Although studio photography arrived in Cheltenham in 1841, it was not until about 1920 that anyone used a camera to record scenes in Charlton Park (the below wedding photograph excepted). That was when Mrs Dorothy Marriott (the former Miss Dorothy Vassar-Smith) walked through the park and took a selection of photographs. Her foresight left us with a unique set of tiny black and white pictures of parkland scenes from when the Vassar-Smith family vacated the estate, taking with them a keepsake of their former home a couple of years before her father died. Her small album was later passed to Miss Statham, the daughter of a Charlton Park coachman. Miss Statham later passed it to Mary Paget when Charlton Kings Local History Society was founded in 1978. In 1983 Mary kindly loaned the album to the author, an amateur photographer, who moved into 'Charlton Park's' modern housing development in 1982, and like many others became interested in Charlton Park's lengthy and fascinating history.
©CKLHS
'A fashionable wedding on the lawns of Charlton Park'
"The Rev. R G L Marriott & Miss Dorothy Millicent Vassar-Smith, youngest daughter of Mr R V Vassar-Smith, D.L., J.P., and Mrs Vassar-Smith of Charlton Park. They were married on Tuesday, June 10 1913, at St Mary's Church, Charlton Kings, where the bridegroom was formerly one of the curates" [Cheltenham Newspaper Co. Ltd].
These (enlarged) photographs offer a rare glimpse of Charlton Park as it was in the early 20th century, at a time when many of the scenes remained unchanged long-term, akin to time-warped glimpses of a century or two before they were actually taken. They give us a final insight into the privately owned estate before the mansion's makeover into a school in 1935, and the park's later fragmentation and conversion into several modern housing developments, commencing with Charlton Park Gate in 1935 and concluding with St Michael's Close in 2006.