Turnford Brook - Turnford
Turnford Brook
The Turnford Brook turns south and flows towards the River Lee
Post to the east Holyfield Lake
Post to the west Turnford
Post to the south Cheshunt
Broomfield Avenue
Housing which is partly built on the site of Brook House
Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age finds on a site near Halfhide Lane. Pottery, flint implements, sling shot and clay loom weights found in 1983.
Canada Fields
Housing and commercial development on site previously partly used for rough grazing, partly as a nursery with a since demolished nurseryman’s cottage and glasshouses, and partly allotments. The Turnford Brook, flows east west through the site
Canada Lane
Housing built on a glasshouse site
Pumping station for Turnford Well. Engine house and a well tower, built in 1870 for the New River Company. The Boulton and Watt marine type pumping engine was originally installed by the Hampstead Water Co., subsquently taken over by the New River Co. It had been used to pump the Hampstead Well in Tolmers Square since 1848. It was the last side lever stationery engine to work in the UK. It had been built as a low pressure engine and new gearing was fitted in 1883 and pumped from a well thorn 140 ft deep at 8 strokes a minute, 2 ¼ m gallons a day. The pumping gear was by Hunter and English of Bow. The station also had an engine manufactured by R.Moreland of London in 1882 which was on its own girder over the well. It was the practice of the New River Company to boost an old low pressure system with a new high pressure engine – and which were vertical to save space. Water is pumped from a well which is 600 ft. deep into the New River. The old engine was retained for historic interest but it was replaced by a diesel oil installation and an electric pump is actually used. The Moreland engine was scrapped. The building is in red brick and the tower has lifting tackle over the well to lift out the pump for maintenance.
Late Bronze Age, early Iron Age and Roman finds here. These include a hut-like structure and tool making remains from the Mesolithic period, and Roman pottery found in a ditch.
Remains of brick walls, from nursery glasshouses
Remains of a tree-lined boundary or track here in the late 18th until the Second World War.
Cheshunt Wash High Road
The Turnford Brook runs alongside the road – hence the name of the ‘Wash’ due to flooding.
Bridge over the Turnford Brook. The road now crosses the brook on a barely visible slant bridge. This is probably the site of the Nuns Bridge maintained by the Turnford nuns and where they raised money. The medieval crossing was replaced with a concrete girder bridge in 1923. Stone balustrades, parapet and date plaque not now visible.
Wall letter box,
Site of milestone.
76 Bulls Head, claims outside to date from 1525. Also called The Bull
13 Cumin Indian restaurant was once the Bull’s Head pub, built in the 19th and latterly called the Massey Turnford Inn. Possibly on the site of an older inn.
Turnford cottages
Turnford Villas. Built for Rochford Nursery workers.
Brook House. 19th house used as a private girls’ school. Demolished and replaced by housing
Turnford Institute built by Rochford Nurserymen for their staff. This is said to have been opposite Brook House – and thus may have been at the point in the terrace opposite where there are three new houses.
Great Cambridge Road
Site of pillbox near southbound exit from A10 at Turnford roundabout. Probably destroyed by road building in the 1970s.
Bridge over Turnford Brook – on one side the balustrade of a 1920s ‘county’ standard bridge survives
New River Arms. Built as a roadhouse in the 1930s
Half Hide Lane
Marriott Hotel. Built 2000s on old glasshouse site.
Turnford brickyard and gravel pits on the north side of the lane. As a result of archaeological work there Bronze Age flint implements and pottery were found. Other finds from the late 19th include Iron Age pottery, Mesolithic stone implements, including axes and Neolithic arrowheads, and a Palaeolithic flint core found
New River
The New River in this section was constructed in 1855 when a loop which ran to the west was straitened
Turnford Aqueduct built in 1855 by Chadwell Mylne as part of the works to bypass the western loop. This is to cross the Turnford Brook but it included a flash which would allow storm water in the brook to be pass accross the New River without entering and contaminating it. It is now possible to walk underneath it on what was called Watery Lane
Nunnsbury Drive
Longland’s Junior Mixed and Infant School
Nursery road
The Workshop
Football ground at the end of the road until the 1950s. Wormley Rovers, formed in 1946, played here on lands east of the Railway, owned by Joseph Rochford of Rochford Nursery's.
Convent Nurseries on site in the 1890s
Perrysfield
Local authority housing built on site of glasshouses.
The Springs.
Housing on the site of The Springs which was an 18th house here
Hertford Regional College which was established in the early 1990’s when East Herts College, which had opened here on a site occupied by glasshouses in 1961, was merged with a college at Ware. It is on the site of two houses called the Cedars and Nunsbury. In 2011 it is being rebuilt, retaining and remodelling the older Student Centre, 2000 and the Green Tye, 1994, and Wormley 2005 buildings. A new ‘landmark’ building is financed by housing for sale built on the northern part of the site. It is said the clock tower from Nunnsbury is included in the site
Turnford Marsh
Cheshunt Nunnery – a farmhouse beside the railway was said to be the nunnery site. I was a Benedictine nunnery, first noted in 1183, and which was burnt down in around 1290. It was dissolved in 1536, and became a farm. The site was given by the Crown to Sir Anthony Denny and it may have been here that Elizabeth was kept under house arrest in his charge. The last part was demolished in the 19th. Nothing remained except some old garden walls, and a fragment of a moat which was later destroyed by gravel digging in 1955 along with the farm itself. The nunnery had a church living quarters, and domestic buildings. It is also thought the nuns ran a hospital of some sort in the 15th dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene.
The Turnford Brook turns south and flows towards the River Lee
Post to the east Holyfield Lake
Post to the west Turnford
Post to the south Cheshunt
Broomfield Avenue
Housing which is partly built on the site of Brook House
Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age finds on a site near Halfhide Lane. Pottery, flint implements, sling shot and clay loom weights found in 1983.
Canada Fields
Housing and commercial development on site previously partly used for rough grazing, partly as a nursery with a since demolished nurseryman’s cottage and glasshouses, and partly allotments. The Turnford Brook, flows east west through the site
Canada Lane
Housing built on a glasshouse site
Pumping station for Turnford Well. Engine house and a well tower, built in 1870 for the New River Company. The Boulton and Watt marine type pumping engine was originally installed by the Hampstead Water Co., subsquently taken over by the New River Co. It had been used to pump the Hampstead Well in Tolmers Square since 1848. It was the last side lever stationery engine to work in the UK. It had been built as a low pressure engine and new gearing was fitted in 1883 and pumped from a well thorn 140 ft deep at 8 strokes a minute, 2 ¼ m gallons a day. The pumping gear was by Hunter and English of Bow. The station also had an engine manufactured by R.Moreland of London in 1882 which was on its own girder over the well. It was the practice of the New River Company to boost an old low pressure system with a new high pressure engine – and which were vertical to save space. Water is pumped from a well which is 600 ft. deep into the New River. The old engine was retained for historic interest but it was replaced by a diesel oil installation and an electric pump is actually used. The Moreland engine was scrapped. The building is in red brick and the tower has lifting tackle over the well to lift out the pump for maintenance.
Late Bronze Age, early Iron Age and Roman finds here. These include a hut-like structure and tool making remains from the Mesolithic period, and Roman pottery found in a ditch.
Remains of brick walls, from nursery glasshouses
Remains of a tree-lined boundary or track here in the late 18th until the Second World War.
Cheshunt Wash High Road
The Turnford Brook runs alongside the road – hence the name of the ‘Wash’ due to flooding.
Bridge over the Turnford Brook. The road now crosses the brook on a barely visible slant bridge. This is probably the site of the Nuns Bridge maintained by the Turnford nuns and where they raised money. The medieval crossing was replaced with a concrete girder bridge in 1923. Stone balustrades, parapet and date plaque not now visible.
Wall letter box,
Site of milestone.
76 Bulls Head, claims outside to date from 1525. Also called The Bull
13 Cumin Indian restaurant was once the Bull’s Head pub, built in the 19th and latterly called the Massey Turnford Inn. Possibly on the site of an older inn.
Turnford cottages
Turnford Villas. Built for Rochford Nursery workers.
Brook House. 19th house used as a private girls’ school. Demolished and replaced by housing
Turnford Institute built by Rochford Nurserymen for their staff. This is said to have been opposite Brook House – and thus may have been at the point in the terrace opposite where there are three new houses.
Great Cambridge Road
Site of pillbox near southbound exit from A10 at Turnford roundabout. Probably destroyed by road building in the 1970s.
Bridge over Turnford Brook – on one side the balustrade of a 1920s ‘county’ standard bridge survives
New River Arms. Built as a roadhouse in the 1930s
Half Hide Lane
Marriott Hotel. Built 2000s on old glasshouse site.
Turnford brickyard and gravel pits on the north side of the lane. As a result of archaeological work there Bronze Age flint implements and pottery were found. Other finds from the late 19th include Iron Age pottery, Mesolithic stone implements, including axes and Neolithic arrowheads, and a Palaeolithic flint core found
New River
The New River in this section was constructed in 1855 when a loop which ran to the west was straitened
Turnford Aqueduct built in 1855 by Chadwell Mylne as part of the works to bypass the western loop. This is to cross the Turnford Brook but it included a flash which would allow storm water in the brook to be pass accross the New River without entering and contaminating it. It is now possible to walk underneath it on what was called Watery Lane
Nunnsbury Drive
Longland’s Junior Mixed and Infant School
Nursery road
The Workshop
Football ground at the end of the road until the 1950s. Wormley Rovers, formed in 1946, played here on lands east of the Railway, owned by Joseph Rochford of Rochford Nursery's.
Convent Nurseries on site in the 1890s
Perrysfield
Local authority housing built on site of glasshouses.
The Springs.
Housing on the site of The Springs which was an 18th house here
Hertford Regional College which was established in the early 1990’s when East Herts College, which had opened here on a site occupied by glasshouses in 1961, was merged with a college at Ware. It is on the site of two houses called the Cedars and Nunsbury. In 2011 it is being rebuilt, retaining and remodelling the older Student Centre, 2000 and the Green Tye, 1994, and Wormley 2005 buildings. A new ‘landmark’ building is financed by housing for sale built on the northern part of the site. It is said the clock tower from Nunnsbury is included in the site
Turnford Marsh
Cheshunt Nunnery – a farmhouse beside the railway was said to be the nunnery site. I was a Benedictine nunnery, first noted in 1183, and which was burnt down in around 1290. It was dissolved in 1536, and became a farm. The site was given by the Crown to Sir Anthony Denny and it may have been here that Elizabeth was kept under house arrest in his charge. The last part was demolished in the 19th. Nothing remained except some old garden walls, and a fragment of a moat which was later destroyed by gravel digging in 1955 along with the farm itself. The nunnery had a church living quarters, and domestic buildings. It is also thought the nuns ran a hospital of some sort in the 15th dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene.
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