Thames Tributary Ravensbourne - The Kid Brooks - Blackheath Park
Thames Tributary Ravensbourne
The Mid Kid Brook flows south-westwards towards the Quaggy
The Lower Kid Brook travels under the Ferrier Estate towards the Quaggy
The Quaggy flows due west towards the Ravensbourne and is joined by the Mid and Lower Kid Brooks. It then turns south at Meadow Court Road.
A suburban area which is more complex than it looks. In Blackheath Park itself are many posh houses as well as a number of 1960s Span developments and some local authority properties - all part of the larger and private Cator Estate. South of that is a complex of sports fields and meadows in various ownerships and many of them with Kidbrook streams running through them. Around Kidbrook Park Road and Kidbrook Station was the brutalist Ferrier Estate now demolished and - as this is written - still being replaced with mainly private housing. It was built on the site of various factories and stores owned by the RAF and used by them in wartime, plus a balloon depot. Before that this was all farmland.
Post to the west Lee
The Mid Kid Brook flows south-westwards towards the Quaggy
The Lower Kid Brook travels under the Ferrier Estate towards the Quaggy
The Quaggy flows due west towards the Ravensbourne and is joined by the Mid and Lower Kid Brooks. It then turns south at Meadow Court Road.
A suburban area which is more complex than it looks. In Blackheath Park itself are many posh houses as well as a number of 1960s Span developments and some local authority properties - all part of the larger and private Cator Estate. South of that is a complex of sports fields and meadows in various ownerships and many of them with Kidbrook streams running through them. Around Kidbrook Park Road and Kidbrook Station was the brutalist Ferrier Estate now demolished and - as this is written - still being replaced with mainly private housing. It was built on the site of various factories and stores owned by the RAF and used by them in wartime, plus a balloon depot. Before that this was all farmland.
Post to the west Lee
Post to the east Kidbrooke
Post to the south Lee Courtlands
Blackheath Park
50 The Kidbrook boundary runs from here east to the Morden Road junction. Boundary stone in the verge.
Blackheath Park. The estate is full of houses built by city merchants. It once belonged to Wricklemarsh Manor, in the later c17 by Sir John Morden, then in the early c18 by Sir Gregory Page. It estate was sold to John Cator in 1783 who began to develop the grounds. The layout is from 1806 with wide, straight, tree-lined avenues. In the gaps are clusters of mid c20 flats and houses, many for Span
The Railway runs under the estate in a 437-yard tunnel only built so that residents didn’t have to see it, and to prevent the buying up of expensive property.
1a Wrenaissance lodge to the estate, late c 19.
10 by Patrick Gwynne for Leslie Bilsby 1968. Slate-hung panels and tinted glass walls. A spiral approach up to the central front door flanked by projecting canted bays.
103, pedimented wings with tripartite windows
2 Windermere by Aston Webb from 1896, half-timber and roughcast over brick; 20 by Peter Moro for himself. Built 1958, a rectangle with overhanging upper floor, timber clad on the garden side; split-level interior.
4 The Gables, brick and roughcast by Aston Webb
50 the Kidbrook boundary follows the Mid Kid Brook to here from Brookway. There is a boundary stone in the rear wall of the building.
7-21, a brick late Georgian terrace of irregular height,
99 Italianate villa of c.1830-40 with a big garden.
101, with pilasters.
Coach House
Hallgate. flats built 1958 with a passage through to the gardens behind. On the passage wall is a sculpture by Keith Godwin called The Architect and Society, - a small oppressed figure within a square niche, to celebrate an Eric Lyons's planning victories.
Brooklands Park
Brooklands. Built by George Smith as his own house in 1826. A stuccoed villa with tower and projecting eaves.
Brooklands Park Estate
London County Council housing from 1956 on the gardens of Casterbridge. Five-storey blocks and terraces grouped among mature trees around an old pond and conduit house.
Mays Pond. Casterbridge Pond filled by the Mid Kidbrook flowing from nearby playing fields.
Brookway
A road built in 1935 which follows the line of the Mid Kidbrook from Lee Road. The Kidbrook boundary follows this and then turns north.
Casterbridge
Brooklands Primary School built February 1958
Corner Green
Built in 1959, with an open layout and with weather-boarded houses round a green.
The Keep
Built 1979 with ten houses linking the two groups.
Ferrier Estate
Built on the Site of Lower Farm or Stud Farm or Green Farm latterly the site of the Royal Flying Corps grounds. It is roughly to the west of the station. The Kidbrook parish boundary runs on the south side of the eastern block on the estate. It was a concrete estate built by the Greater London Council in 1974 using industrialised building methods. It straddled Kidbrooke Park Road. Demolished.
The Lower Kid brook runs down the side of the southernmost block of the Ferrier Estate to join the Quaggy at the southern edge of the Delta Sports Ground. Hdden among trees.
Boundary marker where the two rivers meet
The Kidbrook boundary runs across the estate and then goes into the Delta sports ground along the line of the Lower Kid Brook stream. It then goes south to join the Quaggy in the Roan School fields.
Foxes Dale
Laid out to an estate plan of 1806 with houses from 1819.
Holm Walk
Brick terraces from 1978
Kidbrooke
Area between the Cator Estate and Kidbrook Park Road. It was owned by the Earl of St. Germans who was at odds with the Cator Estate, which would not allow him to build a road to Blackheath. But he did get the railway and the station at Kidbrooke.
Kidbrooke Park Road
The stretch between Weigel Road, and Eltham Road dates from 1924
Post to the south Lee Courtlands
Blackheath Park
50 The Kidbrook boundary runs from here east to the Morden Road junction. Boundary stone in the verge.
Blackheath Park. The estate is full of houses built by city merchants. It once belonged to Wricklemarsh Manor, in the later c17 by Sir John Morden, then in the early c18 by Sir Gregory Page. It estate was sold to John Cator in 1783 who began to develop the grounds. The layout is from 1806 with wide, straight, tree-lined avenues. In the gaps are clusters of mid c20 flats and houses, many for Span
The Railway runs under the estate in a 437-yard tunnel only built so that residents didn’t have to see it, and to prevent the buying up of expensive property.
1a Wrenaissance lodge to the estate, late c 19.
10 by Patrick Gwynne for Leslie Bilsby 1968. Slate-hung panels and tinted glass walls. A spiral approach up to the central front door flanked by projecting canted bays.
103, pedimented wings with tripartite windows
2 Windermere by Aston Webb from 1896, half-timber and roughcast over brick; 20 by Peter Moro for himself. Built 1958, a rectangle with overhanging upper floor, timber clad on the garden side; split-level interior.
4 The Gables, brick and roughcast by Aston Webb
50 the Kidbrook boundary follows the Mid Kid Brook to here from Brookway. There is a boundary stone in the rear wall of the building.
7-21, a brick late Georgian terrace of irregular height,
99 Italianate villa of c.1830-40 with a big garden.
101, with pilasters.
Coach House
Hallgate. flats built 1958 with a passage through to the gardens behind. On the passage wall is a sculpture by Keith Godwin called The Architect and Society, - a small oppressed figure within a square niche, to celebrate an Eric Lyons's planning victories.
Brooklands Park
Brooklands. Built by George Smith as his own house in 1826. A stuccoed villa with tower and projecting eaves.
Brooklands Park Estate
London County Council housing from 1956 on the gardens of Casterbridge. Five-storey blocks and terraces grouped among mature trees around an old pond and conduit house.
Mays Pond. Casterbridge Pond filled by the Mid Kidbrook flowing from nearby playing fields.
Brookway
A road built in 1935 which follows the line of the Mid Kidbrook from Lee Road. The Kidbrook boundary follows this and then turns north.
Casterbridge
Brooklands Primary School built February 1958
Corner Green
Built in 1959, with an open layout and with weather-boarded houses round a green.
The Keep
Built 1979 with ten houses linking the two groups.
Ferrier Estate
Built on the Site of Lower Farm or Stud Farm or Green Farm latterly the site of the Royal Flying Corps grounds. It is roughly to the west of the station. The Kidbrook parish boundary runs on the south side of the eastern block on the estate. It was a concrete estate built by the Greater London Council in 1974 using industrialised building methods. It straddled Kidbrooke Park Road. Demolished.
The Lower Kid brook runs down the side of the southernmost block of the Ferrier Estate to join the Quaggy at the southern edge of the Delta Sports Ground. Hdden among trees.
Boundary marker where the two rivers meet
The Kidbrook boundary runs across the estate and then goes into the Delta sports ground along the line of the Lower Kid Brook stream. It then goes south to join the Quaggy in the Roan School fields.
Foxes Dale
Laid out to an estate plan of 1806 with houses from 1819.
Holm Walk
Brick terraces from 1978
Kidbrooke
Area between the Cator Estate and Kidbrook Park Road. It was owned by the Earl of St. Germans who was at odds with the Cator Estate, which would not allow him to build a road to Blackheath. But he did get the railway and the station at Kidbrooke.
Kidbrooke Park Road
The stretch between Weigel Road, and Eltham Road dates from 1924
Quaggy bridge. On the east side of the road in a concrete channel and on its south side is the Roan sports fields. To the north is the Lower Kidbrooke
Tributary stream at the railway which has come from Thomas Tallis School joining the Mid Kid Brook
A Tributary of the Lower Kidbrook ran west to join it in the Delta Sports field.
A Tributary of the Lower Kidbrook ran west to join it in the Delta Sports field.
F. Burnred and Co. 1912 founded by H.R.Tracey for simple astronomical telescopes. First World War and 1923 lathe chucks and just that since. Went to Battersea and came back after being bombed.
Government Buildings. Scientific and Projections Ltd. founded in 1919 in Clerkenwell Cinema Products H.H. Fairweather chemist invented continuous recording gas calorimeter. Used extensively. Soon making floodlights and beacons etc. Secret apparatus. Bombed
POW camp. Another military presence 1917-18 was a camp for German prisoners of war. The exact site is not clear.
RAF depot. R.F.C. and R.A.F. station. In June 1917 No.l Stores Depot was set up when the Royal Flying Corps moved stores from the Thames Iron Works and the Charlton Rope Works onto the fields south of the railway station. It had railway sidings and internal rail system. By 1918 800 W.R.A.F. were based here and although numbers fell after the War, it continued to be used. The site housed medical stores, explosives and ammunition, and provided training for Equipment Officers and Russian linguists. There was also a special signals development group. Closed mid 1960s
No.l Balloon Centre was here in October 1937 on the land previously used by Lower Kidbrooke Farm. The depot was on both sides of the railway station and Kidbrooke Park Road.
David Lloyd Fitness Centre on the old Delta Sports Field. Drop in the ground there when it rains
John Roan School Playing Field
Government Buildings. Scientific and Projections Ltd. founded in 1919 in Clerkenwell Cinema Products H.H. Fairweather chemist invented continuous recording gas calorimeter. Used extensively. Soon making floodlights and beacons etc. Secret apparatus. Bombed
POW camp. Another military presence 1917-18 was a camp for German prisoners of war. The exact site is not clear.
RAF depot. R.F.C. and R.A.F. station. In June 1917 No.l Stores Depot was set up when the Royal Flying Corps moved stores from the Thames Iron Works and the Charlton Rope Works onto the fields south of the railway station. It had railway sidings and internal rail system. By 1918 800 W.R.A.F. were based here and although numbers fell after the War, it continued to be used. The site housed medical stores, explosives and ammunition, and provided training for Equipment Officers and Russian linguists. There was also a special signals development group. Closed mid 1960s
No.l Balloon Centre was here in October 1937 on the land previously used by Lower Kidbrooke Farm. The depot was on both sides of the railway station and Kidbrooke Park Road.
David Lloyd Fitness Centre on the old Delta Sports Field. Drop in the ground there when it rains
John Roan School Playing Field
Lyme Farm Road
Blackheath Wanderers Sports Ground
Manor Way
Only a few big houses until 1934.
2 a small Italianate Lodge
Blackheath Wanderers Sports Ground
Manor Way
Only a few big houses until 1934.
2 a small Italianate Lodge
Quaggy runs between sports clubs between tree lined earth banks.
Sports Ground. Villacourt Rovers Club
Borough of Greenwich Sports Club
Willow Country Club
Moorehead Way
Wingfield Primary School. Opened November 1970
Sports Ground
Park End
50 Boundary stone at the back
Oak tree on the Bank of the Quaggy as a boundary marker
Park Lodge, Meadowbank, 1967, with split-level roofs and, private spaces front as well as behind. The porches have extra rooms attached
Rail line
The line between Blackheath to Falconwood is a green corridor with cuttings and embankments with sycamore and oak woodland. Hawthorn and bramble providing habitat for birds and animals.
Spangate
Group of Span flats.
Station Approach
Kidbrooke Station. between Eltham and Blackheath on South Eastern Trains. Originally opened in 1895, the present buildings are from 1973 and very basic. Originally built in the standard South Eastern Railway pattern there is a Rudimentary shelter on the down side and otherwise a building with sash windows. In 1971 as the Ferrier Estate was planned it was rebuilt with CLASP buildings and a shelter on the down platform. In 1994 it was rebuilt again in brick. The Bexley Heath Railway Company planned this in the 1880s but a landslide on the embankment at Blackheath delayed the opening until May 1895. The company was absorbed into the South Eastern and Chatham Railway Company in 1900 and in 1923 became part of the Southern Railway. The station is said to have been seen by the earl of St Germans as a way of speeding up development of his land in the parish and to get even with Cator when he would not let him develop. Electrification took place in 1926, although steam trains ran until 1961. No. Footbridge was built until the early 1950s, and the original wooden buildings were retained until 1973 - it was the last station on the line to be modernised... the present buildings are of 1973 and very basic.
Sidings, with a link into the R.A.F. Stores Depot.
Goods yard. busy in the First World War because of the adjacent military depot.
Sports Ground. Villacourt Rovers Club
Borough of Greenwich Sports Club
Willow Country Club
Moorehead Way
Wingfield Primary School. Opened November 1970
Sports Ground
Park End
50 Boundary stone at the back
Oak tree on the Bank of the Quaggy as a boundary marker
Park Lodge, Meadowbank, 1967, with split-level roofs and, private spaces front as well as behind. The porches have extra rooms attached
Rail line
The line between Blackheath to Falconwood is a green corridor with cuttings and embankments with sycamore and oak woodland. Hawthorn and bramble providing habitat for birds and animals.
Spangate
Group of Span flats.
Station Approach
Kidbrooke Station. between Eltham and Blackheath on South Eastern Trains. Originally opened in 1895, the present buildings are from 1973 and very basic. Originally built in the standard South Eastern Railway pattern there is a Rudimentary shelter on the down side and otherwise a building with sash windows. In 1971 as the Ferrier Estate was planned it was rebuilt with CLASP buildings and a shelter on the down platform. In 1994 it was rebuilt again in brick. The Bexley Heath Railway Company planned this in the 1880s but a landslide on the embankment at Blackheath delayed the opening until May 1895. The company was absorbed into the South Eastern and Chatham Railway Company in 1900 and in 1923 became part of the Southern Railway. The station is said to have been seen by the earl of St Germans as a way of speeding up development of his land in the parish and to get even with Cator when he would not let him develop. Electrification took place in 1926, although steam trains ran until 1961. No. Footbridge was built until the early 1950s, and the original wooden buildings were retained until 1973 - it was the last station on the line to be modernised... the present buildings are of 1973 and very basic.
Sidings, with a link into the R.A.F. Stores Depot.
Goods yard. busy in the First World War because of the adjacent military depot.
Sports Fields
Entered via Eltham Road Bowring Group Sports Field
Telemann Square
21 Wat Tyler. Demolished
Features in films 'Greenwich Mean Time’.
The Hall
This is the name of the original house.
Developed with 44 flats and 42 houses from 1957-and a later terrace of tall houses along Foxes Dale from 1967.
The Lane
Built 1964, with short rows of houses at right angles to the approach road.
Weigall Road
In 1844 there was a farm in the angle bend of the road
Quaggy Bridge. Bridge dates from 1863. Metal plate on the Kidbrook boundary was put there by Woolwich Council in 1903
The Kidbrook boundary crosses the road on the line of the Quaggy. The Quaggy forms the southern boundary of Kidbrook Parish.
Telemann Square
21 Wat Tyler. Demolished
Features in films 'Greenwich Mean Time’.
The Hall
This is the name of the original house.
Developed with 44 flats and 42 houses from 1957-and a later terrace of tall houses along Foxes Dale from 1967.
The Lane
Built 1964, with short rows of houses at right angles to the approach road.
Weigall Road
In 1844 there was a farm in the angle bend of the road
Quaggy Bridge. Bridge dates from 1863. Metal plate on the Kidbrook boundary was put there by Woolwich Council in 1903
The Kidbrook boundary crosses the road on the line of the Quaggy. The Quaggy forms the southern boundary of Kidbrook Parish.
The Playing fields between the road and the Quaggy were the ‘Meadow over the Brook’. The Quaggy and the end of the Kyd Brook flow through natural banks across the fields and cross Weigall Road.
Willow Country Club Sports Ground
Willow Country Club Sports Ground
Crofton Albion Sports and Social Club
Golf Driving Range
Old hedge along the river and on the northern side of the fields with young emergent oaks. Grassland with brambles, nettles and rushes.
Sources
Brooklands Primary School. Web site
Egan. Kidbrook
Greater London Council. Home Sweet Home
Greenwich Historical Association. Transactions
London Borough of Greenwich. Local List
Pevsner and Cherry. South London,
Spurgeon. Discover Eltham
Wingfield Primary School. Web site
Old hedge along the river and on the northern side of the fields with young emergent oaks. Grassland with brambles, nettles and rushes.
Sources
Brooklands Primary School. Web site
Egan. Kidbrook
Greater London Council. Home Sweet Home
Greenwich Historical Association. Transactions
London Borough of Greenwich. Local List
Pevsner and Cherry. South London,
Spurgeon. Discover Eltham
Wingfield Primary School. Web site
Comments