Surbiton

National politics

Surbiton falls within the UK parliamentary constituency of Kingston and Surbiton, which is represented in the House of Commons by Sir Ed Davey, a Liberal Democrat who served as Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change during the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition. Davey also represented the constituency between 1997 and 2015, having been ousted for a short period of time by Conservative James Berry. In the 2017 general election, Davey went on to defeat Berry by 45% to 38%.^[6] Both Davey's and Berry's offices were located in Surbiton's Berrylands ward.

In the United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, 2016, Kingston and Surbiton voted to remain a member of the European Union by 61.7% of the local vote.^[7]

London politics

Surbiton is represented in the London Assembly by Conservative Tony Arbour, as part of London's South West constituency.

Local councillors

Surbiton elects 12 of the Kingston upon Thames London Borough Council's 48 councillors. As of the 2018 local elections, the council is controlled by the Liberal Democrats, and all Surbiton's elected councillors are members of that party.

Councillors from Surbiton's 4 Kingston Council wards^[8]

Party	Councillors (12)	Change
Liberal Democrats	12 / 12 (100%)	5
Conservatives	0 / 12 (0%)	5

Religion

Until the early 19th century, Surbiton, like Norbiton, lay in the parish of All Saints, Kingston upon Thames. As a result, Surbiton's three parish churches all date back to the Victorian era.^[10] The two Anglican ones, Saint Mark's and Saint Andrew's, are located in the town centre. The third is the Roman Catholic church of Saint Raphael's, which is located away from the centre towards the north, in the Kingston upon Thames postal district.

St Matthew's, Surbiton

In addition, there are two other Anglican parish churches in south Surbiton, Christ Church and Saint Matthew's. Both are also Victorian.

Christ Church was built in 1862-63, by Charles Lock Luck and lengthened in 1866. The chancel aisles were added in 1864, and 1871. It has no tower, and is built of red brick with stone dressings with some black brick voussoirs. The east stained glass window was done by Clayton and Bell, the central stained glass window by Burne-Jones, while the other stained glass was done by Lavers, Barraud and Westlake.^[11]

Saint Matthew's was completed in 1875, having taken less than 2 years to build. The church and the original vicarage were paid for by one man, William Matthew Coulthurst, who was the senior partner of Coutts Bank. On the outside of the east end of the church, there is a stone plaque recording this and the fact that it was partly built in memory of Hannah Mabella Coulthurst, the dead sister of William Matthew Coulthurst. Built into the wall behind the plaque, there is a photograph of Hannah, a copy of ‘The Times’ newspaper of the day and a letter from William Coulthurst stipulating that the church should remain in the evangelical tradition. The church and vicarage cost £26,500. The old vicarage was pulled down in 1939 and a subsequent one was built on the same plot. In 2012, work started on a new vicarage on part of the plot and this was completed in 2013.^[12]

Resident artists and writers

The clock tower, Surbiton, built to celebrate the Coronation of King Edward VII, 1902

The Pre-Raphaelite painters John Everett Millais (1829–1896) and William Holman Hunt (1827–1910) came to Surbiton in 1851, 26 years before Richard Jefferies (1848–1887). Millais used the Hogsmill River, in Six Acre Meadow, Tolworth, as the background for his painting Ophelia.^[13] Holman Hunt used the fields just south of this spot as the background to The Hireling Shepherd.^[14]

In the mid-1870s the novelist Thomas Hardy (1840–1928) lived in a house called 'St. David's Villa' in Hook Road, Surbiton for a year after his marriage to Emma Gifford. H.G.Wells, in his comic novel The Wheels of Chance, describes the cycle collision of 'Mr Hoopdriver' and a 'Young Lady in Grey'; the young lady approaching 'along an affluent from the villas of Surbiton'. The writer Enid Blyton (1897–1968) was governess to a Surbiton family for four years from 1920, at a house called 'Southernhay', also on the Hook Road.^[15] C. H. Middelton (1886–1945), who broadcast on gardening during the Second World War, lived in Surbiton, where he died suddenly outside his home.^[16] The artist who brought Rupert the Bear to life for a whole generation, Alfred Bestall, sketched out his cartoons from his home in Cranes Park, Surbiton Hill.

In popular culture

A 1972 episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus featured a mock documentary which investigated whether the residents of Hounslow, another London area suburb, had long ago been descendants of the people of Surbiton "who had made the great trek north".^[17]

Surbiton is popularly remembered as an icon of suburbia in such British television programmes as The Good Life (starring Richard Briers, Penelope Keith, Paul Eddington and Felicity Kendal), though location filming was done in Northwood, North-West London,^[18] and John Sessions and Phil Cornwell's comedy series Stella Street, which has on occasion led to the town being nicknamed "Suburbiton". Other names for the town include "the 'Surbs" and "the 'Tron" in reference to '80s movies The 'Burbs and Tron.

Surbiton station features in the 2009 film version of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Blood Prince, with actors Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter and Michael Gambon as Albus Dumbledore. Filming took place in November 2007.^[19] The station also appears in Agatha Christie's Poirot: The Adventure of the Clapham Cook,^[20] a TV adaptation of the short story by Agatha Christie and the first episode of the 1989 ITV series. Having been set in the 1930s^[21] Art Deco period and external shots of Hercule Poirot's fictional residence Whitehaven Mansions being filmed at Florin Court,^[22] the station assists in maintaining the authenticity of the programme and was built within a year of Florin Court.

Surbiton receives an offhand mention in the seventh chapter of the James Bond novel On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1963) by Ian Fleming, whilst Sable Basilisk is discussing heraldry with Bond.^[23]

The guitarist and singer-songwriter Eric Clapton purchased one of his first guitars from a shop in Surbiton called Bells; the shop has since closed.^[24]

In the episode of EastEnders broadcast on 23 November 2012, Ava Hartman, daughter of Cora Cross, refers to her difficulties of being a black woman growing up in Surbiton in the late 1960s and 1970s adopted by white parents.

List of notable residents

• George Best – a retired footballer and TV pundit before his death (having been born in Belfast and lived much of his life in Manchester)
• Alfred Bestall – illustrator of the Rupert books^[25]
• Charlie Brooks – actress
• Wilberforce Bryant – chairman of Bryant and May's matches, eldest son of co-founder William Bryant
• Charles Burney – Archdeacon of Kingston-upon-Thames from 1879 to 1904
• Arthur Brian Burton, founder and owner of Thames Ditton Foundry
• Jane Campbell, Baroness Campbell of Surbiton – equality and human rights champion
• Rosalbina Caradori-Allan – opera singer
• Frank Cellier – actor
• Julian Clary – comedian and novelist
• William Francis Dundonald Cochrane – brigadier-general in the Army, and great-grandson of Archibald Cochrane, 9th Earl of Dundonald
• John Cooper – car maker
• Allan Cuthbertson – actor
• Edward Davey FRSA – Liberal Democrat politician
• Phyllis Dixey – singer, dancer and impresario
• Bernard George Ellis – winner of the George Cross
• David Essex – musician, singer-songwriter and actor, lived on Ditton Road for 16 years until 2002
• John Foxx – musician and digital artist, former resident
• Eileen Gray – cyclist^[26]
• Jennifer Guy – actor, Cavegirl
• Thomas Hardy – author (while completing and for the publishing of Far from the Madding Crowd)
• Roy Hodgson – football manager
• Saskia Howard-Clarke – Big Brother 6 (UK) contestant and glamour model
• Leslie Illsley – artist and one of the founders of Troika Pottery
• James Johnston – rugby union player, lived in Surbiton until 2013 while playing for Harlequins^[27]
• Lukin Johnston – English-Canadian journalist who interviewed Adolf Hitler and subsequently disappeared
• John Keen – racing cyclist
• John McCririck – horse racing pundit, Celebrity Big Brother (2005), and Ultimate Big Brother (2010)
• Debbie McGee – widow of late magician Paul Daniels, born in Kingston, lived in Tolworth, went to Our Lady Immaculate and Tolworth Girls' Schools
• James McQuillan – contestant on television series The Apprentice, 2009
• Art Malik – actor
• Dudley Mason GC – master of the SS Ohio
• C. H. Middleton ("Mr Middleton") – gardener, writer and BBC broadcaster
• Elizabeth Norton – historian and author
• Betty Nuthall – amongst other major titles, winner of the 1930 Women's US Singles Tennis Championship, ranked number 4 in the world
• Andy Parsons – comedian, Mock The Week
• Jon Richardson – comedian, 8 out of 10 Cats, Stand Up for the Week
• L. J. K. Setright – motoring journalist and author
• Helen Sharman – first Briton in space, first woman to visit Mir space station
• David Spinx – actor
• Naunton Wayne – actor
• Dorothy Wrinch – first woman to receive an Oxford DSc., 1938 Nobel Prize nominee, grew up in Surbiton