 and 1900?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Pictures of East Coast health resorts / edited by Arthur Peaton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Parliament, who represented a constituency of 1,500. In addition to the fishing industry, wool spinning was carried on to a considerable extent. But the pitiless encroachments of the sea proved fatal to the town. H ouse after house disappeared, at one time nearly a dozen being destroyed in one day. A curious pamphlet, published in 1642, tells of “a signe from heaven or a fearful and terrible noise heard in the ayre,” when a stone of great weight fell from the sky. As Wilkie Collins, in his “No Name,” observes, “The German Ocean has swallowed up streets, market places, jetties, and public walks ; and the merciless waters, consummating their work of desolation, closed no longer than eighty years since over the salt-master’s cottage, now famous in memory only as the birthplace of the poet Crabbe. “Thrust back year after year by the advancing waves, the inhabi- tants have receded to the last morsel of land which is firm enough to be built on, a strip of ground hemmed in between a marsh on the one side and the sea on the other. Here, trusting for their future security to certain sand-hills which the capricious waves have thrown up to encourage them, the people of Aldeburgh have established their quaint little watering- place.” It will be thus easily understood what a strange quietude as of desolation settled over the place, and it seemed that its destiny was to be a dreary obscurity on the wild Suffolk coast. This fate was happily averted by the discovery that the very solitude of Aldeburgh gave it an immense advantage over not a few other coast towns. It came to be recognised as a veritable haven of rest, where the dwellers could stroll on the beach sure of immunity from the gaieties of fashion and the exciting attractions of popular entertainments. Not only, however, is Aldeburgh sweetly peaceful, it is remarkably healthy, possessing in this latter respect, says a writer of authority, “advan- tages certainly not excelled by any which the most fashionable places of resort can boast.” It is noteworthy that the record of the rainfall here is lower than at any other town in the country. The pleasure of a visit to Aldeburgh is enhanced by the opportunities of visiting scenes of historic interest and natural beauty. Aldeburgh is inseparably connected with the life and poetry of Crabbe, whose word-pictures of the manners, pursuits