Time finally runs out for cottage survivors

Demolition of old but habitable cottages in Canterbury ended in the mid-1970s when the values of conservation and the appearance of street elevations with character were appreciated like never before.

Old properties were done up rather than demolished, and survivors of the whole-scale purges from previous decades were now being cherished.

Two such survivors were the pair of cottages at 13 and 14 Northgate. Once part of a long row of similar early 19th century cottages, these two survived the demolition of 1966, for street widening, because they were slightly more set back than their less fortunate neighbours.

The lucky residents at the time were: Mr RG Eastley (13), and Miss Welstead (14). Also kept, at the time, were the premises of Henry Greenham, the builders’ merchants, between the surviving cottages and the Kingsmead junction.

Demolition was again threatened in 1983, when the nearby electricity works were demolished.

And the bulldozer hovered yet again in 1987, when the Kingsmead roundabout replaced the traffic-lightcontrolled crossroads.

But still the two cottages managed to hang on.

The first of the above pictures dates from the summer of 1988, when the boarding-up of the right-hand cottage clearly indicated that their luck had finally run out. Demolition took place in the winter of the same year, as can be seen in the second photo.

Northgate health centre was subsequently constructed on the site.

Numbers 13 and 14 Northgate with the boards up in the summer of 1988 and in the process of being demolished in the following winter