Edith's Streets

Post to the north Brick Kiln Wood Post to the south Ockendon Junction 30 Ash Plantation Ash Plantation is an integral part of Thames Chase Community Forest. It was part of the original landscape garden of Belhus House designed in the 18th by Richard Woods and Lancelot “Capability” Brown. Bellhus Park Belhus – the names comes from 14th tenants who are said to have come from Ramsden Bellhouse. By the early 15th the Barrett family had inherited a share of the estate and by the mid 17th had built up a large estate. John Barrett rebuilt Belhus House in the early 16th and in 1618 Edward Barrett obtained a license for a park. Thomas Barrett-Lennard, Lord Dacre, made improvements 1744 – 1777 and Lancelot Brown was commissioned to remodel the grounds. In 1923 Thomas Barrett Lennard, who lived elsewhere, dispersed the contents of the house. After the Second World War the park was bought by Essex County Council and developed as a recreation centre, with swimming pool, gym, and golf cour...

Post to the north North Ockendon Post to the west Dennises Lane Dennis’s Road Kemps Farm . Early 19th farm house Field House M25 Railway Level crossing Sources British Listed Buildings. Web site Essex County Archive. Web site

Post to the north Thames Chase Forest Centre Post to the west Cranham Marsh Post to the south North Ockendon Church Lane 7-8 cottages built around 1870 St Mary’s Church of England School . This is now Bell House and Benyon House. In 1842 here a day-school and teacher's house were built by subscription on land in Church Lane owned by Richard Benyon de Beauvoir, lord of the manor. The family remained owners of the school.  There are two large school rooms with boys and girls entrances either side. It was rebuilt in 1902 by James Benyon, It was bomb damaged in 1944 and the county council suggested its closure.  It remained open, however but has since closed. Reading Room Cottages. This wis the Parish Reading Room, a gift of Richard Benyon. Vestry meetings were held there from 1906 to 1910 Garden walls to former North Ockendon Hall 16th and later Remembrance Cottages . These houses were conveyed to trustees in 1930 by Champion Branfill Russell of Stubbers, as almshou...

Post to the north Cranham Post to the south North Ockendon M25 Pike Lane Broadfields Farm. This is now Thames Chase Forest Centre Barn. This is a timber building. There are also 19th stables. Visitor Centre . This is a timber ‘A frame’ building with cedar shingles attached to the barn. Designed by Laurie Wood in 2005. This is the Forest Centre for the Community Forest. woods, meadows, ponds and paths are landscaped on disused farmland. There is a wide variety of wildlife including water voles and newts Ford education room. This is converted from the farm cart shed and used by schools and community groups for study, as a conference centre and for private hire Orchard. This is  planted with traditional Essex apple and pear varieties. Play areas for children, including the Ants Nest, Snake Stepping Stones, Hollow Logs and the Trusty Oak. St.Mary’s Lane Cranham Court. The current building is early 20th and is now a care home. It was originally called Cranham Holme, wit...

London/Essex Boundary.  The Boundary runs down the M25 Post to the north Great Warley Post to the east Parkers Shaw Beredens Lane Beredens was a small independent manor with a house and estate.  By the 1830s the house was known as "Bellevue" by this time and there were also two cottages rented to labourers. The estate was divided and sold in 1865  and in 1918 there was a further sale. The house was destroyed during the Second World War. In 1971 it was sold to the Greater London Council. Concrete foundations may still be observed where the house stood. Folkes Lane Folkes Lane Woodland. From four arable field grouped around a steep hill this has become a major landmark, tucked between the A127 and M25. From its top are vistas south over the River Thames to the North Downs and west across London’s Docklands and Canary Wharf. Over 90,000 native trees are on site, providing a screen to the M25 motorway. M25 Beredens Lane path over the motorway. Between junctions ...

Post to the east Horseman Side Post to the south Navestock Common Post to the Murthering Lane Old Road Loft Hall . Late 18th house in red brick. It has been adapted from an earlier  17th house. Inside is 16th panelling from the old house. There are 18th references to ‘Lost Hall’. Black Cottage Navestock Heath House Sources British Listed Buildings. Web site

Post to the south Lambourne Post to the west Hobbs Cross Road Post to the north Theydon Mount Post to the west Stapleford Tawney Epping Lane Theydon Mount Kennels Hilly Spring Bartlemey Grove Bush Grove Abridge Golf and Country Club  The 18 hole course was designed, in 1962 by Henry Cotton. There are practice facilities including a driving range, 18 hole putting green, chipping area, practice bunkers and a par 3 course. Skinners Farm . The farmhouse is 17th M25 Sources British Listed Buildings. Web site Abridge Golf Club. Web site

Post to the west Copped Hall Estate Post to the south Great Monk Wood Bell Common Bell Common is no longer managed as a common and it is rapidly being taken over by scrub and young woodland. A major part of Bell Common is in the square to the east. The common is a stretch of mixed woodland and grassland that begins at Ambresbury Banks and meanders, mainly along the roadside to Epping.  The Common thus provides an area of transition between Epping Forest and the built-up area, historically as part of a ‘purlieu’, a buffer zone where some, but not all, forest laws applied. a raised ‘purlieu bank’ is still visible along its south side. The common was included among the lands protected as public open space under the Epping Forest Act in 1878, and is now part of the Green Belt and a conservation area, Beacon  It was once known as ‘Beacon Common’ . From at least the 14th this was the site of a beacon to warn London of invasion. it has been suggested that the settlement of E...

Post to the west Upshirebury Post to the east Ambresbury Banks Brambly Shaw Woodland and wildlife area managed by the City Corporation Copthall Green Crown Hill Good Intent. This pub dates from at least the 1850s. It includes what is described as a ‘country garden’. Crown Hill Farm Raveners Farm. The farmhouse is an 18th red brick building Crown Hill Nursery. Garden Centre and shop Copped Hall Green Farm. This was the Rose and Crown Pub dating from the 1840s. About 1903 it became a Temperance Hotel and forest retreat. M25 Sources Garden Centre Guide. Web site Good Intent. Web site Historic England. Web site Pub History. Web site

Post to the south Upshire Honey Lane Post to the west Ninefields Estate Post to the east Crown Hill Blind Lane A green pathway between trees and hedges Green Lane A green pathway between hedges which eventually crosses the motorway. Road names are confusing and on some maps the section crossing the motorway and continuing to Upshire is marked as Woodredon Farm Lane. Potkiln Wood. There is a remnant pottery site in the wood Green Lane Bungalows Horseshoe Hill Sergeants Green Upshirebury Green Copthall Green School. This is marked on maps of the 1870 and annotated as ‘licenced for divine worship”.  The building continues marked as a school until the Second World War. Home for Feeble Minded Boys (John Nicks). This was set up here in the late 19th by the National Society for Promoting the Welfare of the Feeble – Minded under the auspices of the Charity Organisation Society. Boys were ‘trained’ in cookery and farming, being sent to work on local farms. The referenc...

Post to the west M25 Junction 25 High Beech Post to the north Upshirebury Claypit Hill This is the steep winding road that cuts Honey Lane Quarters in half. An older name for it is Honey Lane (Buxton).  It was once a rat-run’ across High Beach to the M25 and it was experimentally closed, but now has pinch points and road humps. Honey Lane The road name is recorded in 1408 Jewish Cemetery. This Cemetery was officially opened in 1960 although some land was bought in 1926. It caters for members of the United Synagogue who live in the east London. There is a Holocaust Memorial consecrated in 1985 under US auspices. In the Prayer Hall is a War Memorial Plaque as a Plain rectangular stone tablet to 26 dead with inscription in black lettering.  It says Second Great War (1939-45) (Hebrew text)  "How are the mighty fallen! May the weapons of war perish forever." This plaque was presented by Mrs. Rebecca Passer in memory of her husband Nathan Passer.   There is an...

Post to the west Black Ditch Dowding Way Post to to the south High Beech Post to the north Ninefields Estate Post to the east Upshire Honey Lane Dowding Way Link Road built in the 1990s Inner Lodge Lord Paget’s Wood Poplar Shaw Honey Lane M25 Junction 26. Waltham Abbey Interchange with the A121 Sources Sabre. Web site

Post to the west Whitewebbs Lane Post to the south Maiden's Bridge Post to the north Theobalds Bull’s Cross The road is a continuation of Green Lanes and thus a drove road into London. Suddenly becomes straight because this is part of the line of Roman Ermine Street which ran from London to York.  This was a small hamlet with a group of old cottages and some ‘big’ houses. The name may come from a family who lived there in the 13th. It was one called ‘Bedalles Cross’. Manor House . This stood on the junction with White Webbs Road and was the home of Sir John French The Orchard. This was the Spotted Cow Pub. It was first noted in 1838 and last used as a pub in 1923. Pied Bull.  This would have stood in the centre of the 17th village. It is a small rendered house and a 17th building when it appears to have been kennels. It is first noted as a pub in 1716. It was also the childhood home of garden writer Frances Perry, Bulls Cross Cottage . Home of garden writer and bro...

Post to the west Potters Bar Post to the south Enfield Chase Post to the east Potters Bar Barnet Road Potters Bar Community Hospital. This opened in 1995, replacing the Hospital in Mutton Lane.  In 2005 a new Diagnostic and Treatment Centre opened, the first of its kind in Hertfordshire.  The Hospital was then able to provide new services – and a new operating theatre opened for cataract surgery, with staff seconded from Moorfields Eye Hospital. In 2006 because of a deficit 15 beds were closed and the empty ward space used as offices. The Hospital is still operational. Priory Hospital. This is a fee paying facility and is a 50-bedded inpatient unit. National School . This was built in 1839. This was built at the expense of the vicar of St. John's Church on land given by George Byng. It was in brick building wth 3 schoolrooms and a teacher's house. It was maintained by voluntary contributions and school money bad after 1870, parliamentary grants. When subsidence unde...

Post to the north Potters Bar Post to the south Hadley Wood Post to the east Enfield Chase Barnet Road/ Great North Road The Great North Road here is running along the ridge of Enfield Chase at a height of 400 ft above sea level. It was made up of fragments of existing roads during the 16th to make a main route between London and the north. From Barnet the road skirted Enfield Chase, still within its boundary banks, across common land which is now part of Wrotham Park. Enfield Chase was notorious for highwaymen. The southern part of the current road in this square runs along the border of Wrotham Park. The road was turnpiked from Barnet to Ganwick Corner in 1720 as the Galley Corner Trust Wrotham Park. This square covers only the north east section of the park. This area is pasture with many mature parkland trees and an oval pond at the north side close to a cricket pitch which lies in the area nearest to the junction of Barnet Road and Dancers Hill Road. This is still a privat...

Post to the west Potters Bar Post to the south Ganwick Corner Post to the east Potters Bar Interchange Barnet Road 2 Potty Pancakes . This was The Lion pub. This was built in 1785. It was originally a blacksmith’s shop, built in 1761 on ‘waste’. There is a large chimney stack at the left and a smaller one on the right. In 1837 the property was sold and divided into two - one a smithy and the other a wheelwright’s. By 1841 it was a beer shop and was called the Lion Brewery in 1861. Particular Baptist Church . There are two buildings here. The older church, to the south, was designed by W. Allen Dixon in 1868. It replaced an earlier Baptist Church of 1789, before which the congregation had met in a field on the same site. It was registered for worship by the Particular Baptists and extended in 1884 with the construction of the Spurgeon Hall. It had a burial ground to the north which remains grassed over. It was damaged by Second World War bombing. It is now used as a church hall ...

Post to the west Mymms Wash Post to the east Potters Bar Baker Street Rydal Mount – a ‘big house’. Pope Paul Catholic Primary School 67 St John’s Methodist Church opened 1941. From 1880 a barn at Darkes Farm had been used for services until a church was built in the Hatfield Road in 1883. St John's was erected in 1941 and the former Hatfield Road premises sold. Potters Bar has formed part of the Barnet Circuit since 1882.  Potters Bar has formed part of the Barnet Circuit since 1882 Dugdale Hill Lane Dugdale Hill Farm . This stood on the north corner with Santers Lane. Dame Alice Owen School. Dame Alice Owen’s School was founded in 1613 and has a long standing association with the Worshipful Company of Brewers. In the 16th Alice Wilkes was milking a cow in Islington when an arrow from nearby butts pierced the crown of her hat, without injuring her. She vowed that when rich enough she would do something for posterity to mark her gratitude. Alice married three times and ...

Post to the north South Mimms Post to the west Mimms Lane ford Post to the south Ridge Post to the east South Mimms, Bignall's corner Blanche Lane Clare Hall. The house was built in 1754, around an existing early 17th century house by Thomas Roberts. It was enlarged between 1797-1842 and became a convent in 1886,, The  Manor was renovated in 1988 and now contains a restaurant, meeting rooms and accommodation for the employees on site. St. Monica's Priory. This was in Clare Hall 1886-1896. Clare Hall Hospital. The house became a private smallpox hospital in 1896, taking some cases from local authorities in Middlesex.  The hospital had been established in Clerkenwell in 1746 as the Middlesex County Hospital for Small-pox by Thomas Poole and moved to various premises subsequently. They moved here despite objections from local people and extensions were built. In 1901 16 new wards were built and 16 huts as well as other facilities including a sewage works. In 1907 it ...

Post to the west Ridge Hill Post to the south South Mimms A6 The A6 was built in the 1970s to replace the St.Albans Road, and is now used as the M25. Blackhorse Lane Flint Cottage , house with stables Woodhill Farm Hawkshead Wood Ancient replanted woodland M25 Orbital motorway taking over the previous A6 Redwell Wood Redwell Wood .  This is a Site of Special Scientific Interest with ancient and secondary woodland, heath and scrub. The woodland canopy is dominated by pedunculate oak. The woodland includes areas of high forest, coppice with standards and small areas of recent selective felling where birch scrub has developed. Part of the wood was replanted with conifers but these have largely failed and natural regeneration is proceeding. Ground flora include bluebells and enchanter’s-nightshade, while heath land species include heather and rare creeping willow Swallowhole. There are temporary swallow holes from seasonal streams where cross boundary between geolog...

Post to the west Salisbury Hall Post to the north Coursers farmland Post to the south Rapley Park Post to the east Redwell Wood M25 This section of the M25 was originally the A6 itself adapted from what was Telford’s St. Albans Road.  On the A6 A dual carriageway bypass was built around 1970, and this section became the M25 in 1986. Old St. Albans Road This is a pathway between Rectory Lane and Ridge Hill. Mentioned from 1220 the old road to St. Albans followed a tortuous course . It was often flooded and in need of repair. A new road was built the east to carry the A6 and in 1965 it was decided to close the old road to motor vehicles to stop them joining the A6 trunk road. In time it was difficult to see the old road at all. It has now been improved by the County Council. Redwell Wood Farm Redwell Wood Farm. The farm buildings and surrounding area support a number of businesses of various sorts as well as farm use and livery. There have been proposals for other uses ...

Post to the north Bell Roundabout Post to the east Ridge Hill M25 This section was originally the A6 but was adapted into the M25 in the 1980s. Ridge Hill Salisbury Hall. Formerly called Shenley Manor. And in the 9th this was part of the Manor of Shenleybury held by Asgar the Stallar. In 1380 it to Sir John Montague, later the Earl of Salisbury.  A new house was built about 1507 by Sir John Cutte, Treasurer to King Henry VII and Henry VIII. This was bought in abut 1668 by James Hoare, a London banker and then to Jeremy Snow who rebuilt it. Salisbury Hall House. Built in 1668-79 for Sir Jeremiah Snow but some parts date from the 14th. It is in red brick and 20th extensions replace the earlier service wings. Snow’s arms are carved on a pediment. Inside are 16th medallions with busts of Roman emperors brought from Sopwell Priory. The house is completely surrounded by a moat. In the late 19th it was occupied by a succession of farmers but in 1905 Lady Randolph Churchill liv...

Post to the west London Colney Post to the north Tyttenhanger Post to the east Coursers Farnland Post to the south Salisbury Hall Coursers Road Willows Farm entrance and car park M25 Junction 22 . This is what was The Bell Roundabout. This was originally a roundabout on the A6 at the south end of the London Colney bypass – the A6 then running as a north west – south east through route.. When the M25 was completed between the A and the A (M), the section of the A6 dual carriageway to the south became the M25 motorway and two extra roundabouts were added to the south. (One of these is in the square to the west)The section of the A6 to the north became the Colney bypass. Carriageways on the north of the roundabout remain as they were originally designed for future use in a different road configuration to that which was actually built. The Bell. This pub dates from at least the 1880s and is now a burger bar. It was previously a road house band a venue for rehearsing rock bands...

This posting relates to sites north of the river only. South of the river is Putney High Street Post to the west Putney Boathouses Post to the east Wandsworth Church Gate Until 1937 this little road was called Church Row. All Saints Church. The first records of a church here are from the 13th, and the tower of the church was built in 1445. Traces of an earlier building have been found to the south of the current church. In 1880 the medieval church was thought too small and liable to regular flooding and it was therefore replaced by a new church designed by Arthur Blomfield also built of Kentish ragstone but higher to avoid floods. Most of the stained glass dates from the rebuilding of the church but the monuments were saved from the old church. There is a tablet to Elizabeth Limpany 1694 in a carved wooden surround and many other monuments. Churchyard . The earliest known burial is that of Richard Colman in 1376. In 1611 pigs were not allowed into the churchyard, and in 1738 ...