10. Cross over the grass on to a broader path along a copse of silver birch on the left. Veer right on to the broad path which runs straight towards the railway bridge ahead. Cross this and go through the alleyway lying head between the houses. This emerges on Baskerville Rd. Walk left, noting the generous gardens of the houses over the road. Patten Rd is on the right; walk down to No. 6 This section of the walk has taken us on the route Edward Thomas would have walked to see his mentor James Ashcroft Noble, a Liberal journalist, critic and writer and, subsequently, to call on Helen.
Patten Rd is a wider street than those of the Thomas homes, indicating wealthier residents. They are spacious, semi-detached residences with pillared porches, fretted gable ends and ornate plaster embellishments; each has a basement, two storeys and an attic. Helen says this home was in a better neighbourhood [than 15 The Grove 22, their first Wandsworth home to the east of this location] with a garden carved out of an old cherry orchard with several fruit trees.23 At the time of writing there are two cherry trees in the front garden.
The family had moved from Liverpool to The Grove in 1892 and it was here Edward first visited Noble. [he house was destroyed by a flying bomb in 1944.]
W G Tarrant, the hymnologist, writer and minister of the Wandsworth Unitarian Chapel attended by Noble, had asked the latter to help young Edward work on his writings in preparation for possible publication. Helen says this shy and constrained lad responded to the genial kindness and interest of her father between whom there developed a fondness.
From 1895, several of Edward's articles were accepted by a weekly paper of which Noble was co-editor and in the Globe. Under his guidance, The Woodland Life was prepared for publication in 1897 which, Noble having died in 1896, he inscribed to the memory of James Ashcroft Noble.
In November 1895, Noble wrote to Thomas, "I think that when you get to know my Helen she might make a very nice friend for you. She is a few months older than you, but she is in many ways younger than her years, and she loves Nature and beautiful things just as you do, though in some ways she is not as clever as the others [her sisters Irene, Susan and Mary]"24 One day, Noble said to the youth, "Here's Helen dying for the country and a good walker; why LI don't you take her and show her some of the places you know?" — It was from this house that we set off for our first walk to Merton.25 The walks continued throughout their life together.
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Philip Boys (aka "HistoryBoys")