Thames Tributary Wandle - Earlsfield

Thames Tributary Wandle – the Wandle continues to flow northwards to the Thames

Busy urban and industrial area alongside the Wandle and in an area north of Wimbledon

Post to the north Earlsfield
Post to the south Haydon's Road


Arthur Road
On the Kingston Zodiac this is near Scorpio’s claw.
97 pretty garden with lawns, a pond and a rose arch with a mulberry tree.
Wimbledon Park Station. Opened in June 1889 and was built for the Fulham Extension Railway. It is now between Southfields and Wimbledon on the District Line. The building is the twin of Southfields Station except it faces the other way.
112 The Tennis Gallery
Christ the King. Roman Catholic Church. At one time Jesuit priests worked locally and this church was built as a chapel-of-ease. A church called St.Austin’s was started but by 1913 it was covered by corrugated iron and known as the Tank. The present church was designed by Gilbert Scott and was completed in 1928 and named Christ the King,
Wimbledon Park Hall. Old library building standing unused and semi derelict.

Brooklands Avenue
Durnsford Road Recreation Ground – an ‘underwhelming’ and ‘little known’ space

Durnsford Avenue
49 Little Hall Gardens. Nursery School in an old church building

Durnsford Road
432 Methodist - Wesleyan Central Hall - Southfields Church. Built 1953 after demolition of the old central hall. The trustees of the church at Colliers Wood commissioned a mural by the young German artist Hans Feibush, who came to England as a refugee in the 1930s. It depicts Christ washing the disciples' feet and as his first religious mural in Britain created considerable interest and some controversy. When the church was taken over by the NCH the mural was moved to
Southfields
Wimbledon Train Care Depot. Advanced maintenance facility for South West Trains.
Wimbledon Train Viaduct
Wimbledon Railway Power Station. Built in 1913 to supply electricity to the electric train system by the London and South West Railway. Built in red brick on the up side of the main line and near the Wandle. It had a boiler house with 16 Babcock and Wilcox boilers and a bunker for 1,400 tons of coal reached by a siding on a viaduct. There was a turbine set and a switchgear section, cooling towers adjoined the river and there were two brick chimneys. It was badly bombed in 1940 and lost a chimney. In 1950 8it was decided to replace it and it was eventually demolished in 1965 the chimneys felled in February
New railway car sheds built here by the London and South West Railway to house 84 three car units constructed at their workshops at Eastleigh for the electric service cleaning and inspection sheds were adjacent.
260-170 Wimbledon mosque built 1977 but dating from the late 19th. It is of a traditional and simple white tiled design with two domed towers at front of the building.
222 Woodman. Current building is 1898,
Woodman Bridge

Woodside Grange
Wimbledon Park Farm also called Manor Farm

Garratt Park
Garratt Park became a public park ‘for children’s recreation’ in 1906. It the area of the grounds of Garratt House. Before 1900 area of fields with a millstream between the park and the current allotments site. There was also a big mill pond east of the river. The Council acquired the land for a tip but let it out for grazing. Earlsfield Rifle Club built a range here. In 1905 clay from East Hill sewers work was used to raise the riverbanks and fill in streams and ponds. In 1970 a bend in the Wandle was straightened.

Groton road
Industrial area alongside the river, included a 19th soap works. Many interesting looking buildings
Jack Beard’s in the Fog. Originally called the Country House. 'The Fog' was a name given by those who called in on their way home and then claimed to be delayed by the fog. Refitted in 1930 with its three bars and original fittings, dumb waiter and three gaslight fittings.

Merton Road
479-481 Pig and Whistle. Young’s pub

Pitt Crescent,
101 Small garden planted with ornamental trees, vine-covered pergola and an arbour of apple and pear trees.

Ravensbury Terrace
Big industrial site alongside the river with old looking buildings and yard. Now a trading estate.

Riverside Road
Calico Printing Works in 1776 the site was occupied by Coleman, Newton and Cuffley, calico printers. By 1823 it5 was occupied by Fort and Newton also calico printers but the property was for sale in 1827 when it consisted of a warehouse, a dye house a bleaching house, drying house, coal shed, an engine house, with a 20 horse power steam engine, and a dwelling house, with greenhouse, garden, and grounds. In 1835 the premises was occupied by Anthony Heath, calico printer, at "Garratt print works" and in 1850 he employed 40 men. There were further occupiers until 1885 when the site was taken over by the Corruganza Manufacturing Company, cardboard box makers, operated by Hugh Stevenson & Sons Limited with a head office in Manchester. During the First World War they also began to operate the Merton Board Mills. However there were several fires some very serious in 1924 and later in 1964. Hugh Stevenson and Sons Limited operated the works until about 1971, when they were amalgamated with Bowaters who left the site in 1989, and it is now occupied by several small commercial and industrial firms.

Ryfold Road
The road was developed in the early 20th by a Mr. Ryan and a Mr. Penfold.
St.Luke’s church. Built 1909 by T G Jackson In brick, with a half-timbered porch.
War memorial in the church grounds

Summerley Street
Garratt House, demolished in 1890. Garratt House, stood on the corner with Trewint Street. This was the residence of the proprietors of Garratt Mills during the 18th and 19th

Trewint Street
Travellers site on the site of the mills
Garrett Mills. In 1653 this had been a gunpowder mill for Abel Richardson and James Lloyd. In 1600 they expanded and more mills built which became the largest supplier of gunpowder to the Ordnance and this continued until 1717 when one mill was used for snuff. In 1735 used as a linseed oil mill of Messrs. Were and Bush. - . Mr. Were's linseed oil and white lead mills" in the time of the Surrey Iron Railway and Robert and William Were and Richard Bush who were among the railway's promoters. In 1817 there was a 30ft wheel which "....turns a main shaft, which gives motion to a pair of vertical stones, raises the driving-beams, and turns a band which carries the seed, in small buckets, from the floor to the hopper". The driving-beams fell on to wedges to squeeze out the oil in a very noisy process’. From 1854 it was used for woolen manufacture. By 1867 the premises was a paper mill, later a bone mill and then leather. Henry Knight & Co manure and super phosphate. Later Wickens, Pease & Co. Ltd, manure and super phosphate 1900. The mill site at end where small bridge crosses the river. Site is the car park.
Millpond extended upstream to middle of Garratt Park earlier a fulling mill.
Council depot
Trewint Street Bridge

Vineyard Hill Road
1 garden with English roses, clematis, lupins, peonies and a wide variety of hardy geraniums. There is a covered arch to fruit trees protected by original 1899 120ft brick wall.

Wandle
Straightened in the 1970s for flood defence work. There remains an island and weir.


Weir Road
Many factory and trading sites

Wellington Road
Wimbledon Park Primary School

Sources
British History online. Wandsworth
Bayliss. The Surrey Iron Railway
Caine. The Kingston Zodiac
Christ the King. Web site
Cinema Treasures. Web site
Davis. Industries of Wandsworth
Gerhold. Wandsworth Past
GLIAS Newsletter
Jack Beards. Web site
London Borough of Wandsworth, Web site
Loobey. Cinemas and Theatres of Wandsworth
Pevsner and Cherry. South London
Pig and Whistle. Web site
Saxby. The Mills of the River Wandle
St Luke's Church. Web site
Wandle Industrial Museum. Web site
Wandsworth Historical Society, web site
Wandsworth Methodists. Web site
Wimbledon Mosque. Web site

Comments

Unknown said…
Very interesting local history. Would you have any information about present rights of way round Garratt Mills ?
Thank you !
Cecilia

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