Henley-on-Thames

Image: Norman Avenue, developed by the Henley builder Charles Clements from c.1885.

Image: an 'improved' Kennet or Thames and Severn canal-type barge at Henley bridge (engraving c.1834)

Henley's present town hall, completed in 1901, has had at least three predecessors, only one of which occupied the same site.

After a difficult period in the early-to-mid 19th century, Henley's fortunes revived in the late Victorian and Edwardian period, as the railway and

Image: Phyllis Court as rebuilt in the 1840s. Its predecessor was garrisoned and fortified during the Civil War.

The present-day Phyllis Court is a stuccoed, Italianate mansion house on Henley's northern edge, built in the early 1840s.

The diaries of Caroline Powys (1738-1817) are one of the most vibrant and entertaining sources for the social life of the gentry and aristocracy in

Image: handbill advertising winter services from the White Hart Inn (by John Alleway), 1717. Read more, or read Alleway's will

Image: a typical crush of pleasure boats at the 1896 Regatta, viewed from one of house boats which lined the banks for weeks on end.

Image: Henley from the Wargrave Road (1698), by Jan Siberechts; courtesy of the River & Rowing Museum, Henley on Thames