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SEE Southampton

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Guided tours of Southampton, and other heritage activities (walks, accessible walks, articles, books, podcasts, Westgate Tower, Vaults&Vino and Welcome Cruise Team).

05/11/2026

Freemantle House that existed from 1750-1852.

05/11/2026

The Tornados had a 1962 number one hit in the UK and the USA with Telstar. The line up included Heinz Burt (bottom right) on bass who had connections to Eastleigh and Southampton.

The song was inspired by Telstar 1, the world's first active, privately sponsored communications satellite, launched on July 10, 1962.
Developed by AT&T's Bell Telephone Laboratories and launched by NASA on a Delta rocket from Cape Canaveral, it was designed to relay live television, telephone calls, faxes, and computer data across the Atlantic Ocean.
It enabled the first live, transatlantic television broadcast between the United States and Europe and carried the first satellite phone call.
Weighing about 170 pounds (77 kg), the spherical satellite orbited Earth every 2.5 hours in an elliptical path, providing roughly 18 to 30 minutes of transmission time per pass.
Its electronics failed prematurely after about 7 months due to high-altitude radiation from a U.S. nuclear test (Starfish Prime) conducted just before its launch.

05/11/2026

‘And on your left, Ladies and Gentlemen’ by Ray Smith, 1980.
Artwork at Avenue Campus of the University of Southampton.

04/11/2026

Public art in Portswood.

04/11/2026

The church foundation stone was laid on September 12, 1846, and the building was consecrated on September 17, 1847, by Charles Sumner, the Bishop of Wi******er. Officially named Christ Church, Portswood, it became commonly known as Highfield Church in 1883. It is a Grade II listed building designed by architects Raphael and Joshua Brandon, constructed from Purbeck Stone with Caen Stone mouldings.
The building has seen numerous expansions, including the addition of a north aisle in 1855, a western extension in 1915, and a west porch designed by Ernest Berry Webber in 1955. It suffered bomb damage in 1941.

04/11/2026

Flight Lieutenant Nicolson was the first fighter pilot to win a Victoria Cross (VC). He was in action over Southampton in 1940. He bailed out over Millbrook and Nicholson (sic) Walk in Rownhams is near where his plane crash landed.

“Darling. Just got VC. Don’t know why.”

Flight Lieutenant James Brindley Eric Nicolson VC. One of The Few. Just 23 years old.

On 16 August 1940, Nicolson was flying a Hurricane with No. 249 Squadron near Southampton when an attack by Messerschmitt Bf 109s left him wounded and his aircraft burning.

As he prepared to escape, another enemy aircraft came into view. Nicolson returned to his controls and continued firing while flames engulfed his cockpit. By the time he finally baled out, he had suffered severe burns.

His telegram to his pregnant wife, Muriel, was an extraordinary understatement:

“Shot down. Very slightly hurt. Full particulars later. All my love, Nick.”

He became the only member of RAF Fighter Command awarded the Victoria Cross during the Second World War. His message home on learning of the award was equally modest:

“Darling. Just got VC. Don’t know why. Letter follows. All my love. Nick.”

Behind the medal was a young husband trying to reassure the woman he loved.

Nicolson recovered and returned to service. On 2 May 1945, by then a Wing Commander, he died when the Liberator aboard which he was flying crashed into the Bay of Bengal. He was 28.

As Remembrance approaches, we remember the people behind the familiar photographs. Their courage, their families, and the futures so many never lived to see.

We will remember them.

04/11/2026

This IKEA was the sea. On the 1935 print of the Ordnance Survey one-inch map, Southampton's shore still runs along the railway and the Western Esplanade below the old Town Walls, with the tidal mud of West Bay beyond and the new dock wall going up. From 1927 to 1934 the Southern Railway reclaimed roughly 400 acres of that mud behind a quay wall about 7,000 feet long, creating the Western Docks. Today the cruise berths, West Quay Road and the IKEA store (opened 2009) stand where the tide once came in. Have you ever sailed from the Western Docks or shopped here?

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