Remembering Eric Norton
Ian Blair
1st July 2021
On Monday I returned to Eagle Wharf Road for the first time in fifteen months, and it was great to see some of my former colleagues after such a long absence from MOLA. Much sadder news however was relayed by Derek Seeley, that Eric Norton had recently died.
Eric worked with me on the first site I supervised for the DUA at Foster Lane in 1982, which may well have been his first site in the City of London, where he was one of a small team of four archaeologists. He later fled: swimming across the Thames to join the DGLA, before returning to the north bank in 1991 when the DGLA and DUA merged as MoLAS. In the mid- 1990’s Eric left the building with Simon O’Connor-Thompson to start the consultancy Norton Thompson Associates.
When I think of Eric, I can still hear his dulcet tones and remember well his very deliberate thoughtful style of delivery. With a sharp sense of humour, he was great company to be with, especially after hours and with a drink in his hand, and tales to relate. His local pub was the Lamb and Flag in Covent Garden, which was also frequented by Charles Dickens (not at the same time) and acquired a reputation in the early nineteenth century for staging bare-knuckle prize fights in its upstairs room, earning it the nickname 'The Bucket of Blood'.
Not being the fighting sort, Eric restricted his sporting endeavours to playing darts with their darts team, and he was an accomplished player, if memory serves me right a South Paw, and he had a wonderful fluid throwing action. He will be missed by all who worked with him on both banks of the River Thames throughout the 1980s and 1990s, another sad loss of a London archaeologist.
RIP
Eric Norton (centre) with from left to right: Barry Bishop, Ian Grainger, Mike Hutchinson, and Chris Phillpotts. Photo possibly taken at Ray Street in the second half of the 1980s. Thanks to Bob Cowie for sharing this image.
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