Swalecliffe, Entrance To Sea View Holiday Camp c.1950

Photo ref: S545304

Have many memories, some happy, some sad, culminating in the death of my mother, Ivy Maud Smith on the 16th August 1944 when a V1 destroyed a railway bridge causing the train she was on to crash. Had two aunts, one lived in a house, Stafford Cottage, Chestfield, on the road leading to the railway bridge, the other in a bungalow at 27 Dovedale Road Swalecllffe. Remember the triangular, ...see more

I was stunned to see this photograph of my dad and me taken at Swalecliffe. We started to go to Seaview Camp in 1949 and in 1950 dad, who was a carpenter and joiner by trade, built us a chalet in our back garden and transported it in pieces to Swalecliffe and erected it on site. We were now the proud owners of one of only two chalets on the site which had an upstairs. Our chalet number was ...see more

You'll all go "Oh yes", when I jog your memory that Seaview was formerly named 'Kite Farm Camp'. It changed its name to Seaview around '61/62 when Arthur Fitt the garage owner on the other side of the station bought it from Old Mr Prout. I was born in 1955 and my mum and her step father (Oscar French from Chatham) had a caravan each. They were both of treated hardboard and were wonderful to us kids (the ...see more

My mum still has a caravan on this site and must be the longest tenant/owner as I am now 60 and she first bought a van on that site 50+ years ago. I remember the gas lights, walking the overnight pee bucket to the toilets, filling up the water bottle under the van. Her name is Eilleen Hayward and our departed dad Jeff, caravan N6. I have not been back to that site in 22 years as I live in Oz. ...see more