Did the magnificent bougainvillea compensate for the tough life into which Bertrand and Florence brought their daughter Dorothy? In 1904 he joined the forest staff of Messrs Steel Brothers and became responsible for much of the firm’s success. As the result of a serious shooting accident while out hunting tigers in 1910 when he lost an eye, his career in Burmah came to an end and he returned to England.
In 1914 he joined the London Board of the company and the Petleys came to live in Beckenham at 31, The Avenue. By 1919, they were living in the house at the bend of South Eden Park Rd that they renamed Harvington. They ran a dairy farm there next to another small dairy farm, Kelsey Manor farm, that stretched across to Kelsey Park. Locals remember hearing the cattle in the fields and Mrs. Petley prided herself that her farm was the longest surviving working farm in the district.
In 1926 Bertrand Petley became the Chairman of the Board. He was the only forester to become the Chairman of Steels. Work in the jungle did not normally lead to the boardroom! He held many other posts and was known as a staunch churchman of great dignity. He retired from business after a debilitating stroke in May 1929 and died on Boxing Day 1930 sorely missed by his wife and children. He had attended Christ Church for nearly twenty years but was buried at Downe cemetery near to the local church.
How the family came to be in Burmah is a fascinating story. By the middle of the nineteenth century, three families had associated as iron founders and ship owners trading with outposts of the British Empire. They were the Peggs, Chappells and the Petleys.
Old Samuel Pegg owned a coal merchanting business sending colliers from Sunderland to London. William Petley, son of the Tewkesbury Quakers, James Petley and Lydia Knight, came to London to work at the Phoenix Gas Co at Bankside in Southwark. He met and married old Samuel’s daughter Mary Pegg. Old Samuel’s friend was John Chappell of the iron foundry business, Of William and Mary’s four sons, young Samuel and James became sea captains and Joseph and William became partners of the iron founders Bailey Pegg and Co.
After an incident in the Bay of Bengal when he was washed off the bridge but miraculously returned on deck unconscious and clutching a rope, James decided to stay on in Rangoon negotiating hardwood concessions. He established a tea and coffee plantation at Nan Cho in the Karen Hills close to Toungoo, which he cultivated until the coffee leaf disease struck Burmah in 1898 and the estate had to be abandoned. James was buried in Toungoo in 1903 and if it were not for his granddaughter, Elizabeth Marion Heptonstall, leaving notes for her nephews and niece, the exciting story of the Petleys in Burmah would largely have been lost.
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I visited Harvington on most days and never realised so much went on there in past times. I took a short cut to go to the Welcome Research Lab across the playing fields. I do remember the pre-fabs along Eden Park Avenue. There was also a very large old tree held together with iron rods.
visited Harvington today with a gps fixing for Eden Lodge. Found old foundations and brickwork in the woodland undergrowth. The large cedar in the woodland could have been on front garden of the lodge
The 1809 map of Burrell estates shows Harvington area as a series of fields numbered to go along with a key to the map but unfortunately the key is missing. Kelseys is to the north, Eden Farm to the west and Langley Farm to the east. No buildiings are shown along what is now South Eden Park Road. The Burrell estates were sold in 1820 which may have led to the building of Eden Lodge. google search ‘nls kent xv’ would bring up the National Library of Scotland archive ordnance survey sheet kent xv for this area showing Eden Lodge. contact me for more details of the British Library material. We only stumbled on it while researching Beckenham Place and Foxgrove/Beckenham Manors. If anyone knows where the 1723 map mentioned by Robert Borrowman is archived I’d like to know, only seen the copy he made for his book.
Prior to the five houses, and before the construction of South Eden Park Road, a map in the British Library of about 1780 shows much of Harvington owned by John Cator and Peter Burrell. Divided into woods and fields, Weblands Wood and fields name West and East Drege the map shows a penciled in outline of the intended South Eden Park Road which the Burrells constructed after land exchanges with John Cator as both of them were consilidating their relative estates. Cator to the north of Beckenham and Burrell to the south.
An ordnance survey map of 1871 shows Eden Lodge, now demolished but the gatehouse remains? and current maps show the driveway though it is overgrown in, I guess, what is left of Weblands Wood.
As Harvington nestled between Langley Park and Eden Park(Farm) presumably the Burrells leased or sold it. Other Burrell estate maps in the British Library of 1809 may reveal more.