Viva Lewes Issue #154 July 2019

INSIDE LEFT
HOLMES AND GARDENS
This photograph was taken by Benjamin
Reeves, from the first floor of Southover
Manor, on Thursday July 9th, 1914, at the
reception of the wedding of Ivy Verrall and BH
Fleming, which would have been the hottest
social occasion of the year in Lewes.
The party took place in Ivy’s back garden:
Southover Manor had been bought by her
great-grandfather William Verrall, owner of
Southover Brewery and many other properties
in the parish, in the 1840s; her father was
Frank Verrall, one of Lewes’ most distinguished
citizens.
The wedding ceremony had taken place in St
John’s, Southover, just down the road. The
Sussex Agricultural Times reported the next day
that ‘Southover has seldom contained a more
fashionable gathering than Thursday’s’, and
described in some detail the dress worn by the
bride ‘of creped chine brocade, trimmed with
ninon and embroidered with small pearls with
manteau de court in net over flesh pink ninon
trimmed with beautiful old lace terminating in
a true lover’s knot formed of orange blossom
and having a fringe of white ostrich feathers
on edge’.
The bride seems to have been an extremely
popular figure. Back to the newspaper report:
‘Her pleasant disposition has won for Miss
Verrall many friends, and all heartily united in
wishing her long and happy married life.’
The paper dedicated no fewer than three
columns to the wedding, listing all the guests,
including Prince and Princess Alexis Dolgoukouri,
and Sir Arthur and Lady Conan Doyle.
We’ve scanned the picture to see if we can spot
the Sherlock Holmes author: could it be the
elegant chap in the centre of the picture, his
face obscured by a cloud of tobacco smoke?
Little expense was spared, I imagine, by the
lady guests on their hats. I’m particularly taken
by the two in the foreground of the picture: the
lady on the right seems to have spotted Benjamin
Reeves at the window. Isn’t she looking
straight at the camera?
Alex Leith
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