A ’Jordan de Bladindon’ owned a house here in the 14th century and is the first known mention of the road and the hamlet of Blendon. This became in time Blendon Hall and the same house later came into the possession of Jacob Sawbridge MP who was a director of the South Sea Company. The company collapsed in 1720 – this was known as the ’South Sea Bubble’ – an early ponzy scheme which lead to a financial crisis. There was also a connection with John Wesley, founder of the Methodist Church.
The Blendon estate was bordered on the west by modern Penhill Road, on the north by Blendon Road, on the east by Elmwood Drive and on the south by the River Shuttle.
A new Blendon Hall replaced the old one in 1763. By the late 1800s, the estate had lodges, cottages and a bailiff’s house. There was a bathhouse on the River Shuttle, an orchid house, peachery kitchen gardens and a mushroom house.
In 1929, Blendon Hall and grounds were bought for £29 000 by DC Bowyer, a prominent local builder who had already planned to lay out the rest of the area for suburban housing. He had planned to keep the hall and lake as part of his new housing estate but, afraid it would burn down, the house was demolished in 1934 and the lake drained in the 1980s. The entire estate was replaced by housing – jump started by the building of the Rochester Way (A2) in 1928. The A2 was widened in 1968 to create a dual carriageway.
The oldest surviving buildings on the road are Jays Cottages, a row built at the beginning of the 19th century and Grade II listed. They were originally known as Blendon Villas and housed workers on the Blendon estate. They still have a lack of rear windows which was intended to stop the inhabitants gazing over the grounds of the Hall and invading the privacy of the hall’s wealthy residents.
Directly opposite the cottages stands the Three Blackbirds public house. The pub was first licensed in 1717 but destroyed by fire in 1890 and rebuilt. The estate owners sold the premises in 1921 and the brewing company Charrington bought the freehold twenty years later.
Another name for Blendon was Bladindon and this alternative name is commemorated in the name of nearby Bladindon Drive.
