John William Cockrill

Parents	William Cockrill Sarah Scott Cockrill, formerly Ballard
Born	247 Bulls Lane, Gorleston. (Sunday 3rd June 1849)
Married	Deborah Shanks (First Wife) Lowestoft Wesleyan Methodist Chapel (presumed). (Gorleston Methodist Chapel not licensed for weddings until 1898) (Summer of 1874) Bessie Palmer, widow, nee Ling (Second Wife) Wesley's Chapel, London (Thursday 16th February 1899)
Children	Ralph Scott Cockrill Owen Hanworth Cockrill
Died	At Home, 'Norbury', 12 Euston Road, Great Yarmouth. (Monday 2nd June 1924)
Buried	St Nicholas Churchyard, Great Yarmouth.

J W Cockrill started his employment with local authorities in 1869 at the age of 20 when he joined the Southtown and Gorleston Local Board as Surveyor and Inspector of Nuisances at £45 per annum, later rising to £70 per annum plus £8 per annum for supervision of Gorleston cemetery. In 1872 much of the central part of Gorleston was provided with drainage, street lighting and pavements under his direction. In 1873 Gorleston, Southtown and Cobholm were integrated with the Borough of Great Yarmouth and J W Cockrill was taken over, as he put it "with the rest of the goods and chattels, the watercarts and wheelbarrows." His appointment was as Assistant Borough Surveyor and as such he continued to have charge of Gorleston.

The following year he married; whether he and Deborah initially resided at 'Glencoe House' is uncertain, his address in the 1870s is given simply as High Street, Gorleston, but he was certainly living there by the late 1870s, eventually moving to Great Yarmouth around about mid 1883. Harrod's Directory of 1875 lists him as an architect and Surveyor for Gorleston District, whilst Kelly's Directories for 1874 and 1875 list him as "Postmaster and offering Post, Money Orders, Telegraph Office and Savings Bank"; Kelly's 1879 lists him as the Norwich Union Fire Agent at his home address of 'Glencoe House'.

The position of Sub-Postmaster was transferred to his brother, W B Cockrill, in or around 1875 judging by a newspaper cutting of November of that year referring to the removal of telegraph wires to the new office under the charge of Mr W Cockrill)

Baptist Church, Gorleston

In 1882 the Borough Surveyor, Mr H H Baker, died and J W Cockrill was eventually, after some quite heated debate and division in the Council, appointed in his place and remained as Borough Surveyor for Yarmouth until 1922. It was during his years with the Borough that Great Yarmouth changed from a fishing port to one of the most attractive coastal resorts of Britain: much of that change was shaped and realised by his architectural and design skills combined with his interest in the use of the relatively new medium - concrete - and also his interest in terra cotta and glazed tiles for facing public buildings.

Many of the intricately moulded red bricks on Great Yarmouth's public buildings were specially made to his designs at the Costessey brickworks, near Norwich, and Doulton of Lambeth manufactured much of the brown salt-glazed and cream enamelled stoneware tiles for him, there is even a Cockrill-Doulton Patent Tile designed with an L shaped key on the back of tiles to enable them to be bonded into concrete walls (ref. The Principles and Practice of Modern House Construction, Lister Sutcliffe, vol I; c1900).

J W Cockrill personally or via his juniors produced many accomplished designs for public buildings and development schemes in Great Yarmouth and Gorleston such as the Gorleston Baptist Chapel (Foundation Stone dated 20 May 1875) which was destroyed by bombing in 1941 and then rebuilt and subsequently reopened in 1951.

Below is a list of John William Cockrill's Major Works:
The Stradbroke Road Schools (1876)
The Tramway Hotel site of the former Horse and Groom (1877-78)
Cemetery Gatehouse and Mortuary Chapel at Gorleston Cemetery (1879)
The Pavilion, Gorleston (July 1901)
Arcade on Yarmouth Marine Parade (1902)
Arcade on Gorleston Marine Parade
Great Yarmouth School of Art
Gorleston Carnegie Library (1907)
Great Yarmouth Free Library
Runham Vauxhall School
The Sea Wall and Beach Gardens (Great Yarmouth)
Marine Parade Extension (Great Yarmouth)
Re-modelling of the Wellington Pier (Great Yarmouth)
Re-modelling former Great Yarmouth Police Station and Fire Station (1912)
Great Yarmouth Swimming Pool
Widening of North Quay and Kitchener Road
Electric Tramways plus the car sheds
Entire reconstruction of the Sewerage System
Public Electric Lighting
Upper Terrace and new shelters on Gorleston Cliffs
Housing Schemes and a Garden Suburb

Cemetery Gatehouse

Tramway Hotel

Cemetery Chapel

Carnegie Library

Wellington Pier

Other works included local cemeteries, three recreation grounds, boundary wall on Caister Road. Some schemes such as a Regency style pavilion on the Jetty put forward in 1890, were too ambitious to get off the drawing board.

The only record of a building for which he was the architect to be built outside the Borough is the Raglan Fish Curing Works built for Messrs. Maconachie Bros. at Lowestoft in 1882. He also took charge of the moving of Great Yarmouth racecourse on no less than three occasions.

In a press interview upon his retirement he remarked -
For a long time people have said I have bossed the show, but it was not so, all my work has been done under control and very rigid control. I came to the Yarmouth side of the water in time to take up office in the new Town Hall, but for a few weeks at first I had an office in the old buildings. In my early time I remember the Council meetings being held in the Tolhouse Hall. I have seen some lively meetings and some dramatic incidents too.

When a young man comes into the public service they say: What does that boy know about it? When he has done over fifty years service, they say: What is the old fool talking about now? Those are the two ends of public life, and I have found them in my own experience.

Of his one time nickname, "Concrete Cockrill", he said - "Concrete paths had been begun before my time by a man named Burwood. Then I did the High Street, Gorleston, in 1874, where the concrete paths have proved themselves, for today they look like lasting till 2074. The only drawback to concrete is its tendency to become slippery but this can be modified by having a broken stone effect surface. The reason for so much concrete work in Yarmouth was, of course, its extraordinary durability and cheapness since sand and shingle were provided free of all cost on the beach in such abundant quantities that thousands of tons have been sent to other towns."

The newspaper tribute continued:
Yarmouth's recreation grounds were all laid out by Mr Cockrill who said he began with the Wellesley. Its site was then open Denes, the only buildings near being three houses in Norfolk Square. At first it was suggested the ground should run down to the Parade but as this would have made a break in the line of houses on the front it would have caused an interruption to building development. Soon after the ground was laid out houses were built all round, the situation becoming very popular. He had all along advocated the laying out of gardens and pleasure grounds as the best means to develop the Corporation estate and his view, although opposed tooth and nail originally, prevailed and was justified by events. A second ground, the Beaconsfield, was laid out on the other side of Sandown Road, and Gorleston could not rest satisfied until it had one too.

The Waterways were conceived by the Council as a 'job creation' scheme (1926-28) in order to relieve poverty by employing by local men during the depression. The Waterways also enhanced Great Yarmouth as a seaside resort. J.W.Cockrill was responsible for the design and works.

The beautification of the Marine Parade was entirely his work. The Parade was widened and lengthened until it ran for three miles. Beach Gardens were laid out and the central promenade given a terrace of flowerbeds. The Winter Garden was bought from Torquay in 1903 for £1,300 plus £2,200 for removal and subsequent re-erection in Great Yarmouth. Reputedly not one pane of glass was broken. The Winter Garden reopened at Great Yarmouth for the 1904 season and has been an attraction ever since. The Jetty has also been remodelled but a larger scheme Mr Cockrill prepared could not be carried out for lack of funds. He completely rebuilt Wellington Pier. The old Parade only ran as far as the line of electric standards in the middle of the present spacious Drive. It was faced by a sea wall, put down when Britannia Terrace was built. The Bath Hotel was the first building on the front and fixed the line of the frontage. Gorleston shared in the forward Cockrill policy and was given a Parade in 1901 with beach gardens, the cliffs laid out (with the Ravine cut made in 1903, although the public toilets were not added until 1907), shelters constructed and the pavilion built.

Mr Cockrill remodelled the borough drainage system and though there are nearly one hundred miles of sewers, all but half a mile of them were laid in his time, no small achievement in itself, but this was only one feature in the programme of his life's work. He put up the refuse destructor, which may not now be considered to be in the best possible position, but it has paid for itself in the reduced cost of cartage. The electric light installation he put down under the guidance of Sir W H Preece, engineering expert to the Post Office.

"Mr Cockrill also laid the tram lines and for this, from beginning to end, he shouldered entire responsibility."

I was told that his proposed plans for the Brittania Pier were criticised by a councillor who (proving that personal attacks are not new in politics) claimed that Cockrill was not a real architect because he was unqualified. Stung by this he, in three years of part time study at the Yarmouth School of Art on South Quay, gained his ARIBA in 1888. I was also told that he was a very strict disciplinarian at work and that his car EX 35 was well known by council workers who kept a wary eye open for its approach. His was not, he boasted, an eight hour day, he was astir as early as, or earlier than, the workmen; was on site when work was in progress and frequently visited other places where similar work was being undertaken to ascertain for himself the best methods of tackling new problems. There were few cities of Europe that he had not visited and at his own expense. He was a life long non-smoker and claimed that he spent his tobacco money upon travel.

For much of his life he lived in Euston Road, Great Yarmouth. His hobby was art work, especially reproducing at home brilliant frescoes that he had studied in Italian cathedrals and churches, with all their wealth of minute detail and vivid colourings. He owned a sumptuous portfolio as big as the top of a table filled with work of that character all done by his own brush.

John William Cockrill's proposed Jetty Extension 1897.

The Jetty as envisaged by John William Cockrill was never built.

Although not a seeker of the limelight, honours and respect were bestowed upon him: in 1913 he was elected president of the Institution of Municipal and County Engineers, which held its annual meeting that year in Great Yarmouth, and in the following year he was chosen as president of the Town Planning Institute of which he was one of the foundation members and had been on its Council since 1882; he was also vice-president of Norfolk and Norwich Association of Architects and was a member of the Institute of Civil Engineers.

In his retirement address to the Council he said that, "at the age of 73 he had, these past months, felt his strength failing a little." After tributes had been paid to him in the Council Chamber the Borough Council, although agreeing to fill the vacancy as soon as possible, also voted (but with dissenting names recorded) that he be appointed as consulting engineer and surveyor for six months at his present salary and thereafter at £400 per annum.

A measure of his vigour and forward planning is demonstrated by the list of schemes it was still his ambition to see carried out:
To link Gorleston and Yarmouth with a sub-way or transporter bridge
To open out a road from St Peter's Road to South Quay
A new Haven Bridge to carry the trams
The reclamation of Breydon
A new street from the Conge to the Market Place
A boulevard from the Yacht Station on North Quay to the north of Caister
A Central Railway station on the North Quay.

In July 1922, when he announced his retirement, fulsome tributes were paid in the Council Chamber and in the local press to his fifty-three years of public service, forty of them as Borough Surveyor. The Borough Council presented him with an illuminated manuscript and a gold watch with a gold and platinum chain.

Although he was for many years closely identified with the Wesleyan Methodist Church, and redesigned the interior of the Dene Side Chapel, he latterly became identified with the parish church of St Nicholas to which he gave a stained glass window (destroyed by bombing in World War 2) to mark his gratitude for having been so long spared to be associated with public life and work in Great Yarmouth. He was accorded a Civic Funeral when he died in 1924.

History of Great Yarmouth and Gorleston-on-Sea

John William Cockrill