Click onThumbnail
for
6 photos
Hexham Abbey from the south east with proposals for gardening
by F R Davidson, July 1946
Verso: Signatures of German Prisoners of War who worked on the project
Hexham Abbey from the south-east 1946
Painted by F R Davison in July 1946, the picture shows proposals for flower beds around the Abbey before these were then made by Prisoners of War.
In 1946 W T Taylor, Verger and Clerk, asked Jack McKeown, Gardening and Science Master at Hexham Secondary Modern School, to design a small garden layout to the east end of the Abbey. Jack McKeown asked Fred Davidson, a shipyard draughtsman, to produce this impression of his designs so the scheme could be approved.
1947. Work on laying out the Abbey Surrounds by Germans is well under way. Hex. Parish Mag. Nov. 1947, p.3.
Hello, I'm writing from Australia. I went to school in Hexham in the 40's and seem to recall a group of German prisoners of was rebuilding part of the Abbey nearest Beaumont St. [A Letter received from Edith A Ward (née Dixon), 1 March 2003.]
Three of the POWs signed the reverse when the work was completed:—
Alfred Flamme, Oberst (Lt Colonel) POW No.560301 (senior officer)
Lt Karl H Koqurink (?) POW No.105564
| Lt Erich Rensmeyer POW No.A845437 | HEXAB3002 |
Important as a view of gardens around the Abbey designed by Mr W.T.Taylor, Verger, to be laid out by prisoners of war.
Verso: Signatures of German Prisoners of War who worked on the project [?obscured by current backing?] Copy of extract from Colin Dallison's file on Hexham Abbey Floorscape — German P.O.W.s; and LabelText/2.
1947. Work on laying out the Abbey Surrounds by Germans is well under way. Hex.Par.Mag. Nov 1947 p.3.
From 1944–62 Jack McKeown was Gardening / Science master at Hexham Secondary Modern School. He was asked by the Verger, W T Taylor, to design a small garden lay-out at the east end of the Abbey, part of a larger scheme to improve the grounds surrounding the building. Labour was provided from Featherstone Castle's POW Camp, who gave several impressive choral and orchestral concerts in the Abbey.
1946. Four men were to help Mr McKeown. His friend Fred Davidson was asked to produce an impression of his plan. As a draughtsman from a Tyne shipyard he began his painting with perspective lines – traces show in the sky streaks! – from ground level. This technique gives greater prominence to lower parts of the structure, and also diminishes the bulk of the tower. The picture was made in July 1946. In the doorway is depicted Fred Davidson's son Ian, in his Boy Scout uniform, in conversation with the then Rector, the Revd A G (Bill) Hardie.
1980. The picture was found, rolled up, when Mr McKeown's house was cleared by his daughter, Mrs Dorothy Miller.
1982. The names of the four Germans were signed on the back of the painting, but when it was framed (by Hedley's of Back Street, Hexham) the names were hidden from view by the backboard. The senior German was Alfred Flamme, who had been a bank manager in Osnabrück. He was slightly older than Jack McKeown who was born in 1897. They discovered that, in the 1914–18 War, they had fought on opposite sides, in the same battles, on the same days, over the same pieces of ground in northern France and Belgium.
2012. The picture was presented to Hexham Abbey by Mrs Dorothy Miller (née McKeown).