A RARE PHOTO

Esther Abbotts

Sometimes I just want to bury my head in my hands and cry!  Ever since I started this blog I have tried to emphasise that in many ways it is a collaboration. I enjoy writing it and researching it and sharing the many pictures I have but I have always pointed out that in such a big family as ours there must be many hidden photographic gems.  Now many of the photographs that we own are simple snaps that don't add a lot to the telling of our family story and others - the rarer ones - have a real historical importance for our history.  One such picture - the one of "Uncle Dick" which I will be posting soon - had been laying in a family album for years before it ended my twenty year search to find it.  Another is the picture above showing my grandmother Esther whom I think you'll agree was a very important person in our family history and certainly the oldest member of the family that any of us living knew personally.  This is the youngest picture I have ever seen of her. I have no idea where it was taken or how old she was in the photo.  I think it is a treasure and I couldn't wait to share it with you.  So why do I feel like sitting and crying?  Guess where I discovered this picture?  It was quite by chance on another family member's web pages along with lots of other family photos!  I had no idea that these had been posted until another family member stumbled across them and alerted me.  I certainly encourage anybody to have their own web pages or blogs and to publish their own photos but please, please let us know about them. Send me details of any web activity that you may have and I will gladly publicize it on this blog so others can share your efforts. PLEASE..

Studying the above picture again I think I can say with some confidence that it was taken in Windermere Road, Upper Holloway. If you compare it with the picture I published of the street some time back on this blog you will see that the door arches and the bay windows are the same.  As to the date, that is more difficult. Esther moved to Windermere Road probably about 1916 and was there until at least 1926 and possibly until the early 1930's before moving to Canvey Island.  If anybody has any thoughts on this please let me know.