HISTORY OF THE PARISH
3: GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT

Surbiton in 1872 had a population of around 7,000, and despite Burney's reference to "the numerous poor", it was a prosperous residential town. An appeal for funds issued by St Mark's Church some years before stated "With all the signs of temporal prosperity exhibited around us, is it too much to appeal to the district for yet more extended aid? We are surround by all the external marks of a thriving people. What was but yesterday a retired rural district has suddenly, as it were by magic, assumed the appearance of a London suburb; and by the control over time and space, through the application of modern science, has been practically converted into a London suburb. We see exemplified the successful energy of the nineteenth century as applied to the multiplication of the comforts and conveniences of life." By 1872 there were big houses for the prosperous middle classes in Claremont Road, Maple Road, Portsmouth Road, Langley Road and elsewhere, and hundreds of cottages in the Alpha Road area, in Brighton Road and in the "river roads". Victoria Road was a flourishing shopping centre, and the streets were lit by gas lamps.

A considerable amount of poverty did exist alongside this affluence, and many people lived in primitive conditions. Surbiton was regulated and managed by the Improvement Commissioners set up by the Surbiton Improvement Act of 1855, and they were still in 1870 having difficulty in persuading the owners of rented-out cottages to lay on a water supply. Large numbers of domestic servants were employed in the big houses, and in the early days of St Andrew's a special celebration of Holy Communion was arranged for them at seven o'clock in the morning of the last Sunday of each month. "Masters and Mistresses" were urged to allow their servants to attend church regularly, at this or other services.

The parish did seem to enjoy a varied social life, in which the river played a large part. The Queen's Promenade had been completed in 1867, and the Kingston Rowing Club and Thames Sailing Club had their headquarters at Raven's Ait. There were regular concerts and plays at the Lecture Hall in Maple Road. Social activities were planned on a grand scale. The Parish Magazine of September 1877 reported on the school treat: after assembling at St Andrew's for a short service, the children marched in procession to Southborough Farm, which had been placed at their disposal by Mr Charles Corkran. There they had races, cricket and other games, Punch and Judy and the "greatest attraction, a large Whirly-go-round, worked by Steam, which during the whole afternoon was beset by eager Candidates for a Ride". A "most substantial and well arranged" tea was provided by Messrs Packham for the 500 visitors. Even more ambitious was the St Andrew's Choir treat, held the same month. Thirty-eight members of the choir assembled at Surbiton Station at 7.00am, travelled by train to Portsmouth, crossed by the Isle of Wight steamer to Ryde, went on again by rail to Ventnor, and walked back to Shanklin, where they started the return journey, arriving back at Surbiton by 9.00pm.

Jarvis, the author of "The first hundred years" written in 1960, noted that "Everyone would no doubt like to be given much more information about our former vicars, but very little can be traced. Memories of quite a number of the congregation go back as far as Charles Burney, but practically all that can be learned about him is that he had a footman or a butler and is said by some to have left most of the work of the parish to be done by his curates. Nor does anything come to light when reading of other vicars that gives a clear picture of their lives and work. We come across such expressions as 'dull, but good', and 'dull beyond words but a packed church'."

Charles Burney became the first Archdeacon of Kingston in 1879. In 1877 the Diocese of Winchester had been sub-divided, and Surbiton was transferred to the Diocese of Rochester. By the turn of the century a further reorganisation was necessary, and Surbiton left Rochester to join the new Diocese of Southwark which was created in 1905. Archdeacon Burney retired in the same year, and was succeeded by Canon J. Haslock Potter, described by one parishioner as "our beloved Canon Potter whose teaching was never forgotten". He enlarged St Mark's Vicarage, already a considerable establishment on the site of what is now Assheton-Bennett House on St Mark's Hill. The vicarage grounds extended all the way back to Church Hill Road, including a tennis court and the surviving Coach House where the horse and carriage were stabled. No photograph is available, but Jarvis's history intriguingly states that Potter added "the battlements and the rooms on the west side".

Another notable character was the Revd John Taylor, who served as curate of St Mark's from 1903 to 1917. His lasting memorial is the 1st Surbiton Scout Group, which he founded in 1909 at the invitation of the boys themselves, who wanted him as their leader. The son of a British officer in the Indian Army, he was a stickler for discipline, but was also remembered with affection by all the scouts of those years for his keen sense of humour, and for the practical jokes which he not only frequently tolerated but also seemed to enjoy.

Canon Potter gave more independence to St Andrew's Church, which for its first 35 years had had no clergy of its own. He assigned one curate, his son-in-law the Revd F.M. Jackson, as "priest-in-charge" of St Andrew's. For some time the influence of the Oxford, or Tractarian, Movement had been growing: Archdeacon Burney had referred to "the renewed life and activity that pervade our Church". Canon Potter was a controversial figure who, as deacon at Banbury, had come under the strong Tractarian influence of the celebrated Revd A.D. Crake. Now he would help the congregation of St Andrew's to develop their own more Anglo-Catholic style, with a greater use of ritual: he later declared he had "laid a foundation upon which my successors have built wisely and well". He kept Sunday Choral Mattins and sermon at 10.45am, and introduced Sung Eucharist with vestments at 11.45am. The compromise was not satisfactory, particularly in view of the strain it imposed on the choir, who were nevertheless "splendidly loyal", but the arrangement lasted for years. It was not until 1918, during the incumbency of the Revd W.J. Margetsson, that the Sung Eucharist became the principal service on Sundays, with Mattins at 10.15 as a preparation.

Notable events at St Andrew's during Canon Potter's time included the decision of the congregation on 1st January 1913 to become responsible for the whole of the stipend of their priest-in-charge, an essential step towards financial independence from St Mark's. In the same year the church was licensed for marriages, the first being solemnised by Canon Potter on 2nd August between Ernest Arthur Rogers and Edith Ethel Talman. The north transept was converted into the Lady Chapel, and a large sum of money was raised to save the Church Schools.

The Revd F.M. Jackson joined the Forces as a chaplain early in the First World War; priests-in-charge after this included the Revd F.C. Whitehouse and the Revd W.A.R. Braybrooke. On the retirement of Canon Potter in 1918, the Revd W.J. Margetsson became vicar of St Mark's, bringing with him as curates the Revd S.W.G. Frost, who was priest-in-charge of St Andrew's until 1923, and the Revd C. Easterling, who succeeded him and served until 1925. The remaining priests-in-charge were the Revd E. Michell (1925-1933) and the Revd Harold Roberts, the last of the clergy to hold the office.

The Revd W.J. Margetsson was a fine preacher, and greatly loved by his congregation, some of whom are said to have wept when he left. During his incumbency the hanging Rood was installed inside St Andrew's as a war memorial. The priest-in-charge took up residence at 54 Maple Road, which was later bought by the Parochial Church Council and became St Andrew's vicarage. In 1922 Archdeacon G.H. Marten became Vicar: he later commented "When, in July 1922, the Bishop of Southwark asked me to become Vicar of Surbiton, there were not wanting some who expatiated on the difficulties inherent in a Parish which possessed two churches which stood for different types of churchmanship and presented different forms of worship. To all these friends I answered that I was really glad of the opportunity, for I hold both types of churchmanship and forms of worship to be entirely loyal to the Church of England, and a legitimate expression of the needs of varying temperaments."

On 24th July 1933, after an investigation by a commission, the Bishop of Southwark acceded to the wishes of the congregation and made St Andrew's a separate parish. The new priest-in-charge, the Revd Harold Roberts, then became the new parish's first vicar. St Mark's sold its Parish Hall in Balaclava Road to St Andrew's, intending to build a new hall to commemorate the coronation of King George VI. There are references in letters to the difficulties that prevented it from being built, but nothing was done by 1939 and then it was too late.

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