The spate of guidebooks published to cater for the needs
of Tenby's visitors provide a fascinating insight into Victorian
Tenby. Graeat emphasis is placed on the health-giving properties
of its location. Pages are littered with tributes and recommendations
from eminent medical authorities of the period on the suitability
of holidaying or over-wintering in the resort, for people
with a vast range of medical conditions.
The implication
was clear. If you had a medical condition, Tenby would
help ameliorate it. If you didn't have it, Tenby would
keep you fit and healthy. Regular visits would guarantee
almost superhuman levels of verve and vitality. Having
ensured your physical salvation, Tenby would provide endless
opportunities for stimulating your mental powers with
wholesome educational pursuits. Rock pools, cliff-top
flowers and grasses, shells, tideline seaweeds and contorted
rock formations, provided the raw material for observation,
collection and classification. These earnest guidebooks
assured naturalists, botanists, geologists, zoologists
and the curious layman, that at every turnTenby's natural
delights were waiting to dazzle and amaze.
Much of this local activity was given greater focus and
significance by the prescense in Tenby of some of the
country's leading biologists. All of this commendable
behaviour was to be set within a context of long walks,
preferably to sites of major historical interest within
the neighbourhood, which would further feed the Victorian
appetite for knowledge and self-improvement.
Afternoons and evenings were often given over to the favourite
social pursuit of dressing up and being seen in acceptable
company. Promenading was taken very seriously. Victorian
Tenby saw a great increase in its population. All of the
prime cliff-top locations round the old town were now
used for building terraces of stylish, well-proportioned
houses for wealthy residents. Some were lived in throughout
the year, others were bought solely for summer use.
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| Opening of Royal Victoria
Pier 1899 |
As the century progressed some of the residences changed
hands and became small hotels. The Castle Hill walkways
to all the town's beaches were created during this period.
More landscaping, involving the creation of sitting out
areas, took place on Castle hill when the Welsh national
monument to Prince Albert was erected on the crest of
the hill in 1865.
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