The Revd. Lewis Way and the Origins of the Promenade des Anglais.
At the re-inauguration of the newly refurbished Holy Trinity Anglican Church in Nice in the summer of 2012, Christian Estrosi, the Mayor of Nice, while talking about the British contribution to the city and its life, described the Promenade des Anglais as the most beautiful avenue in the world. Some might disagree, but no one can deny the Promenade’s iconic status as one of the most recognisable stretches of road on Earth. Approximately three miles (or five kilometres) long, it sweeps in a majestic curve around the Baie des Anges, the grand hotels, apartment blocks, beaches and restaurants - a world away from its humble origins as a simple beach road.
The essential story of how the Promenade des Anglais came to exist is familiar to most who come from, live in or visit Nice: a variation on the theme of wealthy British visitors and residents clubbing together to pay impoverished local people to clear a stretch of road along the beach on which they could walk and ride, and its gradual extension into the modern Promenade. Some versions suggest that only two people were contributors to the first Beach Road: the main instigator of the project and temporary first Chaplain of Holy Trinity Church the Reverend Lewis Way, and Way’s brother-in-law the Reverend Edward Whitby. Indeed, Lewis Way’s name features in most books about the history of Nice in connection with the Promenade’s origins; few others do and in those instances they are inevitably British.
The true story of how the ‘Camin dei Anglés’ (as the first stretch was known) came into being is, perhaps inevitably, more complicated. Great philanthropist though he was, Lewis Way was only one of a number of subscribers to the Beach Road project. With the help of Reverend Way's own file, we can get an insight into who these subscribers were and how much they contributed, among other aspects.
By the early 1820s the stream of visitors to the south of France and Italy, that had been interrupted by the Napoleonic Wars, had recommenced. Most prominent as before were the British, many of whom continued to come for reasons of health. Tuberculosis remained the scourge of Europe and with no antibiotics available to treat it or other pulmonary diseases; from the last quarter of the eighteenth century onwards the best that doctors could recommend was fresh air and a better climate. For those less well-off this might mean, if they could afford it, a visit to a breezy British coastal town or spa, while the wealthier in society could travel to the warmer climate of the Mediterranean. In this sense the coastline of the south of France and the north west of Italy became for a century and a half, the sanatorium of Europe.
By the second decade of the nineteenth century, the numbers of British residents in or visitors to Nice had grown to such an extent (more than one hundred families) that it became clear that a place of worship was required to meet their spiritual needs, as well as a new cemetery.
Nizza, as Nice was then known, was part of the Kingdom of Sardinia and permission was obtained from King Victor Emmanuel I to build a Protestant Chapel in the Croix de Marbre quartier. Construction began in September 1821 and the first Vestry Book declares that “The British Episcopal Chapel at Nice was opened for Divine Service on Advent Sunday the 1st December 1822”. The presiding ministers on this occasion were the Reverend Lewis Way and his brother-in-law the Reverend Edward Whitby, who were almost certainly benefactors of the new Chapel which stood on the site of the present church. (In 1824, Lewis Way as Chaplain to the British Ambassador, would establish a British Chapel in Paris, the forerunner of St George's Church). It was in the spirit of community service that Lewis Way conceived of the Beach Road project and became its first benefactor.
Lewis Way was a pious and somewhat eccentric man (one biographical work describes him as a 'fascinating and unlikely figure' ) and very much a product of his age in terms of his religious interests and outlook, being strongly influenced by Anglican Evangelism. The second son of Benjamin Way, a prosperous Buckinghamshire squire, Lewis whose maternal grandfather was the rector of Denham in Buckinghamshire, harboured ambitions to enter the clergy himself. However, the family living was reserved for one of his five brothers deemed to be less bright and therefore unable to make his own way in life. As a result, Lewis was reluctantly guided into the legal profession and there he might have stayed had it not been for an extraordinary piece of chance that reads like something out of a Dickens novel.
A gentleman named John Way happened to be walking though the Inner Temple in London in October 1799 and noted Lewis’ name on the door of his chambers. John Way, then sixty-seven years old, had been the secretary and agent of the Earl of Mansfield, the former Lord Chief Justice, and through his position had become extremely wealthy. He and his wife being childless however, John was anxious to find an heir. He had already dismissed one relative as a candidate, having been appalled to discover that the fellow carried a flask around in his pocket. Now John Way decided to investigate Lewis and on hearing from his solicitor that Mr Lewis Way was an upstanding and pious young gentleman, John introduced himself. The two men became close friends and John provided the money which enabled Lewis to marry his sweetheart Mary Drewe in 1801. When John Way died in August 1804, having provided for his wife he left the bulk of his estate to Lewis Way. To his and everyone else’s astonishment this amounted to £300000, a vast amount which today would be worth around £37 Million. The only proviso was that Lewis should use the money for the glory of God.
Freed from making a living in the legal profession, Lewis Way threw himself enthusiastically into religious pursuits becoming involved with some unusual associations, most notably the London Society For Promoting Christianity Among the Jews whose principal aim was the restoration of the Jews to the True Faith in time for the coming End of the World. The Society was one of many Millenarianist groups popular at the time, whose general belief was that the corrupt Old Order was soon to be swept away by the Second Coming and the establishment of the Kingdom of God on Earth, an end of the world as it was known. The London Society’s particular concern however, was the salvation of the Jews and in this they were not alone.
With his new found wealth, Lewis Way paid the Society’s debts and became an enthusiastic member. In 1816 he achieved his ambition and was ordained an Anglican priest and the year after began travelling around Europe with a view to furthering the London Society’s cause. He became a friend of Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia who shared his views, and a correspondent of Czar Alexander I. His later trip to the Lebanon and Jordan was also undertaken on the Society’s behalf.
Lewis Way brought his family to Nice in the Autumn of 1822 as part of a traditional European Grand Tour. He and his wife Mary and six children travelled across France in a large coach and a phaeton while sending larger items, such as a piano and ponies for the children, by sea to Nice.
Reverend Way always had an eye for a good cause and having helped the Anglophone community establish a place of worship now saw a way to provide much-needed assistance for the poor of Nizza, while at the same time enabling the British to fully enjoy one of their favourite pastimes, promenading by the sea. The last quarter of the eighteenth century had seen a growth in popularity of health spas where the well-to-do could take the waters and enjoy long walks in the fresh air away from the fetid, unhealthy atmosphere of city life. When George, Prince of Wales (later Prince Regent and George IV), followed his uncle the Duke of Cumberland in establishing a residence in Brighton in the 1780s, he helped encourage a fashion for seaside resorts which the British would eventually export to other parts of Europe and the world. The wealthier in society were soon flocking to Brighton and other coastal towns to enjoy all manner of frivolity, and of course healthy walks along the beach front.
As Lewis Way discovered the British community in Nice were no different and, much to the amusement of the local population, had taken to walking and riding along a length of beach front lying roughly between what is now the Ruhl Hotel and Casino and Rue Meyerbeer. It was however, a rough, pebble-strewn stretch of land which grew muddy in the winter months and was often uncomfortable to use. It so happened that after a couple of harsh winters in the region, which particularly hit fruit and vegetable crops, there were a number of jobless poor congregating in Nice by the end of 1823, facing another difficult winter ahead of them. What better way of helping them, Way considered, than by paying them to create a properly surfaced 'beach road' for promenading and riding, which would obviously be a boon to the Anglophone community and to Nice itself.
Over time the most common version of this story had it that Lewis Way and his brother-in-law, alone paid for the construction of the Beach Road in a grand act of philanthropy, although sometimes the story was extended to include a few members of the British community. However, the truth is quite different. Lewis Way's own file dated 1824 and entitled 'Beach Road Nice,' indicates that a number of people contributed to the general fund for constructing the road and some were not even British.
The process began at a meeting of British Residents which was held in the Vestry of the new Protestant Chapel on 18th December 1823. In his own handwriting, Lewis Way noted that it had been customary for British Residents to make subscriptions for the poor of Nice during the winter, but that 'It is proposed for the present season to employ such idle persons as are capable of work, in making and maintaining a walk, & clearing a ride on the beach, under the garden walls from Maison Le Grand to Maison Barralis; and that Mr La Croix be requested to apply for permission to carry the same into effect...........'. British Consul Pierre Lacroix evidently succeeded in obtaining permission as Way added a further note on December 26th to the effect that permission had been obtained from 'the Consul of the town', Monsieur Saissi di Castelnuovo; and that in order for the work to proceed immediately: '...all persons who are willing to assist, are requested to put down their names, and to pay their subscriptions to the bearer.'
Shortly after a notice was issued which read:
'Beach Road. Nice.
Whereas it is the general desire of the strangers resident at Nice and of many inhabitants of the place that a road should be made upon the sea beach for the convenience of horse and foot passengers in the formation and maintaining of which the distressed poor may find employment during the winter – and whereas many persons have already contributed to the same, it is proposed that a general subscription be immediately opened for that purpose, and the money be deposited with Messrs. Avigdor. December 1823.'
While there is no indication of who had donated on an informal basis, the file now lists the names of those who contributed to the general subscriptions. The first subscription was made in December 1823 and lists fifty-four contributors. At the head of the list is of course the Reverend Way himself, followed by his wife Mary, his brother-in-law the Reverend Edward Whitby and Mrs Whitby and one of the Ways' daughters, Catherine. Further down we find two more of the Ways' daughters, Anna and Louisa, who contributed two Francs and eighteen Centimes, perhaps from their pocket money. Between them these seven individuals gave two hundred sixty two old Francs and eighteen Centimes, some fifteen percent of the total raised in the first subscription. As for the rest, they prove to be a mixture of aristocracy, clergymen, military types and private individuals, mostly British but a few from other countries, including France.
One of the most generous contributors at sixty Francs was the Marchioness of Bute, a lady from an august family who happened to have a connection to Lewis Way. Born Maria North in December 1793, she was the granddaughter of Frederick, Lord North, 2nd Earl of Guildford and Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1770-1782. Maria's aunt, Lady Anne North, was the third wife of John Baker Holroyd, 1st Earl of Sheffield, whose first wife was Lewis Way's late sister Abigail, which meant that the Marchioness of Bute's aunt was married to Lewis Way's former brother-in-law. Doubtless they were both aware of this connection, which could only have helped when Revd. Way was asking for donations.
Lady Maria was also an extremely wealthy woman, having had £40000 (about £5 million in today's currency) settled on her at the time of her marriage in 1818 to John Crichton-Stuart, the rather dour 2nd Marquess of Bute. The 2nd Marquis was the industrialist famed for developing the coal and iron industries in South Wales and was credited by the contemporary press as being 'the creator of modern Cardiff.' In 1827, on the death of her father the 3rd Earl of Guildford, Maria inherited lands worth another £110000, around £14 million today. Contemporaries described the Marchioness as a pleasant and kind woman, and like many who visited the Riviera in those days, she suffered from ill health. The nature of her ailment is unclear, despite it she survived another eighteen years, dying at the age of 47 in September 1841.
The close-knit nature of the British aristocracy at the time is emphasised by the presence directly after the Marchioness of Bute in the list of subscribers, of Lord and Lady Frances Sandon. The Sandons had married in 1823 and so presumably were still on their honeymoon and Lady Frances happened to be the sister of the 2nd Marquess of Bute and therefore sister-in-law to the Marchioness. Lord Sandon was in fact Dudley Ryder, Viscount Sandon who, after his father's death, became the 2nd Earl of Harrowby. Sandon's father had served as Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs under William Pitt the Younger from1804 to 1805; and also as Lord President of the Council in Lord Liverpool's administration from 1812 to 1827. Young Dudley eventually followed his father into politics and served as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (1855) and Lord Privy Seal (1855-57) under Lord Palmerston. Among his other distinctions was being made a Knight of the Garter, and serving no less than three times as President of the Royal Statistical Society.
Another aristocratic lady on the list of subscribers is Anne Orton Pierrepont, the Dowager Countess Manvers. The daughter of a Mr William Mills of Petersham in Surrey, she married Charles Pierrepont (formerly Charles Meadows), the 1st Earl Manvers on 14th March 1744. Their marriage lasted forty two years, until the Earl's death in 1816. Lady Anne died in 1832 at the then considerable age of 76. With her in Nice was one of her sons Evelyn Henry Pierrepont and they contributed a generous sixty Francs each.
The Irish baronage is represented by Thomas Mahon, 2nd Baron Hartland, son of Maurice Mahon, an Irish politician and landowner and the Hon. Catherine Moore, daughter of the 1st Viscount Mount Cashell. Thomas was the eldest of their three sons. Born in 1766 and educated at St John's, Cambridge, Thomas began his career in the army, probably purchasing a commission as a Major in November 1794. He rose to the rank of Lt. General, to which rank he was promoted in August 1819. Although Thomas served in the Napoleonic Wars, even as far away as South America, he had the misfortune to be present at two military fiascos of those wars, namely the second invasion of the River Plate in 1807 and the Walcheren Campaign of 1809. Along with his military career, Thomas followed his father into politics serving as MP for County Roscommon in the Parliament of Ireland from 1799-1801 and after the Act of Union as MP for Roscommon in the UK Parliament from 1801-1802. In August 1811, Thomas married Catherine Topping but unfortunately they had no children.
There are recurrent themes in the backgrounds of many of the contributors, so it is no surprise to find another soldier of an aristocratic background on the list, this time from Scotland. The Hon. Archibald Macdonald was the third son of Alexander Macdonald, 1st Baron Macdonald and 9th Baronet of Sleat, Co. Antrim. Archibald served as Captain of Troop in the 10th or Prince of Wales Own Regiment of Light Dragoons. On 29th October 1802, he married Jane Campbell in Edinburgh; they had five children. Archibald died in February 1861 at the age of 83.
Military men often gravitated to the Mediterranean either to winter there or for their health. Also on the list of subscribers is another Scotsman, Lt. General Matthew Baillie of Bothwell, South Lanarkshire. Baillie started his military career at the bottom, purchasing a Cornetcy in the 13th Light Dragoons, in 1779. Through further purchases and promotions he attained the brevet of Colonel on 1st January 1800 and in April 1808 was promoted to Major-General. His final promotion to Lieutenant-General came on 4th June 1813. It is likely that by the time he made his contribution of forty Francs to the Beach Road fund, General Baillie had retired and we can surmise that he was in ill health as he died in Nice on 5th May 1825, just eighteen months after making his contribution to the Revd. Way's scheme.
The other prominent category in this list of contributors is unsurprisingly that of Anglican clergy, either ordained or of the future. Thus we find the Revd. Henry Livius, a Shropshire man educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. Livius entered the living of Yaxham with Welborne, Norfolk on 5th March 1834. In the winter of 1823-4 however, he was apparently doing the Grand Tour with his relatively new wife Emma, daughter of the Revd. J. Grinfield of Berkley Square, Bristol. Revd. Livius took services at the British Protestant Chapel, acting as occasional Chaplain.
Further down in the list is a cleric from an aristocratic background, the Hon. & Revd. Robert Leslie-Melville. The fifth and youngest son of Scottish Whig politician Alexander Leslie-Melville, 7th Earl of Leven and 6th Earl of Melvill, Robert was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, receiving his M.A. in 1812. He was presented to the rectory of Great Tey cum Pontisbright in Essex by Samuel Thornton Esq. in 1816 and given that he died in Geneva in 1828, just four years after making his contribution to the beginning of the Beach Road, it is possible that like many others, he had come to Nice for health reasons.
George Barber Paley on the other hand had not yet entered the priesthood at this time. Born on 28th October 1799, he came from a wealthy family in Langcliffe in Yorkshire. Having been educated at Bowling School, Bradford and Trinity and Peterhouse Colleges, Cambridge, Paley was just twenty-four when he made his contribution of thirty four Francs and eight Centimes to the Beach Road subscriptions. There is no indication until this point that he intended to enter the church, and yet a little over a year later he was ordained a deacon in Ely and in 1826 was ordained a priest. Could the Revd. Lewis Way have inspired this young man to take the cloth? Perhaps also of significance, is that Paley's financial prospects in 1823-24 may have been limited; indeed he would not succeed to the family estates in Yorkshire until 1860. It may also be no coincidence that the living of St Andrew's, Freckenham in Sussex was from 1760 in the patronage of Peterhouse College, Cambridge, Paley's Alma Mater. It was the first church of which Peterhouse had the patronage and Revd. Paley would serve as its Rector for no less than forty-four years, from 1835 to 1879.
Inevitably, among the subscribers we find further stalwarts of the British community in Nizza, such as Doctors Todd and Shriving, Reverends Davie & Boyer and Messrs Lucas, Charters, Ryves, Graham and Cairncross, who all appear in the 'Vestry Book of the Protestant Chapel At Nice 1822 to 1837,' as participants at General Meetings of the British Residents. One point to note is that just over a third of those who subscribed were women, and in monetary terms women contributed a total of one thousand and ten Francs and eighteen Centimes over the two subscriptions, or roughly forty percent of the total raised. By contrast men gave one thousand two hundred and forty four Francs and twenty eight Centimes, accounting for just over half of the total, with the remaining two hundred and twenty Francs and thirty five Centimes unattributed by gender.
One of the most intriguing individuals to appear on the December 1823 list, with a subscription of thirty Francs, is Chief Justice Monk. A Canadian born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1745, James Monk had an interesting heritage as his grandfather George was one of three illegitimate sons of George Monk, 1st Duke of Albemarle. James Monk was named after his father, a Judge from Halifax, Nova Scotia and followed him into the law, being admitted to the bar in 1768. He went on to serve as Solicitor-General of Nova Scotia (1772-1776); Attorney General of the Province of Quebec (1776-1789 & 1792-1794); and Chief Justice of Montreal with interruptions, from 1794 to 1820.
Monk's career was not without controversy however. His independence of mind, unshakeable confidence in the rightness of his opinions and his pugnacity meant that he was not afraid of a fight, and long-running battles against the incompetence and bias of the judiciary, as well as his anti-revolutionary stance, found him often placed awkwardly between the Governor and the authorities in London. As he wrote to his wife Ann in 1784: “If I act with Law and Constitution legal and political I am to be...ruined by a Governor – If I act against them I shall surely be ruined by a Ministry who will screen their Gov' under my disgrace.” Indeed, because of his actions Monk lost his job in 1789 and it took him three years to regain it. In a reflective letter from his temporary exile in London, James remarked: 'Distinguish between your Government and this at St James...Never use uncommon ardour but where...the policy of St James is incontrovertibly clear. The...tranquillity of the Colony is the object here, and no consideration should hazard that object with a politic Man.” Later, as Chief Justice of Montreal, Monk would be impeached largely because of his anti-slavery stance, which saw him systematically dismiss all suits by owners against runaway slaves, and his programme of judicial reform all of which put him in conflict with colonial administrators and radicals. Once again however, after a long battle Monk and his fellow defendant Jonathan Sewell the Chief Justice of Quebec, were acquitted and returned to their posts. In an ironic twist, on the sudden death in September 1819 of Charles Lennox, Duke of Richmond and Governor-in-Chief of North America, James Monk as acting Speaker of the Legislative Council found himself temporarily President of the Colony. Chief Justice Monk retired to England in 1820 and on the 27th of April 1825, sixteen months after his involvement in the Beach Road project in Nice, he was knighted.
James Monk was a forward-thinking man in some respects, particularly in regard to education and women. Disappointed by the childlessness of his marriage to Ann, he expended his paternal instincts and wealth on his brother George Henry’s numerous children. Under James’ vigilant eye both nieces and nephews received a thorough education including the study of French, which he considered indispensable. Monk was determined that his nieces should have advantageous marriages, but also be equipped with the same intellectual, moral and psychological resources as their brothers, so that they might succeed in life independently of husbands if need be. Of all his nieces, James Monk was closest to Elizabeth Ann, known as Liza. Under his tutelage Liza grew up into a cultured, independent and refined young woman. Monk not only introduced Eliza to Canadian society but on his retirement took her to England as his companion. As many of their station did, James and Eliza wintered in southern France and Italy and so although Eliza may not appear on Lewis Way’s subscription list we can imagine that she was with her uncle in Nice. Monk’s fondness and regard for his niece was such that he accepted her decision to marry for love (to a British officer on half pay) rather than entering a favourable union arranged by her father, and he even made Eliza his sole heir. Sir James died at his home in Cheltenham on 18th November 1826. According to his Will, Eliza became head of the family and also independently wealthy with a substantial fortune to her name of some tens of thousands of pounds, millions in today’s money. Monk's philosophy of life can perhaps be best summed up by remarks he made to one of his nephews in a letter of 1819: “You must learn to feel strength in your own Opinion and Judgement. And reading, study, knowledge and wisdom are the only means to attain it.” What makes James Monk unusual for his time is that he almost certainly gave the same advice to his nieces. Fittingly, Sir James Monk is still remembered in Montreal where Monkland Village and Monkland Avenue take their name from the 'Monklands' estate he built there in 1804 and which, having served as the Governor General's residence, is now a Catholic co-educational school.
Among the predominantly British or Anglophone contributors to the Beach Road Subscription, we also find four French ladies the first of whom, making a subscription of twenty Francs, is 'Madame la Duchesse de Luynes.' Marie-Françoise, Dauvet de Mainneville was the daughter of the Marquis and Marquise de Mainneville and married Honoré Théodore d'Albert, 8th Duc de Luynes in 1822. There is a mystery however, about Marie-Françoise's entry: Honoré d'Albert did not inherit the title Duc de Luynes until his father's death in March 1832 and yet his wife is noted down as the Duchess de Luynes in 1823. We can say for certain that the lady in question is Marie-Françoise and not Honoré's mother Françoise-Marie, as the latter had died in 1813. We can also be sure that it is not Honoré's second wife Jeanne d'Amys de Ponceau, as they were not married until 1846. Honoré d'Albert was just nineteen when he married Marie-Françoise and it is likely that she was very young too. They had a child Honoré Louis, born on 3rd February 1823, but his mother never got the chance to see him grow up as she died the following year on 23rd July 1824, probably at their house on the Boulevard Cessole, Nice, and just seven months after making her contribution to the Reverend Way's project. It is possible given the timing, that Marie-Françoise never properly recovered from childbirth or, in a weakened state after the birth of her son, contracted some other illness.
Just after la Duchesse de Luynes in the list come the 'Mademoiselles Frelin ' who between then contributed thirty Francs. Presumably sisters, we do not know who these ladies were but given that their names are listed between the Duchesse de Luynes and the gloriously named 'La Marechale Gouvion St Cyr' it is possible that they had some connection to one or other of these Grande Dames.
La Maréchale Gouvion St-Cyr could just as accurately have been recorded as the even grander sounding 'La Marquise de Gouvion St-Cyr,' but these titles belie the much humbler origins of La Maréchale and indeed, her husband. Born Anne Gouvion in Toul, Meurthe-et-Moselle, Lorraine, she married her cousin Laurent Gouvion in 1795. Laurent also came from Toul and was the son of a tanner Jean-Baptiste Gouvion and his wife Anne-Marie Mercier, who left when Laurent was just four years old and later adopted the name St-Cyr (which Laurent would later add to his own). Laurent's ambition was to be a painter rather than follow his father into the tanning business; however, fate and the French Revolutionary Wars dictated that he would make his mark in the military. Appointed Captain in a volunteer battalion in 1792 at the age of 28, within two years Laurent Gouvion St-Cyr was a general of division. In 1798 he succeeded one of France's greatest generals André Masséna in command of the Army of Italy, a post that had previously been held by another great general Napoleon Bonaparte. He served under Marshal Masséna in Italy and in the Prussian and Polish campaigns of 1807, and in 1808 was elevated to the aristocracy with the title of Count with command of an army corps in Catalonia. St-Cyr went on to serve under Napoleon in the Russian campaign, and a notable victory over the Russians at Polotsk on 18th August 1812 resulted in his promotion to Marshal; St-Cyr further distinguished himself at the battle of Dresden in August 1813. One might have expected St-Cyr's career to end with the fall of Napoleon and the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy. Instead, he was given the great distinction of being made a Peer of France, which title had previously been held by only a few of the highest-ranking members of the hereditary nobility. Between 1815 and 1819 St-Cyr served twice as War Minister and in 1817 he was created 1st Marquis de Gouvion St-Cyr, all quite a testament to the abilities of this son of a tanner.
So what was the wife of this Napoleonic Marshal doing subscribing forty eight Francs to a British initiative to clear a road on the beach front at Nice? We may never know Madame La Marechale's motivation but what is known is that Marechal St-Cyr's poor health obliged him to retire to Hyères in the south of France. St-Cyr died in Hyères in March 1830 less than six years after the Beach Road was completed; his wife Anne outlived him by fourteen years, dying in Paris in 1844.
Some subscriptions were made anonymously, leaving us with some intriguing questions. Near the end of the first list of subscribers is an entry that reads ‘A friend to the Poor’, this individual giving five Francs and eighteen Centimes; while three entries further on we find ‘Two friends to the Poor’ who donated a combined twenty one Francs and ten Centimes. According to the account, the total raised by the first subscription was one thousand seven hundred and thirty eight Francs and six Centimes. However, this figure is slightly wrong and when added up the total actually comes to one thousand seven hundred and thirty five Francs and sixty six Centimes. This would have been equivalent to a little under £70, or roughly £9,000 in today's money, which considering the work done seems very reasonable.
2nd Subscriptions January 26th , 1824.
The second Subscription for the Beach Road was recorded a month later in January 1824. There were fewer subscribers (only fifteen compared to the fifty-four of the first list) and all featured in the first Subscription. They included Lewis Way’s wife and their daughter Catherine, who contributed a further one hundred and eight Francs between them; the Whitbys who gave generously sixty Francs each as did the Marchioness of Bute; and Lord and Lady Sandon with sixty and forty Francs respectively. The largest amount of money however was represented by ‘A collection of monies of different Countries’ which when exchanged raised one hundred and thirty six Francs and seven Centimes. Unfortunately there is no way to know what monies they were and from which countries they came. Directly below the entry for the collection of monies is one entitled ‘A refused debt ' in the amount of twenty one Francs. Sadly there is no further explanation about this debt but the suggestion is that someone preferred to see the debt owed to them go to a good cause rather than into their own pocket. Finally, quite literally the last entry in the list of subscriptions is simply ‘A gold pencil case’ which is valued at thirty seven Francs. We have no indication of who donated the pencil case but given that thirty seven Francs is a little above the average subscription it was presumably a quality item. The total amount raised by the second subscription was only seven hundred and thirty nine Francs and fifteen Centimes which brought the overall total raised to two thousand four hundred and seventy eight Francs and eighty one Centimes (and not the two thousand four hundred and seventy eight Francs and one Centime noted down by the Revd. Way). This would have been around £100 at the time, which to put it in some sort of perspective was the bare minimum that someone of the 'middle classes' would need as an annual income in order to live reasonably comfortably, or the price of a top quality horse.
The last page of the Beach Road file concerns the expenditure on the levelling and improving of the road. It reveals that the work was carried out over a period of thirteen weeks, starting on 29th December 1823 and concluding on 1st May 1824. The sums were paid out on a weekly basis and ranged from seven Francs and ten Centimes to four hundred and ninety three Francs and six Centimes. The largest weekly payments are in the period from December 29th to February 14th which clearly suggests that the bulk of the work was done between those dates. The total amount expended, two thousand five hundred and twenty five Francs and two Centimes (four Francs less than the total entered by Revd. Way) actually exceeded the amount raised by some fifty Francs and eleven Centimes. Much of that is accounted for by what appears to be an unplanned payment for a 13th week of work, between 26th April and 1st May, which cost thirty five Francs and twelve Centimes.
Lewis Way has also indicated the number of people employed on the work which totalled two hundred and eighty-three; of these the majority (one hundred and twenty) were men, eighty-nine were women, with seventy-four children toiling alongside them. Unfortunately we do not know the names of these workers or anything about their lives or the daily rates they were paid. Nevertheless, we can take some comfort from the fact that in a time of great hardship, they were, thanks to the effort of Reverend Lewis Way and his associates, able to find employment and therefore a means to feed themselves during the hard winter months and one hopes, retain some measure of dignity.
When the work was completed at the beginning of May 1824 the new strip of land was officially titled by the Nizza authorities “Strada del Littorale,” which translates as the “Coast” or “Seaside Road.” The local people however, acknowledging its patrons who could be seen daily walking or riding along it, quickly Christened it “Camin dei Inglés” or “the English Road” in the local dialect. Some ten years later the municipality of Nice took over the upkeep of the Camin and in 1844 extended it to the quartier of Baumettes, after which it became known by its official designation in French “la Promenade des Anglais.” In 1856, a further extension took the Promenade to the area of Magnan, although its width then was still only eight metres and therefore some way from what we see today.
It is therefore, not only Lewis Way and Edward Whitby to whom Nice and those who love and enjoy the Promenade des Anglais owe a debt; but also to the many subscribers, British, French and others whose generosity and assistance to the poor of Nizza began this story. Above all however, we must give thanks to the nameless men, women and children, almost certainly for the most part Italian, whose hard work began the journey of a humble and unpromising strip of beach road, which continued through its transformation and extension, to become the magnificent Promenade we know and love today. Not so much a corner, as a great, sweeping length of a foreign field, that is forever England.
© Richard Challoner 2017.
