Gibb photograph archive, Volume 2

No. 5a - Bishop procession by the Deanery, pre-1942.

Gibb includes this photograph in a sequence entitled as "pre-1942".

The context of this procession is not known. A virger leads the procession, carrying one of the silver virges.

Commentary by Eric Dare: Possibly a Suffragan Bishop (of Plymouth??) with Reggie Llewellyn (Succentor) carrying the cross. Might they have come from the Bishop's Palace making their way past the Deanery?

If it is the Suffragan Bishop of Plymouth, it would be Francis Whitfield Daukes (1877-1954), who was bishop 1934-1950.

The identities of the two men at the rear of the procession are not known.

The view of this area is now different. The large trees in the Deanery have gone, and large wysteria surmounts the length of the wall. The gable-arched gateway is still there, but the double gates have been replaced by a curving wall and moved round the corner, to the right of the photograph. The building is now the Old Deanery and serves as offices for the Diocese, since 2005 when Jonathan Meyrick became Dean (his predessor, Keith Jones, was the last to occupy the 'Old Deanery'). The Deanery has been number 10 The Close since then.