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Thank you to Julian Womersley for the following piece. [A footnote from history] In the days after the passing of Queen Elizabeth 2nd, there was much discussion about why the Royal Train was not used to convey the late Queen from Edinburgh back to London[1]. In 1901, however, there was no such reticence. The Dorking […]

The writer George Meredith lived and wrote at Flint Cottage at the bottom of the Zig Zag Road on Box Hill. He first came to Mickleham on a walking trip and married local girl Marie Vulliamy at St Michael’s Church in 1864. He wrote in a two-room chalet in the garden, often sleeping and eating

We continue to discover echoes of our First World War soldiers as we go about our other Museum roles. A number of postcards were donated to the museum a year or so ago. We were told that we could sell any of these that had no relevance to Dorking. At first glance, a postcard image

“A few days ago Sam Dawson, a member of the Museum’s team of Cave Tour guides and author of “Dorking: A Town Underground” was to be found below ground inspecting an unexplained feature within the bounds of the old Deepdene estate.  When sold two hundred years ago the estate was credited with a copious supply of pumped

Two images of Dorking are coming up for auction in the “Cyril & Shirley Fry: A Life in Art sale” on Friday 9 July at 11am at Chiswick Auctions. First, a watercolour is by Peter De Wint O.W.S. (British 1784-1849) called “View of old cottages at Dorking, Surrey, traditionally said to include Dr Monro’s House”.

by Joanna van der Lande For those of you who know of Dorking, a small market town in Surrey, you might be surprised to hear of a short novel (novella) entitled, ‘The Battle of Dorking’, a work of fiction published in May 1871.  On initially hearing about this story, and having known Dorking my entire

The Museum is asked to help on all kinds of enquiries – and the most satisfying kind are the ones when multiple organisations and individuals work together to pool all knowledge resources. In December we received a mail from Joanna Miles, who is a volunteer at Clumber Park.  “I am researching the history of the

As we continue to plan for our reopening, we are spending time in our store familiarising ourselves with the collection. We recently found three images that we will try to fit into our wartime section. We looked into the Dorking Advertiser archives to see if we could find anything about the C.I.V. (City of London

Back in 2019, we received an e mail from Pat Gregory who had worked for Rob Walker as his secretary during the 1950’s. During her time with Rob – she looked after the racing mechanics, because if they were going to a race meeting somewhere, the mechanics needed some cash. “I had to book their

News from Abinger from 131 years ago. Thank you once again to Melissa Schaupp for her reporting. Complaint against the Parish Churches Bill, stating that it preferentially benefits the clergy and snubs churchwardens. The Central London Underground Railway is proposed, to the opposition of many rate payers. Details of the ‘interesting’ ceremony of the Glanville