Darby's Hard

"Darby's Hard" by kind permission of Mr James King - watercolour on paper circa 1980 - George Roberts, 

Darby's Hard - Gorleston- Norfolk in the 1980s was largely unused and a quiet riverside mooring.  
Occasionally somebody worked on a boat on the Hard which shelved gently into the water, but the amount of activity there was negligible compared with the years in the latter half of the 19th century and in the early 20th century when it was a hive of industry as the Darby family plied their trade there as shipwrights and boat repairers. In 1980 when I spent my lunch break painting 'en plein air' at Darby's Hard , an old redundant trawler was moored up and presented a 'still life' rendered in peeling paint, rotting timber and rusting steel plate.

CHARLES MAYES WIGG (1889-1969) DARBY'S HARD

I was clearly not the first watercolourist to have whipped out my easel at Darby's Hard!