Thames Tributary – Cranbrook - Barkingside

Thames Tributary – Cranbrook
The Cranbrook rises in this area and flows south towards the river Roding.


Barkingside is a suburban area north of Newbury Park and Eastern Avenue.  It has a modest town centre and much between-the-wars housing.  It is notable however for having been home to the headquarters of the Barnardo organisation. Although the site here no longer functions as a children's home much of the housing and facilities remain. Barkingside also has sports grounds, churches and the usual facilities.  It also has an amazingly grand railway station - this originated as a Great Eastern Railway Company building, taken over in the 1930s to become part of the Underground's Central Line - its grandeur said to be in order to impress important visitors to Barnardos

Post to the south Newbury Park
Post to the north Fulwell Cross


Barkingside
The name means a hill or a slope and is first recorded in 1538. So it was on the hill side of Hainault Forest and on the corner of Fairlop Plain. It consisted of forest workers’ cottages, farm houses, and a few mansions – none have survived.

Burford Close
Fullwood Primary School

Carlton Drive
Ilford Jewish Primary School. United Synagogue day school. The school is expected to be replaced by a Hindu school here.
Railway Cottages. Housing built at the same time as the station for their staff. In a ‘semi detached garden city style’.
Station masters house – this is a detached villa with a pillared porch and large garden

Civic Way
32 New Mossford Centre for disabled children opened by Barnardo's in 1975. Closed as part of Barnardo’s plan to stop running children’s homes. It remained unused and empty and has now been demolished.

Court Way
Mossford Lodge. Barnardo was given Mossford Lodge when he married in 1873, two years after he opened his first boys’ home in Stepney. His wife had herself been involved with homeless young people and was the daughter of the Chairman of Lloyds. Barnardo lived here with his family, and the first girls were housed in the stable block. Demolished.
Redbridge Magistrates Court. Built 1974 by the GLC Dept Architecture and Civic Design and is like many others of this period. It was part of plans drawn up in 1967 by the Borough's of Redbridge for a Civic Centre here but which never materialized. It is built on the site of Mossford Lodge.

Cranbrook Road
794, Queen Victoria House. Built as a Receiving House for new inmates of Barnado's estate. Built in 1903 and dedicated to Queen Victoria. In 1970 it was bought by the London Borough of Redbridge ad used as a registry office. Inside are original features and dormitories.
Tesco – built on some of the Barnardo’s site
Barkingside Recreation Ground

Fairlop Playing Fields
The Cranbrook -crane or heron brook – rises here
Fairlop Waters Golf Club. 9 hole golf club opened in 1968

High Street
Police Station. Built in 1964 in concrete and glass. It was extended in 1993.
The Chequers. Mid 19th pub, for a while known as the Old Investigator.

Horns Road
Lodge. Building at the entrance to the Barnardo's estate with a jettied and tile-hung upper storey. Sets the tone for the seventeen surviving cottages

Sandringham Gardens
Cottages in two straight rows, Built in 1851 by William Ingram, farmer and owner of Clay Hall. Model type in a 'Tudor' style. Restored 1981.

Station Road
Barkingside Station. Opened in 1903 it lies between Newbury Park and Fairlop on the Central Line. It was built originally by the Great Eastern Railway designed by William Burgess as a handsome station with a Baroque cupola and weather vane. It stands at the end of an embankment and inside is the ticket hall has a hammer beam roof. On the platforms ‘GER” ironwork remains on brackets. It was lit by electric light from Ilford UDC. It was built to such a high standard for what was then a very small village because it served Barnardo’s girls home where important visitors, including royalty, were expected. Great Eastern built it on their Fairlop loop and it was also thought that the Ilford area was about to expand. However it had very low use and for that reason was closed during the Great War in 1916 and reopened in 1919. It was later incorporated with the Central Line when under the 1930s New Works Programme it was transferred to the London Passenger Transport Board. Work was suspended during the Second World War and eventually the Steam services to the station ended in 1947 and electrified trains began in May 1948. Ticket office was altered in 1987.
The Goods Yard originally extended at the front south of the platforms to the approach road. It was closed in 1965 and is now a builders yard.
Oakside Stadium. This was built in 1998 for Barkingside football club but was sold to the Ford United club.
Redbridge Football Club. The Club's Ford United F.C. which was a 1958 merger between Ford Sports Football Club and Briggs Motor Bodies Sports Football Club both dating from 1934. Known as 'The Motormen', from 2004 they were renamed Redbridge Football Club. The club lost its ground in Romford in 2000 and so they then leased the Oakside Stadium
Barkingside Football Club, was formed in 1889 but disbanded in 1922 and resumed in 1925 as Barkingside Boys Guild. The name was changed to Barkingside Old Boys and played at Barkingside Recreation Ground, later moving to Station Road.

Tanners Lane
The name reflects that tanning was an early local industry in this area. The Cranbrook in this area was sometimes called Tanners Brook in the late medieval period. There was a tannery here in the 19th
Sainsburys
Barnardo’s Head Office. Brutalist grey concrete built to replace the Steppe headquarters, by Ian Fraser and Associates with H. Hall, Chief Architect to Barnardo's, 1969. They are built on the site of the Apple Orchard.
Cottages of 19th-century stock brick

Village Way
Athlone House half-timbered building once a technical school built in 1920. It was part of Barnado's.
‘Girls Village Home’ . Barnardo turned some of the Mossford Lodge estate into a home for girls. This was set up as a village of separate cottages where girls were trained for domestic service under a ‘house 'mother'. It was built in 1875 with a layout round a green by Ebenezer Gregg. Each of the cottages was funded by an individual donor and named with some reference to the donor. more cottages were added as time went on until eventually there were three greens and sixty cottages plus a church, hospital and a school - and later a library, a swimming pool, and on in. One of the original buildings was an early steam laundry. The Village closed in 1991. Seventeen of the cottages remain. And are laid out around a green, planted with specimen trees. They are half-timbered, and each had a differently coloured door and they are reminiscent of Roberts' model dwellings designed for the Prince Consort. Models of them were used as collecting boxes for the charity. They are now housing association property. Cambridge Cottage has been restored inside to its original appearance.
Cairns Memorial Cottage. This was built in 1887 and named for the 1st Earl Cairns, who was the charity's first president and Lord Chancellor. It has an octagonal corner clock tower with a spire.
Tree planted by Princess Margaret when she opened New Mossford then moved to Cairns Cottage when it closed.
Dr Barnardo's grave. This dates from 1905 and features a monument by George Frampton, who sculpted it for free. It includes a bronze relief portrait of Barnardo with girls modelled on some of the residents of the home.
Children’s Church. This was built in 1892 and designed by Ebenezer Gregg for special use by children. There is a stone battlemented tower and inside there is a collection of banners of Young Helpers Leagues.
Governor's House. Rebuilt in the 1960s. Demolished.
Residential Home. Built to replace Scotch House on the site of the old Governor’s House. Closed 1990 and used as offices.
Principal school building. Rebuilt in 1892. Demolished.
Scotch House. Home to 12 disabled ex-staff members, sold to Redbridge Council.

Sources
Barkingside Football Club. Web site
Barnardo. Web site
Day. London Underground
Chequers. Web site
Ilford Jewish Primary School. Web site
Pevsner and Cherry. Essex
Redbridge Football Club. Web site
Victoria County History of Essex

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