Residents
The Undershill family, who turned out to be tanners, are first recorded in the parish in 1526 when they acquire the share of a lease of 20 acres of land with a house. John Undershill is the earliest documented reference to tanning in St. Bartholomew’s when, in 1549, he witnesses the will of John Parker as a tanner.
In 1570 the Will of Thomas Undershill, St Barts states: “Executors to have the putting and letting of my 2 tenements with my tanner house… until son Samuel is 21”.
In 1596 – Will of Simon Undershill, St Barts, tanner. “To wife Johane for life, messuage and tenements wherein I now dwell and all singular gates, gaterooms, backsides, gardens, orchards, vats, chesernes, lyme pytts, cases …. then to son Edward”.
1612 – Will of John Payne of St Barts, tanner. “To Simon Undershill my landlord, 10s in gold”.
1624/5 – Inventory of Henry Woolgar, St Barts, tanner. “Hall, kitchen, buttery, chamber over hall and kitchen, tan house and vault” also a detailed list of various leathers, valued at £96-5s-4d.
1639 – Will of Thomas Bridger, St Barts, tanner.
1640 – A Will refers to Thomas Sandham, tanner.
1649 – Will of Simon Undershill, St Barts, tanner. “To elder son Edmond, after decease of wife, tanyard, vats, etc.” (This suggests that the tanyard was quickly re-established after the civil war).
1703 – John Woolvin, a knacker, mortgaged his messuage, garden, backside and tanyard on the south side of the highway for £70. This tanyard was probably quite a small affair as it was used by knackers and fellmongers rather than full time tanners. On the 1769 map only one building is shown on the site.
Note: It is not known whether all the above listed tanners operated on this site, but it is known that the Undershill family were on the south side of the road out of the West Gate in the 17th century and would have to have been near a water supply.
Master Tanners since 1795:
1795 – William Penny, tanner: brick and thatched dwelling house, mill house, weather boarded, tiled and thatched.
1796 – he acquires the lease of a piece of meadow adjoining the tanyard to the west.
1803 – Richard Philpott, house and tanyard.
1831/5 – William Norman, house and tanyard.
1857 – Thomas Gibbings
The Site in 1874
The Westgate Tannery site in 1874 (WSRO Taken from Ordnance Survey LXi /6/20 1:500 1st edition )
The land is honeycombed with 120 pits each roughly 2m cubes. The site had an available water supply from the Lavant which ran through it.
Master Tanners continued
in 1879 Henry Wippell Gibbings who lived on Westgate and Walter Lewis Gibbings (who lived in North Street)
By 1900 Gibbings, Harrison and Co. Ltd. (Ernest Redford Harrison lived on Westgate)
Towards the end of the 19th Century the business was known as ‘Gibbings and Harrison’. Thomas Gibbings was living in the ‘Tanners House’ in 1861 and 1871. A ‘Tanner’s wife’ with a son and daughter were living there in 1881.
The site in the 20th Century
Rare coloured streetview of the Tannery with the Tanner’s House in the foregournd, built in 1910 and later used as an office. Most of the magnificent nursery flint wall to the left is still standing. (Ken Green)
The big house (today’s no. 65) was the residence of the Master Tanner. The big bay windows on the west frontage seem to have been added sometime between 1846 and 1875.
The Westgate Tannery was badly damaged by fire in the early 20th century. (Photo: Bygone Chichester)
Chichester Fire Brigade with their new engine. The driver was Edwin Thair. (Bygone Chichester)
No. 61 Westgate
In 1901 and 1911, Ernest Harrison was in no. 61 described as a leather manufacturer. William Butcher was in no. 61 in 1921 described as a leather finisher.
Aerial photograph of the Tannery in 1928. (“Britain from above” epw022964 ENGLAND 1928)
George Pratt was in no. 61 in 1950 and ‘54.
The tannery closed in 1966 and the site taken over by the County Council.
By 1974 the site was used for ‘The West Sussex School Library service’, the ‘Local Taxation Licenses department’, and ‘Victa (UK) Ltd, motor lawn mower distributors. This building is a rare survivor: an industrial Edwardian structure (1910), built around a sturdy cast iron framework, which is likely to be demolished when the site is eventually decontaminated and dwellings built.
Richard Brownfield 2025
Redevelopment of the site
To our knowledge, two serious proposals have been made recently to redevelop this site.
In June 2015, the County Council developed a plan to build housing on the site. Huw Thomas Architects were commissioned to draw up this site development proposal. In the early stages, a revised plan was called for and the above drawing produced on 9 July 2015.
This was for 11 town houses and retained much of the trees as well was the refurbishment of the Victorian street frontage provided by nos. 63, 63a and 65 Westgate. We have not researched what stopped this development, but it is likely that no developer stepped forward to take this project on. The sale of 14 dwellings would not have covered the enormous costs of “remediating” this highly polluted site.
A second attempt
In 2024, 54 years after acquiring the site – and under pressure from the Environment Agency due to potential leaching from the toxic tannery pits into the adjacent course of the Lavant – another attempt was made to develop it for housing. Kinsted Homes were commissioned to come up with a plan, and probably the large increase in the number of properties in this plan over the previous was a sign of the scale of the costs required for remediation. The pits are sealed, but still contain toxic elements in a series of 2mx2m cisterns. This will require a minimum of excavation and soil replacement to depth of two and sometimes five metres. The scale of the task and the potential for prolonged disruption are daunting.
The publicity blurb states: “As a result of its 500-year history as a working Tannery, the site understandably contains the remains of its working past. To enable the site to be made safe for future use, it must be remediated in its entirety.
After the site has been remediated, a collection of new homes will be crafted to suit a range of different inhabitants. The dwellings have been designed to closely reference materials and forms from the existing buildings on site, as well as the local vernacular of Westgate and the wider Chichester context.”
This proposal was much more destructive than the one from 2015, leading to the demolition of the Victorian street frontage and the retention of very few of the mature trees on the site. The general reception was sufficiently negative for this plan to be withdrawn on the advice of the District Council planning department.
It remains true through all this, that residents would like this situation to be resolved as soon as feasible. But at this time (December 2025), it is not known what proposal will now replace it. Meanwhile the site continues to be graffitied, used as a drug den and fall into disrepair: probably – as was the case of the Powell & Moya bungalows on Mount Lane, equally owned by the County Council – so that our historic buildings are only fit for demolition.
Colin Hicks Dec 2025