Published in Windlesora 21 (2005)
© WLHG
This photo is one taken by George Henton in the mid 1890s, of local scenes he considered worthy of painting at a later time. Over 100 years later it is difficult to say with certainty who the lads were and equally where they were. However, I am reasonably sure the front boy was my father, Bert Bond, later to be the village greengrocer who as a schoolboy started in business by supplying kippers to over 100 workmen building Boveney Lock. The shorter boy, in the rear, was Alf Quarterman. They appear to be returning to Eton Wick from the ‘Chalvey Fields’, which in fact were not in Chalvey but south of the Colenorton Brook, and more properly named Oak Piece. Until the building of the M4 motorway there was a well-trodden path between Eton Wick and Chalvey and I think the boys were photographed as they were returning across the common, and approaching Sheepcote Road, Eton Wick. As boys in the 1930s we regularly walked the same path to pick dog daisies, as in the photo, and cornflowers.
There are many unresolved points of interest which can only be guessed at. Why pick so many? Were they going to sell the daisies to the pleasure boats on the river, or is the picture arranged to George Henton’s direction? In several of his pictures he has obviously set out the scene, and often the subjects have had sufficient notice to be in their ‘Sunday best’. Several of Henton’s photos also recorded the exact time of day and date. His interests covered street scenes and harvesting in Eton, Windsor and Eton Wick that are of particular interest to local historians. Many prints are held in the Royal Borough Museum Collection, but the copyright is with the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland Record Office. Another very good photographer of five years later (1900) was Rev. Demans of Eton Wick. Although only here for less than two years, his photographs are very collectable.
Windsor Local History Group 