IS there more to shopping than a leisurely stroll round our favourite stores and counters?

For many the state of the economy and mood of the population is reflected in our High Streets.

The century opened with Queen Victoria on the throne and Brightlingsea still enjoying the heyday of yachting.

The graceful racing and cruising yachts spent the winter months on the mud flats, whilst their crews were honing their skills on the open seas fishing for herring and sprats.

Come March and April the town would spring into action, the boat yards preparing the yachts for their wealthy owners and local shops getting ready to supply a range of goods from chandlery, elegant suits to luxury food and wines for the galleys, whilst local men were vying for positions on some of the most prestigious yachts of the day.

The Great War brought with it new challenges and customers, staff from the Naval Base and Engineers from British regiments and for the last half of the war, hundreds of Anzac soldiers all learning engineering skills needed by troops on the Western Front.

During the inter-war years, although yachting did return it never reached the heights of earlier times and shops had to adjust to the role of meeting the needs of the local community, many feeling the effects of the depression.

Another war, and another Naval Base, this time HMS Nemo, also many local men were working all hours in the Aldous shipyard building, servicing and preparing vessels for the Royal Navy.

Rationing affected almost everything and everybody, and shops were encouraging residents to make their own jams and pickles, and for clothe shops, the ‘make do and mend’ attitude must have had a desperate effect.

It was probably the last 50 years of the century that was to see most changes. In the early part of those years there was a shop on nearly every corner selling basic provisions, you didn’t always have to go to the High Street for your sugar or the children’s sweets – there would have been a shop just ‘down the road’ or ‘round the corner’.

However, so much was starting to change – the first of the major shipyards were to close in the 1960s, sprat fishing and the oyster trade came to an end and the train, which had at one time brought people into the town to work, became a victim of the ‘Beeching cuts’ and more and more Brightlingsea residents travelled out of the town each morning to earn their living.

By the mid-1980s the last of the ship-yards closed.

In the side roads, what were once small shops became sitting rooms and to go shopping was a trip to the High Street or Victoria Place.

With more mobility and the advent of the supermarket, there have been more changes, inasmuch that the High Street shops don’t go quite so far up the road and instead of a time when there was at least four bakers and four or even five butchers there are now more hairdressers, beauticians and coffee shops.

But Brightlingsea is lucky to have a range of shops that still include a butchers and bakers, no candle-stick maker, but certainly many others that provide quality products and excellent services.

by Margaret Stone, Curator, Brightlingsea Museum