Charles Herbert Henry Gore – Swindon museum’s first curator

In 2016 we all got very excited when Make Architects produced an ambitious £22m design concept for our town’s much needed new Museum and Art Gallery. But sadly, the bid for a Heritage Lottery Fund grant that would make this possible was unsuccessful and it was back to the drawing board.

And then four years later Covid struck. In March 2020 the Swindon Museum and Art Gallery closed its doors, like everywhere else, as the country shut down in an attempt to halt the spread of Covid 19. But when other museums and galleries nationwide reopened in May 2021, Swindon’s didn’t.

Swindon Borough Council subsequently announced that the Grade II listed Apsley House property wasn’t fit for purpose (which we knew anyway) but what was their solution. The top floor of the Civic Offices in Euclid Street was to be converted into a museum and art gallery while selected artefacts and paintings were to go on tour around Swindon. The long-term plan is to build a new museum and art exhibition facility in the centre of town but when they say long term, they really do mean long term. The estimated timeline is in the region of 10 years.

So why am I telling you this sorry saga?

This is the last resting place of Charles Herbert Henry Gore and his wife Clara. As a ten-year-old boy Charles found the fossilised bones of a prehistoric animal on the site of the Queen Street gasometer and this discovery began a lifetime’s interest in geology and natural history. But of course, what career opportunities were there for the son of a house painter in the 19th century.

By 1881 14-year-old Charles had finished his education and was working as an apprentice coach body maker in the GWR Works according to the census taken that year. In 1890 he married Clara Downs at St Mark’s Church and they set up home just round the corner from here at 31 Radnor Street.

By the turn of the century ill health had prevented him continuing his job in the Works and by 1911 he was working as a Draper’s Traveller. The 1911 census also describes him as a ‘part time student.’ It can probably be safely assumed that his studies involved his interest in fossils and geology.

By 1919 Charles had accumulated an extensive collection, which he offered to the Swindon Corporation on condition that it provided a building in which to accommodate it all (sounds familiar).

It was decided to use the Victoria Hall, a property in Regent Circus, which had just be vacated by the Roman Catholic congregation awaiting completion of their new church at Holy Rood.

Charles was appointed curator, cataloguing and displaying his collection, which opened to the public on October 27, 1920.

Ten years later Charles packed up his collection again and moved it all up to Apsley House where it remained until 2020, when the museum closed it doors for the last time.

Where is Charles’s collection now? Well to be honest we don’t actually know. ‘In storage’ is the official comment – it certainly isn’t on display, that we do know.

Charles’s wife Clara died in 1912 aged 44 and was buried here on May 1. Charles died in 1951 aged 84 years.

There is one last fact concerning Charles Gore who was born in Newbury in 1867, the son of Frederick and Hepzibah Gore. By 1881 the family were living in Swindon at 4 East Street where Frederick died on Tuesday, August 2. Frederick Gore was the first person to be buried in the new cemetery which opened in 1881. His funeral took place on August 6.

Radnor Street Cemetery supporter and local historian Mandy Lea added this fascinating extra to the Charles Gore story.

Charles Herbert Henry Gore – founder/curator of the Swindon Museum. After he left the GWR (due to injury) he owned a draper’s shop in Granville Street. He was also a medium and an artist. His love of fossils and is what started off his geological collection and became a Fellow at The Geological Society – he even had two ammonites named after him – Perisphinctes Gorei and Crendonites Gorei. He and others donated their collections as the Museum was founded; he also sourced the gharial (we all call it crocodile!) and the mummy. The Museum has a bust of him somewhere, but when we asked to see it they couldn’t find it. He was awarded the Freedom of the Borough of Swindon. It appears he led a rather colourful and varied life!