Shoreham-by-Sea, Sussex

Little Buckingham

Undated watermarked photograph of Little Buckingham published on Shorehambysea.com, an online archive of local history. Used with permission.

With more than 4,000 acres of farmland in Shoreham-by-Sea, Sussex, Buckingham House was the home of Squire Harry Colvill Bridger (1799-1872). His son Harry Bridger (1829-1910) lived in Little Buckingham, a nearby farm of 350 acres, with his wife Eliza Ann (1829-1889) and three children who were contemporaries of George Moore: Colvill (1850-1929), Florence L. Bridger (1856-1935) and Dulciebella M. Bridger (b. 1859).

From an undated photograph that may be of Harry Bridger with his two daughters in 1889. From a photograph published on Shorehambysea.com. Used with permission.

Starting in the late 1860s, George Moore visited the farms as a close friend of Covill. His love of this family was profound: “They had come into my life when I was a boy, and had always been the single part of me that never changed; ideas had come and gone, but they had remained” (Ave, p.306).

Buckingham House

Undated photograph of Buckingham House courtesy of Marlipin’s Museum, Shoreham

When the Squire died Harry moved his family to Buckingham House. Moore visited frequently; they nicknamed him Mr. Perpetual, for his endless stream of infatuations, and Kant, for his occasional philosophizing.

Following the death of Eliza and his second marriage to a tenant’s daughter in 1890, Harry Bridger moved from Buckingham House to Adur Lodge, where he remained the rest of his life.

Adur Lodge

Undated photograph courtesy of Mr. Frank Bridger

Colvill, Florence, and Dulciebella Bridger in front of Adur Lodge. Members of the Bridger family and their homes seem to appear in Moore’s fiction. Buckingham House became Woodview in his novel Esther Waters.