Miss Collinson of Clutton ( Letty Ada Hacket Collinson)
Source - Eric Brain (Published in The Five Arches Radstock Museum Journal No. 93 Spring 2019)
An Enigmatic Pioneer Photographer
As a small lad growing up in Clutton in the 1940s, my late mother often used to tell me of a lady called Miss Collinson who “travelled the area in a pony and trap taking photographs”. Many of these photographs, some sold as postcards, came down the family line into my possession. Much more recently a photograph, or more accurately, a half–crop of a Collinson postcard from an article in Five Arches magazine was sent to me saying “Is this really in Clutton?”
Well, no it wasn’t! - and after obtaining a copy of the full picture, I ascertained it as being taken in West Harptree; in fact all the buildings in the photo still remain, though some parts have been incorporated into a desirable modern home. The “Red Herring” was in the vertical panel at the side saying simply “Collinson Clutton” which I knew was the name of the lady photographer whom my mother often spoke about.
This got me going, so having done a bit of "digging” it was soon found from parish registers that Miss Letty Ada Hacket Collinson was born on the second day of August 1859 at Ealing, registration district of Hounslow, and also confirmed, as I always had thought, that she died in Cambrook House in 1941 aged 83, where her death was given as ‘of senility’. The birth and death certificates and the 1911 census calls her Letty. This was not a contraction of Letitia.
Parents and Siblings
Letty’s parents, William Collinson and Heriswitha Lucy Vibert (born 7th August 1825) were married in Penzance district on the 4th November 1849.
Despite the family having moved around the country extensively, and William seemingly often away from home about his business in the paper trade, they lost little time in starting a family. The first son William Vibert Collinson being born in Portishead, Somerset in August 1850, while in 1852 a daughter, Lucy Anna was born in Exeter. A second son John was born in 1855 and another, Frank Treleaven was born in Bawtry, Yorkshire in 1857.
It is also recorded that Letty Ada Hacket Collinson, was baptised in the parish of Ealing, Middlesex, on 4th September 1859. Letty is the youngest of five siblings.
The family seems to have moved about continually as the Collinson children were born in many different places all over England. The family is elusive; on some censuses, for example in both 1861 and 1871, they were to be found without William, possibly away on business at that time. However, focussing on Letty; in 1881 census, described as single, aged 21, and with no occupation, she was living in Manchester with a step-mother, Martha; her own mother Heriswitha, having died in Burley in Wharfedale on 15th March 1873
Ten more years pass and in the 1891 Census, Letty Collinson is found at 1 Landermann Terrace, Boulevard, Weston super Mare. She is described as a “teacher” but among them is Letty’s elder sister, Lucy. I wonder if it was a boarding house?
Northend, Clutton
It is not exactly known when, how or why Miss Collinson came to Clutton to live in a cottage at Northend, or indeed precisely which one of the group of cottages it was, but the 1901 Census gives the first indication that Letty is living at Northend, Clutton so it must have been toward the end of the 1890s.
Coincidentally Clutton County Primary School was opened in 1902/3 and it is likely, having been so described in the 1891 census, that she came to the village as a ‘teacher’. The 1901 census also says that the Northend Collinson household consisted of:
Letty COLLINSON, Head, single, said to be aged 35 [she was actually 41…!], a photographer working on own account at home. Born London.
Phillipe [sic] VIBERT, Aunt, single, aged 58, retired. Born in Penzance, Cornwall.
Sarah CLAYTON, Boarder, single, aged 59, retired. Born at Strand, London.
Letty had, in just a few years, fairly well-established herself into the community because The British Newspaper Archive from the same year, records that in April 1901, “Miss Collinson, of Clutton, played the Wedding March. at St. Leonard’s, Chelwood, at the marriage of Miss Bessie WILKINS (of Chelwood) to Mr Ernest LOVELL, third son of Jesse LOVELL of Bishop Sutton” The Lovells were well-known local traders, wholesale grocers and provender merchants so Letty’s talents were by this time, already well-known around the area.
Referring to Kelly’s directory of 1914, Letty was still in residence at Northend, but by 1919 there was no mention of her in the list of Clutton residents.
Pioneer Photography
My mother (b 1902) often spoke of how Miss C toured the locality in a pony and trap, taking photos with a large wooden camera, this was seemingly quite progressive technology for the early 20th century in a small mining village. A near-neighbour of Letty at that time was Mr Pickford who hired out pony and traps, no doubt for the travellers to the area arriving at Clutton Railway Station nearby. He would have been just one of others doing a similar trade; Mr Maggs in Churchlands Farm, Mr Tiley in The Cross Keys Inn, Mr Blacker at The Railway Inn, to name just a few.
Some years ago the writer was offered, (at a price!) Miss Collinson’s original photograph album but the photos had been hard-glued in and, regrettably with hindsight, I declined but at a later date copied most of the photos it contained. The album was eventually lodged in the safety of the library at Downside Abbey School at Stratton on Fosse where as far as I am aware it still is. The copies of the photos enables me to pick out a Letty Collinson original when studying the pictures on the postcards which were sold locally, many of which are still turning up. The photographs having been sold commercially as postcard views of Clutton, and of many of the surrounding villages, are now sought after by collectors just for the name Collinson; a typical selection was included in a large sale of such postcards at Drewetts Salerooms, Bristol in 2011.
Many of Letty’s photographs, reproduced as postcards, bear the initials LC intertwined as a monogram, often with CS &Co added, and sometimes also the city, ‘Bristol’. I can find no record of a firm CS &Co in Bristol during the pre WW1 period in Kelly’s Directories so can only assume they were printed outside of this area. Often they are just annotated “Colinson [sic] Clutton” or with the rear printed as a postcard format in many different styles and typefaces. Some have been rendered in a simple colourwash and reprinted.
On first coming to Clutton in 1906, it is recorded that the newly-married and appointed rector, James Mansfield, bought a quantity of Letty’s postcards, possibly to distribute among his friends and acquaintances to show-off his new address - “This is where we are living now”.
Sadly not one photograph of Miss Collinson herself is known to exist – unless of course, YOU know differently!
From Mike Flower “I was told was of Letty with her assistant in the trap with the pony named Dickie.
I have no reason to doubt the information as Letty had a studio on the site of Temple Cloud Garage at some time.”
Lucy Anna Collinson
Letty’s elder sister, Lucy A Collinson was born in 1852 in Exeter. In 1894 Lucy married Samuel Frederick Little (an ‘explosives agent’), born in Pimlico) in London.
By 1911, Lucy A Little, aged 52 [sic], Samuel aged 41 (a commercial clerk for an explosives firm) and their daughter Margaret Verna, aged 16, who was an art student, had moved to York Road, Woking, Surrey. I believe that during this period Lucy took on the sales and marketing of Letty’s photographs as postcard views, possibly dealt with from London area.
As mentioned above, from Kelly’s directories Letty Collinson appears to have moved back to the Greater London area during the period of the Great War between 1914 and 1919.
In the 1925, 1926 & 1928 London Electoral Registers, it states that ‘Lettie [sic] Ada Halkett COLLINSON’ is shown on the electoral register in Lansdowne Road, Norland Ward, Kensington, London, where maybe she was looking after her elder brother William, possibly an invalid as a result of the Great War, who is also shown as part of the household.
By 1926, old diaries record that Miss Letty Collinson was active, though maybe temporarily, back in Clutton though no known photographs accredited to her exist in that period.
There is no mention of the name Collinson in the well-annotated 1920 Warwick Estate Sale Catalogue of the cottage in Northend; the map therein showing one cottage and a parcel of land in that vicinity which was not in the sale. The same cottage was not mentioned or described in the later Warwick Sale of 1946 either, so it was in private hands. I believe that the cottage in question is the one now named “Starlings”.
Mycott
For March 2009 street view of Mycott click here
“Mycott”, the cottage between the Clutton (C. of E.) Old School on the main A37 and the former Rectory, was the former Old School House and after the opening of the new County Primary School in the centre of the village in the early 1900s, it was rented out by the church commissioners. In June 1927 the “two-up/two-down” Old School House became empty, having been vacated by a Mr and Mrs Reed.
Mr Fred Flower applied to rent it, having left Lovells of Bishop Sutton to work in Arthur Maggs’ transport office in the Old Brewery opposite. However at a letting meeting of the Trustees, chaired by the Rector James Mansfield, Mycott was rented to Miss Collinson. It is well-known that she lived there from June 1927 with two ladies, always known locally to be two sisters, the Misses Blythe. Miss Collinson obviously participated again in village life in Clutton as it is recorded that on 12th July 1930 she ran a concert in aid of a piano fund for the school hall. An elderly Clutton resident can still remember her going about the village, always dressed in black. ‘Mycott’, in much the same style as it ever was, though greatly increased in size having acquired land from the farm behind and from the sale by the Church Commissioners of Clutton Rectory, is now in private hands.
Cambrook
Letty stayed at Mycott for maybe four years after the death of Sarah ‘Tid’ Blythe in November 1937, with Elizabeth ‘Bet’ Blythe who outlived Letty, dying in 1945 after moving to Bristol; and with Mrs Lucinda Turner, widow of a former Chelwood rector.
On November 27th 1940, Verna Little, Letty’s niece, came to Clutton and discussed with Rev Mansfield and the registrar, Stan Sage, the possibility of Letty going into Cambrook House for care due to her increasing ‘senility’. She was admitted into Cambrook at the end of November 1940, and died there in late 1941. On Dec 1st 1940, it is recorded that Mansfield visited Letty in Cambrook, ‘to see if she had settled in’, and that she “seemed cheery”. His wife Gladys, the village’s self-appointed and de facto welfare officer, also visited her in Cambrook a week later on 8th December.
After Miss Collinson’s death, Verna Little, returned to Clutton and stayed in Mycott to clear up her affairs. The sale of Letty’s furniture and effects was conducted at Farrington Gurney on 1st May 1942 by Blinman & Miles.
Wells Journal 24 April 1942
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1921 Census
Prospect Place, Kingwell, Timsbury, Farmborough
Henry B Scobell – Head – Age 44 – Market Gardener Employer
Letty Collinson – Servant – Age 55 – Housekeeper to H. B. Scobell
Bertie C Durbin – Servant – Age 14 – Assistant in Market Gardening
1939 Register
Mycott,The Old School House, Clutton
Letty A, Collinson 2 Aug 1859 Kindergarten Mistress (Retire) Single
Elizabeth, Blythe 24 Jan 1861 Female Unpaid Domestic Duties Single
Lucinda J M, Turner 26 Dec 1853 Female Unpaid Domestic Duties Widowed
Death Record
Letty A H Collinson Birth year 1858 Age 83 Death year 1941 Death quarter 4
Newspaper Reports
28 June 1912, Somerset Guardian and Radstock Observer
Clutton Board of Guardians
The fortnightly meeting was held at the Clutton Workhouse
The Master (Mr. J. W. Sansom) reported that the following gifts for the inmates had been received ….. Miss Collison, of Clutton, a parcel of papers …
19 February 1926, Somerset Guardian and Radstock Observer
High Littleton Church Social Club – Whist Drive and Dance
For this special whist drive there were 17 tables occupied. under H. B. Scobell as the M.C. There was some keen and play, and at the close Miss Collinson (Clutton) kindly distributed the prizes.
13 May 1927, Somerset Guardian and Radstock Observer
Clutton Women’s Institute
The meeting of the W.I. at the Council Schools on Monday evening Last was as usual, well attended. Being a members night the and secretary retired, and Miss Collinson and Nurse Reading were unanimously elected to take their places for the evening, and they conducted
the business of the meeting admirably.
24 April 1942, Western Gazette
FURTHER SALES BY BLINMAN & MILES. F.A,I.
FRIDAY, MAY 1st.—The Old Schools, Clutton.—Household Furniture and Effects,
removed for convenience of Sale, re Estate of Miss L. Collinson, deceased.
Sale at 2.30 p.m.