The Collection
460 Postcards of Dover
A local man had been collecting postcards of Dover for over 25
years. In 2007 he offered to let the museum look through his
massive collection and to buy the ones it didn’t have. 460 were
selected by the curatorial staff as important images worth adding
to the collection.
This was an opportunity for the museum to acquire a unique
collection of images of Dover, assembled over many decades, all of
which are rare enough not to feature already in the museums
significant collection, which itself has been built-up over the
last 150 years.
Significant contributions to the purchase price came from the
MLA/V&A Purchase Grant Fund and Dover Town Council.
Most of the 460 postcards are hand-printed photographs by local
photographers printed on postcard-back card, rather than being
true, mass-produced, lithograph-printed postcards. Consequently,
most are fairly rare; for example, a postcard of the 10 officers of
the Ancient Order of Philanthropic Prussian Hermits would only have
been printed in small numbers by photographer John Gibson of
Snargate Street, as the market would be limited to perhaps 2 or 3
copies to each officer.
All subjects are included in the collection, including school
classes, meetings, special occasions, street scenes, buildings,
industry, sports, etc. Especially good are the views of local shops
and businesses and the military cards. A number of views of obscure
streets are also featured, for which the museum previously had no
images at all.
As well as a being an important local archive, events of
national importance are also covered, such as Bleriot’s flight
across the Channel, pioneer Channel Swimmers, the arrival of the
bodies of First World War heroes Nurse Edith Cavell and Captain
Fryatt, and the funeral procession and burial of the dead from the
famous Zeebrugge Raid of St. George’s Day 1918.
The Museum is committed to providing full access to all its
collections and has identified its picture collection as that most
in demand by the public. To this end, the museum has been
digitising all its pictures and objects and currently provides a
public image database with almost 40,000 images included. The
public can search, select and print photographs from the database,
along with relevant information files currently being compiled by
volunteer researchers.
The museum is currently devising a project to give worldwide
access to this database via the internet.
Postcards of Dover shops; Kennett’s the grocer, Clark’s the
butchers and the Central Fruit Stores
Postcards of the Funeral Processions of Edith Cavell and Captain
Fryatt on arrival at Dover 1919