As well as smuggling, Victorian Worthing was also renowned for its ‘demonstrations’ and its ‘rough music.’ Woe-betide anyone who annoyed or upset the unwritten code of the local community, for any transgressor could sound find themselves living under siege in their own homes.
Join local historian Chris Hare for some tales of yester year Worthing….
Sir Edward Ogle was the Chairman of the Worthing Town Commissioners and lived in splendour in Warwick House, that overlooked The Steyne. When he tried to make that much loved public space his own private property, he received a vigorous response from local fishermen and their friends.
I will be relating the story of the Marsham family, who lived in Bedford House, who were arrayed as murderers when a footman in their employ, John Puddle, took his own life. He had been sacked for dishonesty, but the Worthing Mob firmly believed in his innocence, and decided to take the law into their own hands.
I shall also be telling the sad story of Owen Breads and the Warwick Street Scandal, the riots resulting from the presence in Worthing of the Salvation Army, and many another scandal besides. These real events in the life of our own took placed between 1813 and 1914.
