This watercolour is Views Along Cromer Cliffs and Beach by Catherine Buxton, painted in around 1860, and the artist was the daughter of Catherine Gurney (1814-1911) and Sir Edward North Buxton (1812-1858). This meant that she was brought up in the wealthy and very well-connected Quaker family, so she would have had access to education, travel and money.
The painting shows the coastline looking down towards Cromer, with the church tower rising above the town and the jetty built in 1845 stretching out into the sea. It also shows a Cromer that has expanded slightly, but the rapid growth wasn’t until after 1877 when the railways reached the town. This was from a time when the town wasn’t burdened by hotels and people trying to eat fish and chips in a strong wind. It was also before Greggs reached Cromer, which makes the whole scene look calm, elegant and faintly deprived.
But what I found the most interesting is that in the foreground is the ruined tower of the old lighthouse, built in the early eighteenth century and already looking as though the cliff had begun making firm plans for its removal. The lighthouse finally disappeared over the cliff in 1866, only a few years after this painting was completed, with Trinity House having more information about the structure.