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

Peter Gambia Street, SE1 Added: 4 Dec 2023 07:05 GMT	Gambia Street, SE1 Gambia Street was previously known as William Street. Reply
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

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

AUGUST

2017

St Mildred, Bread Street
The church of St Mildred, Bread Street, stood on the east side of Bread Street in the Bread Street Ward of the City of London. It was dedicated to the 7th century Saint Mildred the Virgin, daughter of Merewald, sub-king of the West Mercians. Of medieval origin, the church was rebuilt to the designs of Sir Christopher Wren following its destruction in the Great Fire of London in 1666. One of the few City churches to retain Wren’s original fittings into the 20th century, St Mildred’s was destroyed by bombs in 1941.

The former site of the church is now the location of the 30 Cannon Street office building.

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AUGUST

2017

St Mary Aldermary
The Guild Church of St Mary Aldermary is an Anglican church located in Watling Street at the junction with Bow Lane, in the City of London. There has been a church on the site for over 900 years. Its name is usually taken to mean that it is the oldest of the City churches dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The patronage of the rectory of St Mary Aldermary belonged to the prior and chapter of Canterbury, but was transferred to the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1400.

In 1510, Sir Henry Keeble financed the building of a new church. The tower was still unfinished when he died in 1518. In 1629, two legacies enabled it to be completed, and the work, begun 120 years before, was finished within three years. Keble was buried in a vault beneath the floor of church, but his grave was not allowed to remain for long. Richard Newcourt recorded that

Sir William Laxton, who died in 1556, and Sir Tho. Lodge, who died in 1583 (both which were Grocers and had been Mayors of this City), were buried in the Vault of this Sir Henry Keeble, his bones unkindly cast out, and his Monument pull’d down, in place whereof, M...
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AUGUST
28
2017

Royal Mews
The Royal Mews is a mews (i.e. combined stables, carriage house and in recent times also the garage) of the British Royal Family. In London the Royal Mews has occupied two main sites, formerly at Charing Cross, and since the 1820s at Buckingham Palace. The site is open to the public throughout much of the year.

The first set of stables to be referred to as a mews was at Charing Cross at the western end of The Strand. The royal hawks were kept at this site from 1377 and the name derives from the fact that they were confined there at moulting (or "mew") time.

The present Royal Mews is in the grounds of Buckingham Palace, to the south of Buckingham Palace Gardens, near Grosvenor Place.

In the 1760s George III moved some of his day-to-day horses and carriages to the grounds of Buckingham House, which he had acquired in 1762 for his wife’s use, but the main royal stables housing the ceremonial coaches and their horses remained at the King’s Mews in Charing Cross.

When his son George IV had Buckingham Palace converted into the main royal residence in the...
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AUGUST
27
2017

Chester Square, SW1W
Chester Square was voted London’s second best house address early in the 2000s. Nearby Eaton Square was voted first. The square encloses a private garden and the surrounding houses are stucco six storey houses including pillared porches around a private garden. Part of the design of housing was provision of coal cellars. Coal was delivered to these cellars through round holes set into the pavement - many of these can still be seen.

Chester Square was conceived by Thomas Cundy when he planned the entire Estate. It was finally built in the 1840s along with St Michael’s Church – designed in the ‘Decorated Gothic’ style by Thomas Cundy the younger.

Notable residents are a veritable who’s who: Roman Abramovich, Julie Andrews, Matthew Arnold, Tony Curtis, Blake Edwards, Mick Jagger, Nigella Lawson, Yehudi Menuhin, Mary Shelley, Margaret Thatcher and Wilhelmina, Queen of the Netherlands (throughout the Second World War)

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AUGUST
26
2017

Tothill Fields Bridewell
Tothill Fields Bridewell (also known as Tothill Fields Prison and Westminster Bridewell) was a prison located in Westminster between 1618 and 1884. It was named ’Bridewell’ after the Bridewell Palace, which during the 16th century had become one of the City of London’s most important prisons. Tothill Fields later became the Westminster House of Correction.

Like its City counterpart, the Westminster Bridewell was intended as a "house of correction" for the compulsory employment of able-bodied but indolent paupers. It was enlarged in 1655, and during the reign of Queen Anne, its regime was extended to cover the incarceration of criminals.

In 1834 the original Bridewell was replaced by a larger prison, on a different site, 8 acres in area, south of Victoria Street and close to Vauxhall Bridge Road. The new prison, designed by Robert Abraham and costing £186,000, was circular in plan (following Jeremy Bentham’s ’panopticon’) so that warders could supervise prisoners from a central point, and had a capacity of 900 prisoners. After it was completed, the old prison was demolished.

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AUGUST
25
2017

Ebury Street, SW1W
Ebury Street runs from the Grosvenor Gardens junction south-westwards to Pimlico Road. It was built mostly in the period 1815 to 1860.

The houses near number 180 were called ’Fivefields Row’ when Mozart lived there in 1764. Fivefields Row is now called ’Mozart Terrace’, but numbered in such a way that it is continuous with Ebury Street.

An area around here called ’Eia’ is mentioned in the Domesday Book.

Where Ebury Street meets Pimlico Road is a triangular area with seating and a bronze statue of Mozart (aged 8) by Philip Jackson. The area is unofficially called "Mozart Square". Several houses on Ebury Street have been converted to hotels.

There is a blue plaque at 22b to indicate that Ian Fleming lived there from 1934 to 1945. In 1847 Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson lived at number 42. The actor Terence Stamp shared a flat on this street with Michael Caine in 1963. Vita Sackville-West lived with her husband Harold Nicolson at 182 Ebury Street and their son Nigel Nicolson was born here....
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AUGUST
24
2017

Belgrave Road, SW1V
Belgrave Road is a street in the Pimlico area of London. It is situated in the city of Westminster and runs between Eccleston Bridge to the northwest and Lupus Street to the southeast.

The street and the adjacent area were developed by Thomas Cubitt in the 1840s, who considered it as dwellings for the middle class, as opposed to those he had developed in Belgravia for the more affluent. The widths of the properties were comparatively narrow. As a result, the area went into decline but has more recently improved in both appearance and use.

There are three green spaces along its length, which is only 750 metres long. These are Eccleston Square, Warwick Square, and St George’s Square.

Belgrave Road is the home of HM Passport Office and two private schools. For the most part, both sides of the road are terraced stucco-fronted houses, giving the street an appearance of elegance from a previous age. Many of these houses have been converted into hotels, some of which have combined three adjacent house...
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AUGUST
23
2017

Victoria Palace Theatre
Victoria Palace Theatre stands opposite Victoria Station. The theatre began life as a small concert room above the stables of the Royal Standard Hotel, a small hotel and tavern built in 1832 at what was then 522 Stockbridge Terrace, on the site of the present theatre. The proprietor, John Moy, enlarged the building, and by 1850 it became known as Moy’s Music Hall. Alfred Brown took it over in 1863, refurbished it, and renamed it the Royal Standard Music Hall.

The hotel was demolished in 1886, by which time the main line terminus, Victoria Station and its new Grosvenor Hotel, had transformed the area into a major transport hub. The railways were at this time building grand hotel structures at their termini, and Victoria was one of the first. Added to this was the integration of the electric underground system and the building of Victoria Street. The owner of the music hall, Thomas Dickey, had it rebuilt along more ambitious lines in 1886 by Richard Wake, retaining the name Royal Standard Music Hall.

The Royal S...
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AUGUST
22
2017

Little Ben
Little Ben is a cast iron miniature clock tower, situated at the intersection of Vauxhall Bridge Road and Victoria Street, close to the approach to Victoria station. Little Ben was manufactured, according to Pevsner, by Gillett & Johnston of Croydon, and was erected in 1892; removed from the site in 1964, and restored and re-erected in 1981 by Westminster City Council with sponsorship from Elf Aquitaine Ltd "offered as a gesture of Franco-British friendship".

There is a rhyming couplet Apology for Summer Time signed J.W.R. affixed to the body of the clock:

My hands you may retard or may advance
my heart beats true for England as for France.

The couplet is a reference to the fact that the clock is permanently on Daylight Saving Time leading to the time being correct for France during the winter months and correct for the UK during the summer.

A replica of Little Ben called Lorloz (painted silver) was erected in 1903 in the centre of Victoria, capital of Seychelles to mark the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria in 1897.

Little Ben was removed in 2012 and put in ...
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AUGUST
21
2017

St George’s Interdenominational Chapel
St George’s Interdenominational Chapel is a place of worship situated in Heathrow Airport. The Chapel of St George was dedicated on 11 October 1968 as an Ecumenical Christian Chapel in the heart of London Heathrow Airport. The site, in the geographical centre of the airport at the time, was provided by the then British Airports Authority (BAA), and funded largely by the three main Christian traditions - the Church of England (Anglican), Roman Catholic, and Free Churches.

The challenge for the architect, Jack Forrest, of Frederick Gibberd and Partners, was to produce an Ecumenical Chapel which would accommodate the Christian traditions, while also creating, in the middle of an airport, a haven of peace and quiet. The design which is seen now is that of a ’vaulted crypt’, recreating the atmosphere and style of a crypt in the early Christian church. Its underground setting guarantees a unique atmosphere of peace and prayer.

On 1 May 1979 it was licensed for solemnising marriages according to the terms of the Marriage Act 1949.
<...
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AUGUST
20
2017

Garrick Yard, WC2E
Garrick Yard, together with the more familiar Garrick Street to the northeast of here, both took their names from the Garrick Club which commemorates the famous 18th century actor, David Garrick. As a young man of 18 years of age, David Garrick left his native town of Lichfield on the 2 March 1737 and set out for London sharing a horse with his tutor, Samuel Johnson. Whilst Johnson had high hopes of winning fame in the world of literature, Garrick came to complete his education in law, a profession he was very soon diverted from in preference for the stage.

The two arrived in the capital with only four pence between them and were forced into pleading with a bookseller friend of the Garrick family to lend them five pounds. After spending a short period at a college in Rochester, David Garrick’s sentiment for the theatre compelled him to terminate his studies, and with his elder brother, Peter, went into the business of selling wine as a stop-gap while awaiting the opportunity to present himself as an actor.

It was in March 1741 when Garrick got his big break and until his death on 20 January 1779 he enjoyed the fame and popularity attributed...
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AUGUST
18
2017

Phillimore Place, W8
Phillimore Place was part of the old Phillimore Estate and, at first, named Durham Villas. In 1779, William Phillimore inherited the Phillimore Estate and was responsible for the first wave of its Kensington development.

One of the ancient roads out of London ran along the southern boundary of the estate. This road was later to be called Kensington High Street. A terrace of houses was built along this frontage and called Upper Phillimore Place. Apparently George III hated Upper Phillimore Place so much that he had the blinds pulled down on his carriage windows if he had to pass it; and he referred to it as “Dishcloth Row” because of the mouldings in the shape of drapery which decorated the houses facades.

A similar terrace was built further to the east and called Lower Phillimore Place. These houses were all later replaced in the 20th century by three huge mansion blocks called Phillimore Court, Stafford Court and Troy Court. The land itself was later sold off to pay estate duties, so the Kensington High Street frontage no longer forms pa...
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AUGUST
17
2017

Adam And Eve Mews, W8
Adam And Eve Mews is a street in Kensington. Adam and Eve Mews is a cobbled mews entered under a covered entrance on the south side of Kensington High Street.
Some houses have been painted in bright colours, whereas others are faced in plain brick.

The mews forks south and west at the end; at the western section again forks north leading to a very private cul-de-sac which also contains some recently built mews-style houses.

Many of the houses have attractive roof gardens with lots of shrubs by the front doors.

Adam and Eve Mews is named after ‘The Adam and Eve’, an ancient inn with two acres of gardens which used to stand on the site. The site was quite long and narrow and did not really lend itself to building typical large London houses.

William Willett, a speculative builder in the area, bought the land and got permission in 1880 to build a series of stables to serve the surrounding larger houses. The 2-storey stable blocks were put up in 1880 – 1881 w...
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AUGUST
16
2017

Abbey Orchard Street, SW1P
Abbey Orchard Street was the heart of a former slum area. Abbey Orchard Street was built over a former orchard belonging to the monks of Westminster Abbey.

The street was built up in the rapid expansion of London following the Great Fire of 1666, but there may have been a path here long before, trodden out by the Abbey’s local peasant tenants on their way to labour in the orchard.

In time, the street’s fortunes declined.

The Devil’s Acre was a notorious slum on and behind Old Pye Street, Great St Anne’s Lane (now St Ann’s Street) and Duck Lane (now St Matthew Street) in the parish of Westminster.

In the 19th century it was considered one of the worst areas of London - The Devil’s Acre. As with a number of streets at the time, the building of Victoria Street was aimed at removing the slums in the area, and particularly the Devil’s Acre. The street was formally opened in 1851 and, as with other such projects, it displaced rather than removed the slum.

The...
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AUGUST
15
2017

St Agnes Place, SE11
St Agnes Place was once the most famous squatted street in London. St Agnes Place was originally laid out in 1805 with No. 1 built in 1805, and Nos. 3, 5 and 7 in 1808.

It became famous as a squatted street which resisted eviction orders for more than 30 years. When a number of derelict houses were scheduled for demolition to extend Kennington Park in 1969, squatters occupied the properties and a High Court injunction prevented the demolition.

The residents of St Agnes paid utility bills and for several years were run by a housing cooperative with diverse occupancy, and in the last few years a larger number of young homeless people.

Bob Marley stayed at the street on several occasions in the 1970s. St Agnes Place had a Rastafari community and had a Rastafari temple along with other related social centres.

The street was run by a housing cooperative until 2005, when Lambeth London Borough Council obtained an eviction order. Demolition was completed in 2007.

In 2010 Lambeth Co...
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AUGUST
13
2017

White Kennett Street, EC3A
White Kennett Street was named after a Bishop of Peterborough. White Kennett was Bishop of Peterborough in 1707, and previously rector of the nearly St Botolph’s Aldgate.
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AUGUST
13
2017

St Augustine’s Church of England High School
St Augustine’s Church of England High School is a Voluntary Aided Church of England comprehensive school in the West London borough of Westminster, Kilburn. The school is a Science College and has a sixth form. St Augustine of Canterbury is the patron saint of the school. It is located adjacent to its affiliated primary school and parish church St Augustine’s Church.

The school traces its origins to Mother Emily Ayckbowm, who also founded the Community of the Sisters of the Church, working in conjunction with the first vicar of the nearby St. Augustine’s church. The school was opened on 16 May 1870 in Andover Place with seven students, with specifically the High School opening in 1884 as an all boys’ secondary school; the present division into primary and secondary schools being complete by 1951.

In 1969, the present school buildings were opened, with St. Augustine’s High School becoming a Church of England comprehensive school.

In February 2009, the school received a nearly £20 million investment under the BSF programme for schools, which entailed a major refurbishment providing a ne...
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AUGUST
12
2017

Kennington Park
Kennington Park is a public park in Kennington, south London. It was opened in 1854 on the site of what had been Kennington Common, where the Chartists gathered for their biggest "monster rally" on 10 April 1848. Soon after this demonstration the common was enclosed and, sponsored by the royal family, made into a public park.

Kennington Common was a site of public executions until 1800 as well as being an area for public speaking. Some of the most illustrious orators to speak here were Methodist founders George Whitefield and John Wesley who is reputed to have attracted a crowd of 30,000.

The common was one of the earliest London cricket venues and is known to have been used for top-class matches in 1724. Kennington Park hosts the first inner London community cricket ground, sponsored by Surrey County Cricket Club whose home, The Oval, is close to the park.

In the 1970s, the old tradition of mass gatherings returned to the park which was host to the start of many significant marches to Parliament. Tod...
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AUGUST
11
2017

Archbishop Tenison’s School
Archbishop Tenison’s School moved to The Oval in 1928 Thomas Tenison, an educational evangelist and later Archbishop of Canterbury, founded several schools in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. A boys’ school now at the Oval was founded in 1685 in the crypt of St Martin’s in the Fields and relocated by 1895 in Leicester Square on the site previously occupied by the Sabloniere Hotel.

The school moved to The Oval in 1928, with the new building being opened by the then Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII). A girls’ school was formally established in 1706 for 12 girls and in 1863 a new school building was erected at 18 Lambeth High Street. The girls school closed in 1961, when it amalgamated with Archbishop Temple’s Boys School to form a mixed VA school. The building was used by Temple’s as a first-year annex from 1968 to 1974, when Archbishop Temple’s School closed. Archbishop Tenison founded another school in nearby Croydon in 1714.

Archbishop Tenison’s at The Oval became a grammar scho...
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AUGUST
10
2017

Ossulston Estate
The Ossulston Estate is a multi-storey council estate built by the London County Council in Somers Town between 1927 and 1931. The estate was built to rehouse those poor who were not being served by the LCC’s new suburban estates, and was significantly denser to suit the urban site. It was located on the site of the Somers Town slum, between Euston and St Pancras stations. The original proposal made in 1925 was for 9-storey blocks on the American model, which would have required lifts, and with more expensive flats for private tenants on the highest floors. This was rejected and the height reduced to a maximum of 7 storeys, with fewer lifts and no private flats. The provision of central heating was also eliminated, but the buildings were unusual in providing electricity from the start, and Levita House had the first central heating system installed by the LCC.

The design, by G. Topham Forrest, chief architect of the LCC, and his assistants R. Minton Taylor and E.H. Parkes, was influenced by Viennese modernist public housing such as Karl Marx-Hof, which Forrest had visited. The estate consists...
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AUGUST
9
2017

Wood Lane (1914)
Wood Lane - apparently London’s "go-to" station. There was a bewildering confusion of station names in the area, because the London & South Western Railway, which ran trains along the tracks of the West London Railway through Addison Road, in 1869 constructed a branch line which curved westwards from Addison Road down to Richmond with stations eventually opened at Shepherd’s Bush (in Shepherd’s Bush Road south of the Green), Hammersmith in Grove Road, and Shaftesbury Road (later renamed Ravenscourt Park). In 1868 the Metropolitan line Hammersmith station was moved further south, nearer to the Broadway, and to compound the duplication of names, the District line in 1874 extended its track from Earls Court and formed another Hammersmith station on the south of the Broadway.

This was not, however, the last Hammersmith station, because the Piccadilly line opened theirs in 1906 and at the same time the District line, which had previously run their trains through to Richmond on the branch line of the UzSWR took ...
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AUGUST
8
2017

Bury Street, SW1A
Bury Street runs north-to-south from Jermyn Street to King Street, crossing Ryder Street. The street first appears by the name Berry Street in rate books of 1673.

Most likely it takes its name from Bury St Edmonds as Rushbrooke - the country seat of the Jermyn family - was situated nearby. From 1643 until 1660, the landowner was known as Baron Jermyn of St. Edmundsbury.

The freehold of the street belongs to The Crown Estate.

Previous residents included writer Jonathan Swift, poets Thomas Moore and George Crabbe.
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AUGUST
8
2017

Friern Barnet Lane, N11
Friern Barnet Lane was an important road by 1814. Friern Barnet’s road system was established by the late 15th century. The main north-south route of that date became known as Whetstone High Road in the north, as Friern Barnet Lane between Whetstone and Colney Hatch, and as Colney Hatch Lane from there to Muswell Hill. It had been the principal highway from London to Barnet and the north of England but by the early 14th century the main road ran through Hornsey Park to Finchley and thence to rejoin Friern Barnet Lane at Whetstone, along the route of the modern Great North Road.

Friern Barnet Lane, also known as Friern Lane, was Wolkstreet c. 1518. Colney Hatch Lane, so called from 1846, was Halliwick Street (Halwykstrete) in 1398 and Muswell Hill Lane or Aspen Lane in 1801. No route led westward, except via Whetstone. To the east a road led from Colney Hatch to Betstile, where it met roads to Enfield, Tottenham and Wood Green, East Barnet, and the modern Oakleigh Road. It was known in turn as Betstile Lane between 15...
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AUGUST
8
2017

Park Village East, NW1
Park Village East was part of a proposed canal-side village. Nash’s Regent’s Park development incorporated an entire range of house sizes and styles. Within the Park were large villas set in their own grounds for the very rich, and imposing stucco terraced palaces for the wealthy. Outside the Park were middle class villas in Park Village and the markets and barracks, each with their working class housing, near the Cumberland Basin. It was built as a complete new town on the edge of London.

John Nash saw the romantic possibilities of the new Regent’s Canal which was being built around the northern edge of his new Regent’s Park. On the way to the new hay market which he was planning in Cumberland Basin, would be a secluded, peaceful valley bordering the canal. He envisaged a pretty ‘village’ on its banks, as an annexe to his noble Corinthian terraces in Regent’s Park itself. In stucco, with tall windows leading out to wooded gardens overlooking the canal. On the edge of London, they would be the equivalent of Blaize ...
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AUGUST
6
2017

Yorkshire Road, CR4
Yorkshire Road is part of Pollards Hill. Pollards Hill is a residential district crossing the border of the south London boroughs of Croydon and Merton between Mitcham and Norbury. It is the name of a council ward in Merton. The district is bisected by the Croydon/Merton boundary along Recreation Way. With no road connections between the Croydon and Merton portions of the district, they retain very different characteristics.

Mitcham Borough Council’s solution to the post-war housing shortage was to build prefabricated ‘Arcon’ bungalows at Pollards Hill. The first bungalows were ready as early as January 1946, and were meant to last about 10 years; in fact, many were still in use in the mid-1960s.

The four maisonette blocks were built by the Council in the 1950s on Yorkshire Road, beginning with Westmorland Square in 1950 and the final block, Bovingdon Square, in 1956; the other two were Hertford Square and Berkshire Square. The pre-fabs were mostly demolished in the 1960s, to make way for ...
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AUGUST
5
2017

New Local Government Network
Nokes Estate was an agricultural estate in the Earl’s Court area, formerly known as Wattsfield. Since at least the sixteenth century this area, reckoned as seventeen but in fact nearer eighteen and a quarter acres, had been known as Wattsfield.

Essentially, it included part of Earls Court Lane (now Earls Court Road) and Barrow’s Walk (now Marloes Road) and contained an orchard and several fields on which Abingdon Villas, Scarsdale Villas and neighbouring roads were later built .

In 1593 it was owned by Robert Fenn and remained in that family until Sir Robert Fenn sold it, with its advantage of a westward abutment on Earl’s Court Lane, to William Arnold in 1652. The Arnolds kept it until 1673, when it was bought by John Greene, and it remained with representatives of the Greene family until at least 1755.

Rocque’s mid-century map shows Barrows Walk bounding its eastern side, on the present line of Marloes Road.

By 1810 the owner was Samuel Hutchins, who in that year bought the enfranchisement from Lor...
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AUGUST
3
2017

Ossington Street, W8
Ossington Street leads from Moscow Road at its north end to the Bayswater Road at its south end. In the 1830s, a section of Gravel Pit Field was transformed into Ossington Street, extending from the former Uxbridge Road to Moscow Road. Initially named Victoria Grove, it was later renamed Ossington Street in 1837 when it became part of Kensington. It is speculated that the street derived its name from Viscount Ossington.

On the western side, the buildings consisted of two-story terraced cottages with basements, accompanied by a mews located behind them. Victoria Grove Mews retains its original name to this day.

To the south, a number of terraced houses were leased to William Ward, a builder from Marylebone. Ward also erected an inn and five shops, known as nos. 1 to 6 Wellington Terrace, between Victoria Grove and the former Paddington boundary, around 1840.

By 1865, the majority of Bayswater had been developed, leaving only a few spaces for further construction, particularly south of Moscow Road and along the eastern side of Victoria G...
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AUGUST
2
2017

Blackbird Hill Farm
Blackbird Hill Farm was situated on the corner of Birdbird Hill and Old Church Lane. It is unknown when Blackbird Hill Farm was first established. There were at least five “villagers” cultivating small areas of land in this part of Kingsbury at the time of the Domesday Book in 1085, but old records suggest that many local inhabitants died during the Black Death plagues of the mid-14th century. About 100 years later, in 1442, there is a mention of what may have been a farm on this site, and when a detailed map of the parish was drawn in 1597 it clearly showed a property called Findens here, a group of buildings around a yard with a strip of land, just over an acre, attached.

The large field behind it is shown as being leased to John Page, gentleman, by St Paul’s Cathedral (‘The Deane of Powles’), while the land on the opposite side of the main track was held by Eyan Chalkhill, who also had a watermill on the River Brent. In 1640, Findens was a 12-acre smallholding.

By the time of John Rocque’s map of 1745, there w...
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AUGUST
1
2017

Chandler’s Cross
Chandler’s Cross is a hamlet south of Sarrat, Hertfordshire. Its pub, the Clarendon Arms, became a restaurant in the 2000s.

A nearby hotel is The Grove, set in 300 acres. This has hosted major events such as the G20 London summit and the 2013 Bilderberg Conference. As a house, it was remodelled by various architects including Surveyor of the King’s Works, Robert Taylor on the site of a medieval manor house as a home for the Earls of Clarendon, second creation, the Villiers family who downsized their estates to one they have long held at Swanmore, Hampshire following the 1914 increase of estate duty.
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