Institute of Historic Building Conservation No 137 November 2014 THE IMPACT OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR
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C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 1 Cover: Plans for a block of houses for the Scottish Veterans’ Garden City Association at Longniddry, East Lothian; and a SVGCA publicity print of the 1915 painting ‘The Veteran’s Dream’, showing an injured war veteran day-dreaming about life in a garden city settlement. Images courtesy of the SVGCA. www.ihbc.org.uk Registered as a charity in England andWales number 1061593 and in Scotland number SC041945. Company Limited by Guarantee. Registered in England number 3333780. Registered Office: 3 Stafford Road,TunbridgeWells, Kent TN2 4QZ. Officers President Trefor Thorpe, president@ihbc.org.uk Chair Mike Brown, chair@ihbc.org.uk Vice Chair Emilia McDonald, vchair@ihbc.org.uk Secretary Jo Evans, ihbcsecretary@ihbc.org.uk Treasurer Richard Morrice, treasurer@ihbc.org.uk National Office Director Seán O’Reilly, director@ihbc.org.uk Projects Officer Fiona Newton, projects@ihbc.org.uk Consultant Consultations Coordinator James Caird, consultations@ihbc.org.uk Membership Services Officer Carmen Moran, membershipservices@ihbc.org.uk LETS Officer Kate Kendall, lets@ihbc.org.uk Administration Officer Lydia Porter, admin@ihbc.org.uk Committee Chairs Policy David Kincaid, policy@ihbc.org.uk Membership & Ethics Paul Butler, membership@ihbc.org.uk Finance & Resources Richard Morrice, resources@ihbc.org.uk Education David McDonald, education@ihbc.org.uk Communications & Outreach Charles Strang, communications@ihbc.org.uk Branch Officers North Geoff Underwood, 0191 433 3435 NorthWest Crispin Edwards, 0161 474 2620 Yorkshire David Blackburn, 01943 603479 West Midlands Charles Shapcott, 0121 7044312 East Midlands Roy Lewis, 01623 756623 South Julia Foster, 01296 585888 SouthWest JamesWebb, 01202 732849 East Anglia David Andrews, 07760 208231 South East Sean Rix, 01483 523379 London Sheila Stones, 01223 582716 Scotland Stuart Eydmann, 07525 479835 Wales John Edwards, 07796 440934 Northern Ireland Colin Hatrick, 028 9064 1126 Republic of Ireland Cormac O’Sullivan, 00353 5677 62907 Institute ofHistoricBuildingConservation No 137November 2014 THE IMPACT OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR 2 Briefing 4 Letter 4 Out of Context 5 Periodically 7 The writer’s voice 8 Legal briefing THE IMPACT OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR 11Editorial 12'To obliterate forever Hunnish names' Malcolm Noble 14Orkney’s legacy of the first world war Geoffrey Stell 17She Works at Woolwich Arsenal Now Mark Stevenson 19The earliest airfields Jeremy Lake 23The East Coast War Channels Antony Firth 25Homes for war-workers Alan Johnson 28The Veteran's Dream Lou Rosenburg and John Rosser 31Commemorative cityscapes Stefan Goebel 33Remembrance and the first world war Paul Stamper 36Environmental monitoring in a historic building John Fowler 37Architecturally speaking 39Notes from the chair 40Director’s cut 41New members 42Vox pop 43Book reviews 46Products and sevices 48Advertisers index
2 C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 Editor Rob Cowan Editorial Coordinator Fiona Newton, 01507 602567 editorial@ihbc.org.uk Editorial Board Nigel Crowe Peter de Figueiredo (book reviews) Rebecca Madgin Fiona Newton (chair) Elizabeth Smith Michael Taylor Cartoons by Rob Cowan Context is distributed to all members of the Institute of Historic Building Conservation. © Institute of Historic Building Conservation 2014 ISSN 0958-2746 Publisher Cathedral Communications Limited, High Street, Tisbury,Wiltshire, England SP3 6HA 01747 871717 context@cathcomm.co.uk www.buildingconservation.com Non-member subscriptions to Context Context is available to corporate bodies at an annual subscription rate, including postage, of: United Kingdom £60.00 Elsewhere £90.00 The views expressed in Context are not necessarily held by the IHBC or the publisher. Neither the publisher nor the IHBC shall be under any liability whatsoever in respect of contributed articles. We gratefully acknowledge the support of firms whose advertisements appear throughout this publication.While every effort has been made to ensure that the information contained in this issue of Context is current and correct, neither the IHBC nor the publisher can be held responsible for any errors or omissions which may occur. Briefing Context Copy deadlines Context is published five times a year, in March, May, July, September and November. The next five copy deadlines are: March, issue 138 16 January May, issue 139 13 March July, issue 140 15 May September, issue 141 17 July November, issue 142 11 September Stable condition Students from the Scottish Waterways Trust’s canal college are to carry out work to protect a historic stable building on the Forth and Clyde Canal. The project will see canal college students undertake a programme of maintenance and archaeological investigation at Craigmarloch Stables near Kilsyth. Run by the Scottish Waterways Trust and supported by Scottish Canals, canal college is a training programme for 16 to 25-yearolds that teaches heritage, environment and employability skills on the Lowland Canals and at the Falkirk Wheel. Built in the early 19th century, Craigmarloch Stables was once a staging post to rest teams of horses that pulled swift passenger boats along the Lowland Canals. Following the decline of the waterways, the stable fell into disuse and eventually ruin. The building, located some distance from the canal, is the second stable to be built at the site. The original block was constructed on the banks of the waterway but sank as the land near the canal was too boggy to support a building of the size required to house the colossal barge horses. Craigmarloch Stables is one of a number of similar buildings, built to a standard pattern, on the banks of the Lowland canals. The impact of war English Heritage is asking the public to help ‘tag’ a vast online archive of aerial photographs known as Britain from Above with sites, ruins and remains that show the impact of the first world war on British soil. Britain from Above is a four-year project, funded through a £1.7 million Heritage Lottery Fund grant, run by English Heritage to conserve, digitise, catalogue and make available online a unique collection of photographs taken by the pioneering Aerofilms company CS Jagger’s Royal Artillery Memorial is one of over 100 significant war memorials in London, France, Belgium and northern Italy for which the Twentieth Century Society has put information and photographs online. Gavin Stamp (who took this photo) has written the notes.The site is part of a 1914–18 centenary project, supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund, which has also included guided walks around the London memorials. Craigmarloch Stables was once a staging post to rest teams of horses that pulled boats along the Lowland Canals.
C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 3 over the course of the 20th century. Sites needing to be tagged might be defence structures erected on the coast or secret listening stations that intercepted enemy communications. They might be shipyards, factories and other buildings where armaments and supplies were produced, gardens and parks turned over to allotments, hospitals where wounded soldiers were treated or country houses requisitioned as convalescent homes. The high resolution Britain from Above photographs, especially those of the 1920s and 1930s, are often the only record left of the first world war’s impact on Britain’s towns, cities and countryside. Users can zoom in to the details of the photographs and tag sites with a description. They can add close-up contemporary photos, historic photos or photographs of relatives who were associated with the site, or share the untold stories of these places. Buildings at risk English Heritage has announced the latest findings of its annual Heritage at Risk Register. Places added to the register and in need of rescue include Geevor Tin Mine in west Cornwall, built in the 18th century and still operational until 1991, the largest and most complete surviving tin mine in Europe; Eastbourne Pier in Sussex, ravaged by fire this summer; Bedlam Furnaces, Ironbridge Gorge, where the nearby world-famous bridge was forged; the shipwreck Hazardous, an 18th century British warship, beached in Bracklesham Bay, Sussex, during a storm of 1706. Sites that have been rescued in the past year and are now off the register include Langham Airfield Dome in Norfolk, built in 1942 to train antiaircraft gunners, and one of only six second world war training domes left in the country; Newman Brothers coffin works in Birmingham, built in 1894, the most prestigious manufacturer of coffins in the world, providing coffins for the funerals of Sir Winston Churchill and Neville Chamberlain; the London tomb of performer Emile Blondin, most famous for crossing Niagara Falls on a tightrope, at Kensal Green Cemetery; the wreck of the Holland No 5, discovered off the southeast coast in 2000, the only surviving example of this class of submarine on the seabed anywhere in the world. The 2014 register is the most comprehensive to date, with listed buildings, places of worship, industrial sites, scheduled monuments and Roof repairs at St Peter’s on the Green, Froxfield Green, East Hampshire. Funding for toilets and roof repairs were the top requests made to the National Churches Trust grant programmes in 2013.Toilets headed the list of requests made to the community grant programme, and roof repairs were most in demand for repair and cornerstone grant funding. archaeology, conservation areas, parks and gardens, protected wrecks and battlefields identified as at risk, and in need of rescue. English Heritage launched the register at Battersea Power Station, a Grade II* listed building that was added to the Heritage at Risk Register in 1991 following its closure in 1983. After many years work is now under way to repair this landmark and bring it back into use. More than 15 years on from the first Heritage at Risk Register, English Heritage has identified five more buildings ready for redevelopment and reuse. All of them have been on the register for at least a decade. English Heritage wants to draw attention to these entrenched cases, where seemingly there is no way forward. The buildings are the Police and Fire Station, London Road, Manchester, Grade II*, on the register since 1997 (built in 1901–6, designed by architects Woodhouse,Willoughby and Langham, the red brick building dominates its corner plot in Manchester’s city centre); the Price and Kensington Teapot Works, Stoke on Trent, Grade II*, on the register since 1998 (one of the oldest potteries to survive in Stoke, the building closed its doors in the 1990s); the Carriage Works, Bristol, Grade II*, on the register since 1998 (built in 1862 for Perry Martin Ashley, Surveyor of the Fabric at St George’s ChapelWindsor, has overseen the installation of a series of new grotesques, part of programme of carving by students at the City and Guilds of London Art School.The programme, continuing a 650-year-old sculptural tradition at St George’s Chapel, was commissioned by the College of St George. Proposed new sculptures were assessed by the Fabric Advisory Committee at St George’s Chapel.The new sculptures reproduce the scale, massing and detailing of the original medieval conception.
4 C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 The Grade II listed Chorley Flying Railway Arches have been lifted back into place as part of railway improvements. The original arches, built in 1841 across the main line between Manchester and Preston to support the retaining walls in a cutting, have been replaced with the addition of a permanent steel brace under each arch to meet modern safety regulations. and Son’s carriages, only the shell of the building remains); the Grade II listed Pump House at Abbey Mills (Station B), London, dates from 1891 and forms part of a collection of late Victorian buildings associated with the main Pumping Station, designed by Sir Joseph Bazalgette; and the State Cinema, Thurrock, Essex, Grade II*, on the register since 2002 (one of the best preserved of the ‘super cinemas’ of the late 1930s, so little of this building has changed that its survival is unique). Despite this being the most complete view of at-risk heritage to date, the state of the majority of the listed heritage, Grade II listed buildings, is still unknown. Currently with the exception of London, only Grade I and II* buildings are included on the register. English Heritage is sharing its expertise with volunteers, owners and local authorities to tackle this and is asking people up and down the country to survey Grade II buildings.With this information, a national picture can be built to see how many of these buildings are at risk and uncover underlying causes. Test surveys in Stockton, Cumbria, York, Derbyshire,Worcester, Birmingham, Essex, Hounslow and Aylesbury are laying the groundwork for volunteers to get to work when the project launches nationally in spring 2015. Last orders A historic pub of national importance has been the subject of a landmark High Court battle between the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) and Bradford City Council. On two occasions CAMRA has succeeded in getting the High Court to overrule the decisions of Bradford City Council to grant planning permission and listed building consent for alterations to the Cock and Bottle – in connection with its conversion to a restaurant – including the tearing out of most of the historic interior. Much of the interior has already been stripped out. Taking the case to the initial judicial review was the first-ever such action by CAMRA. A second action was needed less than eight months later as planning permission and listed building consent was once again re-applied for and granted by Bradford City Council, prompting the second High Court battle. In neither High Court ruling did Bradford City Council contest CAMRA’s view that they had acted unlawfully in granting listed building consent and planning permission. The council duly consented to a quashing order and also agreed to pay CAMRA’s costs. The Cock and Bottle in Bradford: much of the interior has already been stripped out. Supporting Howsham Mill From Ian Lush, chief executive of the Architectural Heritage Fund It is disappointing that Martin Phillips (‘The restoration of Howsham Mill’, Context 135) fails to mention the Architectural Heritage Fund (AHF) as a key supporter of the project. Indeed, it was the AHF, as readily acknowledged by Mo MacLeod, which helped the owners to form the appropriate type of trust and, in 2004, offered the crucial early-stage funding for a feasibility study. This was followed by two further grants and a loan offer. It is likely that without this support the trust would never have reached the stage which enabled it to apply successfully to the Heritage Lottery Fund and other funders for the capital works. Ian Lush Letter ‘YEARS before anyone else I knew, he saw that the future would mean re-creating the past – that is, the rise of the heritage industry. In 1967 he wrote a deliberately teasing article headed ‘The great British history parkway drive-in’. He asked:Why not regenerate mid-Wales, then in a worrying decline, by using history, scenic beauty and a new-build skyline as the regenerator? Like so much of what he wrote, this sprang from his experience of the United States. He didn’t sneer at this heritage aspect of the future – which of course has come about. He tried to understand.’ Paul Barker remembering Sir Peter Hall, who died in July, in Town and Country Planning.
C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 5 Periodically The combined summer edition of the Association of Preservation Technology Bulletin, the Journal of Preservation Technology (Vol XLV, No 2–3, 2014) is an important one. This is another themed issue concerned entirely with values-based preservation. A wide-ranging overview from the USA and Australia about the value of values (so to speak) is both timely and highly informative in view of the recent publication of the revised British Standard Guide BS7913: 2013, and the continuing UK debate about the application of conservation principles in practice, and the presence or absence of national frameworks. Pamela Jerome introduces the issues surrounding a valued-based approach with some observations about shifting perceptions from the Western-based doctrines of the Venice Charter (which associated cultural significance with monumentality in the 1960s) to the emergence of the need to consider the significance of sites that never had architectural remains, let alone monumental ones. Much of this thinking came by way of the work of Australia ICOMOS, attempting to rectify the imbalance by recognising the more intangible social and spiritual values of communities. This led in turn to the first Burra Charter in 1979 (most recently revised in 2013), which emerged from Australians’ desire to include in the heritage process the participation and values of their aboriginal population. Managing community engagement is, however, a complicated process, which inevitably tends to frame the emerging definition of values with professionals leading the process. The continuing development of valuesbased management therefore poses questions about whether community stakeholders should have more say in the identification of heritage values and the treatment of sites, or whether this should remain in the hands of experts and academics. The Burra Charter is strongly identified with its originators, Australia ICOMOS. It appears to be rarely cited in the UK, perhaps because of the paternalistic, centralised, top-down approach to defining how heritage should be managed. The concept of degrees of significance and statements of significance now underpin how heritage interventions are assessed even when the term plays no part in UK legislation. Meredith Walker’s explanation of how the Burra charter developed, how it has been reviewed, its publication and promotion is very informative. The use of statements of significance and the issues of the recognition of community values are explained. But Walker has concerns about translating theory into practice, and about the lack of the skills and resources required to ensure that more attention is given in future to passing on the meanings of places to the people who live, work and play there. The article has excellent source notes to further reading. The question of whether values-based management can be implemented at all heritage sites is addressed by a project entitled ‘The Agora’, explained by Marta De La Torre of the Getty Conservation Institute. The author highlights something that should be selfevident, but clearly is not. Values evolve when examining how heritage places have been valued over time; yet conservationists often act as if the values of a heritage place are static, having been identified long ago and never subsequently reviewed. Heritage values stem from the particular interests of the participants. A multiplicity of values attributed to any one heritage place creates the possibility of different priorities and approaches to conservation. This was recognised as long ago as 1903 by the Austrian art theoretician Aloïs Reigl. The US National Parks Service (NPS) celebrates its centennial in 2016, when the National Preservation Act will turn 50. Barbara Little uses this context to discuss how the tenets and application of valuesbased management apply to the work of the National Parks Service. She reflects on the work of the Getty on one of the NPS sites, Chaco Culture National Historical Park, in relation to the Burra Charter, and on the protection of heritage values and the commitments of the NPS to maintaining the relevancy of sites and promote diversity and inclusiveness. Sheridan Burke and Susan Macdonald consider the question of relative significance in the management of the Sydney Opera House. After the years of controversy surrounding the development of the building, a reengagement with its architect Jørn Utzon has been incorporated into the kind of conservation management approach that is now usual in Australia. The latest iteration of the Opera House Plan (its fourth), introduces the concept of sensitivity to change. While this makes the plan more robust, the authors note that this is already being tested on a daily basis. They conclude that such innovative conservation-planning approaches are essential to courageously (my emphasis) meet the needs of complex site management where heritage conservation is imperative. Bottom-up versus top-down conservation is perhaps best exemplified in the paper by Chris
6 C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 Johnson on social significance in practice in Australia. The author looks at engagement with communities in order to understand the social significance that informs their deep sense of the places they inhabit. The paper explains what is meant by social value and how this is evaluated in practice. Other papers examine whether experts can facilitate heritage projects in ways that give fair consideration to other sets of cultural values, using public parks in the USA as examples. Gareth Maeer of the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) outlines why wellbeing and welfare should be more important to economists that just counting money. The special issue concludes this wide-ranging overview of values with an examination by distinguished IHBC member (and new chief executive of Cadw) Kate Clark of the way in which the thinking about cultural significance and values-based heritage management influences practice in the UK, particularly from the HLF. Clark looks in particular at the development of thinking stemming from Burra; the evolution of conservation management plans; the significance of different types of heritage; the incorporation of community values in statements of significance; and the evolution of the concept of spirit of place developed by the National Trust. Competence to undertake works to heritage assets has become a recurring concern in recent years. In the most recent issue of the Institution of Civil Engineers Proceedings on Engineering History and Heritage (Vol 167, issue EH3, August 2014), IHBC member John Avent, chair of the ICE/ StructE CARE Panel, and William Addis of consulting engineers Buro Happold, have written a joint editorial reminding us of the importance of accreditation across the professional institutes, and the challenges of managing change in the historic environment that may often extend beyond core skills. They have provided succinct explanations of the aims of the CARE accreditation scheme and of nine key benefits that can be critical to an appreciation of the disciplines and interests that extend beyond the professional qualification of engineers. The proceedings then discuss two projects. The first, by the team at Northamptonshire Highways, is the South Bridge at Oundle. This seven-span stone bridge of medieval origins is both scheduled and listed. The authors explain the options for repair and refurbishment following the leak of a water main within the structure in 2011. The article describes the historical context, structural assessment and the accommodation of the requirements of English Heritage and the Environment Agency in leading to a minimumintervention solution. Descriptions follow of the procurement process; ingenuity in the use of a suspended repair scaffold cantilevered over the abutments (to maintain river flow); and the post-completion monitoring. The paper aims to demonstrate the levels of project management skills required to complete such a difficult repair successfully. The second project is the restoration of the cast- and wrought-iron roof canopies at the Grade II* listed Tynemouth Station. The building is an outstanding example of a regional excursion station. As its use declined particularly after the second world war, its deterioration increased as a result of poor maintenance and disfiguring alteration, exacerbated by its coastal location. James Miller of Ramboll Engineers describes how the building was surveyed and the defects in the ironwork identified. The paper is particularly noteworthy for putting the conservation philosophy of repair in context, and explaining the key features of the repair specification and the seven principal lessons learned in successfully converting the building to modest retail and community uses. The final paper, by Andrew Pattison, describes the career of pioneering ironfounder William Hazeldine (1763–1840), an important but virtually forgotten figure in the history of engineering. Hazeldine produced the iron for the first all-iron-framed multi-storey building in the world: the Ditherington Flax Mill in his home town of Shrewsbury. Recent research has begun to reveal his role in the production of cast-and wrought-iron for significant early metal bridges, and the rigorous testing he undertook to verify the properties of his products. Recent reviews have drawn attention to Barry Hunt’s series of short guides to British stone in Natural Stone Specialist. The July/August and September issues continued this theme with a description of Yorkstone and Cumbrian slate respectively. Hunt succinctly explains the geology, properties, standard tests and results ranges, and suitable uses for these stones. The earlier issue also describes the recently enhanced production facilities at Glebe Quarry, Lincolnshire, to meet increasing demand for Ancaster limestone, especially for walling and flooring. The September issue covers extensions to the Hermitage Quarry in Kent, supported by English Heritage. This quarry will make available a valuable source of Kentish Ragstone, for which no alternative supply is readily available. Consent for the quarry extension was granted following unsuccessful opposition in the High Court. Also highlighted is the granting of planning consent at Portland for the continued mining of that famous, eponymous limestone. Extraction is expected to start this year, permitting
C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 7 30 years worth of supplies from the Bowers Basebed, Whitbed and Roach seams from mining operations only. The interesting mix of papers in the latest print edition of the Journal of Architectural Conservation (Vol 20, No 2 2014) can be divided very broadly into two types: assessment and repair of buildings and interiors; and repairs to masonry involving stone cleaning, and structural repairs to dolmens. Fiona Raley describes the repairs carried out by Donald Insall Associates to the Café Royal Grill Room in London, following serious damage by fire in 2010. The room is largely a 1920s recreation of the original 1865 room. The author describes the drying out process required following the fire, and the subsequent extensive analysis of the surviving fabric as a basis for determining the construction and repairs to an interior that was already in need of refurbishment. Raley draws four significant lessons from the completed scheme including how to deal with an interior that was culturally more significant than the fabric it contained. She writes that the analysis undertaken provided evidence to justify proposals which did not follow a slavishly historicist approach ‘setting the room at “a moment in time”’ with all the ‘fakery pokery’ of theatrical grime and aging effects, despite this being a theatrical room and a commercial interior designed for effect. From questions of authenticity, Dennis Roubien’s paper on 19th-century construction techniques in Greece expounds the proposition that style was more important than construction at a time when the nation was newly independent, building form had a strong ideological content, and the country was isolated economically and geographically from the construction techniques of the industrial revolution. Consequently new buildings aped the classical style but were often not well built, leading to problems and defects that now have implications for conservation and repair. The third paper concerns itself with the dilemma of conservation of two ruined small medieval monasteries in Cyprus. Maria Philopkypou uses these as case studies to illustrate the alternative approaches of continued preservation as a ruin (and the conservative interventions required); or restoration and extension to permit reoccupation (by an order of nuns) while respecting the building’s architectural, aesthetic, cultural, historic and symbolic values. Techniques in conservation, particularly relating to the alternative methods of cleaning monuments, are constantly evolving. Jakub Ďoubal’s paper investigates the use of lasers on fine-grained silica sandstones, using sites in Bohemia as examples. He compares this to alternative methods such as micro-abrasives and chemicals, concluding that laser cleaning offers the benefit of a high degree of controllability and sensitivity. While minimal intervention is often advocated, the final paper considers monuments where high levels of intervention have been considered appropriate. These involve the structural repair and conservation of dolmens, the oldest architectural structures preserved in Spain. Luis Marínez-Torres outlines the phases of the conservation process, the methods of calculating the structural forces at work, the discrete stabilisation methods used, and the risks of collapse from not intervening in a region potentially at risk from earthquakes. The interventionist methodology makes an interesting contrast to the conserve-as-found approach generally adopted in the UK. Bob Kindred MBE From Undertones of War by Edmund Blunden (1928) From the old crumpled bridge which took us southward into Cuinchy, the street northward was not displeasing in appearance. That is to say, it had not yet lost its rows of brick dwellings, which stood up externally presentable if inwardly dismantled; and it was perhaps wholly protected against enemy observation posts by the slight ridge which gathered gently to the east of it. The ridge was still adorned with a shrine, from which a machine gun nightly instructed the enemy in obeisance. Between the village line and the front trenches lay another road, roughly parallel with them, and originating at Givenchy Church. Some houses here yet retained their outline, and when one had walked up the communication trench — Wolfe Road, if I am right — it was curious and touching to see them, after the thought that one was past all houses. I walked among their white shutters and painted garden railings in the thick mists of morning, with that compelled spirit of reverence which those village ruins awoke in me more vividly perhaps than a Wren masterpiece can to-day. To visit such relics of a yesterday whose genial light seemed at once scarcely gone, and gone for ages, relics whose luckless situation almost denied them the imagined piety of contemplation and pity, was a part of my war… Bethune… was a marvellous little town to be found so near the trenches. It was old, it was young; its streets were not of 1916, but its pretty faces were immediate, and the heartiness of ordinary life prevailed. C’est triste, la guerre; ah, malheur, malheur. That note was there, but above it for the time played the spirits of delight in whatever baffled war’s gray tentacles. In the church the twilight bloomed with art’s ancient beauty; the music adored its own centuries of grandeur. In the shops the white fingers that turned over pictures or books for one’s choice were pure poetry. It is a bitter reflection that, perhaps on account of the aforesaid ceremonial parade, with the gleaming bayonets and accoutrements not unnoted by German flying scouts, the town was shelled by heavy guns on the day that we departed, and many citizens were killed.
8 C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 LEGAL BRIEFING Changes to the listed building consent regime The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 has made a number of significant changes to the listed building consent regime with the aim of introducing greater flexibility. The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 (the relevant parts of which came into force on 6 April 2014) has made a number of significant changes to the existing regime for listed building consent, namely: the exclusion of structures or objects from listing, certificates of immunity from listing, heritage partnership agreements, listed building consent orders and certificates of lawfulness of proposed works. These measures should significantly reduce the number of individual applications for listed building consent in relation to minor or routine works to listed buildings. The act also replaces the need to obtain conservation area consent for the demolition of unlisted buildings in a conservation area with a requirement to obtain planning permission. Existing regime Section 7(1) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 prohibits any person from executing or causing to execute ‘any works for the demolition of a listed building or for its alteration or extension in a manner which would affect its character as a building of special architectural or historic interest’ without obtaining listed building consent from the local planning authority or secretary of state under section 8. There was previously no way for a person proposing to make minor works to a listed building to legally determine whether those works would, in fact, affect the special character of the building without making an application for full listed building consent. Understandably, conservation officers are unwilling to give any kind of informal assurances in the absence of a formal application. Furthermore, there was no equivalent in the listed building consent regime to ‘permitted development rights’ under the planning regime or ‘class consent’ under the scheduled ancient monument regime, which grant advance blanket consent to development or works which, while they may affect the special character of a building, are still relatively minor or uncontroversial. Exclusion of specified objects or structures from listing Schedule 17 of the act amends the 1990 act to provide for a new listing of a building to specifically state that an object or structure is excluded from the listing. It also allows for existing listings to be updated, to exclude specific objects or structures. This should be a very welcome provision. It will allow developers and conservation officers to specify at the outset which parts of the listed building are intrinsic to its special interest, and to avoid some of the frequent debate over whether a particular object or structure is part of the listed building or within its curtilage when subsequent works are proposed. Certificates of immunity from listing The 1990 act is further amended by Schedule 17 to introduce a right for any person to apply to the secretary of state for a certificate stating that the secretary of state does not intend to list a specified building for at least five years.The act extended the right so that an application for a certificate may now be made at any time. Heritage partnership agreements Section 60 of the act inserts a new section 26A into the 1990 act which enables a local planning authority to enter into an agreement with any owner (or a tenant for a term of seven years or more) of a listed building.This effectively grants advance listed building consent for works specified in the agreement, subject to conditions also contained within the agreement. Section 26A sets out a very wide range of other provisions that a heritage partnership agreement may contain, including setting out works which would not affect the character of the listed building (and, therefore, not require listed building consent at all), provision for the maintenance and preservation of the listed building, for public access or the provision of facilities, information or services to the public, for the restriction of access or use of the listed building, and provision for payments towards the costs of works by the local planning authority, English Heritage or the secretary of state. A number of other bodies can be party to a heritage partnership agreement in addition to the local planning authority and the owner of the listed building: another local planning authority, the secretary of state, English Heritage, a person with another legal interest in the building, an occupier of the building, any person involved in the management of the listed building and any person The text of this article has been amended from the printed version of Context 137 in respect of the timing of the right to apply for a certificate of immunity from listing.The act extended this right so that an application for a certificate may now be made at any time.
C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 9 who appears to have a ‘special knowledge or interest’ in the listed building (or buildings of architectural or historic interest more generally). A heritage partnership agreement must be in writing and contain provision for review at specified intervals as well as provision for possible variation and termination. A single agreement may relate to more than one listed building, which opens up the possibility of a single agreement to cover a network of listed buildings across administrative boundaries. The Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Heritage Partnership Agreements) Regulations 2014 (made by the secretary of state under new section 26B of the 1990 act) provide for further specified details to be included in heritage partnership agreements, as well as for the consultation and wider publicity that must take place before the agreements are entered into or subsequently varied. These statutory agreements will undoubtedly be of great use to local planning authorities and a number of public sector and other organisations with large landholdings that include listed buildings on which regular repair and maintenance are carried out. The intention is to cut down significantly the number of applications for individual listed building consent required for routine works by trusted bodies, as well as to provide statutory backing to agreements relating to continuing maintenance and access. The act places on a statutory footing the voluntary heritage management agreements previously piloted between English Heritage and a number of national heritage bodies (including the Canal & River Trust) in respect of certain large listed buildings which require regular, continuing repair and maintenance. Listed building consent orders The new section 26C of the 1990 act enables the secretary of state to make an order granting listed building consent for certain classes of works to listed buildings of any description in England, subject to specified conditions. These consent orders would operate in the same ways as permitted development rights under the planning regime or class consents under the scheduled monument regime, removing the need for an individual application for listed building consent for those works covered in the order. A consent order may give the local planning authority an opportunity, in specified cases, to require details of works covered by the consent order to be approved by them.Therefore a consent order may grant unconditional listed building consent for some works while making the detail of other works subject to prior approval of the local planning authority.This prior approval would, presumably, not relate to the principle of whether the works should be carried out (otherwise the works would not be included in the consent order and would require full listed building consent) but rather to the details of the work, akin to the type of approval given by local planning authorities under some classes of permitted development rights (such as the erection of telecoms apparatus). English Heritage and the Canal & River Trust are currently working on a pilot listed building consent order to cover routine maintenance works to the trust’s listed canal locks and bridges. Equivalent powers are given to local planning authorities to make ‘local listed building consent orders; in respect of listed buildings within their administrative area only under new section 26D.These are equivalent to the powers of local planning authorities to make local development orders under the planning regime. The Planning (Local Listed Building Consent Order) (Procedure) Regulations 2014 have also been enacted (under the new Schedule 2A inserted into the 1990 act), setting out the prescribed process for the preparation and adoption of local consent orders. In considering whether to make a consent order, the secretary of state or any local planning authority must have special regard to the desirability of preserving the listed buildings covered by the order as well as their setting and any special features. The secretary of state must consult English Heritage before making a national consent order. Certificates of lawfulness of proposed works A new section 26H of the 1990 act enables anyone to apply to a local planning authority for a certificate of lawfulness for proposed works which do not affect the special interest of a listed building (that is, works that fall outside section 7(1) of the 1990 act altogether and do not, therefore, require listed building consent). The detailed procedure for making an application for a certificate is contained in the Planning (Listed Buildings) (Certificates of Lawfulness of Proposed Works) Regulations 2014. The new section 26K also gives a right of appeal to the secretary of state against refusal or the failure to determine an application for a certificate within 28 days. A certificate will provide developers with the certainty that their works are lawful without actually having to apply for a full listed building consent. One would clearly be useful in a conveyancing context to enable the vendor of a property to prove to a prospective buyer beyond doubt that no listed building consent should have been obtained for minor works. Again, this proposal would mirror the system of certificates of lawful proposed development or use in the planning regime. Removal of conservation area consent Finally, Schedule 17 introduces a new section 196D into theTown and Country Planning Act 1990 to replace the need for conservation area consent with the requirement to obtain planning permission to demolish a building in a conservation area. Where a developer wishes to demolish and then replace a building in a conservation area as part of the same scheme, rather than making separate applications for conservation area consent and planning permission, a developer will now only need to make a single application for planning permission. Tom Deards is a solicitor in the legal department of the Canal and River Trust.
10 C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 “Lectures really well delivered and interesting, fantastically knowledgeable and approachable tutors.” For more information Email: cpd@westdean.org.ukor go to www.westdean.org.uk/BCMor www.westdean.org.uk/College West Dean College, Chichester,West Sussex PO18 0QZ PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT DIPLOMA IN HISTORIC BUILDING CONSERVATION AND REPAIR RECOGNISED BY ENGLISH HERITAGE Can be achieved through the successful completion of 10 of our Building Conservation Masterclasses and the submission of a 3,000-word essay. Glass for period windows The London Crown Glass Company specialises in providing authentic glass for the windows of period buildings. This glass, handblown using the traditional techniques of the glass blowers, is specified by The National Trust, the Crown Estates and indeed many others involved in the conservation of Britain’s heritage. Specify authentic period glass for your restoration projects. THE LONDON CROWN GLASS COMPANY 21 Harpsden Road, Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire RG9 1EE Tel 01491 413227 Fax 01491 413228 londoncrownglass@gmail.com www.londoncrownglass.co.uk Managing change in the historic environment Contact: Roger Mascall roger.mascall@turley.co.uk 020 7851 4010 turley.co.uk ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN BUILDING CONSERVATION HERITAGE CONSULTANCY Purcell. Thoughtfully designed evolution. www.purcelluk.com @Purcelluk
C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 11 Remembering them The participants are gone, but reminders of the physical impact of the first world war remain. Some of these would be noticed only by historians – like the renamed streets whose original German-inspired names had become an embarrassment in the new jingoism and xenophobia of 1914. Others, such as the structures and buildings on Orkney, rust and crumble as incongruous features of the landscape, but remain too important a part of British history not to conserve and remember. Some remains are chilling reminders of a vast industry devoted to raining death on the enemy. The buildings of the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich, where 80,000 people, many of them women, made armaments, are now adaptable to peaceful uses. Elsewhere, some of the earliest buildings associated with powered flight survive. Many of them are modest structures, but they are of immense significance as the first steps in a world-changing new technology. Other remains are more easily forgotten, such as the hundreds of shipwrecks of the East Coast War Channels, in which thousands of seafarers died in the desperate struggle to maintain naval movement and essential trade. Some reminders of the first world war are less grim. With attention currently focused on how to get large numbers of houses built, and on the possible lessons of the garden city model, we look at the many houses constructed for British war-workers and war veterans which still remain and are highly valued. The Scottish Veterans’ Garden City Association was one organisation devoted to rebuilding shattered lives and thinking about how to plan for more peaceful times. More obvious features of cities, town and villages are the buildings and structures built specifically as memorials to the victims of the first world war. This issue of Context looks at some of them, while also considering more difficult questions of how to deal with the enormous variety of relics of one of the world’s great disasters.
12 C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 MALCOLM NOBLE ‘To obliterate forever Hunnish names’ As it became apparent that the war would not be ‘over by Christmas’, anti-German sentiment took hold in the British national psyche, leading to streets and places being renamed. The centenary of the start of the first world war has been marked by a large number of community heritage projects. Many of these are training volunteers to research the home front using archival, print and oral history sources. ‘How Saxby Street Got its Name’ goes further: by capitalising on the ethnically-diverse population of South Highfields, Leicester, family stories from around the globe have been collected. In this way the exhibition and accompanying catalogue explore the experience of the war globally and domestically. An important part of this is the built heritage of the war: memorials and other traces in the urban fabric. One of the most remarkable episodes was the change of several street names in response to anti-German hostility in 1918–19. Anti-German sentiment during the war saw places and streets renamed in Australia, the United States and Britain. Such acts offered an inexpensive way to demonstrate nationalism and express xenophobic feeling, so they tell historians much about identity. Towards the end of 1914, as it became apparent that the war would not be ‘over by Christmas’, anti-German sentiment started to take hold in the British national psyche and popular culture. Jingoistic journalists encouraged fear and suspicion. Rumours of spies and conspiracy theories abounded. Germans, naturalised or otherwise, were under permanent suspicion, had to register with police, and if the authorities considered them to pose a threat, were interned.1 While there were some riots in response to the sinking of the passenger ship Lusitania in May 1915, the hatred was not generally violent. All things German were to be avoided. German businesses suffered heavily. German culture had been in fashion: the music of Beethoven, Bach and especially Wagner had resounded from concert halls. In their place English composers, especially of nostalgic and nationalist songs, found new audiences.2 Germans had emigrated to Britain, the USA and Australia in the later 19th-century. Their names were given to businesses, streets and places. During the war, these became an embarrassment. George V changed the royal family’s name toWindsor from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. If they could, private citizens with Germansounding names followed suit. Anti-German sentiment inAustralia followed a similar trajectory of internment and intolerance. The entire German community, and other persons considered suspicious, were interned in New South Wales – what Gerhard Fischer has described as ‘an imagined internal enemy’.3 In the camps, German internees created huts in the style of farmhouses, and in one the main road was dubbed Kaiser-Wilhelm Street.4 The Nomenclature Act 1917 changed many Australian place names. For example, in New South Wales Germanton became Holbrook; German’s Hill, Lidster; and German Creek, Empire Vale.5 In all, References 1 Panikos Panayi, The Enemy in Our Midst, Berg, NewYork, 1991; Prisoners of Britain, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2012 2 Samuel Hynes, AWar Imagined, Bodley Head, London, 1990 3 Nadine Helmi and Gerhard Fischer, The Enemy at Home, New SouthWales Press, Sydney, 2011 4 Ibid 5 CHWickens, OfficialYear Book of the Commonwealth of Australia, Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics, Melbourne, 1926 Saxe Coburg House, Mecklenburg Street (Photo: Andrew Thirlby) Gotha Street and the streets to its north, seen in 1915 and then with changed names in 1930
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