Shelsley

“In 1879 Church moved to Kew where he had a house specially built for himself and his wife, which he filled with his valuable pictures, Oriental bronzes, porcelain, antique embroideries, English pottery, and a unique collection of Japanese sword-guards. In the same year he took up post as Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Academy and remained there for thirty-two years, retiring four years before his death in 1915.”

Lorna Parker, Sir Arthur Herbert Church and his links to William Morris and the Arts & Crafts Movement, the Journal of William Morris Studies, Winter 2007.

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Original photographs held at Richmond Local Studies and Archive
© The Richmond Society.

According to Stephen Bartlett of the Richmond Local History Society, Shelsley was almost certainly built by builder James Lucas (lead builder of the Selwyn Estate on which it stood) as he built all the houses in Ennerdale Road down to no 59.

With Church having lived in Cirencester while he was in post at the Cirencester Royal Agricultural College (1863-1879), it seems possible the new house was named after one of the Shelsley villages (Walsh, Beauchamp and King) to the north, in the Malvern Hills.

According to the 1881 census, Church and his wife Jemima were living at ‘Royston’, while Shelsley was being built. Standing on the corner of Litchfield Road, Royston is one of the grand ‘lost houses’ of Kew Road. It was pulled down in the 1950s and a modern block, Royston Court, stands on its site.

Shelsley-1891-census

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