Riverside - south of the River,. west of the Tower. Nine Elms
Riverside - south of the River,. west of the Tower. Nine Elms
Post to the east Vauxhall and Riverside
Post to the east Vauxhall and Riverside
Post to the west Battersea - power/dogs/park
Post to the north Battersea Wandsworth Road
Ascalon Street
Previously named Cross Street and renamed in the late 19th the road is said to be named after the biblical town of Ashequelon, where Samson slew the Philistines.
Rose Clubroom and Community Centre1 Duke of Cornwall pub. Now demolished
Battersea Park Road
This square covers only a short stretch of the road between Stewart’s Lane and Kirtling Street. This was formerly Lower Wandsworth Road, the old route from Nine Eels to Battersea Village
Public baths. These were built by Battersea Council in 1901. It was seen as a very dirty area and in need of this facility. The design was by Francis J. Smith, ‘in the Renaissance style. It had a huge swimming bath with galleries so it could be used for other entertainments. There was a reading room, women’s slipper baths and men’s and women’s entrances. Above was the superintendent’s flat, and other rooms and to the rear a public wash-house, and a crèche. Two artesian wells were sunk here. The baths became a centre for radical political meetings, and as a boxing venue. By 1904 it was being referred to as the ‘People’s Hall’. By the 1930s structural defects in the balconies led to them being closed .the baths closed in 1970 and were demolished the following year
St George’s church, parsonage and graveyard. This was a Commissioner’s church built in 1827–8 to serve Nine Eels. The architect was Edward Blore. It was made a district church in 1858. The churchyard was closed as a burial ground in 1858. A new church was opened in Patmore Street in 1955
33 built as. St George’s vicarage by Lathey to Ewan Christian’s designs in 1862–3. This is now flats. There are now lawns and car parks covering the site of the church and graveyard
55 Plough and Harrow pub. Now demolished
101 Duchess Pub. This was originally a pub called the ‘Duchess of York’, built in 1789 and named for the marriage of the Duke of York to Princess Frederica Charlotte of Prussia. It was a new build begun on sites being developed then by Lovell & Peecock. It was demolished in 1883 and rebuilt.
77–87 and 101–113 built in the early 1960s by the Reema Constriction Method for the London County Council. Now painted bright blue
Bradmead
This short road was once part of Stewart’s Lane, cut off when the railway line was built.
21 Flannigan’s, inter-war brick pub. The interior is now a single space but still had is original counter, panelling and wooden surrounds to the fireplaces. In the servery is a dumb waiter worked by ropes. It used to be called the Old Red House.
1 The Pavilion pub
Cringle Street
Cringle Dock Refuse Transfer Station. This is now run by Cory Environmental. It was built by the Greater London Council’s Special Works Department in 1969-71 on the eastern part of a site previously used by Dorman Long ay. . This has a compacting plant at the front, where domestic refuse comes by road to be squashed into containers, which are then transferred at the rear to barges for transportation downriver to the appropriately named Mucking landfill site at Thurrock.
Farmiloe – T.& W. Farmiloe were an old established firm who had a white lead and colour works in part of their nine elms lane complex which also included lead, solder and brass foundries, a large warehouse and a riverside wharf. In 1937 there were 9 or 10 white lead stacks in a building on the corner of Kirtling Street and Cringle Street. The company had offices and showrooms in Rochester Row and other premises in Rochester Street and at Mitcham and elsewhere, although these were closed when they expanded the Nine Elms site. Their other products included the once well known "Nine Elms" brand of paints, varnish, plumber's brass work and sanitary fittings.
Battersea Water Pumping Station. This was built in 1840 for the Southwark Water Company and extended in 1856. It housed a series of Cornish engines used to pump water from the Thames into filter beds. It once housed the largest Cornish engine ever built, with a 112" diameter cylinder. It ceased in this use in the early part of the twentieth century and has had a variety of other uses since then. Although it was listed it was demolished in the autumn of 2014
Cemex. Has had a concrete plant at Kirtling Wharf since the 1960s. The plant handles imports of aggregates via the river, and supplies ready-mix concrete to local construction sites
RMC Aggregates. took on part of the ex-Dorman Long site and converted it to a storage wharf and concrete-mixing plant.
Tideway Tunnel site. Construction site.
Currie Street
This was one of the streets in the area now covered by trading estates in Ponton Road
2 Despard House. This was a club run by Charlotte Despard 1891-1922. Initially as a surgery for local children, it grew into a centre. It was later given to Battersea Council having been renamed Socialist Hall.
30 Crown Pub. Long gone.
Everett Street.
This was one of the streets in the area now covered by trading estates in Ponton Road. It was named for its developer. The whole road has now entirely disappeared
Club run by Charlotte Despard.
Nine Elms Settlement. Founded in 1914 by the Women’s Freedom League established the here, serving children with dinners of vegetarian soup and large slices of pudding
Steam Ship Pub. Long gone
Haward Street
This was one of the streets in the area now covered by trading estates in Ponton Road. The Haward family had had a farm in the area.
1-9 Nine Elms Gas Works. This was a works of the London Gas Light Company which uniquely sold gas to north and south of the river. It began in 1863 as a holder station supplied by the company’s works to the east in Glasshouse Way/Vauxhall Way. It was built as an operational works when the lease on the Vauxhall works ran out. The works was surrounded by a brick wall and in Haward Street were a porter's lodge and the Engineer’s office, the Light office, and the Messenger's lobby. There was a Grand Entrance is from Nine Elms Lane, with two pairs of massive folding doors facing which was a flight of stone steps with ornamental cast iron banisters. Leading to the impressive Board Room – which had never been used. A bad accident here in 1865 killed 11. In 1870 there were “five immense gasholders with double lifts capable of holding in all 7,000,000 cubic feet of gas”.. The company was taken over by the Gas Light and Coke Co (The Chartered) in 1883. The works was bombed in the Second World War and new plant was built post war including a new jetty in 1952, which remains. It was subsequently nationalised. The works was closed in 1970 and the site has been redeveloped,
Kirtling Street
Park Wharf. Used by Henry Carne, Barge builder here in the early 19th.
Crown Wharf. This became Harvey's Wharf in the 1860s and used by the engineering company Harvey’s of Hayle as their London depot. They employed here Foremen, and erection and maintenance personnel
Victoria Wharf .In the 1880s this was the Burnham Brick Co,
The Haven. Riverside area. May have been a house.
RNAS Battersea. These were the RAF's Experimental Workshops here in the Great War.
New Covent Garden
New Convent Garden. Covent Garden market itself dates back to the Middle Ages when the Abbey of Westminster owned the convent garden near The Strand. A regular market grew up and from 1670 was chartered. By the 20th it was clear this was not a convenient location for a major produce market. In 1961 Covent Garden Market Authority was established and they chose Nine Elms at Vauxhall as the new home for the market using the site of the railway goods yard and locomotive depot. Construction began in 1971 to open in 1974. It covers 65 acres and the buildings were by Gollins, Melvin, Ward & Partners, 1970-5 and planned for motor transport with parking and unloading areas. It is a huge wholesale market for fruit and vegetables where retail greengrocers buy produce... There is a brick office tower with shops linked by a bridge to the flower market. The fruit and vegetable market is in two parallel blocks the market serves 40% of the fruit and vegetables eaten outside of the home in London. There are now plans for redevelopment of the area based on some sort of so called ‘regeneration’ for Nine Elms.
Nine Elms Lane
Nine Elms. Marked as this on the Ordnance Survey map of 1822, named from ‘ix elmeslane’ in 1646. The area was low lying and marshy. The name Nine Elms apparently was used about a pub on the south side of the lane which had elms growing in front of it
1 Club Colosseum. Bad news club in vast blocks built in the 1970s as Market Towers. As part of the new Covent Garden. It was designed by Gollins, Melvin, Ward and Partners, 1970-75. And has now been demolished.
Railway dock. This was part of the London to Southampton Railway works. A goods depot was constructed, and a jetty was built out onto the foreshore. A dock was also built exploiting an inlet; the outflow of a ditch which marked the boundary between Lambeth and Battersea. The site remained in use by the railway throughout the 19th. By the mid 20th the railway dock entrance had been infilled,
Railway wharf. This was installed by the railway company in the area adjacent to the dock by 1894.
Government Emigration Depot. This was in the old company offices of the South Western Railway in the mid 19th, where Government sponsored emigrants to Australia were housed before being taken by train to Southampton for disembarkation.
Nine Elms Wharf. This was used for coal transhipment throughout the latter part of the 19th by John Bryan – who I assume is the same John Bryan, or one of the same family, who had numerous works and interests connected with the gas and coal industries in the earlier part of the century.
Randall’s’ Windmill. This mill built in the 18th was on the river’s edge. Randall & Co leased it in the 1770s.
Phoenix Wharf. Francis & White. Charles Francis began here in 1809–10 as a cement merchant in partnership with John Bazley White. In 1819 the firm acquired the patent for Hamelin’s Mastic, used in the then fashionable stucco. Later the firm, as Charles Francis & Son was an important supplier of patented ‘Roman cement’. This was a large factory with a tall tower and a red brick chimney.
Railway Hotel. This pub was opposite the nine elms terminus of the LSWR on the north side of the road. It was present in the early 1840s
Robbins and Miller. This lighterage firm ran a fleet of barges and were handling coal. They were licensed watermen. They were present in the 1840-1860s on a wharf next to the railway goods yard.
41 Nine Elms Brewery. James Farren and Joseph Till leased the Nine Elms Brewery, 1833 - 1841 after which it was acquired by John Mills Thorne with 16 public houses. He was joined by his brother Benjamin Thorne in 1861. Thorne Bros ltd was registered as a limited liability company in 1897. The brewery was built by W. H.Duffield in 1898. There was an impressive chimney and buildings decorated with the brewery name and with decorative gables. In the early 1920s this was added to by buildings on the Hennibique system. They were taken over by the Meux Tottenham Court Road based, Horseshoe Brewery in 1914 and their production was transferred here in 1921. The brewery was then renamed the Horseshoe Brewery and eventually closed in 1964. There was said to be a hop garden behind the brewery.
Tan yard and fellmonger's establishment. This is said to have preceded the brewery on its site.
Bourne Valley Pottery depot. This depot was for Sstanding and Marten whose pottery and clay works was at Branksome, near Bournemouth in Dorset. They made glazed stoneware sewage and sanitary pipes in the 19th.
Palace Wharf. In the late 18th early 19th, as Surrey Wharf . This may/may not have been in use by various members of the Hubert family as barge builders. In the 1820s it may have been used by Hewitt and Ford that had an adjacent malt house. They also handled coal. It was later known as Palace Wharf used by Joseph Sharp, brick and tile merchants. By the 1870s it was used by Hugh Wallace & co. Manufacturing chemists, a long established company with a works in Battersea. In the early 20th it is shown with a lock at the southern end.
Prescot Wharf. Recently listed wharf which appears to be used for flower displays
Seaham Wharf. This was a coal wharf supplying coal from the Marquis of Londonderry’s Durham mines to customers calling at the wharf. Seaham being the port of from which the steam colliers the firm used had embarked from
Newcastle Wharf. This was built 1894 1893. Before this it was owned by E. Underwood & Son, who dealt in horse fodder which arrived as hay baled up in barges.
46 White Swan. This was extant in the late 19th. Now demolished.
Middle Wharf. Shown on maps from the early 20th this was most recently used to handle aggregates. It is/was a safeguarded wharf.
Mill Pond Wharf. This is shown as an inlet to the west of Middle Wharf
Heathwall Pumping Station. Thames Water. Shown on 1913 map as owned by the London County Council. The current building dates from 1962 and is not good looking. It replaced a building of 1901 which was designed for storm water relief.
Battersea Barge. Restaurant and entertainment venue on a moored barge and jetty
Manor House Wharf. In the 1880s this was the Victoria Works of the Wade Disinfectant Syndicate with Wade’s Patent Boiler-covering cements and Wade’s Patent Boiler scale dissolving fluid
69–79 this was a row of traditional cottages which survived until demolished in 1908.
Manor House. This stood on the south side and is said to have had nine trees facing it. It had been built for the Watson family who were whiting and lime manufacturers. It was called Nine Elms House and was demolished around 1880.
Heathfield House. This had been a farmhouse in the 1790s. After 1830 a new owner Edward Haward, pulled down the old house and built a new one. Eventually the whole property was sold to the London Gags Light Company.
Nine Elms tide mill. This was on a small stream or creek which emerged into the river roughly parallel to the point at which Nine Elms Lane becomes Battersea Park Lane. Most of the land here was acquired by Daniel Ponton who was the promoter of a plan to expand the watercourse into a cut leading to a large millpond There was a tide mill here until the mid-19th with a pond acting as a reservoir on the other side of Nine Elms Lane. It was established around 1760 by local landowner Daniel Ponton and presumably leased to a miller along with a granary and other buildings. Henry Darby was a miller at a mill here in the 1860s. There may also have been an associated boat building facility. What is described as ‘the carcase’ of the tide mill together with the remains of a lock was on premises used by the gas company and used for storage. Later the gas company demolished the mill and enlarged the dock. They built a purifier installation above the arm of the dock so that spent lime could tip straight into barges. In 1879 a wharf was built at right angles to the river with hydraulic cranes and a tramway system to the retort house. This dock which, although apparently foreshortened is the now the site for a number of boats, known as Tideway Village.
Mill pond. The tide mill pond was on the south side of the road and on the site later taken for the gas works. It covered about 15 acres.
Workman's Institute and Band room for the gas works. This was apparently used for Mothers' Meetings and Bible readings
Tideway Village. Affordable boat based housing. All the boats are on mains sewerage and have a full refuse collection service. They include converted Thames lighters as well as novel eco boats designed by Bill Dunster.
Mill Bridge this was the bridge which took Nine Elms Lane over the leat going to the mill site and it is said that the gas company sometimes had forty barges here and a vast coal lift. The bridge was humpbacked and a hump remained her well into the 20th. By the early 20th a tramway – a coal conveyor – was built above it taking coal into the gasworks.
Riverlight Quay, new development by St. James on some of the old gas works site.
Riverlight Quay. Nine Elms Tavern a modern pub, opened on the riverside in 2015. It includes an upper deck with views of the river, and a large outdoor terrace
Riverlight Quay. Studio RCA, a Royal College of Apart public exhibition space -- artists, thinkers and makers to host exhibitions, screenings performances seminars and artist residencies - plus a pocket park.
33 Nine Elms Tavern. This pub, on the south side of the road dated to at least the 1850s . It is however said to have had tea gardens and walks in the area later covered by riverside coal wharves.
Kilsby’s Wharf. Edward Kilsby was here in the early 19th - bankrupt in 1827-9. He was a a timber merchant and ship-breaker a wharf, two cranes and a timber yard
Steam saw mills. These were owned by John Pearson and were here in the 1860s
Imperial wharf. Crosse and Blackwell factory built in 1906 to replace their jam and pickle factory which had been demolished for the building of county hall. This was taken over by the Gas Light and Coke Co. In 1924 and which they renamed Watson House. It had been designed by Roumieu and Aitcheson. There were three floors for stores and on another the department testing laboratories with training facilities. In 1933 it became the gas development centre for London. In 1936 it was relocated to Fulham.
Loat. Whiting works and lime-kilns on this riverside dated back at least to the 17th. In 1829 Mary Loat had a whiting works here. She was part of a family with chalk pits in the Lewisham area and a building business in Clapham, she was bankrupt in the 1830s
Iron Steam Packet Co works. Mid 19th
James Atkins lime wharf. Mid 19th
Nine Elms Pottery. This was owned by John Brayne, a brown stone potter and filter maker in the mid 19th. His father operated a pottery in Lambent.
Stationery Office Building. Thus was by PSA architects, a built in 1982. Now demolished,
Post Office building. This was Royal Mail’s South London sorting office, now flogged off and closed. Likely to be a development site any minute
Ponton Road
Named for Daniel Ponton, landowner in the 19th. This road once went to the riverside at Nine Elms Lane. Its current route now takes in other roads on what was a small residential area – now trading estates.
Riverside Malthouses. Malthouses stood here in the area near the brewery. They may have been those of F. Hewitt and W. Ford, who went out of business in 1827. By the 1860s the maltings were in the hands of members of the Swonnell family in partnership for a time with a Mr. Smith. It was then known as the Patent Malt Works. In 1900 Swonnells were negotiatig with sites in East Anglia to move their business nearer to the source of the raw materials.
Ponton Road School. This had originated as a branch of St George's National School. Ponton Road School was opened by the London School Board in 1885 and the earlier school was closed. The top floors became a Day Industrial School in it 1902 was taken over from the School Board for London in 1904. The Infants’ School remained on the ground floor and there were objections to this. In 1912 it was adapted as a remand home to replace Camberwell Green Remand Home. It was used for girls and young boys until December 1929 boys were sent there subsequently. It closed imp 1936
2-12 Inner London Education Authority Nine Elms School Bus Garage
42 Christies. Fine art auctioneers warehouse. Currently being redeveloped for housing.
Railway
The great swathe of railway lines on this square consist of the running lines going into Waterloo Station via Vauxhall and lines going into the Nine Elms Goods Depots (slightly to the east of this square). These originated with tithe London and South West Railway.
Locomotive Works. Between the lines on the 1869 OS map is the Running Shed’ which is said to have been the site of the mill pond for the tide mill. South of this were the Nine Elms Locomotive Works. These sheds gad suffered a fire in 1841. They were rebuilt and from 1843 were used to construct over one hundred new locomotives for the company, to the designs of John Viret Gooch and Joseph Hamilton Beattie. South of these works were more sidings and round tables constructed in the early 1860s. The company enlarged the workshops on a number of occasions and at its height in 1904 the locomotive works employed 2,438 men, building 22 and repairing 450 locomotives in a year. By the mid-1880s it was clear that further expansion at Nine Elms would be impossible and the various works moved to Eastleigh in Hampshire
Motive Power Depot. This serviced locomotives for Waterloo Station. In 1838 it had been on the north side of the main line but this was closed and demolished in 1865. A replacement for these sheds, on the south of the main line, was opened in 1865 and demolished in 1876 to make way for the widening of the main line. A brick semi roundhouse was built in 1876 and demolished in 1909 A fifteen track shed was opened in 1885, called the 'Old Shed'. Next to it was a ten-line shed built in 1910 called the 'New Shed'. The depot was demolished in 1967, after the end of steam working out of Waterloo. It is all now a part of Covent Garden Market
Savona Street
Site for housing estate built by the London County Council from 1938 onwards. In 1960 they added three 11-storey blocks and three lower blocks built from pre-cast units by the patent Reema Construction method. Most have been demolished
Sleaford Street
55 Dairy Crest Depot. Along with the whole industrial estate this is scheduled for demolition in favour of yet more flats. It was previously Express Dairies
31 John Oswald Iron Foundry. Founded 1871 by Scottish engineer John Oswald. Millwrights, iron founders & pattern makers – and ‘quick repairs’.
Thessaly Road
St George’s School. This began as St. George's National School when John Spencer Lucas, in 1857, gave a plot of land in what was then called New Street for a school for children and adults of the working classes. In 1895 some of the school premises were sold to the South Western Railway Company and the money was used for improvements. It is now a Church of England Primary School supported by the local authority.
Wandsworth Road
128-130 Southbank Club. The site had been used for the Clock Tower Cinema from 1921. It was purchased by Bernstein Theatres and demolished in 1936. It was opened as The Granada by Granada Theatres Ltd. It was designed by architects E.D. Lyons, L. Israel and C.H. Elsom. There is a brick tower over the entrance, which had a vertical fin sign on it. Inside were decorative motifs depicting musical instruments by Frank Dobson. There was a Wurlitzer 3Manual/8Rank organ and a fully equipped stage. It closed in 1940 when it had been bombed and bombed again before it could reopen. It eventually re-opened in 1949. In the early 1960’s bingo sessions were introduced and the last films were shown in 1967. The bingo club closed in 1977 and it became a skate-board centre. In 1986, it re-opened as the London South Bank Squash and Fitness Club, today known as the Southbank Club.
Woodgate Street
St. James Mission Church. In 1870 Thorne Brothers of Nine Elms Brewery, sponsored a subsidiary school to St George’s Schools and in 1870 later added few cottages and a meeting hall. When Ponton Road Board School was built the earlier school became St James’s Mission Church and Hall
Sources
Bartlett School. Survey of London. Battersea. Web site
Barton. London’s Lost Rivers
Cinema Treasures. Web site
Clunn. The Face of London
Duchess. Web site
Field. Place names of London
Francis. History of the Cement Industry,
GLIAS Newsletter
Grace’s Guide. Web site
London Encyclopaedia
Morris. Archives of the Chemical Industry
New Covent Garden. Web site
Old Bailey. Online. Web site
Pearson. British Breweries
Pevsner and Cherry South London
Port of London Magazine
Simmonds. All About Battersea
Stewart. North Thames Gasworks
Thames Basin Archaeology of Industry. Report
Wikipedia Web site. (Horseshoe Brewery, Nine Elms Locomotive Depot, Covent Garden Market)
Ascalon Street
Previously named Cross Street and renamed in the late 19th the road is said to be named after the biblical town of Ashequelon, where Samson slew the Philistines.
Rose Clubroom and Community Centre1 Duke of Cornwall pub. Now demolished
Battersea Park Road
This square covers only a short stretch of the road between Stewart’s Lane and Kirtling Street. This was formerly Lower Wandsworth Road, the old route from Nine Eels to Battersea Village
Public baths. These were built by Battersea Council in 1901. It was seen as a very dirty area and in need of this facility. The design was by Francis J. Smith, ‘in the Renaissance style. It had a huge swimming bath with galleries so it could be used for other entertainments. There was a reading room, women’s slipper baths and men’s and women’s entrances. Above was the superintendent’s flat, and other rooms and to the rear a public wash-house, and a crèche. Two artesian wells were sunk here. The baths became a centre for radical political meetings, and as a boxing venue. By 1904 it was being referred to as the ‘People’s Hall’. By the 1930s structural defects in the balconies led to them being closed .the baths closed in 1970 and were demolished the following year
St George’s church, parsonage and graveyard. This was a Commissioner’s church built in 1827–8 to serve Nine Eels. The architect was Edward Blore. It was made a district church in 1858. The churchyard was closed as a burial ground in 1858. A new church was opened in Patmore Street in 1955
33 built as. St George’s vicarage by Lathey to Ewan Christian’s designs in 1862–3. This is now flats. There are now lawns and car parks covering the site of the church and graveyard
55 Plough and Harrow pub. Now demolished
101 Duchess Pub. This was originally a pub called the ‘Duchess of York’, built in 1789 and named for the marriage of the Duke of York to Princess Frederica Charlotte of Prussia. It was a new build begun on sites being developed then by Lovell & Peecock. It was demolished in 1883 and rebuilt.
77–87 and 101–113 built in the early 1960s by the Reema Constriction Method for the London County Council. Now painted bright blue
Bradmead
This short road was once part of Stewart’s Lane, cut off when the railway line was built.
21 Flannigan’s, inter-war brick pub. The interior is now a single space but still had is original counter, panelling and wooden surrounds to the fireplaces. In the servery is a dumb waiter worked by ropes. It used to be called the Old Red House.
1 The Pavilion pub
Cringle Street
Cringle Dock Refuse Transfer Station. This is now run by Cory Environmental. It was built by the Greater London Council’s Special Works Department in 1969-71 on the eastern part of a site previously used by Dorman Long ay. . This has a compacting plant at the front, where domestic refuse comes by road to be squashed into containers, which are then transferred at the rear to barges for transportation downriver to the appropriately named Mucking landfill site at Thurrock.
Farmiloe – T.& W. Farmiloe were an old established firm who had a white lead and colour works in part of their nine elms lane complex which also included lead, solder and brass foundries, a large warehouse and a riverside wharf. In 1937 there were 9 or 10 white lead stacks in a building on the corner of Kirtling Street and Cringle Street. The company had offices and showrooms in Rochester Row and other premises in Rochester Street and at Mitcham and elsewhere, although these were closed when they expanded the Nine Elms site. Their other products included the once well known "Nine Elms" brand of paints, varnish, plumber's brass work and sanitary fittings.
Battersea Water Pumping Station. This was built in 1840 for the Southwark Water Company and extended in 1856. It housed a series of Cornish engines used to pump water from the Thames into filter beds. It once housed the largest Cornish engine ever built, with a 112" diameter cylinder. It ceased in this use in the early part of the twentieth century and has had a variety of other uses since then. Although it was listed it was demolished in the autumn of 2014
Cemex. Has had a concrete plant at Kirtling Wharf since the 1960s. The plant handles imports of aggregates via the river, and supplies ready-mix concrete to local construction sites
RMC Aggregates. took on part of the ex-Dorman Long site and converted it to a storage wharf and concrete-mixing plant.
Tideway Tunnel site. Construction site.
Currie Street
This was one of the streets in the area now covered by trading estates in Ponton Road
2 Despard House. This was a club run by Charlotte Despard 1891-1922. Initially as a surgery for local children, it grew into a centre. It was later given to Battersea Council having been renamed Socialist Hall.
30 Crown Pub. Long gone.
Everett Street.
This was one of the streets in the area now covered by trading estates in Ponton Road. It was named for its developer. The whole road has now entirely disappeared
Club run by Charlotte Despard.
Nine Elms Settlement. Founded in 1914 by the Women’s Freedom League established the here, serving children with dinners of vegetarian soup and large slices of pudding
Steam Ship Pub. Long gone
Haward Street
This was one of the streets in the area now covered by trading estates in Ponton Road. The Haward family had had a farm in the area.
1-9 Nine Elms Gas Works. This was a works of the London Gas Light Company which uniquely sold gas to north and south of the river. It began in 1863 as a holder station supplied by the company’s works to the east in Glasshouse Way/Vauxhall Way. It was built as an operational works when the lease on the Vauxhall works ran out. The works was surrounded by a brick wall and in Haward Street were a porter's lodge and the Engineer’s office, the Light office, and the Messenger's lobby. There was a Grand Entrance is from Nine Elms Lane, with two pairs of massive folding doors facing which was a flight of stone steps with ornamental cast iron banisters. Leading to the impressive Board Room – which had never been used. A bad accident here in 1865 killed 11. In 1870 there were “five immense gasholders with double lifts capable of holding in all 7,000,000 cubic feet of gas”.. The company was taken over by the Gas Light and Coke Co (The Chartered) in 1883. The works was bombed in the Second World War and new plant was built post war including a new jetty in 1952, which remains. It was subsequently nationalised. The works was closed in 1970 and the site has been redeveloped,
Kirtling Street
Park Wharf. Used by Henry Carne, Barge builder here in the early 19th.
Crown Wharf. This became Harvey's Wharf in the 1860s and used by the engineering company Harvey’s of Hayle as their London depot. They employed here Foremen, and erection and maintenance personnel
Victoria Wharf .In the 1880s this was the Burnham Brick Co,
The Haven. Riverside area. May have been a house.
RNAS Battersea. These were the RAF's Experimental Workshops here in the Great War.
New Covent Garden
New Convent Garden. Covent Garden market itself dates back to the Middle Ages when the Abbey of Westminster owned the convent garden near The Strand. A regular market grew up and from 1670 was chartered. By the 20th it was clear this was not a convenient location for a major produce market. In 1961 Covent Garden Market Authority was established and they chose Nine Elms at Vauxhall as the new home for the market using the site of the railway goods yard and locomotive depot. Construction began in 1971 to open in 1974. It covers 65 acres and the buildings were by Gollins, Melvin, Ward & Partners, 1970-5 and planned for motor transport with parking and unloading areas. It is a huge wholesale market for fruit and vegetables where retail greengrocers buy produce... There is a brick office tower with shops linked by a bridge to the flower market. The fruit and vegetable market is in two parallel blocks the market serves 40% of the fruit and vegetables eaten outside of the home in London. There are now plans for redevelopment of the area based on some sort of so called ‘regeneration’ for Nine Elms.
Nine Elms Lane
Nine Elms. Marked as this on the Ordnance Survey map of 1822, named from ‘ix elmeslane’ in 1646. The area was low lying and marshy. The name Nine Elms apparently was used about a pub on the south side of the lane which had elms growing in front of it
1 Club Colosseum. Bad news club in vast blocks built in the 1970s as Market Towers. As part of the new Covent Garden. It was designed by Gollins, Melvin, Ward and Partners, 1970-75. And has now been demolished.
Railway dock. This was part of the London to Southampton Railway works. A goods depot was constructed, and a jetty was built out onto the foreshore. A dock was also built exploiting an inlet; the outflow of a ditch which marked the boundary between Lambeth and Battersea. The site remained in use by the railway throughout the 19th. By the mid 20th the railway dock entrance had been infilled,
Railway wharf. This was installed by the railway company in the area adjacent to the dock by 1894.
Government Emigration Depot. This was in the old company offices of the South Western Railway in the mid 19th, where Government sponsored emigrants to Australia were housed before being taken by train to Southampton for disembarkation.
Nine Elms Wharf. This was used for coal transhipment throughout the latter part of the 19th by John Bryan – who I assume is the same John Bryan, or one of the same family, who had numerous works and interests connected with the gas and coal industries in the earlier part of the century.
Randall’s’ Windmill. This mill built in the 18th was on the river’s edge. Randall & Co leased it in the 1770s.
Phoenix Wharf. Francis & White. Charles Francis began here in 1809–10 as a cement merchant in partnership with John Bazley White. In 1819 the firm acquired the patent for Hamelin’s Mastic, used in the then fashionable stucco. Later the firm, as Charles Francis & Son was an important supplier of patented ‘Roman cement’. This was a large factory with a tall tower and a red brick chimney.
Railway Hotel. This pub was opposite the nine elms terminus of the LSWR on the north side of the road. It was present in the early 1840s
Robbins and Miller. This lighterage firm ran a fleet of barges and were handling coal. They were licensed watermen. They were present in the 1840-1860s on a wharf next to the railway goods yard.
41 Nine Elms Brewery. James Farren and Joseph Till leased the Nine Elms Brewery, 1833 - 1841 after which it was acquired by John Mills Thorne with 16 public houses. He was joined by his brother Benjamin Thorne in 1861. Thorne Bros ltd was registered as a limited liability company in 1897. The brewery was built by W. H.Duffield in 1898. There was an impressive chimney and buildings decorated with the brewery name and with decorative gables. In the early 1920s this was added to by buildings on the Hennibique system. They were taken over by the Meux Tottenham Court Road based, Horseshoe Brewery in 1914 and their production was transferred here in 1921. The brewery was then renamed the Horseshoe Brewery and eventually closed in 1964. There was said to be a hop garden behind the brewery.
Tan yard and fellmonger's establishment. This is said to have preceded the brewery on its site.
Bourne Valley Pottery depot. This depot was for Sstanding and Marten whose pottery and clay works was at Branksome, near Bournemouth in Dorset. They made glazed stoneware sewage and sanitary pipes in the 19th.
Palace Wharf. In the late 18th early 19th, as Surrey Wharf . This may/may not have been in use by various members of the Hubert family as barge builders. In the 1820s it may have been used by Hewitt and Ford that had an adjacent malt house. They also handled coal. It was later known as Palace Wharf used by Joseph Sharp, brick and tile merchants. By the 1870s it was used by Hugh Wallace & co. Manufacturing chemists, a long established company with a works in Battersea. In the early 20th it is shown with a lock at the southern end.
Prescot Wharf. Recently listed wharf which appears to be used for flower displays
Seaham Wharf. This was a coal wharf supplying coal from the Marquis of Londonderry’s Durham mines to customers calling at the wharf. Seaham being the port of from which the steam colliers the firm used had embarked from
Newcastle Wharf. This was built 1894 1893. Before this it was owned by E. Underwood & Son, who dealt in horse fodder which arrived as hay baled up in barges.
46 White Swan. This was extant in the late 19th. Now demolished.
Middle Wharf. Shown on maps from the early 20th this was most recently used to handle aggregates. It is/was a safeguarded wharf.
Mill Pond Wharf. This is shown as an inlet to the west of Middle Wharf
Heathwall Pumping Station. Thames Water. Shown on 1913 map as owned by the London County Council. The current building dates from 1962 and is not good looking. It replaced a building of 1901 which was designed for storm water relief.
Battersea Barge. Restaurant and entertainment venue on a moored barge and jetty
Manor House Wharf. In the 1880s this was the Victoria Works of the Wade Disinfectant Syndicate with Wade’s Patent Boiler-covering cements and Wade’s Patent Boiler scale dissolving fluid
69–79 this was a row of traditional cottages which survived until demolished in 1908.
Manor House. This stood on the south side and is said to have had nine trees facing it. It had been built for the Watson family who were whiting and lime manufacturers. It was called Nine Elms House and was demolished around 1880.
Heathfield House. This had been a farmhouse in the 1790s. After 1830 a new owner Edward Haward, pulled down the old house and built a new one. Eventually the whole property was sold to the London Gags Light Company.
Nine Elms tide mill. This was on a small stream or creek which emerged into the river roughly parallel to the point at which Nine Elms Lane becomes Battersea Park Lane. Most of the land here was acquired by Daniel Ponton who was the promoter of a plan to expand the watercourse into a cut leading to a large millpond There was a tide mill here until the mid-19th with a pond acting as a reservoir on the other side of Nine Elms Lane. It was established around 1760 by local landowner Daniel Ponton and presumably leased to a miller along with a granary and other buildings. Henry Darby was a miller at a mill here in the 1860s. There may also have been an associated boat building facility. What is described as ‘the carcase’ of the tide mill together with the remains of a lock was on premises used by the gas company and used for storage. Later the gas company demolished the mill and enlarged the dock. They built a purifier installation above the arm of the dock so that spent lime could tip straight into barges. In 1879 a wharf was built at right angles to the river with hydraulic cranes and a tramway system to the retort house. This dock which, although apparently foreshortened is the now the site for a number of boats, known as Tideway Village.
Mill pond
Workman's Institute and Band room for the gas works. This was apparently used for Mothers' Meetings and Bible readings
Tideway Village. Affordable boat based housing. All the boats are on mains sewerage and have a full refuse collection service. They include converted Thames lighters as well as novel eco boats designed by Bill Dunster.
Mill Bridge this was the bridge which took Nine Elms Lane over the leat going to the mill site and it is said that the gas company sometimes had forty barges here and a vast coal lift. The bridge was humpbacked and a hump remained her well into the 20th. By the early 20th a tramway – a coal conveyor – was built above it taking coal into the gasworks.
Riverlight Quay, new development by St. James on some of the old gas works site.
Riverlight Quay. Nine Elms Tavern a modern pub, opened on the riverside in 2015. It includes an upper deck with views of the river, and a large outdoor terrace
Riverlight Quay. Studio RCA, a Royal College of Apart public exhibition space -- artists, thinkers and makers to host exhibitions, screenings performances seminars and artist residencies - plus a pocket park.
33 Nine Elms Tavern. This pub, on the south side of the road dated to at least the 1850s . It is however said to have had tea gardens and walks in the area later covered by riverside coal wharves.
Kilsby’s Wharf. Edward Kilsby was here in the early 19th - bankrupt in 1827-9. He was a a timber merchant and ship-breaker a wharf, two cranes and a timber yard
Steam saw mills. These were owned by John Pearson and were here in the 1860s
Imperial wharf. Crosse and Blackwell factory built in 1906 to replace their jam and pickle factory which had been demolished for the building of county hall. This was taken over by the Gas Light and Coke Co. In 1924 and which they renamed Watson House. It had been designed by Roumieu and Aitcheson. There were three floors for stores and on another the department testing laboratories with training facilities. In 1933 it became the gas development centre for London. In 1936 it was relocated to Fulham.
Loat. Whiting works and lime-kilns on this riverside dated back at least to the 17th. In 1829 Mary Loat had a whiting works here. She was part of a family with chalk pits in the Lewisham area and a building business in Clapham, she was bankrupt in the 1830s
Iron Steam Packet Co works. Mid 19th
James Atkins lime wharf. Mid 19th
Nine Elms Pottery. This was owned by John Brayne, a brown stone potter and filter maker in the mid 19th. His father operated a pottery in Lambent.
Stationery Office Building. Thus was by PSA architects, a built in 1982. Now demolished,
Post Office building. This was Royal Mail’s South London sorting office, now flogged off and closed. Likely to be a development site any minute
Ponton Road
Named for Daniel Ponton, landowner in the 19th. This road once went to the riverside at Nine Elms Lane. Its current route now takes in other roads on what was a small residential area – now trading estates.
Riverside Malthouses. Malthouses stood here in the area near the brewery. They may have been those of F. Hewitt and W. Ford, who went out of business in 1827. By the 1860s the maltings were in the hands of members of the Swonnell family in partnership for a time with a Mr. Smith. It was then known as the Patent Malt Works. In 1900 Swonnells were negotiatig with sites in East Anglia to move their business nearer to the source of the raw materials.
Ponton Road School. This had originated as a branch of St George's National School. Ponton Road School was opened by the London School Board in 1885 and the earlier school was closed. The top floors became a Day Industrial School in it 1902 was taken over from the School Board for London in 1904. The Infants’ School remained on the ground floor and there were objections to this. In 1912 it was adapted as a remand home to replace Camberwell Green Remand Home. It was used for girls and young boys until December 1929 boys were sent there subsequently. It closed imp 1936
2-12 Inner London Education Authority Nine Elms School Bus Garage
42 Christies. Fine art auctioneers warehouse. Currently being redeveloped for housing.
Railway
The great swathe of railway lines on this square consist of the running lines going into Waterloo Station via Vauxhall and lines going into the Nine Elms Goods Depots (slightly to the east of this square). These originated with tithe London and South West Railway.
Locomotive Works. Between the lines on the 1869 OS map is the Running Shed’ which is said to have been the site of the mill pond for the tide mill. South of this were the Nine Elms Locomotive Works. These sheds gad suffered a fire in 1841. They were rebuilt and from 1843 were used to construct over one hundred new locomotives for the company, to the designs of John Viret Gooch and Joseph Hamilton Beattie. South of these works were more sidings and round tables constructed in the early 1860s. The company enlarged the workshops on a number of occasions and at its height in 1904 the locomotive works employed 2,438 men, building 22 and repairing 450 locomotives in a year. By the mid-1880s it was clear that further expansion at Nine Elms would be impossible and the various works moved to Eastleigh in Hampshire
Motive Power Depot. This serviced locomotives for Waterloo Station. In 1838 it had been on the north side of the main line but this was closed and demolished in 1865. A replacement for these sheds, on the south of the main line, was opened in 1865 and demolished in 1876 to make way for the widening of the main line. A brick semi roundhouse was built in 1876 and demolished in 1909 A fifteen track shed was opened in 1885, called the 'Old Shed'. Next to it was a ten-line shed built in 1910 called the 'New Shed'. The depot was demolished in 1967, after the end of steam working out of Waterloo. It is all now a part of Covent Garden Market
Savona Street
Site for housing estate built by the London County Council from 1938 onwards. In 1960 they added three 11-storey blocks and three lower blocks built from pre-cast units by the patent Reema Construction method. Most have been demolished
Sleaford Street
55 Dairy Crest Depot. Along with the whole industrial estate this is scheduled for demolition in favour of yet more flats. It was previously Express Dairies
31 John Oswald Iron Foundry. Founded 1871 by Scottish engineer John Oswald. Millwrights, iron founders & pattern makers – and ‘quick repairs’.
Thessaly Road
St George’s School. This began as St. George's National School when John Spencer Lucas, in 1857, gave a plot of land in what was then called New Street for a school for children and adults of the working classes. In 1895 some of the school premises were sold to the South Western Railway Company and the money was used for improvements. It is now a Church of England Primary School supported by the local authority.
Wandsworth Road
128-130 Southbank Club. The site had been used for the Clock Tower Cinema from 1921. It was purchased by Bernstein Theatres and demolished in 1936. It was opened as The Granada by Granada Theatres Ltd. It was designed by architects E.D. Lyons, L. Israel and C.H. Elsom. There is a brick tower over the entrance, which had a vertical fin sign on it. Inside were decorative motifs depicting musical instruments by Frank Dobson. There was a Wurlitzer 3Manual/8Rank organ and a fully equipped stage. It closed in 1940 when it had been bombed and bombed again before it could reopen. It eventually re-opened in 1949. In the early 1960’s bingo sessions were introduced and the last films were shown in 1967. The bingo club closed in 1977 and it became a skate-board centre. In 1986, it re-opened as the London South Bank Squash and Fitness Club, today known as the Southbank Club.
Woodgate Street
St. James Mission Church. In 1870 Thorne Brothers of Nine Elms Brewery, sponsored a subsidiary school to St George’s Schools and in 1870 later added few cottages and a meeting hall. When Ponton Road Board School was built the earlier school became St James’s Mission Church and Hall
Sources
Bartlett School. Survey of London. Battersea. Web site
Barton. London’s Lost Rivers
Cinema Treasures. Web site
Clunn. The Face of London
Duchess. Web site
Field. Place names of London
Francis. History of the Cement Industry,
GLIAS Newsletter
Grace’s Guide. Web site
London Encyclopaedia
Morris. Archives of the Chemical Industry
New Covent Garden. Web site
Old Bailey. Online. Web site
Pearson. British Breweries
Pevsner and Cherry South London
Port of London Magazine
Simmonds. All About Battersea
Stewart. North Thames Gasworks
Thames Basin Archaeology of Industry. Report
Wikipedia Web site. (Horseshoe Brewery, Nine Elms Locomotive Depot, Covent Garden Market)
Comments