Victorian Semi

[UKDave]

Hi there.

I have recently purchased a small Victorian Semi on the Isle of Wight. A very cute little property with sand coloured brickwork. I would love to know when the property was built but unfortunately the deeds were lost many years ago. I asked the neighbour but his deeds are also lost as a previous owner years ago owned both properties. Anyway, I have a rather small photo here and I wonder of any of you would be able to give me an idea, based on the style, when it might have been built. I might be able to get some bigger pics later if this photo's too small. Many thanks.

 

[UKDave]

A new, slightly larger image here.

Regards.

 

[UKDave]

Regrettably it looks as if I'm going to have to give up on this forum. A full 2 days getting my first post onto the forum and further delays posting an update.

Good luck to all. For the record I'll take a guess at 1880.

 

[jocelyn plummer]

Yes, I would say around 1880, possibly a little later. Is there anything left inside to give a further clue, such as a fireplace, mantelpiece, skirtings?

 

[MdB]

Maybe there is something wrong with the forum or possibly it is just anti-spam protection (which has been an issue). I haven't seen your post before this evening.

Unfortunately I am no expert on dating properties so can't comment.

 

[Feltwell]

Very difficult to tell from such small pictures Dave, especially when it looks like the door & windows are not original.

Have you any original fireplaces inside? They are a good guide - post a picture up if you can.

Try your local library for old maps, ours has them at quite regular intervals from 1800 onwards, that should help you narrow down when it was built.

Sorry to hear you've had problems with the forum. I've found that uploading pictures directly to the forum doesn't work very well, uploading them to Photobucket then pasting a link works much better - it's free and quite simple, and that's the opinion of someone who is not great with computers.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Agree with Feltwell. I'm for your house being a little later -1900. Very sweet!

 

[Lime]

A lot of houses like yours were built in this area.
The Peterborough brick works was only 15-20 miles away.
They made a sandy coloured brick which was very good.
I know which hole in the ground some of my brickwork came from.. the Gildenburg pit now called Gildenburg Waters.

Nearly all house deeds in England were destroyed by solicitors in the 1970s.
The land registry became the source of information for house purchase and, once registered, the old house deeds were destroyed thus freeing up many store rooms to be used for no win no fee clarks.

In my area that kind of house was most commonly built between 1865 and 1895.

 

[Gareth Hughes]

I would hazard a gues at post-1880, pre-1914. I've found the Old Maps website a very useful source, especially now they've uploaded a lot more material than they used to have, including the 1:2500 maps from the late 19th century
http://www.old-maps.co.uk/index.html

 

[Flyfisher]

Maybe there is something wrong with the forum or possibly it is just anti-spam protection (which has been an issue). I haven't seen your post before this evening.

I second that - I've only just seen UKDave's post and I check for new posts at least once each day and usually more (frequent tea breaks being the ideal opportunity!).

Perhaps the Isle of Wight has a very slow link to the mainland? :wink:

Anyway, please don't give up UKDave - things seem to be working now.

 

[jocelyn plummer]

I have a friend who lives on the IOW, she is always cursing the bad communications, texts take hours, sometimes days to go, and only from certain areas, Her computer is really bad, soooo sloww, she tells me.

 

[Feltwell]

I like the Isle of Wight a lot, especially the Military Road which skirts the southern coast. The ferries are ridiculously expensive though!

When I lived in Hampshire, it did amuse me slightly that all the locals refer to the Isle of Wight as "The Island" - as if it's the only island in the world!

 

[UKDave]

Some really useful advice, thank's very much.

That old-maps link is a great resource, I had a search and was surprised to find that the property exists on a map marked 1866. I didn't expect that. I will certainly try the local library for more detail.

When I get a mo I will upload a few photos of some interior features, although unfortunately many have been lost, which I'm sure is a pretty familiar story.

Regards.

(Oh and the site's all working perfectly now, so please excuse my earlier rant)

 

[Penners]

Regrettably it looks as if I'm going to have to give up on this forum. A full 2 days getting my first post onto the forum and further delays posting an update.

Dave, I believe that your first few posts are checked by the moderator prior to being put up on the forum. It's an anti-spam process used by quite a lot of forums.

After a short while, once you've proved that you are a good man and true, you should find that your posts appear instantly (provided you haven't made any attempt to sell us Acme Multi-Function Carpet Shampoo and Laxative).

So don't give up!

 

[d49xc]

The earliest large scale OS survey was around 1873
Then there were others in 1899,1919,1934
The precise dates may vary around the country and I've no idea about the status of the isle of wight.
These were done at 25" to the mile.

Before that you would have to rely on any estate maps which might survive plus the tithe map and enclosure map.
The latter two if they survive vary over a very wide date range late 1700's to late 1800's for the tithe maps.
These were both done at a large scale.

Census returns for 1851, 1861,1871,1881,1891 etc can be very useful, but it can take some effort to identify your property in the list of houses - particularly if the streets have been re-numbered. you will be shocked at the number of people listed at living inside houses at the time.
Urban areas are actually easier for this than rural areas where the house names are often not quoted at all
These will be in your local record office though libraries sometimes have copies of the immediate area.

 

[CatherineB]

Hello Dave, and welcome!
To second d49xc's (there's a name to twist your tongue) suggestion, do you have censuses in the IoW? I managed to date our house back to 1904 from census records in our library, when the (attached) neighbours said it was 1910; you should be able to get within 4 years with that, maybe closer combined with OS maps?

Good luck, and happy Xmas!