3-028-476 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Opening of the Derby Fine-Arts and Industrial Exhibition, 1870. 'A new building in Becket-street, Wardwick, to be used for a drill-hall by the volunteer corps of the town of Derby, has been opened with a Fine-Arts and Industrial Exhibition, and a fancy bazaar. The opening ceremony...was presided over by the Duke of Devonshire; and Lord Vernon, Lord Scarsdale, Lord Belper, the Bishop of Lichfield, the High Sheriff of the county, and the Mayors and magistrates of this and the neighbouring towns, were present by invitation. There was a procession from the Guildhall to the new building, where the chief persons, with Colonel Wilmot, M.P., commandant of the volunteers, and chairman of the committee, ascended a dais or platform. Colonel Wilmot read an address, to which the Duke replied. The orchestra and chorus, of two hundred performers, conducted by Mr. Woodward, then gave the inauguration ode, composed specially for this occasion. The exhibition of fine pictures in the great hall, and of other works of art, models of inventions, rare specimens of nature, antiquarian relics, and various curiosities, in the passages and upper rooms, was opened to the public, with the ladies' bazaar in the conservatory'. From "Illustrated London News", 1870.