Mitcham Gardens and Gardeners of the 18th Century

by E N Montague

In Mitcham Gardens the author explores the surprisingly rich history of 18th-century horticulture in Mitcham, manifested by plantations, shrubberies, walled gardens, glasshouses and gravel walks, as local gentlemen vied with each other in this fashionable craze.

Review in MHS Bulletin 136 (Dec 2000)

Published by Merton Historical Society – November 2000

Further information on Merton Historical Society can be obtained from
the Society’s website at www.mertonhistoricalsociety.org.uk , or from
Merton Library & Heritage Service, Merton Civic Centre, London Road,
Morden, Surrey. SM4 5DX

MITCHAM
GARDENS AND
GARDENERS
OF THE 18TH

CENTURY

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY 2000

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND SOURCES

Croydon Local Studies Centre, Harold Williams collection of Sale Particulars:
Estate of The Firs (Mr Langdale’s Property) at Mitcham
Edwards J., Companion from London to Brighthelmston Pt. II (1789)
Greenwood C. and J., Surrey Described (1823)
Jessop L., ‘Notes on Insects, 1692 & 1695 by Charles duBois’ in Bulletin
British Museum (Natural History) Vol 17 No 1 (1989)
Loudon J. C., ‘Arboretum et Fructicetum Britannicum’ in Society of Gardeners
I (1838) 62-3
Lysons D., The Environs of London I (1792)
Malcolm J., Compendium of Modern Husbandry III 1805)
Rocque J., Environs of London 1741-5
Surrey Archaeological Society Library, watercolour, ‘Mr Tipple’s House at
Lower Mitcham’
Surrey History Centre; Sale Particulars:
Colliers Wood, 1822, 85/2/1 (2) No. 27
Tamworth House, 1822, 85/2/1 (2) No.29

Sutton Archives; Sale Particulars:
Estate of Henry Hoare, 1828, Acc. 414 (formerly Surrey
Record Office 2361/2/2)

In 1802 it was reported to Mitcham vestry that a great part of the
common field – it is not made clear whether this referred to the West
Field, or the East Field or both – was used as “Garden grounds”. As
Lysons had observed, since 1790 there had been a very great increase
in these garden grounds, using land which in the past had been meadow
or arable. In fact, a total of 490 acres, or roughly 25% of the parish not
covered by heath or used for housing etc, was employed in the
cultivation of herbs by the turn of the century. This is all the more
remarkable when it is remembered that this was during the Napoleonic
wars, when the price of corn had soared, and growing of bread wheat
was highly profitable.

CONTENTS
Foreword 4
1 Parks 5
2 The Elizabethan Legacy 6
3 The Gardens of the 18th Century
and a search for Surviving Landscape Features 8
4 Hothouses and Walled Gardens 12
5 Contemporary Descriptions 13
6 The Trees and Shrubs 20
7 Charles duBois 22
8 The Mitcham Herb Gardeners 24
Bibliography and Sources 27

MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS

‘Mitcham Grove from the south’, from a watercolour of c.1820 Cover
Mitcham, from A. Bryant’s Map of Surrey, surveyed in 1822-23 2
Colliers Wood from J. Rocque’s map The Environs of London 1741-5 7
‘South East View of Elms House, Mitcham’ [The Elms] 1834 14
‘Mr Tipple’s House, Mitcham’ [The Manor House]. Gideon Yates, 1825 16
‘North View of Mitcham Hall’, watercolour by Gideon Yates, dated 1825 17
‘Baron House Academy’, an engraving of c.1814 18
‘Mitcham Grove, in Surrey, the Seat of Henry Hoare Esq.
an engraving of c.1791 19
‘Harvesting Lavender at Mitcham’, c.1820, by Ivor Glynn 25

Cover illustration: Mitcham Grove from the south, with the Wandle in the
foreground (from a watercolour, c.1820, in Merton Local Studies Centre)

FOREWORD

E. N. Montague December 1999
4

inherited the business on his father’s death in 1773, and by what we are
told was “great care, skill and industry” had become by the time of his
own death in 1799 the premier grower in England. He also contrived
to amass a considerable fortune. On James Potter’s death the business
passed to James Moore, his 30-year-old nephew.

‘Harvesting Lavender at Mitcham’, c.1820, by Ivor Glynn
(Reproduced in calendars printed for T. Francis & Son in the 19th century)

Lysons, in his Environs of London, published in 1792, had observed
that the soil of Mitcham consists “principally of a rich black mould.”
About 250 acres were occupied by the physic gardeners in his time,
“who cultivate lavender, wormwood, camomile, aniseed and rhubarb,
liquorice and many other medicinal plants in great abundance; but
principally peppermint, of which there are some 100 acres. The demand
for this herb is not confined to the apothecaries’ shops,” said Lysons,
“it being much used in making a cordial well-known to the dram-
drinkers. Forty years since, a few acres only were employed in the
cultivation of medicinal herbs in this parish. Perhaps,” he concluded,
“there is no place where it is now so extensive.”

“But to none of the before-mentioned persons” [referred to in an
earlier part of the catalogue] “is England more indebted for
introducing trees, plants, flowers and fruits, than to the learned
and ingenious Charles Dubois, Esq., of Mitcham, who has not
only been very industrious to procure plants from abroad, but
also as generous in communicating whatever his garden would
afford, and also many useful observations relating both to their
culture and uses, to all delighters in planting and gardening; and
it is to him that we are greatly indebted for many valuable trees
and plants which enrich this catalogue.”

8. The Mitcham Herb Gardeners
Any review, however brief, of what is known of gardeners and gardening
in Mitcham in the 18th century must include mention of ‘physic
gardening’, then still in its relative infancy, but destined to become a
major industry in the parish during the first half of the following century.

Edwards informed his readers in the 1790s that James Potter’s
“Botanical Gardens” in Mitcham were “very extensive”, and that behind
his residence overlooking Figges Marsh Potter had “works for extracting
the essence of all his botanical herbs”. He also described the sinking
of an artesian bore by Potter a few years previously to obtain water for
the distillery.

The year 1742 had seen the death of John Potter, one of the earliest
Mitcham ‘physic gardeners’ of whom we have record. His son Ephraim
followed in the old man’s footsteps, and in 1749, with William Moore,
to whom he was related in marriage, Ephraim founded a distillery for
the extraction of oil of lavender. The rapid expansion of the herbal
industry in the latter part of the 18th century can be attributed to John
Potter’s grandson, James, who had begun the cultivation of medicinal
herbs on a small scale on his own account in 1768 or 1769. James

MITCHAM GARDENS AND GARDENERS
OF THE 18TH CENTURY

1. Parks
In the Middle Ages the lords of the Mitcham manors were usually
absentees, content, as far as we can tell, to run their estates within the
parish as small demesne, or home, farms. The manor house, if any,
was more likely than not to be the residence of the bailiff or steward.
Although, as in the case of Ravensbury, rights of warren might be a
coveted privilege and from time to time attempts would have been
considered necessary to control hunting and fishing, there is no evidence
in Mitcham of any emparkment or enclosure specifically for hunting
purposes. Neither was there any post-medieval emparkment by the
monarch, with the consequent displacement of the population, such as
occurred at Nonsuch or Richmond. The only exception to this
generalisation was 75 acres (30 ha) of Mitcham Common enclosed by
Sir Nicholas Carew in 1535 and added to Beddington Park, and a further
100 acres (40 ha) adjoining, for which an inclosure award was made
in 1820.

It was during the 18th century that the term ‘park’ came to be applied
to the land surrounding a gentleman’s residence, whether or not it had
been created by the incorporation of adjoining land. Several of the
larger establishments in Mitcham at this time – one could cite as
examples Colliers Wood House, Biggin Grove (or Tamworth House),
The Firs, The Canons, Mitcham Villa (also known as the Rectory or
Cranmers), Mitcham Hall, Baron House and Mitcham Grove – were
surrounded by grounds which in size certainly merited being described
as small parks, but the term does not seem to have been used at that
time.

The parks which existed in Mitcham shortly before the outbreak of
war in 1914, such as Gorringe Park, Mitcham Park and Ravensbury
Park, were manifestations of their late Victorian owners’ aspirations
to social standing within the hierarchy of an older society whose roots
could be traced back to the landowners of the 17th and 18th centuries.
It was no coincidence that in each case their 19th-century owners were

newcomers to the district. In reality the three examples quoted merely
comprised the gardens and paddocks of somewhat larger than average
houses, to which the term “park” was attached quite arbitrarily for the
prestige it was felt to convey.
The Elizabethan Legacy
Several large houses standing in quite extensive grounds are known to
have existed in Mitcham in Tudor times. Dr Julius Caesar’s house to
the south of the Cricket Green, and the residence of Sir Thomas and
Lady (Margaret) Blanke on the opposite side of the road, were both
grand enough to offer hospitality to Queen Elizabeth on several
occasions. Thomas Smythe’s house by the Wandle, later incorporated
within the structure of Mitcham Grove, and the Rutland family’s home
at Colliers Wood, are other good examples. In none of these cases is
there evidence to suggest an attempt to enlarge the estate at the expense
of adjacent land and to create parks such as those at Beddington and
Wimbledon. The actual circumstances will probably never be known,
but the reason is likely to have been that none of the Mitcham gentry
had the seigneurial authority to override local opposition to the
necessary enclosures.

These Mitcham estates remained more or less intact until the 19th
century, but we have no idea of the layout of the gardens surrounding
the houses in the 16th and 17th centuries. We would be reasonably
safe, however, in visualising formal gravel walks and lawns and, in the
more private parts of the grounds away from public view, ‘fair garden
plots’ and ‘pleasaunces’, which would have included the herb and knot
gardens, arbours and mazes beloved of the Elizabethans.

remembered locally for the collection of unusual trees and plants he
established in his garden to the south of Fair Green.

DuBois was born c.1656, the son of John duBois, citizen and mercer of
the City of London, and Anne Herle, his first wife. Charles inherited
the house and land, which later became known as The Firs estate, from
his father who, after the death of Charles’ mother in or before 1662,
married Sarah Waldo of All Hallows, London, and Mitcham. In politics
a Whig, like his father, Charles duBois also inherited a share in the
latter’s silk trading business in 1684 and later succeeded his step-brother
John as Cashier-General, or Treasurer, of the East India Company,
serving in this capacity from 1702 until 1737.

Nationally, Charles duBois had already acquired a reputation as a
naturalist, but it was the contacts he now made with ships’ officers and
company officials travelling to and from all parts of the known world
that enabled him to indulge his other hobby, that of collecting exotic
plants, and to develop his botanical garden at Mitcham, where he
maintained a noteworthy collection of ‘stove plants’ in a hothouse. He
was particularly proud of his part in securing the supply of a sample of
Indian rice to a Carolina merchant in 1696, thus being instrumental in
introducing the cereal to North America. DuBois attended meetings of
the Temple Coffee House Botany Club, a small group of gentlemen
who had founded an informal natural history society around the turn of
the 17th century which included amongst its members distinguished
entomologists such as Plukenet and Dandridge. He also shared an
interest in natural history with Sir Hans Sloane, with whom he was a
frequent correspondent, and his work was recognised by his being
admitted a fellow of the Royal Society in 1700. Charles duBois’
collection of shells received contemporary acclaim, and his herbarium,
which is preserved at Oxford, is said to contain many specimens from
Mitcham Common and the surrounding countryside.

In a collection of unpublished notes used by J. C. Loudon when
compiling a catalogue of exotic species for the Society of Gardeners in
1838 there is the following charming reference to Charles duBois, who
had been a member:

Cedars of Lebanon had also been introduced into the United Kingdom
in the mid-17th century, and were highly fashionable during the 18th
and 19th centuries, being planted widely in parks and in the grounds of
larger houses. The presence of a large cedar today is often a sign that
an old mansion stood nearby, and one such tree, depicted in an early
19th century watercolour of Mitcham Grove, can still be admired in
the linear park between the Watermeads housing estate and the Wandle.
Four other Mitcham examples survived the 1939/45 war. One, at the
corner of Baron Grove and London Road, had been in the grounds of
Mitcham Hall. Another, by the junction of Raleigh Gardens and Western
Road, formerly graced the front entrance drive to Mitcham House, whilst
a third, allegedly 300 years old, stood by the drive leading to the front
door of Park Place. All three have been felled, two whilst in the care of
Merton Council. The only one of the quartet remaining is that
overlooking the pond at The Canons.

7. Charles duBois
A ‘physic garden’ was established at Oxford in 1621, and with the
expansion of trade and exploration, exotic botanical specimens of all
kinds began to arrive in this country, and the collector gardener appeared.
Edwards gives no clue as to what “the exotic trees” in the grounds of
Mitcham Grove might have been, but they may well have included
species from the Indian sub-continent, for some 30 years prior to his
visit the house had been the home of the father of John Stewart, who
had connections with the East India Company. If the truth be known,
an interest in trees and plants, particularly those new to this country,
was probably shared by several of the gentlemen with estates in Mitcham
at this time, but it was Charles duBois, one of the foremost plant
collectors of the 18th century, who without doubt best deserves to be

The house and gardens of Peter de St Eloy at Colliers Wood, depicted in J.
Rocque’s map of The Environs of London, dated 1741-5

3.3.
The baroque formality of the landscapes created by Le Nôtre and his
followers impressed many of the royalists exiled in France after the
Civil War, and following the Restoration the concept of symmetry in
garden design, with avenues and fair prospects, took root in England.
Enthusiasm for the new ‘landscape’ gardening followed the accession
of William and Mary, which opened the country to the influence of the
Dutch interpretation of baroque gardening, and the intimate, enclosed
gardens of the Tudors gave way to the parterre, a level space filled
with topiary, statues and formal bedding. Outside the actual garden,
walks and avenues radiated from a central point, affording vistas of
the countryside beyond.

The influence of the new ideas can be detected in Rocque’s
representation of the gardens of Peter St Eloy’s house at Colliers Wood
in his map of 1741-5. Here, to the south and behind the house, Rocque
shows the parterre, giving on to formally planted gardens and orchards
in the Dutch manner, whilst to the east lay a quite different garden,
essentially baroque in style, with a formal planting of trees in long
intersecting avenues, down the central axes of which were ornamental
canals meeting in a small round pond or ‘bason’. Such a garden would
have been intended to form a world apart, in which the owner of the
estate and his friends might take their pleasure in ordered, elegant
surroundings.

Naturally, allowance must be made for artistic licence, but if we accept
that Rocque’s portrayal was not entirely fanciful, these gardens at
Colliers Wood were in the style of the early, rather than the middle,
18th century, and must predate St Eloy’s acquisition of the property in
about 1739. Unfortunately, we know too little of the tenure of the
Colliers Wood estate in the early 18th century to be able to suggest
who might have been responsible for the planning of this garden, and
its execution.

Other less ambitious avenues or ‘alleys’ which, typically, would have
been of pleached limes or Spanish chestnuts, are indicated by Rocque
in the grounds of Mitcham Hall, whilst to the rear of Baron House he

Edwards’ notes on Mitcham contain several references to “shrubberies”,
which were obviously a prominent feature of many of the gardens he
visited. Unfortunately he tells his readers nothing of the species then
popular, and the uninformed today might be excused on this account
for visualising gardens containing an uninteresting mixture of privets
and native evergreens such as box, laurels and hollies. This is probably
very far from the truth, for although many of the species familiar to the
modern gardener had yet to be discovered by the great Victorian plant
collectors, John Evelyn had been advocating the planting of shrubs in
London gardens since the late 17th century, extolling the particular
virtues of “such shrubs as yield the most fragrant and odoriferous
flowers, and are aptest to tinge the Air upon every gentle emission at a
great distance.” Sweet briar and woodbine, the common white and
yellow jasmines, philadelphus (mock orange), lilacs, guelder roses,
juniper, lavender, rosemary and many others were all hardy, well loved,
and familiar, and few of the larger gardens in Mitcham could have
been without them.

Edwards’ interest was clearly attracted by the more spectacular or
unusual species of tree encountered on his travels, and probably for
this reason he failed to mention two, the London plane and the cedar of
Lebanon, both of which were relatively recent introductions to England
but already becoming commonplace in the gardens of the larger houses.
Their interest for us lies in the fact that a few examples can still be seen
in Mitcham, close to the sites of the houses Edwards visited, and for
this reason seem likely to have been already growing there in the 18th
century.

Of these species the London plane, now abundant all over southern
England, was first planted in this country in 1680. A hybrid between
the oriental plane and the American plane, it grows to massive size,
and specimens at Barnes, some of the earliest to be planted, are now
over 300 years old. Closer to home, in the Festival Walk at Carshalton,
is one of the tallest examples known, thought to have been planted
c.1750. Several fine specimens can be seen in Ravensbury Park, near
the site of the Arbuthnots’ house, and must be roughly 200 years old.
Another at Glebelands is visible in an engraving of 1841, and was
probably planted soon after the house was built in 1791.

6. 6.
Of the trees Edwards mentioned, the English elm seems to have been
one of the most conspicuous in the Mitcham landscape. Although
known to live for 200 to 300 years, none of the specimens on which he
commented can still be standing, any late survivors from the 18th
century having succumbed to the outbreak of Dutch elm disease in the
1970s.

Malcolm, in his Compendium of Modern Husbandry published in 1805,
remarked that the elm delights in a deep loam, or a soil that is of a
gravelly tendency. In Surrey it was particularly common to the north
of Croydon, where elms were to be seen growing spontaneously in the
hedgerows. Many of the specimens Malcolm had noticed were large
and handsome, and in his estimation would cut into scantlings of almost
any dimension. In Mitcham and the adjoining parishes to the north,
however, there had already been considerable felling, since the wood
was much in demand not only for cutting into planks for the navy
shipyards and for general construction work, but also for more
specialised applications, such as coffin boards, and the making of carts
and waggons. Since the wood stands up well to prolonged immersion
in water, large quantities were used by the London waterworks at
Chelsea and Lambeth, whilst the lesser trees were bought by the pipe
borers, who required timber of smaller diameter.

Over 600 species of fig are now recognised in the tropics and subtropical
regions of the world, but that most commonly grown in England
is Ficus carica, of which the White Marseilles variety was one of those
recommended in old gardening books. Figs were amongst the first
fruits cultivated by man, and were highly prized as a dessert and for
cooking. They were also used decoratively, and on Lord Burghley’s
Wimbledon estate there was a noted fig walk, planted in the 16th century.
The tree at Mitcham Villa has now disappeared, but by a strange
coincidence a well-established fig tree can still be found today on
common land opposite Mitcham Garden Village, not far from the
southern boundary of the Cranmers’ estate. There is another in the
grounds of Wandle Villa, Phipps Bridge.

gives a hint of formal planting of trees in ordered rows in what had
been known in the early 17th century as Walnut Tree Close. The large
scale OS map of 1865 indicates that several of the trees from this
plantation survived into the mid-19th century, although by this time
their ranks had been severely depleted, and the intended effect was
destroyed.

Baron House also boasted a ha-ha, or sunken fence, that ingenious
combination of brick retaining wall and hidden ditch so popular in the
18th century, allowing the owner of the house to enjoy an unbroken
view over the meadows and parkland beyond the gardens. The line of
the ha-ha separating the lawns of Baron House from Walnut Tree Close
can be followed on the OS map of 1895 and, remarkably, a short length
of both ditch and retaining wall is still identifiable in the London Road
Playing Fields, behind numbers 482-484 London Road.

As far as we can tell, none of the grounds of the more substantial houses
in Mitcham, or their owners, were important enough to attract the
attention of the great landscape gardeners of the mid-18th century such
as Charles Bridgeman and William Kent, under whose influence the
more ‘natural’ English landscape garden evolved, with its contrived
informality and carefully placed classical temples.

The first Earl Spencer had commissioned Launcelot (‘Capability’)
Brown in 1765 to transform Wimbledon Park. Mitcham Grove, lying
at the heart of a large estate, passed into the hands of Lord Clive around
1773, and might have been similarly ‘improved’. Clive retained the
property for only a short time, however, having already purchased
Claremont in 1769, and it was there that he employed the skills of
Brown to great effect. Mitcham Grove was presented by Clive to
Alexander Wedderburn KC, and in 1786 the house and estate was
purchased by Henry Hoare, a man not given to flamboyant
extravagance. One feels that, perhaps with the exception of the Grove
and Ravensbury with their proximity to the Wandle and gently rising
ground to the south, the unromantically flat landscape of central
Mitcham would in any case have presented little obvious scope for
improvement to excite the great Brown’s interest.

The construction of artificial ‘mounts’ and belvederes had achieved
popularity much earlier in the century, grand examples such as that
created for the Duke of Newcastle at Claremont by Vanbrugh being
quickly imitated elsewhere. Although it may have its origins in
antiquity (it has been suggested it may mark a burial), the mound in
Morden Park (where in any case the terrain is already undulating) could
well represent a modest venture of this kind by John Ewart, who created
the park shortly after being granted leases of various parcels of land
by Richard Garth in 1768.

Man-made or natural, the attractions of water were certainly not absent
from Mitcham gardens. Both Rocque’s map of 1741-5 and the large-
scale OS maps of the 19th century show what are obviously artificial
lengths of water, not only in the grounds of Colliers Wood House (where
they would have been fed by the Graveney), but also at Mitcham Hall
and, enigmatically, to the rear of the manor house of Biggin and
Tamworth, near Figges Marsh. Were these last two features created as
‘canals’ dug in imitation of those to be seen in the great baroque gardens,
or might they have been the remains of moats dug for less aesthetic
reasons in the Middle Ages? Without testing the sites archaeologically,
one can only speculate.

By the 18th century the Wandle below Mitcham Bridge had been
partially diverted into several subsidiary streams meandering
attractively through the wooded glades of Mitcham Grove and
Ravensbury. Very much in keeping with the rustic informality

fashion. The house, in the Palladian style, occupied a slightly elevated
position on which there had been a succession of houses since the
Middle Ages. Full advantage had been taken of its riverside position,
and Edwards tells us the banks were “covered with pleasant gravel
walks, very rural, and decorated with shrubs and exotic trees”. On the
southern side of the house there was “a large lawn on a gentle declivity”,
“skirted against the turnpike-road by a shubbery upwards of three
furlongs in length”. To the west the grounds met those of Ravensbury
House, whilst the continuation of Henry Hoare’s estate a half-mile or
so southwards beyond the river, ensured that nothing disturbed the
peace and beauty of the setting.

Mitcham Grove, in Surrey, the Seat of Henry Hoare Esq.
(An engraving of c.1791)

Ban
Ban

Ravensbury House, approached from the road to Morden by a private
drive about three furlongs in length (600m), was the residence of
Admiral Marriot Arbuthnot, who retired from service at sea with the
Atlantic fleet at the end of the American War of Independence. The
old lane to Morden had been diverted in 1753 to afford better privacy,
and as a consequence the house occupied what Edwards described as
“a pleasant, rural situation, upon the north banks of the Wandle”. Walks
extending a considerable distance on the river side, were bounded with
“handsome shrubberies”, and the large lawn on the south (that is, across
the river) belonging to the Grove, in Edwards’ words “added much to
the beauty of the place”.

Mitcham Grove, the seat of Henry Hoare, senior partner in Hoare’s
Bank in Fleet Street, stood about 60 yards from the Sutton road, to the
west of Mitcham bridge and on an island site created by a diversion of
the river. The drive to the house and grounds commenced at gates
leading off the turnpike, where a lodge had been built in the gothic

advocated by Brown, but pre-dating his influence by a century or more
(for the origins of these backwaters were mainly industrial and
connected with the bleaching of textiles), the streams provided excellent
trout fishing in the 18th century as well as working pumps or ‘engines’
to supply water for domestic and even firefighting purposes.

In the grounds of The Firs (or Fir Grove as it was sometimes called)
the outfall from the Three Kings Pond, a stream much smaller than the
Wandle or Graveney, was used to feed a canal and an irregularly shaped
pond before continuing its course westwards to serve another pond in
the grounds of Mitcham House. Its final outfall was a backwater of
the Wandle south of Merton bridge.

Veneration of antiquity, especially features evocative of classical Greece
and Rome, developed early in the 17th century, and merged into the
romantic movement of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Artificial
ruins, sham castles, and picturesque cottages (cottages ornées) all
became popular garden features, designed to surprise, or to evoke
suitable feelings of sentiment and melancholy.

There was an attempt by the Watson family in the late 19th century to
create a flint grotto in their garden at Mill House on Mitcham Common,
and nearby the incongruous Towers Works was erected in debased
gothic by a Victorian industrialist as an extension to the parish
workhouse. Both have now gone, but the tower-cum-buttress in Phipps
Bridge Road, built in about 1875 and now owned by the National Trust,
must not be overlooked. All three are (or were) in the tradition of 18th
century romanticism, although they are late examples. Gatehouses
and lodges were often built in the mock-gothic style popularised by
Horace Walpole at Strawberry Hill, and the lodge at Mitcham Grove
and the former coachman’s cottage in the grounds of Wandle Villa, the
latter also happily still surviving in the care of the National Trust, are
local examples, although again not of the 18th century.

4. 4.
The use of rudimentary greenhouses and the value of shelter for the more
delicate plants was well known in Elizabethan times, and at Beddington
there was the celebrated Carew orangery. In general we lack detailed
information for Mitcham in the 18th century, but it is known that Charles
duBois had a ‘stove house’ in his garden in the 1730s, and the sale
particulars of the estate in 1822 (The Firs) make reference to a
“Conservatory, Hot House, and Grapery”. At Colliers Wood, auctioned
coincidentally in the same year, there was also a hot house and “Grape
Pit”. In a watercolour painted c.1825 of the garden to the rear of Mr
Tipple’s house at Lower Mitcham (known later as The Manor House)
we can see cloches and a cold frame being used, whilst at Mitcham Grove,
offered for sale in 1828, in addition to a conservatory heated by flues,
there was an orangery, and a ‘forcing house’ stocked with vines. These
are, of course, mainly references from the early 19th century, but there is
no reason to think that the cultivation of vines and other tender subjects
had not been standard practice in these and other Mitcham gardens since
the previous century.

The value of the walled garden was also well understood in the 18th
century, not only for the cultivation of the more delicate fruits such as
peaches and nectarines, early cherries, figs and so on, but to provide
shelter for a whole variety of plants and vegetables. At Mitcham Grove
the walled kitchen garden was described as “productive”, “Fully stocked,
Cropped and Planted … and Clothed with Fruit Trees, to Great Perfection”.
The Firs had a melon ground, and a “Large and highly productive Kitchen
Garden and Vegetable Ground, with a lofty Fruit Wall to a good aspect”,
whilst at Colliers Wood the walled gardens of the house encompassed an
acre of ground, fully planted with choice fruit trees. Nothing of these
gardens survives today, the last trace of the walls which surrounded the
garden at Mitcham Grove having been demolished in the 1970s during
the course of the development of the Watermeads housing estate by
Merton Corporation. The Canons, however, can still boast a small
attractively planted walled garden, and incorporating within its eastern
wall a stone commemorating its erection by James Cranmer in 1761. A
larger walled garden is now used as a car park for the swimming pool
and The Canons leisure centre.

principal of a London firm of merchants, with offices in Copthall Court.
Behind the house were what Edwards considered “good gardens,
plantations etc”, extending to the east and south to include the whole of
the area now covered by the houses of Baron Grove and Mitcham Park.

‘North View of Mitcham Hall'(Watercolour signed “Yates 1825″
Surrey Archaeological Society)

Baron House, on the opposite side of the road, was in Edwards’ words
“a large one”, and had “a handsome area of pleasure ground betwixt it
and the road, enclosed with a high wall”. Some of the landscaping and
formal planting for which we have a little evidence, was probably carried
out for the wealthy Mendes da Costa, who shared with Charles duBois
an interest in natural history and occupied the house from 1722 until
1742. The house was to derive its name from a later owner, Oliver
Baron, a barrister of the Inner Temple, who died in 1786. The property
was still owned by the Baron family when Edwards visited, but seems
to have been leased to Mrs Carter, the proprietor of a boarding academy
for young ladies.

for his adherence to Protestantism. Edwards was obviously impressed,
noting that the tree, the branches of which were “very low”, had a
stem which measured 30 inches in girth, and had “every possible mark
of great age”.

‘Mr Tipple’s House, Mitcham’ [later known as the Manor House].
Watercolour by Gideon Yates, dated 1825. (Surrey Archaeological Society).
Note the use of cold frames and cloches.

A little further on, Mitcham Hall stood back 50 yards from the road
leading south to Sutton. This was a large, square house with the
appearance of having been built towards the end of the 17th century,
and had the figures of a lion and a dog on the piers of the front entrance
gates. In Edwards’ day it was the residence of Andrew French,

5. Contemporary Descriptions
Our best contemporary source for descriptions of the more notable
Mitcham houses and their gardens in the late 18th century is James
Edwards, whose Companion from London to Brighthelmston was
researched in about 1789 and first published a year or so afterwards.

In North Mitcham, Biggin Grove, soon to be enlarged and renamed
Tamworth House, and subsequently demolished to make way for
Gorringe Park house, was the seat of John Manship, a director of the
East India Company. The front of Manship’s 18th-century house, which
Edwards described as “good, but rather low”, was orientated towards
the south-east and was open to the road to Streatham, from which it
was separated by what he called a “grass plat” or lawn. The latter was
bounded by a shrubbery to the north, beyond which we know from
later sale particulars to have been the kitchen gardens and a meadow.
The estate included Biggin Farm, located behind the house, and in all
embraced over 200 acres, bordered by Figges Marsh, Streatham Road
and the river Graveney. The soil was mixed, in some places being of
clay and in others sand and gravel. When the estate was offered for
sale by auction in 1822 the vending agents drew the attention of potential
buyers to the “fine grown Timber Trees and Shrubs” which adorned
the property.

A mile or so to the west, Colliers Wood House at the close of the 18th
century was the seat of Francis Barlow, “of the Crown Office, in the
Court of King’s Bench”. Edwards described the house as lying about
one furlong (200m) to the east of the turnpike road leading from Tooting
to Merton, “opened to the road by a pleasant lawn scattered with single
trees and a few clumps. The north side of this lawn,” he said, “is
bounded with a thick shrubbery, through which is the road to the
mansion.” Recently built in grey stock-brick to replace the old house
nearer the road, which had been occupied by Peter de St Eloy, Colliers
Wood House was “finished in the refined taste” and was “adorned with
suitable plantations and good gardens.” In the process of
redevelopment, what remained of the canals and formal avenues of
trees of the early 18th-century gardens must have been swept away,
and from Edwards’ reference to a lawn “scattered with single trees and
a few clumps” the layout of Barlow’s garden was obviously much more

in keeping with the ideal of rural simplicity Brown and other landscape
designers were seeking to achieve by the application of art to nature.
The Elms in Upper Mitcham, a substantial Georgian house roughly
opposite Eagle House and standing 50 yards back from the road, had
large gardens on the north. Edwards tells us that it commanded “a
pleasant prospect over the enclosures on the east, as far as Norwood”,
and was “sheltered against the road by remarkable large elm trees”.

Of The Firs, or Fir Grove, which lay on the south-eastern side of the
Upper or Fair Green, Edwards commented that the house itself – “an
indifferent low building” – was “almost concealed from sight of the
road by a high wall” and had stables which “appear large in proportion
to the house”. In fact, Edwards was somewhat piqued at being unable
to view the house and its grounds, explaining to his readers that “Mr
Langdale, the present possessor, after I had repeatedly waited on him,

refused me the least information, as well as the favour of inspecting
the description which I had prepared for that purpose”. Edwards
therefore contented himself with recollections of “the beauties of a
little lawn on the south” which the previous owner, John Pollard, had
been happy to show him. We know from a description of the grounds
seen on a visit by the Society of Gardeners in 1835 that even then they
still contained a fine selection of exotic trees, planted by Charles duBois,
a previous owner, including a nettle-tree, a pinaster 40 feet high, a very
old stone pine, and a large staghorn sumach. In Langdale’s time, when
many more trees would have been in their prime, the collection must
have been very impressive.

On Commonside West there was Park Place, the seat of John Pollard’s
brother, William, a London wine merchant. Edwards described it as “a
handsome house, built of grey stock-bricks, and finished in the present
taste”, with a “small lawn, which was skirted on one side with high
elm trees, and bounded on the east and south by Mitcham Common”.
Twenty years earlier, when the property was owned by Francis Gregg,
an attorney, the vestry had authorised him, on payment of an annual
fee of one guinea, to enclose part of the Common abutting the gardens
of the house. This extended the grounds as far as today’s Madeira
Road, and secured for Gregg and subsequent owners unbroken views
across open heathland to Pollards Hill and the North Downs.

Beyond The Canons, of which Edwards had surprisingly little to say,
stood Mitcham Villa, owned by James Cranmer, another lawyer and
the lord of the manor of Mitcham, and leased to James Portis, a London
stockbroker. The house “has good … gardens etc.,” Edwards told his
readers, and “in the Common is an avenue of high elm trees directly in
front”. The elms have long been felled, but the approach to the house
is still there, crossing the green known as Cranmer’s Piece. Today
known as King George VI Avenue, the drive was planted with species
of ornamental crab trees some 50 years ago, and now leads to gates
giving access to a service area of the former Wilson Hospital. In the
garden of Mitcham Villa Edwards was shown a “white Marseilles fig-
tree”. This, he was assured, had been planted by Archbishop Thomas
Cranmer, from whose brother, it was claimed, the Mitcham Cranmers
were descended, and who in 1556 had been burned at the stake at Oxford