The Underground Map

The Underground Map is a project which is creating street histories for the areas of London and surrounding counties lying inside the M25.

In a series of maps from the 1750s until the 1950s, you can see how London grew from a city which only reached as far as Park Lane into the post war megapolis we know today. There are now over 85 000 articles on all variety of locations including roads, houses, schools, pubs and palaces.

You can begin exploring by choosing a place from the dropdown list at the top.

As maps are displayed, click on the markers to view location articles.

Latest on The Underground Map...

Yiewsley

Yiewsley is a large suburban village in the London Borough of Hillingdon. Yiewsley’s transition from an agrarian community began when the Grand Junction Canal was opened. Construction started in May 1793 and connected the area to the Thames at Brentford, passing through Yiewsley on its way north following the River Colne. An aqueduct was built at Cowley Lock to cross the Fray’s River. In 1794, the canal opened between the Thames and Uxbridge, and in 1795, the aqueduct over the Fray’s River was likely completed.

The following year, in 1796, Colham Wharf, Yiewsley’s first dock, was established near Colham Bridge. In 1801, the Paddington Arm of the canal opened, connecting the area to national trade routes.

The canal played a vital role in transporting Cowley stock bricks, which were made from the abundant brick-earth in Yiewsley. The bricks were transported mainly along the Grand Junction Canal and the Regent’s Canal to supply the demand for building materials in Victorian London.

By t...

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NOVEMBER

2023

South Harrow
South Harrow originally spread south and west from the hamlet of Roxeth as a result of easier access from Central London by rail In the 1890s, the Metropolitan District Railway, which later became the District Line but was operating as an independent company at the time, recognised the inadequate service to Uxbridge and Harrow. To address this, they proposed the construction of a railway line towards both towns, and this led to the formation of the Ealing & South Harrow Railway. The railway line was intended to extend to South Harrow, which was then a rural area located to the south of Roxeth.

Construction of the railway line was completed by 1899, but the District Line faced financial difficulties that delayed its opening until 1903. Consequently, South Harrow became the terminus of a line extending from Park Royal & Twyford Abbey. The location around Northolt Road subsequently developed into South Harrow’s own commercial and residential hub.

The original station building was approximately 170 metres south of the present-day station. This extension marked a significant miles...
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SEPTEMBER

2023

Great Portland Street
Great Portland Street is a London Underground station near Regent’s Park Great Portland Street station was opened on 10 January 1863 as Portland Road, renamed Great Portland Street and Regents Park in 1923 and changed to its present name on 1 March 1917.

The station’s present structure, constructed in 1930, is situated on a traffic island at the intersection of Marylebone Road, Great Portland Street and Albany Street. This building features a steel-framed design with a cream terracotta exterior. The station’s perimeter also houses shops and, in the past, included a car showroom with office spaces above it. Notably, Great Portland Street was a significant sales location for the motor industry. The station’s architectural design, credited to C.W. Fowler, earned it a Grade II listing in January 1987.

The area around Great Portland Street station offers various points of interest. Regent’s Park and the iconic BT Tower are nearby attractions. Additionally, the station’s proximity to Regen...
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SEPTEMBER

2023

Courtfield Gardens, SW5
Courtfield Gardens is named after the field beneath it, cultivated until the 19th century According to 16th-century records, Courtfield Gardens was built on a vast open meadow known as Great Courtfield. This meadow was surrounded by fertile land and small farms and was part of a large area of land that extended from Cromwell Road to The Old Brompton Road in one direction, and from Gloucester Road to Earl’s Court Road in the other direction. Great Courtfield was included in the Earl’s Court ’manor’.

During the 18th century, Earl’s Court House, a grand manor house, was constructed on the land that is now the western terrace of Barkston Gardens. This building replaced an extensive dwelling that was described in 1705 as having fountains, a marble-tiled dairy, engines for water, and impressive gates at its entrance.

In the 19th century, the area surrounding Courtfield Gardens was developed with rows of terraced houses, as the demand for housing in London grew. Earl’s Court House was demolished in the middle of th...
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JUNE

2023

Alba Place, W11
Alba Place is part of the Colville Conservation Area Originally the stable house accommodation for the main houses on Lancaster Road, the primary purpose of the Mews properties is now residential.

Alba Place is located on the site of an original Mews but has been redeveloped to a degree that it no longer contains any surviving Mews properties. It is a gated cul-de-sac off Portobello Road in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, almost opposite Hayden’s Place (another redeveloped Mews). It contains 16 properties used for residential purposes.

Alba Place was Albion Place until 1937, one of the many patriotic names dating from the period immediately following the Crimean War.
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LATEST LONDON-WIDE CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PROJECT

Eileen Brecknock Road, N7 Added: 10 Nov 2023 09:42 GMT	Brecknock Road Pleating Company My great grandparents ran the Brecknock Road pleating Company around 1910 to 1920 and my Grandmother worked there as a pleater until she was 16. I should like to know more about this. I know they had a beautiful Victorian house in Islington as I have photos of it & of them in their garden. Source: Family history Reply
Squirrel’s Lane, IG9 Added: 6 Nov 2023 16:59 GMT	061123 Why do Thames Water not collect the 15 . Three meter lengths of blue plastic fencing, and old pipes etc. They left here for the last TWO Years, these cause an obstruction,as they halfway lying in the road,as no footpath down this road, and the cars going and exiting the park are getting damaged, also the public are in Grave Danger when trying to avoid your rubbish and the danger of your fences. Source: Squirrels Lane. Buckhurst Hill, Essex. IG9. I want some action ,now, not Excuses.MK. Reply
Christian Cornwall Road, W11 Added: 31 Oct 2023 10:34 GMT	Cornwall Road, W11 Photo shows William Richard Hoare’s chemist shop at 121 Cornwall Road. Reply
Vik Oaks Road, TW6 Added: 30 Oct 2023 18:48 GMT	Old pub sign from the Rising Sun Hi I have no connection to the area except that for the last 30+ years we’ve had an old pub sign hanging on our kitchen wall from the Rising Sun, Stanwell, which I believe was / is on the Oaks Rd. Happy to upload a photo if anyone can tell me how or where to do that! Reply
Phillip Martin Ashburnham Place, SE10 Added: 16 Oct 2023 06:25 GMT	16 Ashburnham Road On 15 October 1874 George Frederick Martin was born in 16 Ashburnham Road Greenwich to George Henry Martin, a painter, and Mary Martin, formerly Southern. Reply
Christine Bithrey Holly Park, N4 Added: 15 Oct 2023 15:20 GMT	The Hollies (1860 - 1900) I lived in Holly Park Estate from 1969 I was 8 years old when we moved in until I left to get married, my mother still lives there now 84. I am wondering if there was ever a cemetery within The Hollies? And if so where? Was it near to the Blythwood Road end or much nearer to the old Methodist Church which is still standing although rather old looking. We spent most of our childhood playing along the old dis-used railway that run directly along Blythwood Road and opposite Holly Park Estate - top end which is where we live/ed. We now walk my mothers dog there twice a day. An elderly gentleman once told me when I was a child that there used to be a cemetery but I am not sure if he was trying to scare us children! I only thought about this recently when walking past the old Methodist Church and seeing the flag stone in the side of the wall with the inscription of when it was built late 1880 If anyone has any answers please email me [email protected] Reply
Chris hutchison Broadhurst Gardens, NW6 Added: 15 Oct 2023 03:04 GMT	35 broadhurst gardens. 35 Broadhurst gardens was owned by famous opera singer Mr Herman “Simmy”Simberg. He had transformed it into a film and recording complex. There was a film and animation studio on the ground floor. The recording facilities were on the next two floors. I arrived in London from Australia in 1966 and worked in the studio as the tea boy and trainee recording engineer from Christmas 1966 for one year. The facility was leased by an American advertising company called Moreno Films. Mr Simbergs company Vox Humana used the studio for their own projects as well. I worked for both of them. I was so lucky. The manager was another wonderful gentleman called Jack Price who went on to create numerous songs for many famous singers of the day and also assisted the careers of Bob Marley and Jimmy Cliff. “Simmy” let me live in the bedsit,upper right hand window. Jack was also busy with projects with The Troggs,Bill Wyman,Peter Frampton. We did some great sessions with Manfred Mann and Alan Price. The Cream did some demos but that was before my time. We did lots of voice over work. Warren Mitchell and Ronnie Corbett were favourites. I went back in 1978 and “Simmy “ had removed all of the studio and it was now his home. His lounge room was still our studio in my minds eye!! Reply
Sue L Battersea Added: 13 Oct 2023 17:21 GMT	Duffield Street, Battersea I’ve been looking for ages for a photo of Duffield Street without any luck. My mother and grandfather lived there during the war. It was the first property he was able to buy but sadly after only a few months they were bombed out. My mother told the story that one night they were aware of a train stopping above them in the embankment. It was full of soldiers who threw out cigarettes and sweets at about four in the morning. They were returning from Dunkirk though of course my mother had no idea at the time. I have heard the same story from a different source too. Reply

Click here to explore another London street
We now have 628 completed street histories and 46872 partial histories

DECEMBER

2017

Kersley Mews, SW11
Kersley Mews is a rare survival of a local mews and built to serve the residents of Foxmore Street and Kersley Street. The mews is open at both ends and has a historically valuable original cobbled surface that is equally rare in Wandsworth borough.

Key features of the retained mews buildings include their external stock brick structure and pitched roof; the large pair of double side hung timber doors which would have given access to horses and carriages; and windows to the grooms’ accommodation above.
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DECEMBER

2017

Mellitus Street, W12
Mellitus Street is a road in the W12 postcode area Mellitus (died 24 April 624) was the first Bishop of London in the Saxon period, the third Archbishop of Canterbury, and a member of the Gregorian mission sent to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons from their native paganism to Christianity.

He arrived in 601 AD with a group of clergy sent to augment the mission, and was consecrated as Bishop of London in 604. Mellitus was the recipient of a famous letter from Pope Gregory I known as the Epistola ad Mellitum, preserved in a later work by the medieval chronicler Bede, which suggested the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons be undertaken gradually, integrating pagan rituals and customs. In 610, Mellitus returned to Italy to attend a council of bishops, and returned to England bearing papal letters to some of the missionaries.

Mellitus was exiled from London by the pagan successors to his patron, King Sæberht of Essex, following the latter’s death around 616. King Æthelberht of Kent, Mellitus’ othe...
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DECEMBER

2017

Coulsdon Common lies near to Old Coulsdon. The threat of enclosure led to it being taken over by the Corporation of London in the early 1880s.

At 51 hectares, it forms part of a larger area of open countryside within the London green belt that links London with the wider countryside of Surrey. Coulsdon Common lies in the North Downs Natural Area and virtually all of it is a Site of Nature Conservation Importance (Site of Metropolitan Interest) for its chalk grassland and wood pasture habitats.

This mosaic of open grassland, scrub and woodland contributes to an attractive landscape nestled amongst the residential housing nearby.
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DECEMBER

2017

Gallants Farm
Gallants Farm survived until 1936. At the time of its final demolition by developers Ideal Homesteads, Ltd, Gallants Farm was the nearest working farm to central London. 430 houses were built on the 45 acre site.

One of the provisions of the deal, was to preserve Russell-Lane - also called "Lovers’ Lane" - for the neighbourhood. They promised to build a road behind the existing lane of tall trees, and said that ’from the lane it will not be possible to see the new houses that are to be built’. An official of the company stated that the estate itself will be built on lines which will not offend the susceptibilities of anyone who knows the district as it is to-day.
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DECEMBER

2017

Lolesworth Close, E1
Lolesworth Close is a short cul-de-sac on the east side of Commercial Street which was originally the western extremity of Flower and Dean Street. It acquired its present form after the opening of the Clement Attlee adventure playground in 1980 and the construction of the Flower and Dean Estate in 1982-4.

It was named Lolesworth Close c.1983
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DECEMBER

2017

Baylis Road, SE1
Baylis Road runs between Westminster Bridge Road and Waterloo Road.

At its northern end Baylis Road continues as The Cut. The Old Vic Theatre is located on The Cut where the roads meet.

The road is named after Lilian Baylis (1874–1937), a theatrical producer and manager, who managed the Old Vic Theatre. Previously, the road was called Oakley Street, as first simply a cul-de-sac since when the route of the road has been moved at its northern end to merge with Lower Marsh.

On 16 November 1802, Colonel Edward Marcus Despard and his co-conspirators were arrested at the Oakley Arms public house at 72 Oakley Street for their part in the Despard Plot. They were charged with three counts of High Treason and tried before a Special Commission, for conspiring to capture and kill the King and overthrow the government. They had also planned to stop the mail coaches entering and leaving London and take over the Tower. Admiral Lord Nelson appeared in Despard’s defence and gave him an excellent character reference. Ho...
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DECEMBER

2017

Ansdell Terrace, W8
Ansdell Terrace is a cul-de-sac off of Ansdell Street and was previously known as St Albans Road North. In 1878, Thomas Hussey, a Kensington builder bought No. 13 Kensington Square. He built Ansdale Terrace as a cul-de-sac on the back garden. The houses were originally occupied by servants working in the main houses and local artisans.
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DECEMBER

2017

Shepherd’s Bush Green, W14
Shepherds Bush Green is the southern section of road lining Shepherd’s Bush Green itself. From the 17th century, the North High Way (Uxbridge Road), the main route from London to Oxford, ran along the north side of the triangular green known as Shepherds Bush, an area of waste land owned by Fulham Manor, The other two sides of the triangle led to Brook Green Lane (Shepherds Bush Road) and Gold Lock Lane (Goldhawk Road).

There was little development of the area beyond a few houses, and an inn, on the north side of the Common and Syndercombe Cottage, on the comer of Gold Lock Lane.

By the early 19th century the roads were much improved and the north side of the Common and the beginning of Wood Lane, up to Wood House, were lined with terraces. A development of semi detached houses, known as Lawn Place, lined the west side of the Green but the southern side remained open. It is unsure when a formal road lined the south side of the Common - in the 1860s, it is labelled "New Road".

By the mid 19th century the Common had been acquired ...
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DECEMBER

2017

Princedale Road, W11
Princedale Road was formerly Princes Road. Before the development of the Ladbroke Estate, almost the only building in the area was a large house just west of the road which was the “handsome pleasant seat” of the owner of the Norland Estate.

Benjamin Lewis Vulliamy had owned the Norland Estate. In September 1838, taking advantage of land price rises due to the possible coming of railways to the area, Vulliamy began discussions with William Kingdom, a building speculator who was probably already active in the development of Westbourne Terrace and Hyde Park Gardens, Paddington.

In the end, Kingdom did not purchase the Norland estate. In January 1839 he assigned the benefit of his agreement with Vulliamy to a solicitor, Charles Richardson, for £5,932. The circumstances of the sale are obscure, but it appears that Kingdom’s assignment to Richardson was in payment of a mortgage debt, possibly on Kingdom’s property in Paddington.

Richardson became the freehold owner of all fift...
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DECEMBER

2017

Regent Street, NW10
Regent Street, otherwise an obscure side street is one of the oldest roads in Kensal Green. As the common land was finally enclosed, Regent Street was run along the south side of the new enclosure during the 1830s. It ran westwards from Flowerhills Lane (now Kilburn Lane).

As other roads were built, its length become curtailed with Wellington Road built at the western end.

Two pubs were built along its short length in Victorian times - the Grey Horse about halfway along and, on the Kilburn Lane corner, the "Little Plough" (1892). The latter was known as the Little Plough in contrast to the Plough, situated not 100 yards away on the Kilburn Lane/Harrow Road junction.
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DECEMBER

2017

Notting Hill in Bygone Days: St Charles’s Ward
Chapter 10 of the book "Notting Hill in Bygone Days" by Florence Gladstone (1924) The Borough of Kensington is divided into nine Wards, five of which are on the south of Uxbridge Road, and four on the north of that road. Of the four northern wards Norland Ward and Pembridge Ward lie between Uxbridge Road and the curved line of Lancaster Road ; they are divided by Ladbroke Grove. Golborne Ward, a comparatively small area to the east of Portobello Road, includes Kensal Town, and was dealt with in another chapter of this book.

St. Charles’s Ward, the remaining tract of land, is much larger than any of the others. It is bounded on the east by Portobello Road, on the north by Harrow Road from Ladbroke Grove to the western limit of Kensal Green Cemetery, and on the west by the parish boundary as far south as Lancaster Road. When Mr. Loftie wrote of Kensington in 1888 ” a new quarter ” was ” rapidly springing up on the slope towards Kensal Green,” and ” New Found Out ” was a local name given to the district. But, although this ” quarter ...
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DECEMBER

2017

Necropolis Station
The London Necropolis Railway was opened in 1854 as a reaction to severe overcrowding in London’s existing graveyards and cemeteries. Waterloo station was originally the terminus for London’s daily funeral express to Brookwood Cemetery. Funerary trains bearing coffins (at 2/6 each - singles, naturally) left from the ’Necropolis Station’ just outside the main station. The Necropolis Station was totally destroyed during World War II.

It aimed to use the recently-developed technology of the railway to move as many burials as possible to the newly-built Brookwood Cemetery in Brookwood, Surrey. This location was within easy travelling distance of London, but distant enough that the dead could not pose any risk to public hygiene.

Although it had its own branch line into Brookwood Cemetery, most of the route of the London Necropolis Railway ran on the existing London and South Western Railway (LSWR). Consequently, a site was selected in Waterloo, near the LSWR’s recently-opened London terminus at Waterloo Bridge station (now London Waterloo). The building was specifically designed for ...
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DECEMBER

2017

Canterbury Music Hall
The Canterbury Music Hall was established in 1852 by Charles Morton on the site of a former skittle alley adjacent to the Canterbury Tavern at 143 Westminster Bridge Road. It was the first purpose-built music hall in London, and Morton came to be dubbed the Father of the Halls as hundreds of imitators were built within the next several years. The theatre was rebuilt three times, and the last theatre on the site was destroyed by bombing in 1942.

Morton and Frederick Stanley, his brother in law, purchased the Canterbury Arms, in Upper Marsh, Lambeth, in 1849. Morton was experienced in presenting ’Gentlemen Only’ entertainments in his other pubs, and he had been impressed with the entertainments at Evans Music-and-Supper Rooms in Covent Garden and decided to offer a harmonic meeting, held on Saturdays, in the back room of the public house. He brought in smart tables, with candlesticks, allowing audiences to sit and eat comfortably while watching concerts known as ’Sing-Songs’ or ’Free and Easys’ on Mondays and Saturdays. Soon, a Thursday evening programme was added to accommodate the crowds. Morton encouraged women to attend the ...
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DECEMBER

2017

Our Lady of Lourdes, Wanstead
Our Lady Of Lourdes church is the Catholic parish church of Wanstead, and is part of the Diocese of Brentwood. A mass centre was opened in Wanstead in 1910 by the parish priest of Walthamstow. In 1918 it was transferred to the hall of the newly opened St. Joseph’s convent school, Cambridge Park. Wanstead became a separate parish in 1919, and the church was opened in 1928, and completed in 1934.

The church was built in the Neo-Gothic style. The church exterior is of red brick with cream stone edgings. Inside, the plan is that of a nave and two aisles on either side. At the back, over the entrance, there is the choir balcony, on which a new organ has been constructed. The interior walls are simply whitewashed, excluding the stonework. Behind the altar is an elaborate stone gothic altarpiece. Two stained glass windows have been inserted in the left aisle.
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DECEMBER

2017

North Ockendon
North Ockendon is the only area of Greater London which is outside the M25 orbital motorway. North Ockendon parish had an ancient shape that was elongated east-west. With the adjoining parishes this formed a large estate that is at least middle-Saxon or, perhaps, even Roman or Bronze age.

The parish church of St Mary Magdelene has a probably re-used Norman nave door on the south side of the nave. Its tower was used in the first accurate measurement of the speed of sound, by the Reverend William Derham, Rector of Upminster. Gunshots were fired from the tower and the flash thereof was observed by telescope from the tower of the church of St Laurence, Upminster; then the time was recorded until the sound arrived, from which, with an accurate distance measurement, the speed could be calculated.

To the east is a small area of fenland, which extends into Bulphan and the rest is clays and Thames alluvials. The land is very low lying. The field boundaries are wholly rectilinear. To the far north, beyond the London, Tilbury and Southend Railway, it borde...
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DECEMBER

2017

Kenley Street, W11
Kenley Street, W11 was originally William Street before it disappeared. Avondale Park, directly to the north of William Street (Kenley Street) was opened in 1892 and known by the locals as the ‘Rec’. It housed a flower garden, a playground area for children and a bandstand with a public Mortuary Chapel.

In 1900, an act of the Kensington Borough Council purchased part of William Street. Houses for use as workmen’s flats and dwellings went up. District Nurses had a home erected in the same street for their use.

Five streets known as the ‘Special Area’ were Bangor Street, Crescent Street, St Clement’s Road, St Katherine’s Road and William Street. This area differed very little from the Potteries in terms of health and well being. But the ‘Special Area’ was especially overcrowded with a large number of pubs.

Lodging houses accommodated over 700 people, each paying about fourpence or sixpence a night. Houses for ‘ladies of the night’ were open from the evening till around mid morning, at a cha...
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DECEMBER

2017

Cobley’s Farm
Cobley’s Farm, also known as Fallow Farm, stood near to the "elbow" of Bow Lane. The area of Fallow Corner and of Cobley’s (Fallow) Farm (so called by the 17th century) was first recorded in 1429. By the 18th century there was a small hamlet of houses and the access roads from these to the main road formed the distinct Bow Lane. The route of the road was originally part of a lengthy track leading across from Muswell Hill through Coldfall Wood to the northern portion of Church End. Bow Lane, which was named for its shape, was constructed in 1814 after the enclosure of Finchley Common.

Opposite Cobley’s Farm it diverged, the northern portion ultimately doubling back to the Great North Road from Fallow Corner in the form of a "bow," and the western portion proceeding across the fields of the farm to Church End, reaching Ballards Lane by the side of Willow Lodge. The northern of these two branches was known as Fallow Lane.

Fallow Farm was in the possession of the Cobley family in the year 1680. An earlier lease of the farm is in exis...
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DECEMBER

2017

Wellgarth Road, NW11
Wellgarth Road connects North End Road with the Hampstead Heath Extension. Sir Raymond Unwin was a mining engineer turned architect who turned Dame Henrietta Barnett’s vision for Hampstead Garden Suburb into reality.

Wellgarth Road was designed as one of Unwin’s large-scale formal approaches to the Heath Extension.

Towards the Heath it was intended to build two pairs of grand houses designed by Parker and Unwin’s friend, Edgar Wood, the pioneer of the flat roof. Evidently there was no one courageous enough to build these Wood designs, and in their place there is a much safer mixture of individual houses.

Of the houses along Wellgarth Road, Threeways (19 Wellgarth Road) is of neo-Georgian design by C Cowles-Voysey.

Number 17, with its lively bay windows, is probably by T Phillips Figgis. Numbers 9 and 15 are excellent houses of the mid-twenties in the Parker and Unwin dark brick style designed in Soutar’s office by his chief assistant Paul Badcock. Parker and Unwin themselves designed in 191...
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DECEMBER

2017

Park Farm, Finchley give much of its land to the later Hampstead Garden Surburb. One of the last occupiers of Park Farm was the circus proprietor Lord’ George Sanger, who retired there in 1904.

Sanger was an English showman and circus proprietor who set up the enterprise with his brother John. The first show was in February 1854 at the King’s Lynn Charter Fair in Norfolk. His circus visited over 200 towns in a nine month season, giving two shows a day, every day except Sunday.

In 1905 he sold off his zoo and some circus effects - these were auctioned by circus auctioneer Tom Norman. His descendants continued the circus in operation until the 1960s.

While he owned Park Farm, he allowed the circus animals to winter on his land. An elderly resident of Denman Drive - constructed in 1908 on what was once Westminster Abbey’s land - used to recall elephants grazing’ in the field between Big Wood and Little Wood, before Denman Drive North and Denman Drive South - constructed in 1912 on what was once the Bishop’s land...
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DECEMBER

2017

North End Way, NW3
North End Way is the name for the southernmost section of North End Road - running from Hampstead to Golders Green. North End Way runs through an area once known as Littleworth.

The advertisement for Old Court House in 1839, a detached residence with extensive views, suitable for a ’family of respectability’, could have applied to any of the houses along North End Way. Old Court House was used as an estate office during the 1850s and 1860s although there is no evidence that courts were held there but the other houses continued as substantial family homes.

In 1841 the inhabitants of the former Littleworth in other houses included merchants at Fern and Heath lodges, a banker at Hill House, a clergyman at Camelford Cottage, a solicitor at Crewe Cottage, and several described as ’independent’. A major-general lived in Fern Lodge in 1851 and his widow and daughter were still there in 1890.

From 1872 until 1890 or later Heathlands was the home of Hugh M. Matheson, the Far Eastern merchant.

By 1890 Sir Richard Temple, Bt., had built Heat...
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DECEMBER

2017

Burgess Hill, NW2
Burgess Hill runs off of Finchley Road. By the mid 18th century the Hampstead part of Childs Hill was divided in two by the road later called Platt’s Lane, which ran from West End and Fortune Green to the heath, Hampstead town, and Hendon. It was entirely occupied by two estates, both of which may have originated as land of the Templars.

The arrival of the Finchley Road lessened the area’s isolation. A house called Temple Park was built on the smaller Temples estate probably in the 1830s by Henry Weech Burgess, a prosperous Lancastrian. About the same time farm buildings were erected on Platt’s estate fronting Platt’s Lane.

Some nine and a half acres of Henry Weech Burgess’s estate had become a brickfield by 1864 and Temple Park had become the Anglo-French College by 1873. A few houses had been built in what became Burgess Hill by 1878 and in 1880 Weech Road was constructed between Fortune Green Road and Finchley Road on the portion of Teil’s estate purchased by the Burgesses in 18...
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DECEMBER

2017

Child’s Hill
Childs Hill, now a select area, was formerly reknowned for bricks and laundering. Child’s Hill was a centre for brick and tile making during the second half of the 18th century, supplying material for building Hampstead (which is to the east nearby), and run by a Samuel Morris. Being more than 259 ft above sea level (at the Castle Inn), Child’s Hill is visible for miles around. From 1808 to 1847 there was an optical telegraph station, one in a line from the Admiralty to Great Yarmouth. Only the name, Telegraph Hill, remains.

An Act of Parliament in 1826 allowed for the construction of the Finchley Road (completed by 1829) with a tollgate at the Castle Inn. In the early 1850s a Colonel Evans built houses in a field called The Mead (later renamed Granville Road). By the 1870s a number of laundries, servicing much of Victorian era West London, were established in The Mead. Clothes washed in London were thought to be susceptible to water borne disease, such cholera and typhoid, and Child’s Hill, then still in the countryside was supplied by a seri...
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