Alfred Watkins Tribute. Part Two "In Hereford".

"Vivid proof of two sighted tracks is to be found in the centre of old Hereford. Stand at a point in East Street, where it begins to bend to get around to St John Street, and look (westward) the whole length of the continuous East and West Streets. Here again traffic can be seen, passing in Victoria Street, which is 430 yards distant, although the streets narrow down to 12 feet wide in places." The Old Straight Track (The Classic Book On Ley Lines) by Alfred Wakins. 1925.

"Standing in the Cathedral Close (at the western iron post of a gate), and looking the whole length of the two lanes-Upper and Lower Church Street-traffic can be seen passing in the high-town 183 yards distant, although in some parts the lane is only 7 feet wide. In these cases narrow, straight sighted tracks are still preserved between the houses of these narrow lanes (not withstanding several obvious encroachments) for 430 yards and 183 yards respectively. The crossing point of these two tracks was the highest ground within the city." The Old Straight Track By Alfred Watkins. 1925.

The back of the Wakins & Son Brewery offices in Bewell Street

The Watkins & Son Brewery Offices front entrance on Eign Street. In an illustrated booklet "Hereford In 1892", the main office was described as having 'substantial mahogany fittings, and every convenience is provided for the transaction of business by the large staff of clerks and others engaged here...'

"Original sign for the Imperial on Widemarsh Street."

The birth place of Alfred Watkins, born on 27th January 1855. The frontispiece for the Watkins "Imperial" Hereford Brewery was always this pub. The Golden Lion and The Orange Tree in Hereford are the only other remaining pubs that were also owned by the "Imperial Brewery". There were five in Hay-On-Wye as well; The Kings Head, The Wheatsheaf, the Talbot, The Severn Stars and The Holly Bush.

The Watkins Brewery was demolished in the early 1960's and was a car park and a jam factory untill this Tesco was built in 1982.

Alfred Watkins was intimately connected to The Old House in High Town, now a museum providing visitors with an insight into seventeenth century life in Hereford.. he wrote the first guide for the building which was illustrated with ten of his photographs. He wrote of this old house 'The yearly orgy of May Fair gave a new aspect to this Old Housse, for all round were booths, stalls and roundabouts, whist Fossett's Photographic Studio long took up its position almost blocking the bank entrance.

Alfred Watkins was also the Chairman for the executive committee responsible  for the erection of the county and city War Memorial in St. Peter's Square

5 Harley Court, Alfred Watkins at the time 64 and his family moved here in 1919 and lived here untill his death in 1935

A Photographic Tribute To Alfred Watkins. Part One; The Old Standing Crosses Of Leominster Priory.

   I was Christmas shopping in Hereford with the children the other day. I'm sure I had heard the name Alfred Watkins some where in the murky mists of time. But it had never really connected with anything. That was until I was exploring the back streets around Hereford Cathedral. I turned a corner into St John's Street and there was a little blue plaque on the wall that said "Alfred Watkins 1855-1935 Pioneer Photographer Antiquarian Lived Here 1920-1935". Then I went around another corner and came upon the house of Henry Bull the naturalist. I was flabbergasted.
   So when I got home I started Googling as one does now. He truly was a pioneer! He patented the first light meter in 1890. This was called the Watkins Bee Meter, in the first year he sold 1,400 meters at a guinea each. It was that good Herbert Ponting used one for his exposure readings on the fateful trip to the Antarctic with Captain Scott in 1910-1912.
   He started out working for his father and eventually running The Imperial Brewery, it was sold in 1898 for £64,000 making Alfred totally independent.A lifelong interest in photography started in his late ’teens with little more than a pinhole camera, developing his wet glass-plate negatives in a small tent before they had a chance to dry. Alfred Watkins spent over sixty years photographing events throughout Herefordshire and the neighbouring counties. First by horse and trap, then by one or other of his favourite steam cars and later by his Wolseley Stellite, he travelled to the most remote parts of the county taking photographs of items which caught his interest with his massive plate camera,.
   Watkins became a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society in 1910 and was awarded the society’s 11th Progress Medal for his research work. The following year he completed his all-embracing reference work Photography; its Principles and Applications — the ‘bible’ for amateur photographers for a couple of generations. In later life he experimented in colour photography and had a hand-turned cine camera.
   The Woolhope Naturalists’ Field Club was formed in 1851 Watkins regularly attended the Club’s meetings, in Hereford during the winter months and out and about in the County and further afield in the summer. Club Transactions were illustrated almost entirely by Watkins’ photographs. Rare shots include buildings long since demolished, historic trees and diverse countryside activities. He became a County Magistrate in 1907 and served on the Bench for many years. In 1914 he became County Councillor for Tupsley and was eventually made a County Alderman. His efforts were responsible for the riverside path below the old General Hospital and, as committee chairman, the design of the War Memorial in St.Peter’s Square.

Grave of John Ward and Sarah Ward, grandparents to the Herefordshire Charles Kemble acting dynasty

   He was also an antiquarian who insured that fine photographic records exist of many archaeological sites that have since been lost including sections of Hereford’s City Walls, Craswall Priory, St Giles Chapel and many others. He also published a theory about "Ley Lines" (Prehistoric trading routes based on straight lines between a variety of sighting points. Of great significance, these original markers were subsequently re-used and their sites marked by later, but still historic features.) This was a subject that was to occupy him for the rest of his life as he attempted to convince others of his theories. In rapid succession he published The Ley Hunters Manual, Early British Trackways, Archaic Tracks around Cambridge, and, still in print after some 78 years, The Old Straight Track.

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