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.

Baker Street

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.

Licence: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence

Click here to explore another London street
We now have 666 completed street histories and 46834 partial histories
Find streets or residential blocks within the M25 by clicking STREETS

APRIL

2018

Upper Addison Gardens, W14
Upper Addison Gardens runs between Holland Road and Holland Villas Road. Nos. 2-13 and 30-43 Upper Addison Gardens were built by James Hall over several years from 1857. These are terraced houses with three storeys above a semi-basements and a 25 foot frontage. They were built using yellow brick with stucco dressings, and are crowned with an elaborate modillioned cornice.

James Hall built about 120 houses in the estate in the 1850s. He also built extensively in the Chepstow Villas and Pembridge Place area.
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APRIL

2018

St Paul’s Churchyard, EC4M
By the beginning of the sixteenth century, St. Paul’s Churchyard was the chief centre of the book trade, not only for London, but for the whole country. Parts of the cathedral and its surrounding areas had been used as markets since the fourteenth century. By 1597, St. Paul’s was used not only as a church - it had become the bookshop of London.

Booksellers on Paternoster Row became a source of competition in the latter half of the century, eventually winning the prominent position in London bookselling, but St. Paul’s maintained its supremacy well into the seventeenth century.

The bookshops were populated largely by foreign booksellers in the sixteenth century. England did not have its own printing press until the 1490s, and in 1484 Richard III had passed an Act of exemption to foreign printers, encouraging them to bring their trade to London. The central settling point for these booksellers was St. Paul’s Churchyard.

The Rev. Dr. Croby, in his ’Life of George IV.,’ tells us that Queen Charlotte was in the habit of paying visits, in company with some lady-in-waiting, to Holywell S...
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APRIL

2018

Chelsea
Chelsea is an affluent area, bounded to the south by the River Thames. Its eastern boundary was once defined by the River Westbourne, which is now in a pipe above Sloane Square tube station. The modern eastern boundary is Chelsea Bridge Road and the lower half of Sloane Street, including Sloane Square, along with parts of Belgravia. To the north and northwest, the area fades into Knightsbridge and South Kensington, but it is safe to say that the area north of King’s Road as far northwest as Fulham Road is part of Chelsea.

The word Chelsea originates from the Old English term for chalk and landing place on the river. The first record of the Manor of Chelsea precedes the Domesday Book and records the fact that Thurstan, governor of the King’s Palace during the reign of Edward the Confessor (1042–1066), gave the land to the Abbot and Convent of Westminster. Abbot Gervace subsequently assigned the manor to his mother, and it passed into private ownership. The modern-day Chelsea hosted the Synod of Chelsea in 787 AD....
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APRIL

2018

The Rifle
The Rifle was a public house on Fulham Palace Road. It was established at 7 Compton Terrace by 1874.

The pub was managed for about forty years by the Mancini brothers- - Toni and Alfred - alongside their father. With their interest in boxing, they renamed the pub the "Golden Gloves". It became the "Suffolk Punch" in 1996 and later "The Old Suffolk Punch".
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APRIL

2018

Coleherne House
Coleherne House once stood on the corner of Brompton Lane (later Brompton Road) and Walnut Tree Lane (now Redcliffe Gardens). Coleherne House dates from the 1600s and might have originally been known as Cold Barn House. There were many owners over the years including the poet Richard Blackmore lived there in 1700s. By the time of the turn of the nineteenth century, it was in the hands of William Bolton who also may have rebuilt the house.

Certainly the following owner, Philip Gilbert built another property in the grounds of Coleherne House in 1815, called it 'Hereford House' and went off to live in it until he left in 1838.

James Gunter bought both Coleherne House and Hereford House in 1864, leasing Coleherne to Edmund Tattersall, an auctioneer, from 1865. Tattersall fell ill at Newmarket races in 1898.

After his death, both Coleherne House and Hereford House were demolished.

In their place, Coleherne Court - a large apartment block, was built. This was the final home of Lady Diana Spencer before she married Prince Charles in 1981.
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APRIL

2018

Egerton Crescent, SW3
Egerton Crescent was described in 2013 as "the most expensive street in Britain". The street runs roughly north to south in a curve, with both ends forming t-junctions on Egerton Gardens, which in turn runs roughly north to south between Egerton Terrace and Brompton Road.

The houses were designed by George Basevi and built by James Bonnin in the 1840s, when it was called Brompton Crescent, but was renamed Egerton Crescent in 1896 in honour of Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater.

In 2013, property here cost more than 74 times the price of the average home in the UK.

By December 2015, it had been demoted to be the second most expensive street in England, with an average property price of £7,550,000, according to research from Lloyds Bank, based on Land Registry data..
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APRIL

2018

Sands End
Sands End was a close knit working class community. Once a rural backwater called Sandy End, it became the industrial heart of Fulham with its gas works, power station and petrol depot providing work for generations of local families.

A property boom beginning in the 1970s coupled with the advent of oil fueled processing of North Sea oil led to an inexorable process of gentrification with offices and studio businesses and flats on the market for more than £2.4 million.

On the bank of the Thames is Hurlingham Retail Park, which includes Currys and PC World. There is also a business enterprise centre in the Sulivan district. Across the other side of Townmead Road there is a large Sainsbury’s, and Imperial Wharf, a brownfield development of the former Imperial Gasworks which is growing to include a mixture of affordable housing, both private and public, shops, a park and a new railway station.
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APRIL

2018

Nicoll Farm
Nicoll Farm is one of the earliest locations recorded in the Borehamwood area. Nicoll (Nicholl) Farm was built on land owned by Lord Aldenham. The farmhouse was built c.1500 with a crosswing added a century later. There was an early and mid eighteenth century extension, and 19th and 20th century additions.

The farm was interesting geologically as it occupied land suitable for growing crops whereas the surrounding area was mostly clay. Later in its life, it had an equestrian speciality.

By 1908, the farm was tenanted out to Joseph Still. Later the tenancy went to Douglas Dalton who was known for both his pigsty and his sausages.

Despite being green belt, a housing development was built on the site in the 2010s.
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APRIL

2018

The Fascination of Chelsea
The Fascination of Chelsea was a book published in 1902. It was written by Geraldine E. Mitton. It was part of the "Fascination of London" series edited by Walter Besant and published posthumously in 1902 following his death the previous year.

The original publishers were Adam & Charles Black (London).

The Spectator published the following contemporary review: "The Fascination of London : Chelsea. By G. E. Mitten. Edited by Sir W. Besant. (A. and C. Black. ls. 6d. net.)—This volitme, one of four on the same scale and with substantially the same author; ship, Mr. Mitten collaborating with Sir W. Besant, or having his work supervised by him, is an earnest of the great work on the Metropolis which Sir W. Besant contemplated. Each parish was to be perambulated and made the subject of a small book, Chelsea being chosen as a specimen, with . Hampstead, Westminster, and the Strand district. This is a very pleasant little book, the work of.a competent observer, who knows what to look for and how to deal with what be ...
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APRIL

2018

Abchurch Yard, EC4N
First mentioned in 1732, Abchurch Yard was built on the St Mary Abchurch churchyard. Although not one of the City’s most secluded byways, it is ideally situated at the side of a tiny lane – an antique area that has changed little in layout since the 12th century.

The bulk of Abchurch Yard, a paved square lying to the south of St Mary Abchurch, was once the graveyard to this outstanding church, and now, during the summer months, is prettily decked with tubs of colourful flowers. From the seats arranged along the church wall you can take time out to watch the scurrying lunchtime herds. Leading from the ‘square’, along the west side of Wren’s red bricked church, is the old churchyard path, now formed as a narrow lane but retaining, through its name, a link with centuries past.

The present church was built in 1681 after its predecessor was destroyed on the 3rd September 1666, a victim of the Great Fire. Although it is one of the smallest of Wren’s City churches, the almost square interior is made to appear spacious by the great do...
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APRIL

2018

St Mary Mounthaw
St Mary Mounthaw or Mounthaut was a parish church in Old Fish Street Hill. The church was originally built as a chapel for the house of the Mounthaunt family, from Norfolk, from whom the church took its name. In around 1234 the house and the patronage of the church were bought by Ralph de Maydenstone, Bishop of Hereford. He left it to his successors as bishop, who used the house as their London residence. One of them, John Skypp, personal chaplain to (and champion of) Anne Boleyn, was buried in the church.

The church was enlarged and partly rebuilt in 1609, partly at the cost of Robert Bennet, Bishop of Hereford. The next year new glass was installed, at the cost of Thomas Tyler and Richard Tichburne.

Along with the majority of the 97 parish churches in the City of London, St Mary Mounthaw was destroyed by the Great Fire in September 1666. In 1670 a Rebuilding Act was passed and a committee set up under Sir Christopher Wren to decide which would be rebuilt. St Mary Mounthaw was not one of those chosen; instead the parish was uni...
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APRIL

2018

Marlow Workshops, E2
Marlow Workshops is a Victorian block containing a mixture of residential and commercial use. They consist of a terrace of Grade II listed industrial workshops and were built in 1899

The residential part of the block is accessed via a private forecourt.
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APRIL

2018

York Way, WD6
York Way is the remnant of a service road which used to serve the MGM studios. with the demise of the MGM Borehamwood studios in the early 1970s, the studio was vacant for a while before Christian Salveson - a Scottish logistics company - moved there. Salveson demolished the backlot and built storage facilities. However they retained the distinctive MGM tower and added their logo.

When Salveson in turn moved out, the chance was taken to develop an industrial estate. This meant the demolition of the last MGM buildings.
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APRIL

2018

Haydon Street, EC3N
Haydon Street heads east from the Minories. The earliest mention of Haydon Street seems to be on Greenwood’s map, 1827. Earlier forms of the streetname were "Heydons Yard" (1677). "Heydon Yard" (Rocque, 1746). "Haydon Yard" (Horwood, 1799).

The name is derived from the family of Heydon, who were well known in the district. Captain John Heydon occupied the Minories officially as Master of the Ordnance 1627-1642, and took a great interest in the precinct.
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APRIL

2018

Haydon Street, E1
The eastern end of Haydon Street was called Mansell Passage. It was known by this name as a railway cut off the greater part of Haydon Street to the west. When the railway disappeared the two parts of Haydon Street were combined.
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APRIL

2018

America Square, EC3N
America Square is a street and small square, built in about 1760 and dedicated to the American colonies. America Square was developed as part of plans by George Dance the Younger in 1768-1774.

Nathan Meyer Rothschild lived at No. 14 in the 19th century. The square was bombed in 1941, and Rothschild’s house was demolished.

Today, America Square is occupied by offices, restaurants and a gym.
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APRIL

2018

Petticoat Lane Market
Petticoat Lane Market is a fashion and clothing market in the East End. It consists of two adjacent street markets. Wentworth Street Market is open six days a week and Middlesex Street Market is open on Sunday only.

It is one of a number of traditional markets located to the east of the City of London. A few hundred yards to the north is Old Spitalfields Market, which has been refurbished, and across Commercial Street, to the east, lies Brick Lane Market. A half mile further east is the Columbia Road Flower Market. Petticoat Lane Market was not formally recognised until an Act of Parliament in 1936, but its long history as an informal market makes it possibly one of the oldest surviving markets in Britain.

The name Petticoat Lane came from not only the sale of petticoats but from the fable that "they would steal your petticoat at one end of the market and sell it back to you at the other."

In Tudor times, Middlesex Street was known as Hogs Lane, a pleasant lane lined by hedgerows and elms. It is thought city ba...
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APRIL

2018

Holy Trinity, Minories
Holy Trinity, Minories was a Church of England parish church outside the eastern boundaries of the City of London, but within the Liberties of the Tower of London. The parish covered an area previously occupied by the precincts of the Abbey of the Minoresses of St. Clare without Aldgate, founded by Edmund Crouchback, in 1293, for a group of Spanish nuns of the Order of St. Clare who arrived with his wife. The nuns were also known as the Minoresses – which came to be adapted as the name for the district, Minories. The nunnery was surrendered to the Crown in 1539, during the Dissolution of the Monasteries, and the buildings, excluding the chapel, were used as an armory for the Tower of London, and later, as a workhouse. Some of the abbey buildings survived until their destruction by fire in 1797.

The liberty was incorporated in the Metropolitan Borough of Stepney in 1899, and today is within the City of London.

The nuns’ chapel became a parish church. Considerable changes were made to the building: all the ancient monuments were removed, a gallery, a new pulpit and pews were installed, and a steeple was built...
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