Post-war views before the city was rebuilt

The Blitz of Canterbury and the clearance of damaged buildings in the aftermath, opened up unprecedented views of the cathedral, particularly from the city centre.

These vistas could be enjoyed until the rebuilding of Canterbury, which began in the early 1950s and was completed 20 years afterwards.

More distant views of the cathedral could be enjoyed long before the Second World War, especially from the western approaches to the city, but these too would be closed down, or compromised, by the early post-war rebuilding of Canterbury.

The above photographs show two such late 1940s views that cannot be seen today. The first of these dates from September 1949 and was taken from a traffic-free Summer Hill, which was the main A2 at the time.

The cathedral looks splendid from across the water meadows; once much beloved of painter Sidney Cooper and, later on, maverick Canterbury artist, Toby Nash.

The concrete ribbons of the Rheims Way would carve themselves across these buttercup adorned meadows in the early 1960s.

The second picture, from 1947, views the cathedral from a farm track that would later become Whitehall Bridge Road. Canterbury Cine Club member Rob Williams, also includes his colleague, Geoff Fuller, as he attempts to capture the same view.

Early post-war road plans would have seen the city ring road follow the line of Whitehall Road, seen at the bottom of the sloping lane.

However, the agreed Wilson Plan moved the ring road much closer in, to replace St Peter’s Place.

The cathedral from Summer Hill in 1949

A closer view, from Westgate Farm, in 1947