Carrel's Temperance Hotel

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Carrel's Temperance Hotel


Anc15Carrel'sTemperanceHotel.jpg


Carrel's Temperance Hotel was one of a row of tearooms, cafes and hotels along Gorey Pier, and opened some time after the extension
of the Jersey Eastern Railway to the harbour in 1891

This picture taken in 1888 shows that the land reclamation which would allow the railway line and harbour terminal to be built was nearly complete, but the property which would become Carrel's Temperance Hotel, on the left of the photograph, was still a private house

Our Picture of the week (right) from 8 November 2015 was a photograph of Carrel’s Temperance Hotel on Gorey Pier. We knew the location, we thought we know the owners, and we had a date, but did they match? No they did not!

Private house

As the photograph above, taken in 1888 shows, it was previously a private house. In the 1891 census it was shown as occupied by 45-year-old widow Amelia Le Mettez, from France, described as a hotel keeper, and her four children, two boarders and a servant. The Jerripedia contributor who sent us the picture in the box on the right, says that it was taken in about 1903 and shows Mary Jane Carrel, the daughter of Philip John Carrel and his wife Jane Mary, nee Le Seelleur. However, immediately to the right of the property there is a date which appears to be 1906, although it is difficult to read through the street light. The 1901 census named the premises as Castle Temperance Hotel (not Carrel's, as we originally thought) and the head of houshold was 'grocer/shopkeeper' Charles Lewis.

Philip and Jane Carrel were shown living in Les Mars House, Faldouet, but their son Philip, a carpenter, and his wife Elizabeth were shown living a little further down the pier in Exeter House, the other side of Nelson House, the hotel's neighbouring property. The 1911 census showed both Philip snr and his son living on Gorey Pier and the father was described as a 'shipbuilder', as he was in earlier censuses living elsewhere in St Martin. The properties along Gorey Pier were not numbered or otherwise identified in the 1911 census returns but they appear to follow in sequence from the land end, which places Philip John Carrell and his family in the building which had housed (perhaps still housed) the Temperance Hotel, but Philip John was still described as a boat builder and employer, working from home.

No trade was shown for his wife Jane Mary or their daughter Mary Jane, who, aged 26, was still single and living with her parents. Philip jnr and his family were in the next census document, before Nelson House, which was identified as such, so they must also have been living in the same premises as his father. But nobody in either houshold was shown to be involved in running the hotel, and we cannot say exactly what connection the Carrel family had with the hotel named after them, nor exactly when this photograph was taken.

Further information

Further information received since this picture appeared has revealed that Philippe Carrel did not buy the property until 1905. He bought it from Francis John Cantell on 30 September that year. He left it to his son Thomas Edwin Carrel in his will, written in 1931 and registered in December 1938. Today the property is occupied by the Seascale Hotel and further pictures we have unearthed in our Gorey album show that at some point - before 1931 - it changed to Carrel's Seascale Cafe.

By the time Thomas Carrel sold the property in June 1955 it was described as the 'Seascale Hotel, formerly Seascale Cafe'. All this new information suggests that the Temperance Hotel was established by the Carrels before they bought the premises, so perhaps it was leased by Philippe to be run by his wife and daughter.

Lewis family bankruptcy

The Lewis family were not so successful. Mr and Mrs Lewis went bankrupt in 1902/3 and their property Mont Orgueil House reverted to its previous owner, George Thomas Bryant. Charles Henry Lewis had bought the property in October 1897 from Bryant, but then sold it on to his wife, Jane Eliza Lewis nee Arthur, on 31 December 1902, for reasons which were not clear, and it seemed quite an odd transaction. On reading the consideration clause of that contract, Charles seems to have got into arrears with his payment of the rente interest due from his earlier purchase. Jane was required to make that arrears payment (£25 2s 6d) as part of the deal, as well as pay her husband £89 14s 5 cash and take on the liability of annual interest due on rente to the capital value of £354 7s 6d. However, by September 1903 her real property was adjudged renounced, by Order of the Royal Court, and a degrèvement of both her real property and that of Charles was concluded on 24 October 1903, with Mont Orgueil House thereby being returned to the ownership of Bryant. It looks as if she could not keep up with the repayment schedule, as was the case with Charles before her.

So by the time of the 1901 census they already owned Mont Orgueil House, but were living at and running the Temperance Hotel next-door but one. By 1903 they had disappeared from the scene and the Carrel family owned, and were presumably running, what had become their Temperance Hotel

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