Railway from London Bridge to Gravesend. Plumstead
Railway from London Bridge to Gravesend
The line continues straight eastwards
Post to the west Woolwich
Post to the east Plumstead
Post to the north Broadwater and Arsenal
Ancona Road
St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Primary School. This is an Infant and Junior School with a Nursery. It originated at Coupland Terrace, in an iron building in 1891 and was maintained from Parish funds. In 1893, the new church opened in Conway Rd, and the school was beneath it. A new building opened in 1909. The boys and girls department merged in 1930 to form one school, the infants became a separate school. In 1960 Commonwealth Hall at Abbey Wood was hired from the RACS until St. Thomas –a-Becket School to take the extra children. Up to 1962 St. Patrick’s had secondary pupils but then they joined pupils from St.Peter’s to form a new secondary school at Briset Road. In 1968 a New School was completed, initially Infant School and Offices. The current school hall is the old St. Patrick's Church
Ann Street
The area is now all 1960s local authority housing but the previous terraces were badly bombed in the Second World War. For instance – twelve people from three families killed in their Anderson shelters in October 1940.
104 Royal Standard Pub. This was on the south west corner with Glyndon Road. This dated from at least the 1850s and was still there in 1956. There are now planters on the site and a mosaic panel describing the Glyndon Estate
44 Bridge Tavern. Demolished in 1960
Blendon Terrace
Birds Nest Hole. This is a ravine between Blendon Terrace and Vicarage Park.
Plumstead Common Nature Reserve. This is behind Blendon Terrace and is a wooded area containing which had long been neglected as an unofficial dumping ground. It has now been cleared by local people. It is an area of oak woodland with holly. There are also new steps on the east and west sides of the reserve
St. Margaret’s Church. This was on the site of what is now Azile Everitt House. The church was built in 1858 but had structural problems and was closed in 1966 and later demolished.
Brewery Road
The road was laid out after 1860 when the north side was the site of extensive brick works. This may have been the brickworks belonging to Lewis Davis
Co-op shop opened in 1880 – one of the earliest to be opened by RACS. The store had a bell supplied by Gillett of Croydon. Its fate is not known
South Rise School. The school dates back to 1874 when it was a London School Board school. Initially it was known as Earl Street School and later renamed Earl Rise School. The school at first took boys and girls and there was a separate infants department. It was named South Rise School sometime after 1970.
Richmond Gospel Hall. This is a place of worship for Brethren. The hall is probably post Great War.
Chapel for the Peculiar People. This was on the south side of the road, near or on the junction with Waverley Road and dated from at least the early 1890s. The Peculiar People were an Essex originating sect which became very strong in Plumstead. They are now the Union of Evangelical Churches which does not have a Plumstead branch.
Burrage Grove
Burrage Grove School. This was an early London School Board School built in 1874. It was eventually closed and was used as an adult education centre – part of Thameside Institute and Woolwich College of Further Education. In due course this has become Greenwich Community College.
Burrage Grove Centre used for adult education by Greenwich Community College.
Heronsgate School. A branch of this Thamesmead base infants school, known as their Royal Arsenal centre, opened in 2012 in part of the old Burrage Road School.
Matchless Motor Cycle Factory. The factory was built and owned by the Collier brothers who made Matchless motor cycles here from 1899 to 1966. They had begun manufacture in Herbert road and had won successive TT Races; a Matchless ridden by Charlie Collier won the first single-cylinder race in the first TT in 1907. Colliers produced pedal bicycles in the late 1800s and built their first production motorcycles in 1912 powered by their own units. Colliers designs evolved into the traditional diamond-shaped frame they added one of the first pillion seats in 1903 and chain drive in 1905. They bought AJS in the early 1930s and moved production south from Wolverhampton forming Associated Motorcycles Limited. In the 1960s, the Matchless four-stroke twin was replaced with the Norton twin and by 1967; the Matchless singles had ceased production. It was later part of Norton-Villiers-Triumph and their machines were assembled at Plumstead using engines from Wolverhampton and frames from Manchester. In 1968 the Greater London Council issued a compulsory purchase order and the works closed in July 1969. The main factory site was bordered by Plumstead Road to the north, Maxey Road to the east and Burrage Grove to the south with the race, packing, spares and repairs shops on the south side of Burrage Grove next to the railway line. Burrage Grove was always given as their address.
54 Sunday School. This seems to have been connected to the Woolwich Baptist Tabernacle. It was there until the end of the Great War but by the 1950s had gone.
Burrage Road
The name of the road relates to a local estate known as ‘Borowosh Maner’ in 1464 and derives from Burwash in East Sussex. This part of Plumstead was developed from 1849. Burrage Road led to the Manor house.
16-18 Lotus Club. This was the Co-op Club
Electricity box with embossed Woolwich Coat of arms – corner of Burrage Road and Burrage Place
23 Queen's Arms. Says it is a sports pub
89-91 Crown and Sceptre pub. Long gone
158 Lord Raglan. A pub of 1855
St.James with St. Paul’s Church. This is now converted to housing. The architect is unknown. It was built as a proprietary chapel for Burrage Town in 1855. It became a parish church in 1878. The date of closure is unknown but it was converted in 1966 to the Greenwich Young People's Theatre. This project originated in the 1960s When Greenwich theatre was set up and included a youth theatre. It moved into premises here in 1970. In 2010 the company left Burrage Road for the Tramshed. The church had however acquired an Act of Parliament in 1968 in order to sell it but it was only sold in 1981 and again in 2003 when the theatre left. It was converted to apartments in 2005. Inside were wall tablets to the Pattison family of Pattison's Pit.
St James British School. This was a school for boys and girls at the rear of the church in what is now Congleton Grove. This dated from at least the 1860s.
Congleton Grove
This road is made up of what was Church Terrace or Church Street from Burrage Road and also the renamed southern end of Maxey Road, previously also Percy Terrace
117 The Congleton Arms. This was a Courage pub which was closed and demolished in the early 1970s. A room upstairs was used by the local Masonic Lodge along with a number of provident societies.
Conway Road
St Patricks Roman Catholic chapel. Built in 1893 as a permanent school and church which were built at the corner with Griffin Road. The architect was Alexander Henry Kersey, the vendor of the site. The church was formally opened in 1892. This brick building has a first-floor chapel with a school room below. By 1960 it was too small and the Catholic Church moved to a redundant Anglican church nearby. This building is now used as a weekday and school chapel. A Presbytery is attached.
Dawson Close
This was previously Charles Street – but it was a continuation of Dawson Street, now gone, to the east.
Dawson's Brickfield. This was between Maxey road and Richmond and Pattison Roads. There were two brickyards – run separately by a father and son – and they also had yards at East Wickham and in Dartford,
Durham Rise
The western section of the road lies along the southern boundary of the Kent Water Works site.
Earl Rise
St John's Church. Evangelical Anglican church. The first church here was built in 1883 and demolished in 1953 after damage in the Second World War. This church was built inside the ruined walls using parts of the transept and chancel walls and some of the original windows. It has a rectangular nave and there are two extensions attached for the vestry and a library. The church hall is to the west and it shares the main entrance to the church.
Mosaic Panel the wall of a block of flats which front onto Glyndon Road.
Elmley Street
River Heights. Tower blocks built 1970 with 24 floors
Glyndon Road
Glyndon Road Brickfield owned by Lewis Davis in the early 19th. This was south of the western end of the road
Glyndon Estate This was a redevelopment done in 1959. It had worthy environmental aims with the elimination of through roads and ten acres of open space.
6 William Barefoot produced early Woolwich Labour Party publications here, including the Pioneer
40 The London Lei Zang Si Bhuddist Temple. This was previously the Prince Rupert pub. Originally it was the Park Estate Tavern it dates from the 1880s.
179-359 River Heights. Tower Block. This is a tenant managed co-operative
Amalgamated Engineers Club was here before the Great War. This was on the south west corner with Villas Road on an area which is now parkland.
Primitive Methodist church here in the 1890s. This was on the south east corner with Robert Street.
Griffin Road
2a this long low building is now in use as a restaurant. It seems originally to have been a cow house – presumably for a local dairy.
East Plumstead Baptist Church. The church dates from 1880 however the site is shown as allotments on the 1914 map so the current church is later. It is a red brick church - with staircases either side on the Brewery Road frontage leading to first floor halls. There are crenulations and a spire. There are considerable buildings to the rear and doors going into other halls and rooms. It also supports many organisations, including a pre-school and is a busy centre.
Heavitree Close
Old People’s Dwellings.
Coronation Garden. The garden was provided by the Woolwich Borough Council to commemorate the Coronation of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2 June 1953
Heavitree Road
Reservoir. The Reservoir was built for the Woolwich Plumstead and Charlton Pure Water Consumers Company in 1854 but this later became the Kent Water Co. A plaque above the access doorway is for 1854 –although it is thought this may be the year the roof was added. The reservoir itself may date 1840. It may therefore be longest serving brick built 19th reservoir in London. There are two tanks separated by a common wall and which are divided by a raised walkway along the central dividing wall and linked by arched openings in the upper part of the wall. Cast-iron beams support brick jack arches. The walls are of yellow brick masonry set in a lime mortar. The brick floors fall to a central drain in each tank.
Plumstead Alms-houses were built in 1896. This part of the almshouses was destroyed in the Second World War II but later rebuilt.
Majendie Road
Vivien Majendie was the a 19th explosives expert and Chief Inspector of Explosives based at the Arsenal.
Maxey Road
Maxey Road once ran up to Plumstead Common but has been curtailed with 1960s local authority developments. The east side ran alongside Dawson’s brick field
Windsor Castle. Pub dating from the 1880s and demolished in 1971. It was a Courage house.
Windsor Castle Hall. This was a hall attached to the pub. It was a cinema 1909- 1915.
Plumstead Baptist Tabernacle. Dating from 1861 and in use until 1930. This stood on the corner of what was then Dawson Street. They appear at one time to have had a very active cricket club.
Mount Pleasant Road
Built on the site of Plumstead Road Schools
Orchard Road
Orchard Road, is now a side turning but was once the name for the northern end of Ancona Road.
Plumstead High Street
24 Rose and Crown Pub. Closed and now in other use as a restaurant and a hairdressers
Plumstead Road Schools. London School Board School opened in 1879 and included a separate infants’ department.
Plumstead Road
The north side of Plumstead Road on this stretch was entirely taken up by the wall of the Arsenal. There were however gates – Plumstead Gate was opposite the end of Charlotte Street – but these, like the rest of the Arsenal, are not shown on most maps.
47 Lord Panmure Pub. Closed and demolished.
52 Essex Arms. Pub, closed and demolished.
69 Clarence Arms. Pub, closed and demolished.
91 Dover Castle. Pub, closed and demolished
131 Railway Tavern pub. Closed and demolished.
131 Greenwich Islamic Centre. Sharia mosque in a modern centre, with educational and sport facilities. This was built in 1996 following meetings in local houses and is on the site of a derelict pub.
132 Fountain Pub. Closed and demolished.
Plumstead Station. Opened in 1859 it lies between Abbey Wood and Woolwich Arsenal stations on Southern Eastern Trains. It was built on the North Kent Line in 1849 following the huge 19th population increase in Plumstead. The station buildings stand on an over bridge at the country end. These buildings are three-storeys high because the platforms are below in a cutting. The main building appears to be modest and single-storey with some fancy brickwork and tall chimneys. At platform level the trackside façade has three arches, looking like a viaduct, and behind these were the offices and facilities. This design is unique to Plumstead. Both platforms also had a canopy with valances similar to those at Dartford At first there was no footbridge, passengers having to cross the line via the road but a lattice footbridge was installed in 1894 and had a roof for a while. There were three platforms one being an up line facing bay connected to sidings and including a water tower and crane. This was removed in 1926 electrification for electrification and only the tower and crane were left. The track bed of the bay line was in-filled to platform level and a wooden waiting shelter erected there. In the 1960s this shelter was removed along with footbridge roof and the platforms were rebuilt in concrete.
Polthorne Grove
Polthorne Estate. Much council housing of the 1960s of mixed heights, Lyons Israeli Ellis for the G.L.C. 1962-6.
Railway
Signal Box for Plumstead Station was at the western end of the platforms and was opened in 1892 to the South Eastern Railways in- house design. It closed in 1926
The entry point for the North Kent Line to access the Arsenal was known as the Hole in the Wall. It had been originally made in 1824 for a horse drawn tramway. Inside the Arsenal was eventually a huge complex of light and heavy rail lines and systems. There was a single-track connection from the Plumstead goods sidings and this was eventually removed in 1967.
Sidings were provided for the connection to the Arsenal. There were there nine Goods sidings were east of the Plumstead road bridge. Some of these were later electrified and these have been retained.
Railway cutting between Woolwich and Plumstead. Sycamore woodland with bramble and elm. Lots of birds and animals.
Sandbach Place
Foxfield Primary School. This was built in the 1980s on a site previously occupied by housing as an amalgamation of Foxhill School and Bloomfield Road School and is currently being partly rebuilt.
Southport Road
This was once called Station Road
St Margaret's Grove
Shree Kurtch Satsang Swaminarayan Temple. This is in the old drill hall building which was derelict. The temple committee bought the land in 1986. The murtis were ordered from India and arrived by sea. Before the temple, satsangis held sabhas at each other’s homes and at festivals large halls were hired. Eventually the temple was ready and the murtis were moved to their rightful place. The temple was inaugurated in 1988 and His Holiness 1008 Acharya Shree Tejendra Prasadji Maharaj was present.
St. Margaret's School. There is a plaque on the school which says it was Plumstead Central School with funding from the War Department and voluntary sources. The original School building dates back to 1856 with additional classrooms and buildings added in the 1970s.
Vicarage Park
Spiral Garden. A new garden built adjacent to the Azile Everitt block
Vicarage Road.
Deadman's Lane was later Vicarage Road and it was also at one time Bramblebury Lane
Bramblebury House, The Old Vicarage. House which was built between 1790 and 1793. It was the home of Captain Dickinson, Supt. Ordnance in 1811. It was built on the site of a previous mansion called Bramble Briars, part of the Clothworkers' Estate which stretched from Vicarage Park to Plumstead Common Road and since sold off for housing. After the closure of St Margaret's Church it was sold and eventually vandalised, and the interior fittings stolen. But the original interior has been totally lost and it is now flats.
Villas Road
Woolwich College. In 1921 this was founded as Woolwich College of Further Education. In 1998 it amalgamated with Greenwich Community College .The build is by the Greater London Council by architect Frank Kinder and completed in 1967. There has been considerable building and additions since.
Walmer Terrace
Plumstead Radical Club. The Club was founded in 1887 at first in a small building on the corner of Southport Road and Walmer Terrace. The term 'Radicals' fell into disuse with the rise of the Labour Party. Membership grew and by 1891 the Club moved to the present site. It joined the C.I.U in 1892. The 1950s saw increasing membership and bar takings, with the Club becoming more popular than ever. The stage in the concert hall was demolished and a new bar and band rostrum replaced it.
89 Lord Derby. Closed and now in other use
Waverley Crescent
53-57 Plumstead Almshouses. There is a plaque saying they were set up by Colonel Hughes MP in 1896.
Waverley Road
Water Works. A water works was set up in 1861 called the Plumstead, Woolwich, and Charlton Consumers' Pure Water Company using a process of water softening developed by Doctor Clark for which a plant was set up on Shooters Hill. A well was constructed, and the necessary plant was put up by the Company, which, however, afterwards became bankrupt, when the plant was bought by the Kent Waterworks Company in the early 1860s. The company engineer was Samuel Collett Homersham MICE. The well was at was then known as Rose Street (Waverley Road) and there were three further reservoirs from which water and was pumped up to the higher level Heavitree Road reservoir, which acted as a service reservoir. The North Kent Water Company took IT over but was amalgamated with the Kent Water Works in 1864, which in turn became part of the Metropolitan Water Board. The site has been redeveloped with housing.
Sources
AJS. Web site
Aldous. Village London
AMC. Web site
Bygone Kent
Cinema Treasures. Web site
Clunn. The Face of London
Field. London Place Names
Foxfield School. Web site
Glencross. Buildings of Greenwich
Greenwich Antiquarians Transactions
Greenwich Industrial History blog
Greenwich Industrial History. Newsletter
Kent Rail. Web site
London Borough of Greenwich. Local List
London Encyclopaedia
Lost Pubs. Web site
Lotus Club. Web site
Matchless. Web site
Military railways in Kent
Nature Conservation in Greenwich
North West Kent Family History Society. Web site
Norton Villiers. Web site
Plumstead Common Environment Group. Our Common Story
Plumstead Common Environment Group. Web site
Plumstead Radical Club.Web site
Shree Kurtch Satsang Swaminarayan Temple. Web site
Smith. History of Charlton,
South East London Industrial Archaeology
Spurgeon. Discover Greenwich and Charlton
Spurgeon. Discover Woolwich
St. Margaret's School. Web site
St.Patrick’s Church. Web site
St. Patrick’s School. Web site
Woolwich Antiquarians Journal
Woolwich Architecture Trail
The line continues straight eastwards
Post to the west Woolwich
Post to the east Plumstead
Post to the north Broadwater and Arsenal
Ancona Road
St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Primary School. This is an Infant and Junior School with a Nursery. It originated at Coupland Terrace, in an iron building in 1891 and was maintained from Parish funds. In 1893, the new church opened in Conway Rd, and the school was beneath it. A new building opened in 1909. The boys and girls department merged in 1930 to form one school, the infants became a separate school. In 1960 Commonwealth Hall at Abbey Wood was hired from the RACS until St. Thomas –a-Becket School to take the extra children. Up to 1962 St. Patrick’s had secondary pupils but then they joined pupils from St.Peter’s to form a new secondary school at Briset Road. In 1968 a New School was completed, initially Infant School and Offices. The current school hall is the old St. Patrick's Church
Ann Street
The area is now all 1960s local authority housing but the previous terraces were badly bombed in the Second World War. For instance – twelve people from three families killed in their Anderson shelters in October 1940.
104 Royal Standard Pub. This was on the south west corner with Glyndon Road. This dated from at least the 1850s and was still there in 1956. There are now planters on the site and a mosaic panel describing the Glyndon Estate
44 Bridge Tavern. Demolished in 1960
Blendon Terrace
Birds Nest Hole. This is a ravine between Blendon Terrace and Vicarage Park.
Plumstead Common Nature Reserve. This is behind Blendon Terrace and is a wooded area containing which had long been neglected as an unofficial dumping ground. It has now been cleared by local people. It is an area of oak woodland with holly. There are also new steps on the east and west sides of the reserve
St. Margaret’s Church. This was on the site of what is now Azile Everitt House. The church was built in 1858 but had structural problems and was closed in 1966 and later demolished.
Brewery Road
The road was laid out after 1860 when the north side was the site of extensive brick works. This may have been the brickworks belonging to Lewis Davis
Co-op shop opened in 1880 – one of the earliest to be opened by RACS. The store had a bell supplied by Gillett of Croydon. Its fate is not known
South Rise School. The school dates back to 1874 when it was a London School Board school. Initially it was known as Earl Street School and later renamed Earl Rise School. The school at first took boys and girls and there was a separate infants department. It was named South Rise School sometime after 1970.
Richmond Gospel Hall. This is a place of worship for Brethren. The hall is probably post Great War.
Chapel for the Peculiar People. This was on the south side of the road, near or on the junction with Waverley Road and dated from at least the early 1890s. The Peculiar People were an Essex originating sect which became very strong in Plumstead. They are now the Union of Evangelical Churches which does not have a Plumstead branch.
Burrage Grove
Burrage Grove School. This was an early London School Board School built in 1874. It was eventually closed and was used as an adult education centre – part of Thameside Institute and Woolwich College of Further Education. In due course this has become Greenwich Community College.
Burrage Grove Centre used for adult education by Greenwich Community College.
Heronsgate School. A branch of this Thamesmead base infants school, known as their Royal Arsenal centre, opened in 2012 in part of the old Burrage Road School.
Matchless Motor Cycle Factory. The factory was built and owned by the Collier brothers who made Matchless motor cycles here from 1899 to 1966. They had begun manufacture in Herbert road and had won successive TT Races; a Matchless ridden by Charlie Collier won the first single-cylinder race in the first TT in 1907. Colliers produced pedal bicycles in the late 1800s and built their first production motorcycles in 1912 powered by their own units. Colliers designs evolved into the traditional diamond-shaped frame they added one of the first pillion seats in 1903 and chain drive in 1905. They bought AJS in the early 1930s and moved production south from Wolverhampton forming Associated Motorcycles Limited. In the 1960s, the Matchless four-stroke twin was replaced with the Norton twin and by 1967; the Matchless singles had ceased production. It was later part of Norton-Villiers-Triumph and their machines were assembled at Plumstead using engines from Wolverhampton and frames from Manchester. In 1968 the Greater London Council issued a compulsory purchase order and the works closed in July 1969. The main factory site was bordered by Plumstead Road to the north, Maxey Road to the east and Burrage Grove to the south with the race, packing, spares and repairs shops on the south side of Burrage Grove next to the railway line. Burrage Grove was always given as their address.
54 Sunday School. This seems to have been connected to the Woolwich Baptist Tabernacle. It was there until the end of the Great War but by the 1950s had gone.
Burrage Road
The name of the road relates to a local estate known as ‘Borowosh Maner’ in 1464 and derives from Burwash in East Sussex. This part of Plumstead was developed from 1849. Burrage Road led to the Manor house.
16-18 Lotus Club. This was the Co-op Club
Electricity box with embossed Woolwich Coat of arms – corner of Burrage Road and Burrage Place
23 Queen's Arms. Says it is a sports pub
89-91 Crown and Sceptre pub. Long gone
158 Lord Raglan. A pub of 1855
St.James with St. Paul’s Church. This is now converted to housing. The architect is unknown. It was built as a proprietary chapel for Burrage Town in 1855. It became a parish church in 1878. The date of closure is unknown but it was converted in 1966 to the Greenwich Young People's Theatre. This project originated in the 1960s When Greenwich theatre was set up and included a youth theatre. It moved into premises here in 1970. In 2010 the company left Burrage Road for the Tramshed. The church had however acquired an Act of Parliament in 1968 in order to sell it but it was only sold in 1981 and again in 2003 when the theatre left. It was converted to apartments in 2005. Inside were wall tablets to the Pattison family of Pattison's Pit.
St James British School. This was a school for boys and girls at the rear of the church in what is now Congleton Grove. This dated from at least the 1860s.
Congleton Grove
This road is made up of what was Church Terrace or Church Street from Burrage Road and also the renamed southern end of Maxey Road, previously also Percy Terrace
117 The Congleton Arms. This was a Courage pub which was closed and demolished in the early 1970s. A room upstairs was used by the local Masonic Lodge along with a number of provident societies.
Conway Road
St Patricks Roman Catholic chapel. Built in 1893 as a permanent school and church which were built at the corner with Griffin Road. The architect was Alexander Henry Kersey, the vendor of the site. The church was formally opened in 1892. This brick building has a first-floor chapel with a school room below. By 1960 it was too small and the Catholic Church moved to a redundant Anglican church nearby. This building is now used as a weekday and school chapel. A Presbytery is attached.
Dawson Close
This was previously Charles Street – but it was a continuation of Dawson Street, now gone, to the east.
Dawson's Brickfield. This was between Maxey road and Richmond and Pattison Roads. There were two brickyards – run separately by a father and son – and they also had yards at East Wickham and in Dartford,
Durham Rise
The western section of the road lies along the southern boundary of the Kent Water Works site.
Earl Rise
St John's Church. Evangelical Anglican church. The first church here was built in 1883 and demolished in 1953 after damage in the Second World War. This church was built inside the ruined walls using parts of the transept and chancel walls and some of the original windows. It has a rectangular nave and there are two extensions attached for the vestry and a library. The church hall is to the west and it shares the main entrance to the church.
Mosaic Panel the wall of a block of flats which front onto Glyndon Road.
Elmley Street
River Heights. Tower blocks built 1970 with 24 floors
Glyndon Road
Glyndon Road Brickfield owned by Lewis Davis in the early 19th. This was south of the western end of the road
Glyndon Estate This was a redevelopment done in 1959. It had worthy environmental aims with the elimination of through roads and ten acres of open space.
6 William Barefoot produced early Woolwich Labour Party publications here, including the Pioneer
40 The London Lei Zang Si Bhuddist Temple. This was previously the Prince Rupert pub. Originally it was the Park Estate Tavern it dates from the 1880s.
179-359 River Heights. Tower Block. This is a tenant managed co-operative
Amalgamated Engineers Club was here before the Great War. This was on the south west corner with Villas Road on an area which is now parkland.
Primitive Methodist church here in the 1890s. This was on the south east corner with Robert Street.
Griffin Road
2a this long low building is now in use as a restaurant. It seems originally to have been a cow house – presumably for a local dairy.
East Plumstead Baptist Church. The church dates from 1880 however the site is shown as allotments on the 1914 map so the current church is later. It is a red brick church - with staircases either side on the Brewery Road frontage leading to first floor halls. There are crenulations and a spire. There are considerable buildings to the rear and doors going into other halls and rooms. It also supports many organisations, including a pre-school and is a busy centre.
Heavitree Close
Old People’s Dwellings.
Coronation Garden. The garden was provided by the Woolwich Borough Council to commemorate the Coronation of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2 June 1953
Heavitree Road
Reservoir. The Reservoir was built for the Woolwich Plumstead and Charlton Pure Water Consumers Company in 1854 but this later became the Kent Water Co. A plaque above the access doorway is for 1854 –although it is thought this may be the year the roof was added. The reservoir itself may date 1840. It may therefore be longest serving brick built 19th reservoir in London. There are two tanks separated by a common wall and which are divided by a raised walkway along the central dividing wall and linked by arched openings in the upper part of the wall. Cast-iron beams support brick jack arches. The walls are of yellow brick masonry set in a lime mortar. The brick floors fall to a central drain in each tank.
Plumstead Alms-houses were built in 1896. This part of the almshouses was destroyed in the Second World War II but later rebuilt.
Majendie Road
Vivien Majendie was the a 19th explosives expert and Chief Inspector of Explosives based at the Arsenal.
Maxey Road
Maxey Road once ran up to Plumstead Common but has been curtailed with 1960s local authority developments. The east side ran alongside Dawson’s brick field
Windsor Castle. Pub dating from the 1880s and demolished in 1971. It was a Courage house.
Windsor Castle Hall. This was a hall attached to the pub. It was a cinema 1909- 1915.
Plumstead Baptist Tabernacle. Dating from 1861 and in use until 1930. This stood on the corner of what was then Dawson Street. They appear at one time to have had a very active cricket club.
Mount Pleasant Road
Built on the site of Plumstead Road Schools
Orchard Road
Orchard Road, is now a side turning but was once the name for the northern end of Ancona Road.
Plumstead High Street
24 Rose and Crown Pub. Closed and now in other use as a restaurant and a hairdressers
Plumstead Road Schools. London School Board School opened in 1879 and included a separate infants’ department.
Plumstead Road
The north side of Plumstead Road on this stretch was entirely taken up by the wall of the Arsenal. There were however gates – Plumstead Gate was opposite the end of Charlotte Street – but these, like the rest of the Arsenal, are not shown on most maps.
47 Lord Panmure Pub. Closed and demolished.
52 Essex Arms. Pub, closed and demolished.
69 Clarence Arms. Pub, closed and demolished.
91 Dover Castle. Pub, closed and demolished
131 Railway Tavern pub. Closed and demolished.
131 Greenwich Islamic Centre. Sharia mosque in a modern centre, with educational and sport facilities. This was built in 1996 following meetings in local houses and is on the site of a derelict pub.
132 Fountain Pub. Closed and demolished.
Plumstead Station. Opened in 1859 it lies between Abbey Wood and Woolwich Arsenal stations on Southern Eastern Trains. It was built on the North Kent Line in 1849 following the huge 19th population increase in Plumstead. The station buildings stand on an over bridge at the country end. These buildings are three-storeys high because the platforms are below in a cutting. The main building appears to be modest and single-storey with some fancy brickwork and tall chimneys. At platform level the trackside façade has three arches, looking like a viaduct, and behind these were the offices and facilities. This design is unique to Plumstead. Both platforms also had a canopy with valances similar to those at Dartford At first there was no footbridge, passengers having to cross the line via the road but a lattice footbridge was installed in 1894 and had a roof for a while. There were three platforms one being an up line facing bay connected to sidings and including a water tower and crane. This was removed in 1926 electrification for electrification and only the tower and crane were left. The track bed of the bay line was in-filled to platform level and a wooden waiting shelter erected there. In the 1960s this shelter was removed along with footbridge roof and the platforms were rebuilt in concrete.
Polthorne Grove
Polthorne Estate. Much council housing of the 1960s of mixed heights, Lyons Israeli Ellis for the G.L.C. 1962-6.
Railway
Signal Box for Plumstead Station was at the western end of the platforms and was opened in 1892 to the South Eastern Railways in- house design. It closed in 1926
The entry point for the North Kent Line to access the Arsenal was known as the Hole in the Wall. It had been originally made in 1824 for a horse drawn tramway. Inside the Arsenal was eventually a huge complex of light and heavy rail lines and systems. There was a single-track connection from the Plumstead goods sidings and this was eventually removed in 1967.
Sidings were provided for the connection to the Arsenal. There were there nine Goods sidings were east of the Plumstead road bridge. Some of these were later electrified and these have been retained.
Railway cutting between Woolwich and Plumstead. Sycamore woodland with bramble and elm. Lots of birds and animals.
Sandbach Place
Foxfield Primary School. This was built in the 1980s on a site previously occupied by housing as an amalgamation of Foxhill School and Bloomfield Road School and is currently being partly rebuilt.
Southport Road
This was once called Station Road
St Margaret's Grove
Shree Kurtch Satsang Swaminarayan Temple. This is in the old drill hall building which was derelict. The temple committee bought the land in 1986. The murtis were ordered from India and arrived by sea. Before the temple, satsangis held sabhas at each other’s homes and at festivals large halls were hired. Eventually the temple was ready and the murtis were moved to their rightful place. The temple was inaugurated in 1988 and His Holiness 1008 Acharya Shree Tejendra Prasadji Maharaj was present.
St. Margaret's School. There is a plaque on the school which says it was Plumstead Central School with funding from the War Department and voluntary sources. The original School building dates back to 1856 with additional classrooms and buildings added in the 1970s.
Vicarage Park
Spiral Garden. A new garden built adjacent to the Azile Everitt block
Vicarage Road.
Deadman's Lane was later Vicarage Road and it was also at one time Bramblebury Lane
Bramblebury House, The Old Vicarage. House which was built between 1790 and 1793. It was the home of Captain Dickinson, Supt. Ordnance in 1811. It was built on the site of a previous mansion called Bramble Briars, part of the Clothworkers' Estate which stretched from Vicarage Park to Plumstead Common Road and since sold off for housing. After the closure of St Margaret's Church it was sold and eventually vandalised, and the interior fittings stolen. But the original interior has been totally lost and it is now flats.
Villas Road
Woolwich College. In 1921 this was founded as Woolwich College of Further Education. In 1998 it amalgamated with Greenwich Community College .The build is by the Greater London Council by architect Frank Kinder and completed in 1967. There has been considerable building and additions since.
Walmer Terrace
Plumstead Radical Club. The Club was founded in 1887 at first in a small building on the corner of Southport Road and Walmer Terrace. The term 'Radicals' fell into disuse with the rise of the Labour Party. Membership grew and by 1891 the Club moved to the present site. It joined the C.I.U in 1892. The 1950s saw increasing membership and bar takings, with the Club becoming more popular than ever. The stage in the concert hall was demolished and a new bar and band rostrum replaced it.
89 Lord Derby. Closed and now in other use
Waverley Crescent
53-57 Plumstead Almshouses. There is a plaque saying they were set up by Colonel Hughes MP in 1896.
Waverley Road
Water Works. A water works was set up in 1861 called the Plumstead, Woolwich, and Charlton Consumers' Pure Water Company using a process of water softening developed by Doctor Clark for which a plant was set up on Shooters Hill. A well was constructed, and the necessary plant was put up by the Company, which, however, afterwards became bankrupt, when the plant was bought by the Kent Waterworks Company in the early 1860s. The company engineer was Samuel Collett Homersham MICE. The well was at was then known as Rose Street (Waverley Road) and there were three further reservoirs from which water and was pumped up to the higher level Heavitree Road reservoir, which acted as a service reservoir. The North Kent Water Company took IT over but was amalgamated with the Kent Water Works in 1864, which in turn became part of the Metropolitan Water Board. The site has been redeveloped with housing.
Sources
AJS. Web site
Aldous. Village London
AMC. Web site
Bygone Kent
Cinema Treasures. Web site
Clunn. The Face of London
Field. London Place Names
Foxfield School. Web site
Glencross. Buildings of Greenwich
Greenwich Antiquarians Transactions
Greenwich Industrial History blog
Greenwich Industrial History. Newsletter
Kent Rail. Web site
London Borough of Greenwich. Local List
London Encyclopaedia
Lost Pubs. Web site
Lotus Club. Web site
Matchless. Web site
Military railways in Kent
Nature Conservation in Greenwich
North West Kent Family History Society. Web site
Norton Villiers. Web site
Plumstead Common Environment Group. Our Common Story
Plumstead Common Environment Group. Web site
Plumstead Radical Club.Web site
Shree Kurtch Satsang Swaminarayan Temple. Web site
Smith. History of Charlton,
South East London Industrial Archaeology
Spurgeon. Discover Greenwich and Charlton
Spurgeon. Discover Woolwich
St. Margaret's School. Web site
St.Patrick’s Church. Web site
St. Patrick’s School. Web site
Woolwich Antiquarians Journal
Woolwich Architecture Trail
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