Dollis Brook - Finchley Church End
Dollis Brook
Dollis Brook flows south westwards. It is joined by a tributary from the west
Post to the north Mill Hill East
Post to the west Holders Hill
Post to the south Henley's Corner
Post to the south Finchley Church End
Bibsworth Road
The name is that of a local manor – Bibsworth Manor – in this area.
Church End
One of a number of small scattered settlements which grew up around the edge of Finchley Common. Church End is the old heart of the original parish and in the 14th it was Bibsworth Manor. The diversion of the Great North Road to the east took commerce away and this became a rural backwater.
Dollis Park
St. Mary’s Church of England School. The original school dates from 1812 opening as Finchley National School in an old building in Hendon Lane leased from the charity estates. In 1843-4 standards were very low and a new rector gave glebe land near the church in 1848 where a school-house was opened in 1853. The National Society refused to pay because of nonconformists on the school's management committee and thus annual grants came from the local authority. Extra classrooms were built in 1897 and after the Second World War. The current building dates from 1990.
Dollis Road
Dollis Bridge
Christ College Playing Fields. The College acquired these playing fields in 1906
Ducksetters Lane
This ran from Temple Fortune to Finchley and was replaced in the early 19th by the turnpike road from Marylebone.
Gravel Hill
Pond at the junction with Hendon Lane until 1885 when it was drained. There is now a horse chestnut tree on site.
St Philip the Apostle Roman Catholic Church. In 1918, the Sisters of Marie Auxiliatrice came to the Manor House in East End Road, Finchley running it as a residence for business women. The nuns’ chapel became a centre for a new parish. They later took on Derwent House at the corner of Regents Park Road and East End Road and part of this was a new chapel and dedicated to St. Philip. The present church was built in Gravel Lane in 1933
Flora and Gothic Cottages
Hendon Avenue
Laid out on the Grass Farm Estate in 1900. Now lots of posh houses. Footpath to Dollis Brook at the end.
6 Maeda Gakuen. Independent Japanese kindergarten
30a at the end of a long drive. Built in 1956 by Chamberlain, Powell & Bon. It has slim supports over a garage, with an external staircase giving access to first- floor balcony. The core of is built of Uxbridge bricks Surrounded by a light timber structure with weather boarded cladding outside. It was design to provided light in its orchard surroundings and was described as 'a modern house with the character of a tree-top hide'
Hendon Lane
This was known as Finchley Hill in the 17th
104 Kensit Evangelical church. This is associated with the Kensit Memorial Bible College of 1908. The Protestant Truth Society had been founded by John Kensit in 1889 to take a stand against the growing influence of Romanism the nation. In 1898 the first Wickliffe Preachers were appointed and in 1905 the Ken sit Memorial Bible College was established to train the
Christ’s College. In 1857 Rev Thomas Reader White, Rector of St Mary’s opened Finchley Hall School on the site of the Library in an old pub. The following year a new school was built, to designs by Anthony Salvin. These buildings do not survive. In 1860 a new school was built on the east side of the road with money from White's brother and it was named Christ's College. Designs were by Edward Roberts, and it had a 120-foot tower. In 1902, the school was taken over by Middlesex County Council as its first County grammar school. In 1972, a new annexe for design and technology was built in East Finchley and in 1991 the whole school moved there.
Pardes House Grammar School and Pardes House Primary School are now using the buildings once built for Christ’s College. They are a voluntary-aided school, for boys from Orthodox Jewish families. They were originally set up in 1952 to serve the chareidi community and moved here in 1990.
Yehoshua Freshwater Education Centre – attached to Pardes House school.
St. Mary's Church. According to tradition, the church was founded here by St. Erkenwald in 675 for workmen felling timber for old Saint Paul's. It was also a wayside halt for pilgrims going to the Shrine of Saint Alban. This appears to be the church of a large medieval parish which is documented from 1274. Outside is a 15th battlemented tower of rag stone. The medieval church replaced a Norman building of which some bits remain. The east end of the church was bombed in 1940 and restored in the early 1950s by Caroe and Partners with a window was designed to replace that destroyed in 1940. The font is 12th and was found in the rectory stables in the 1890s. A Millennium wall hanging was produced in 2000. The bells are a full peal; the earliest dated 1770 and there is a peal board as well as charity boards in the tower. Three is a two-manual Willis organ, of 1878. The console was rebuilt in 1948 as a war memorial
Churchyard. The large churchyard had views over the Dollis valley, and a range of tombstones. There is an obelisk to Major Cartwright, the radical, died in 1824 which was erected in 1835 by public subscription. There is a large yew tree on the Hendon Lane frontage
Pillar box by A. Handyside & Co. Ltd. With a V.R. cypher. 1887/
Finchley Fire Brigade stables replaced by shops north of Park House. It was a voluntary brigade set up in 1888 and lasted until 1935. They had the first motorised fire engine in London by Greenwich based Merryweather in 1904. It is now in the Science Museum
56 Park House. A house of 1739, two storeys in brick
58 Lodge of Grass Farm. 19th house by Edward Roberts, with red brick and tile-hanging. It was designed for John Heal and became the home of his widow after 1870.
Grass Farm itself was west of the road and was developed in the late 19th. In 1856 it was the home of John Heal, who opened the Tottenham Road shop and was grandfather of Ambrose heal who made it a home of cutting edge design
Church End Library. This is on the site of what was the Old Queen’s Head, which took its name from Queen Anne, and was owned by The Finchley Charities. In 1833 the original inn burned down and was rebuilt, surviving until the lease on the house came up in 1857. The buildings were renamed by the Vicar as Finchley Hall and it became the first buildings used by Christ’s College. In 1902 Finchley Council took over the hall for office use but it was bombed in 1940 and demolished. The library was built in 1960.
1 –4 Park Cottages
Morningside Cottage
Blue Beetle Hall used as a local lettings hall this was once a working men’s club and was renamed in the 1960s by the local youth club
Hamilton Hall. Opened in 1899 and a donation of local resident Francis Hamilton, has been used by a variety of religious groups and as a Civic Restaurant. Now flats.
Holders Hill
This was ‘Oldershyll’ in 1584, bur associated with a family called Holder' - Roger le Holdere is mentioned in 1294. It is the northern part of Hendon separated from Finchley by the Dollis Brook and owned by All Souls, Oxford. It Became a posh area in the 19th with Building development by C.F.Hancock in the 1870s but the construction of the North Circular in the late 1920s increased demand for housing.
Holders Hill Road
This was track in existence by the 14th. After the Great War strips of land were sold by the cemetery and the golf club and thus ribbon development - posh houses and flats – grew up along the road.
Hendon Cemetery. Founded in 1892 by the Abney Park Cemetery Company on the site of Dollis Farm. The Crematorium was added in 1922. The Gatehouse was by A. A. Bonella in Old English style, with half-timbered entrance arch and roughcast walls with Gothic lettering in stone.
Dollis Farm. This was on the west side of the road near the junction which is now Holders Hill Circus. Jeremy Bentham used it as a retreat and wrote there. Demolished 1930.
Hendon Golf Club on the site of Holders Hill Farm.
Stone milestone, possibly dating from Telford's survey. On the west side north of Hendon Park Cemetery entrance.
Regents Park Road
This road running from the West End of London to Ballards Lane at Finchley – made up of Finchley Road and Regents Park Road - was made only in 1827 as a turnpike road. It paralleled and replaced Ducksetter's Lane.
287 Grove Lodge
Queens Head. Took its name from the Old Queens Head in Hendon Lane and was built in 1868.
Tollgate. The Tollgate was moved here following disputes with local people. There is a plaque to it on the Queen’s Head pub.
Milestone. Outside 296. 19th marker made of Cast iron in a "V" shape inscribed: "Finchley Parish" Regents Park 5 Barnet 4¼
Village Road
Finchley Garden Village. Built by Finchley Co-partnership Association of 1908 on Garden city principles. A garden suburb of 1909-14 with pairs of houses roughcast and gabled, laid out around an informal green. Designed by Frank E. Stratton of the local firm Bennett & Stratton. He is commemorated by a memorial lamp on the green.
Windsor Avenue
Windsor Open Space
Sources
British History Finchley web site
CAMRA. Real Beer in London
Christ’s College Wikipedia web site
English Heritage web site
Field. London Place Names,
Finchley Community web site
Heathfield. Finchley and Whetstone past
Middlesex County Council. History of Middlesex
Nairn. Modern Buildings,
Pevsner and Cherry. London North
Stevenson. Middlesex
Postscape web site
St.Philip web site
Walford. Village London
Webster. Great North Road
Dollis Brook flows south westwards. It is joined by a tributary from the west
Post to the north Mill Hill East
Post to the west Holders Hill
Post to the south Henley's Corner
Post to the south Finchley Church End
Bibsworth Road
The name is that of a local manor – Bibsworth Manor – in this area.
Church End
One of a number of small scattered settlements which grew up around the edge of Finchley Common. Church End is the old heart of the original parish and in the 14th it was Bibsworth Manor. The diversion of the Great North Road to the east took commerce away and this became a rural backwater.
Dollis Park
St. Mary’s Church of England School. The original school dates from 1812 opening as Finchley National School in an old building in Hendon Lane leased from the charity estates. In 1843-4 standards were very low and a new rector gave glebe land near the church in 1848 where a school-house was opened in 1853. The National Society refused to pay because of nonconformists on the school's management committee and thus annual grants came from the local authority. Extra classrooms were built in 1897 and after the Second World War. The current building dates from 1990.
Dollis Road
Dollis Bridge
Christ College Playing Fields. The College acquired these playing fields in 1906
Ducksetters Lane
This ran from Temple Fortune to Finchley and was replaced in the early 19th by the turnpike road from Marylebone.
Gravel Hill
Pond at the junction with Hendon Lane until 1885 when it was drained. There is now a horse chestnut tree on site.
St Philip the Apostle Roman Catholic Church. In 1918, the Sisters of Marie Auxiliatrice came to the Manor House in East End Road, Finchley running it as a residence for business women. The nuns’ chapel became a centre for a new parish. They later took on Derwent House at the corner of Regents Park Road and East End Road and part of this was a new chapel and dedicated to St. Philip. The present church was built in Gravel Lane in 1933
Flora and Gothic Cottages
Hendon Avenue
Laid out on the Grass Farm Estate in 1900. Now lots of posh houses. Footpath to Dollis Brook at the end.
6 Maeda Gakuen. Independent Japanese kindergarten
30a at the end of a long drive. Built in 1956 by Chamberlain, Powell & Bon. It has slim supports over a garage, with an external staircase giving access to first- floor balcony. The core of is built of Uxbridge bricks Surrounded by a light timber structure with weather boarded cladding outside. It was design to provided light in its orchard surroundings and was described as 'a modern house with the character of a tree-top hide'
Hendon Lane
This was known as Finchley Hill in the 17th
104 Kensit Evangelical church. This is associated with the Kensit Memorial Bible College of 1908. The Protestant Truth Society had been founded by John Kensit in 1889 to take a stand against the growing influence of Romanism the nation. In 1898 the first Wickliffe Preachers were appointed and in 1905 the Ken sit Memorial Bible College was established to train the
Christ’s College. In 1857 Rev Thomas Reader White, Rector of St Mary’s opened Finchley Hall School on the site of the Library in an old pub. The following year a new school was built, to designs by Anthony Salvin. These buildings do not survive. In 1860 a new school was built on the east side of the road with money from White's brother and it was named Christ's College. Designs were by Edward Roberts, and it had a 120-foot tower. In 1902, the school was taken over by Middlesex County Council as its first County grammar school. In 1972, a new annexe for design and technology was built in East Finchley and in 1991 the whole school moved there.
Pardes House Grammar School and Pardes House Primary School are now using the buildings once built for Christ’s College. They are a voluntary-aided school, for boys from Orthodox Jewish families. They were originally set up in 1952 to serve the chareidi community and moved here in 1990.
Yehoshua Freshwater Education Centre – attached to Pardes House school.
St. Mary's Church. According to tradition, the church was founded here by St. Erkenwald in 675 for workmen felling timber for old Saint Paul's. It was also a wayside halt for pilgrims going to the Shrine of Saint Alban. This appears to be the church of a large medieval parish which is documented from 1274. Outside is a 15th battlemented tower of rag stone. The medieval church replaced a Norman building of which some bits remain. The east end of the church was bombed in 1940 and restored in the early 1950s by Caroe and Partners with a window was designed to replace that destroyed in 1940. The font is 12th and was found in the rectory stables in the 1890s. A Millennium wall hanging was produced in 2000. The bells are a full peal; the earliest dated 1770 and there is a peal board as well as charity boards in the tower. Three is a two-manual Willis organ, of 1878. The console was rebuilt in 1948 as a war memorial
Churchyard. The large churchyard had views over the Dollis valley, and a range of tombstones. There is an obelisk to Major Cartwright, the radical, died in 1824 which was erected in 1835 by public subscription. There is a large yew tree on the Hendon Lane frontage
Pillar box by A. Handyside & Co. Ltd. With a V.R. cypher. 1887/
Finchley Fire Brigade stables replaced by shops north of Park House. It was a voluntary brigade set up in 1888 and lasted until 1935. They had the first motorised fire engine in London by Greenwich based Merryweather in 1904. It is now in the Science Museum
56 Park House. A house of 1739, two storeys in brick
58 Lodge of Grass Farm. 19th house by Edward Roberts, with red brick and tile-hanging. It was designed for John Heal and became the home of his widow after 1870.
Grass Farm itself was west of the road and was developed in the late 19th. In 1856 it was the home of John Heal, who opened the Tottenham Road shop and was grandfather of Ambrose heal who made it a home of cutting edge design
Church End Library. This is on the site of what was the Old Queen’s Head, which took its name from Queen Anne, and was owned by The Finchley Charities. In 1833 the original inn burned down and was rebuilt, surviving until the lease on the house came up in 1857. The buildings were renamed by the Vicar as Finchley Hall and it became the first buildings used by Christ’s College. In 1902 Finchley Council took over the hall for office use but it was bombed in 1940 and demolished. The library was built in 1960.
1 –4 Park Cottages
Morningside Cottage
Blue Beetle Hall used as a local lettings hall this was once a working men’s club and was renamed in the 1960s by the local youth club
Hamilton Hall. Opened in 1899 and a donation of local resident Francis Hamilton, has been used by a variety of religious groups and as a Civic Restaurant. Now flats.
Holders Hill
This was ‘Oldershyll’ in 1584, bur associated with a family called Holder' - Roger le Holdere is mentioned in 1294. It is the northern part of Hendon separated from Finchley by the Dollis Brook and owned by All Souls, Oxford. It Became a posh area in the 19th with Building development by C.F.Hancock in the 1870s but the construction of the North Circular in the late 1920s increased demand for housing.
Holders Hill Road
This was track in existence by the 14th. After the Great War strips of land were sold by the cemetery and the golf club and thus ribbon development - posh houses and flats – grew up along the road.
Hendon Cemetery. Founded in 1892 by the Abney Park Cemetery Company on the site of Dollis Farm. The Crematorium was added in 1922. The Gatehouse was by A. A. Bonella in Old English style, with half-timbered entrance arch and roughcast walls with Gothic lettering in stone.
Dollis Farm. This was on the west side of the road near the junction which is now Holders Hill Circus. Jeremy Bentham used it as a retreat and wrote there. Demolished 1930.
Hendon Golf Club on the site of Holders Hill Farm.
Stone milestone, possibly dating from Telford's survey. On the west side north of Hendon Park Cemetery entrance.
Regents Park Road
This road running from the West End of London to Ballards Lane at Finchley – made up of Finchley Road and Regents Park Road - was made only in 1827 as a turnpike road. It paralleled and replaced Ducksetter's Lane.
287 Grove Lodge
Queens Head. Took its name from the Old Queens Head in Hendon Lane and was built in 1868.
Tollgate. The Tollgate was moved here following disputes with local people. There is a plaque to it on the Queen’s Head pub.
Milestone. Outside 296. 19th marker made of Cast iron in a "V" shape inscribed: "Finchley Parish" Regents Park 5 Barnet 4¼
Village Road
Finchley Garden Village. Built by Finchley Co-partnership Association of 1908 on Garden city principles. A garden suburb of 1909-14 with pairs of houses roughcast and gabled, laid out around an informal green. Designed by Frank E. Stratton of the local firm Bennett & Stratton. He is commemorated by a memorial lamp on the green.
Windsor Avenue
Windsor Open Space
Sources
British History Finchley web site
CAMRA. Real Beer in London
Christ’s College Wikipedia web site
English Heritage web site
Field. London Place Names,
Finchley Community web site
Heathfield. Finchley and Whetstone past
Middlesex County Council. History of Middlesex
Nairn. Modern Buildings,
Pevsner and Cherry. London North
Stevenson. Middlesex
Postscape web site
St.Philip web site
Walford. Village London
Webster. Great North Road
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