Bulletin 143

PRESIDENT: J Scott McCracken BA FSA MIFA PRESIDENT: J Scott McCracken BA FSA MIFA
VICE PRESIDENTS: Viscountess Hanworth, Lionel Green and William Rudd
BULLETIN NO. 143CHAIRMAN: Lionel Green SEPTEMBER 2002

PROGRAMME SEPTEMBER-DECEMBER

Saturday 28 September 2.30pm Visit to Reigate Priory

A visit arranged to follow up Audrey Ward’s talk to the Society last December. The Priory is in
Bell Street, Reigate. There is an hourly bus from Sutton, or travel by shared cars.
£2 a head

Saturday 12 October 2.30pm .Merton and Morden – Then and Now.

Snuff Mill Environmental Centre
This year’s Evelyn Jowett Memorial Lecture is a presentation by member David Roe, with
Judith Goodman, of past and present views of a variety of sites in Merton and Morden. Some
scenes have changed completely, though there are some surprising survivals. Illustrated using
two projectors.

Saturday 2 November 2.30pm 52nd Annual General Meeting (see page 16)
Snuff Mill Environmental Centre
After the business part of the meeting member Don Fleming will give an illustrated talk:
.Elizabeth I – the Early Years.

(The Snuff Mill Centre, in Morden Hall Park, is on bus routes 93,118,157 and 164. Drivers use

the garden centre
car-park. Take the path across the bridge; go through the gateway and turn right. The Snuff

Mill is straight ahead.)

Saturday 7 December 2.30pm .The Upper or Fair Green, Mitcham.

The Canons, Madeira Road, Mitcham
In this illustrated lecture, another in his series of Mitcham studies, member Eric Montague
turns his attention to the Upper Green. Once a meeting-point of roads from surrounding Saxon
settlements, it has had a long and picturesque history.

The Society’s events are open to the general public, unless otherwise stated.

(Rectangle comment XPMUser
24/05/2017 23:10:07
blank)
THE GREAT EXHIBITION OF 1851

A large audience came to hear Richard Milward at the Snuff Mill on 23 February. He
reminded us he last spoke to us there in 1997, and we gave him a warm welcome on his
return.

The concept of the Exhibition was first promoted by Prince Albert, who wanted to popularise
English art and design. The idea was realised by Sir Henry Cole (1808-82), a civil servant
who had written guide books of Hampton Court and the National Gallery, and Joseph
Paxton, gardener at Chatsworth, who was also a businessman.

A Royal Commission was formed, which included Robert Stephenson. The president was
Prince Albert.

The building was begun in June 1850 and the Exhibition opened in May 1851.
One MP, Mr Sibthorpe, who feared trees would be chopped down, spoiling Hyde Park, was
reassured when a transept was built to contain the trees from damage in September 1850.

The building was named .The Crystal Palace. by Punch magazine.
You could not see everything in one day, so most people bought a season ticket. A
businessman arranged special train services from York, Birmingham etc and accommodation

in London. His name was Thomas Cook – and thus began .Cook’s Tours.. 165,000 travelled
on the Midland Railway alone.
It changed some things for ever. .Leisure time. was born. 45,000 people visited on a Monday,

but the most popular – and expensive – day was Saturday.

There were different entrance charges depending on which days you went, but it was not
cheap. Few of the working classes could afford it.
There had been Chartist riots in 1848 and a fear of rebellion was in the air. Forty policemen
were on duty at all times.

A solution to the problem of
what to do with the Crystal Palace at the end of the 1851 Exhibition without taking up too much space
William Morris and John Ruskin were only two of many who opposed the Exhibition.

It was transferred to Sydenham and re-opened there in June 1854, and was used for concerts

and other events until it burnt down in 1936. Some of our members sang there, and some

in Hyde Park. An architect,
witnessed its burning-down, which was seen from miles around. C Burton, proposed

standing it on its end to

Richard showed us some very interesting photographs also, and gave us an entertaining

form a 1000-ft tower.

afternoon for which we are most grateful.

From F Barker & R Hyde

Don Fleming London As It Might Have
(This report was inadvertently omitted from the previous Bulletin . our apologies to speaker

Been, J Murray, London 1982
and reviewer. JG)

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY’s EXHIBITION
AT THE HERITAGE CENTRE, THE CANONS 30 APRIL TO 2 JUNE

I visited it one morning when it would be quiet so that I could browse. I enjoyed being

welcomed by the
photographs of various past activities of the Society, which included archaeological digs,

outings and our 50th
Anniversary Dinner last year. I cannot be the only person to have happy memories stimulated,

but, more important,
the photographs showed the social activities of MHS members. On entering the main exhibition

area surely no-one could miss the large display case in the corner. A splash of colour and familiar lettering

proclaimed Carter’s
Tested Seeds, and I recalled looking from the train window for the first glimpse of the clock

and Carter’s
colourful display of flowers. There were also items from Gutteridge’s corn chandlers in Mitcham

– including an
old account book. At that stage I just wanted some large bunches of lavender!

Maps, old implements, a model of Merton Priory, notes on William Morris and others were all on

display. I had
forgotten that there are still SEVEN horse troughs in the Borough. All of the photographs were

excellent . the
shops of Morden being very interesting. Finally a large collection of MHS publications were

shown, including
some now out-of-print.

The variety of the subject material demonstrated the diversity of our interests, also that much

historical material
is well within living memory. Thank you, Bill and your team, for setting it up.

Audrey Thomas

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 2

ZEPPELIN LED

Twenty members of the Society were transported back to the 1930s for a whole afternoon on 14

June. We
arrived at Britain’s premier pre-war aerodrome at Croydon for a flight of fancy. We passed

under the glass
canopy which once displayed the golden wings emblem (now kept inside), and entered the Booking

Hall. With
very little imagination needed we saw the bookstall in one corner and the post office in the

other and sat on the
benches as the well-dressed would have done while they said fond farewells to intrepid

travellers.

One incongruous item was the Tiger Moth aircraft suspended from the ceiling and partly hiding

the fine original
glass dome. Passing along the corridor leading to customs examination we were allowed access to

the control
tower, and observed navigational aids for pre-war flying. The twin towers of the Crystal

Palace, and the
Beddington sewage treatment works were useful, but perhaps more beneficial was the navigational

radio beacon
at Mitcham. Each wall within the control room was helpfully labelled (for the operators)

.north., ‘south., .east.
or .west.. We were surprised to find the large clock faces on the outside of the control tower

still in place.

So what has this got to do with
Zeppelin? It was the advent of the
zeppelin airships over London in
1915 that gave rise to Croydon
aerodrome. The scale of civilian
casualties caused the War Office to
panic, and three airfields were
designated to protect the citizens of
London. A military airfield was built
at Plough Lane, Waddon, in January
1916, with an adjoining factory to
construct aeroplanes. In fact the
aircraft at that time were not able to
reach the height of the airships and
were of little effect. A further airfield
was made to the east, to become

Croydon aerodrome. Immediately the war ended the factory was closed and the Aircraft Disposal

Company
was set up to disperse thousands of aircraft parts. In 1920 the two airfields were combined and

regular civilian
flights began, leading to the formation of Imperial Airways in 1924. Four years later the

existing airport buildings
were erected, serving the airliners throughout the 1930s – which is where we came in.

Post-war development around an airport without proper runways caused the demise of Croydon

Airport (an
airport is a .port. and handles international flights, while an aerodrome only handles internal

ones), which
closed with a last flight to Rotterdam in September 1959.

Sincere thanks go to the Croydon Airport Society and its chairman Mr Frank Anderson for a

memorable visit.

Lionel Green

(Rectangle comment XPMUser
24/05/2017 23:10:39
blank)
A Handley Page HP 42 biplane in front of the central tower at Croydon. (John Gent Collection)

DOROTHY TYLER MBE
Dorothy Tyler (née Odam) was created an MBE
(Member of the Order of the British Empire) at an
investiture at Buckingham Palace on 28 May. The Prince
of Wales presented her with the honour. Dorothy, now
a very fit octogenarian, was one of a remarkable
generation of Mitcham athletes (see Bulletins 134 and
135) and an all-time national star of the sport.
MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 3

VISIT TO ST LAWRENCE CHURCH AND MORDEN PARK

A large group of members and visitors met Bill Rudd on the morning of 23 May outside St

Lawrence. In a brief
introduction he pointed out that there may have been a small wooden Saxon church on the site.

When that was replaced
by a stone building is conjectural. The first reference to the parish being organised as a

rectory dates from 1205.

There was a substantial refurbishment of the church in 1635/6.
Although the western tower was probably completely rebuilt,
the main part of the building was simply refaced with brick, in
first Flemish and then, mainly, English bond. Within this facing
is contained the medieval church. Nave and chancel are in one,
and there is no screen. The windows are mid-14th-century in
style, but the glass is mainly 19th- and 20th-century, though
the east window has some from the 17th century.

The gallery at the west end dates from 1792 and was built to
accommodate the children of the Sunday School, which had
been founded a year earlier. The present pews are modern,
replacing box ones that once supported candles (probably later
converted to oil lighting). Warmth, once provided by a central
stove, is now by gas-heated water-pipes in channels.

Mrs Elizabeth Gardiner (d.1719), one of the Garths, gave the pulpit, which was once a three-

decker, and the communion
rail. She has a fine monument carved with drapery, a Corinthian aedicule and a skull as a

memento mori. There are also
good monuments to the Leheup and Jones families and some tablets to the Garths. Commemorated by

their hatchments
are members of the Hatfeild, Garth, Tritton, Ridge, Conway and Hoare families.

Bill told us that the churchyard was cleared in 1970, at which point a large number of

gravestones and monuments were
removed, though he was able to record many of the inscriptions. There are a few handsome

surviving tombs, however,
including those for some Mauvillains and Rutters (families of Wandle industrialists), some

Bazalgettes (though Sir
Joseph himself is buried in Wimbledon – see Bulletin No.142), and the founder of the Bishop’s

Move removals
company.

A badly-timed cloudburst meant that at this point the party had to thank Bill hurriedly for his

knowledgeable account
of St Lawrence and adjourn to the George for shelter and other creature comforts.

JG

At 2.30pm we made our way to the late 18th-century mansion in Morden Park, where Mr William

Rudd graciously
received us in the Green Room, formerly the lower drawing-room. He explained that, for security

reasons, we had to
be counted, (there were 21 of us), and pointed out that there were some rooms, the former

dining-room at the front of
the house, and the library, adjoining the Green Room, that were now used as offices and were

not open to the public.
Otherwise we were allowed to see the whole house. However, he stressed that the house had

undergone considerable
remodelling to suit its present use, and that it would be difficult to envisage the original

layout of the house by looking
at the present rooms. The servants. quarters at the back of the house had been completely

redesigned to enable
wedding parties to have suitable access to the three main rooms, but this section of the house

had already undergone
major restructuring during the first century of its existence.

In order to understand better the original layout of the house, Bill took us around the outside

of the house. This view
also enabled us to see the westward (rear) extension of the house, undertaken before the

earliest large-scale Ordnance
Survey maps were produced in the 1860s. Later additions, notably a weather-boarded construction

providing servants.
bedrooms, over the principal drawing-room, and successive extensions in the south-west corner,

had been removed
during the recent renovations.

The house had been empty since 1985 and a photographic display in the room over the former

library showed the
terrible state that it was in before it was converted for use as a Register Office. It has now

been restored, if not to its
former glory, then to a very high standard. We must be thankful that such an important building

has been saved.

Our thanks are due to Bill for guiding us around this historic site, and to the Senior

Registrar and her staff for allowing

us access.
For those who missed the visit, the house will be open to the public during the Open House

weekend 21-22 September,
by which time the Society’s new book on Morden Park, a thorough revision of Miss Jowett’s 1977

publication, should
be available.

Peter Hopkins

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 4

VISIT TO PARHAM HOUSE, NEAR PULBOROUGH, WEST SUSSEX

We were fortunate in having excellent weather for our coach-trip to Parham (pronounced

.Parrum., not .Paarum.),
kindly and efficiently organised by Pat and Ray Kilsby on 13 July. And so were the stallholders

at the annual
Garden Weekend event there, whose plants and gardening equipment would not have looked so

tempting in the
rain. Yes, there were crowds of visitors, but the house was relatively peaceful and the grounds

big enough for all.

Parham, which is built mainly of grey local stone and is roofed with Horsham ‘slabs., is

essentially Elizabethan,
the foundation stone having been laid in 1577, with some 20th-century restoration in the same

spirit. It is not
unlike Loseley, though a little later. Its principal view is of the swell of the South Downs,

less than a mile away,
with nothing between but the little church of St Peter. (Once there was a cluster of cottages

too, but, in the ruthless
manner of landowners, they and their occupants were swept away in the 18th century – to improve

the outlook.) E-
plan in shape, with lots of gables and some immense windows, Parham has its main façade,

unusually, to the south,
though the entrance was moved to the north sidec.1700. Its principal rooms receive plenty of

light. There is a great
hall and a long gallery, but the other important rooms have lost much of their 16th-century

character, having been
altered with changing fashions. The gallery’s ceiling was painted with trailing foliage in the

1960s by Oliver
Messel, but is still traditionally hung with family portraits and other paintings. Among its

furniture is a ponderous
partners. desk, rather surprisingly designed by George Jack for Morris & Co early last century.

Somehow I don’t
think William Morris would have liked it.

There are many interesting paintings throughout the house, including portraits by Lely,

Kneller, Gainsborough

and Reynolds, and a charming kangaroo by Stubbs, and there is an important collection of

needlework.
The tiny church, which stands on the south lawn, is 16th-century in origin, but was remodelled

c.1825 in Gothick
style and has hardly changed since. There are box pews for the main congregation, but the north

transept, which is
the squire’s pew, is nicely cushioned and carpeted and has a cosy fireplace and its own door.

The house is surrounded by a large deer-park, separated by a ha-ha from the pleasure grounds.

In the four acres of
walled gardens there are vegetable plots, an orchard, herbaceous and shrub borders, formal

hedges, arbours and
many wall-trained plants. A delightful miniature house for children to play in was built into

the wall at one corner
in the 1920s.

After Parham we briefly visited Goring-by-Sea where the Catholic church has a reduced version

of the Sistine
Chapel ceiling paintings laboriously reproduced on its own ceiling by a parishioner.

Interesting rather than beautiful,
perhaps.

An agreeably scenic route home brought us to Park Place, Mitcham, where some of us then stayed

for dinner. All
arranged efficiently by the Kilsbys, to whom many thanks for a most successful day.

Judith Goodman

CHESTNUT COTTAGE, 9 CRICKET
GREEN, MITCHAM

An interesting discovery was made recently which adds
somewhat to the little we know about the early history of this
house in the Cricket Green Conservation Area. An excavation
made in the back garden by workmen repairing a service pipe
exposed the top of a brick-lined well, partly under the northern
corner of the building. It had been loosely filled with rubble
before the cottage was extended, possibly in the mid-19th century.
From what could be seen of the brickwork the well appeared to
be of 18th-century date, and its position suggests it had probably
once been in the backyard of the original dwelling, which forms
the front half of today’s Chestnut Cottage. Since the wall lies
partly under the present structure it was too dangerous to remove
any of the filling to examine the interior, and the well has now
been covered over again.

Shallow wells provided the principal source of water for domestic
purposes before the arrival of mains water some 150 years ago.
Many of these wells are marked on the early large-scale OS maps.

Eric Montague

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 5

.A SALUTE TO NELSON AND THE HAMILTONS’

On the evening of Saturday July 20th 2002 Vice Admiral Lord Viscount Nelson and Dame Emma

Hamilton
were graciously pleased to be present at a Fête Champêtre, a Concert and a Fireworks display in

and adjacent
to the Church of St Mary the Virgin at Merton.

Sea chanties, performed by three sturdy Mariners, whose fine voices belied their rough

appearance, entertained
the Picnickers in the Glebe Field, while the Admiral and his fair Companion strolled among

their Guests and
condescended to converse with them on sundry subjects. (Your reporter looked in vain for Sir

William, but the
old Gentleman is somewhat frail these days, and may have been recruiting his strength indoors –

perhaps with
a sip of a Restorative.)

A Peal of Bells summoned all to the church, where the well-known Master of Ceremonies Mr

Richard Baker
(who himself once served in this country’s glorious Navy) presided over the Proceedings. Songs,

from Haul
Away the Bowline and The Battle of the Nile to The Old Superb and Rule Britannia, performed by

a Soprano, a
Tenor and a Bass Baritone, with Pianoforte accompaniment, alternated with Readings, mainly from

Diaries and
Letters written by the Hero and by the charming and gracious Lady whose Pure Friendship with

him is so well
known.

Afterwards all present, while partaking of liquid Refreshments, were treated to a most

ingenious and impressive
Display of the Fire-work Maker’s Art outdoors in the field adjoining. The Great Man must have

felt the Battle
of the Nile most strikingly recalled to him. The blowing-up of L.Orient herself can hardly have

been a more
astonishing and aweful Spectacle.

..This
event marked the start of .Nelson’s Tour 2002′ which is a series of happenings to commemorate

the tour
undertaken by Nelson and the Hamiltons to Wales and the Midlands 200 years ago. The .Tour. is

just one part
of the run-up to October 2005, when the bicentenary of Trafalgar will be celebrated. The

organisers are the
Official Nelson Commemoration Committee, who are drawn from the main museums, societies and

foundations
concerned with the Nelson heritage. For further information about the ONCC and 2005 contact

Colin White,
Chairman ONCC, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London SE10 (023 8312 8525 or
CWhite@nmm.ac.uk)

JG

From LONDON ARCHAEOLOGICAL FORUM’s Archaeology Report February-April 2002
MERTON
176-188 London Road, Mitcham

PCA Ltd, Evaluation

Prior to the demolition of the buildings on the site, a standing building survey was conducted

on the Swan Inn
Public House, 178 London Road. The evaluation comprised four trenches, 10m x 2m, and 8m x 2m. A

10th-12th
century roadside ditch was the earliest feature excavated, and ran across the eastern limits of

the site. A
possible 10th-12th century wall foundation, composed of a plinth of large flint nodules

overlain with green
sandstone blocks, overlay the ditch, representing building activity along London Road. Cutting

this wall was a
large 13th /14th century pit containing domestic waste. A pit, dating between 1580 and 1700,

cut the natural
layers in Trench 1 suggesting that this area was to the rear of properties fronting London

Road. Another pit
contained pottery dating to between 1740 and 1880. A brick drain dating to between 1700 and

1900 may have
been associated with the Swan Inn.

Land at Love Lane, Mitcham

AOC Archaeology Group, Evaluation

The evaluation revealed no archaeological features.

LAMAS 37th LOCAL HISTORY CONFERENCE

The London & Middlesex Archaeological Society’s conference for 2002 will take place on 16

November in the
Museum of London Lecture Theatre from 10.00am to 5.00pm. Called Buying & Selling in

Metropolitan London,
topics covered by speakers will include department stores, luxury shopping, groceries and

distance shopping from
1200 to the present day. Application forms for tickets from Local History Conference.
£5 for non-members of LAMAS, but two members from this Society can attend for £4 each.

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 6

DR JOHNSON’s HOUSE

.When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.“
Twenty-one members agreed with that statement when we visited the good Doctor’s house at 17

Gough Square,
London EC4 on Saturday 10 August 2002.

One approaches the square through short, narrow alleys from Fleet Street, with Chancery Lane

just round the
corner. We were stepping into history.

The house is at one end of this small square, built in 1700.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) lived here from 1748 to 1759, when he moved to another house in the

vicinity. It
was here he wrote The Rambler and A Dictionary of the English Language, which was a mammoth

task covering
nine years.

Each room in the house has its own atmosphere, and each is a delight, from the ground-floor

parlour to the
second-floor library and bedroom.

He was never wealthy, as he had between five and seven people living in and was always

entertaining others.

Many .names. of the 18th century were visitors: David Garrick, actor, Joshua Reynolds, painter,

Fanny Burney,
writer, and Mrs Montague, leader of the .Blue Stockings., were just a few.
Miss Asher, our guide, was so informative and told us so many stories, that after an hour her

voice gave up.
There is a very interesting video with two actors portraying Johnson and Boswell walking around

the house.

This had a surreal effect on me as I thought I might bump into them as I entered a room.
A word of caution.
There are many stairs
to climb, but in the
rooms there are chairs.
The banisters and
door-knobs are
authentic, so you are

literally in touch with
history!
The house was not

only full of people but
also books and cats.
Two of his favourite
cats were Hodge and
Lily. In Gough Square
there is a statue of
Hodge, sitting on the
Dictionary with two
oyster shells by his
paws. This statue has
been there three years
and is still the latest
statue in the City of
London.

After two hours in the
serenity of the house,
getting on a No.11 bus
packed with tourists
was something of a
culture shock.

Don Fleming

No.17 Gough Square in
1881. Watercolour in the
Guildhall Library

(Rectangle comment XPMUser
24/05/2017 23:12:28
blank)
MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 7

LOCAL HISTORY WORKSHOPS

Friday 5 July 2002 – 5 members present. Bill Rudd in the chair.
©
It was encouraging to hear from Bill Rudd that these Workshop reports are worthwhile. As a

result of the
report on the May Workshop in the last Bulletin, John Pile had passed on to Bill information

from the 1881
Census obtained from his genealogist friend, John Cunningham, relating to both the Trendell

family of
Flitwick Cottage, Morden Common, and the Collinge sisters of Morden Park. Bill has since been

able to
follow up leads, and obtain the details he has been trying to track down for some time. Buy the

new booklet
on Morden Park to discover more on Isabella and Helena Collinge!
©
Sheila Harris has been in contact with Vanessa Bunton, recently appointed as Community

Archaeologist
by English Heritage to liaise with local societies in the Greater London area. Vanessa has

asked to meet our
Society to discuss possibilities, and the Workshop on 4 October is being set aside for this

purpose. It is to
be hoped that many members will want to come to this meeting.
©
Lionel Green took a break from Merton
Priory to tell us of a possible link between
Merton and Dorking, where he is heavily
involved with the local museum. A pair of
houses, now numbered 113 and 115 South
Street, Dorking, built around 1846,
incorporate some doors and windows from
the late 17th or early 18th century.
According to J Attlee, Reminiscences of Old
Dorking (1912) p.11, these are supposed to
have come from .Lord Nelson’s house at
Merton.. The builder, Arthur Dendy of
Tower Hill, is said to have .bought a large
quantity of doors and windows very cheap..
As Merton Place began life as the more
modest Moat House Farm, apparently built
around 1750, and was demolished by 1823,
the story seems hard to credit.
©
Don Fleming stayed with Nelson to
mention the recent announcement by
Sotheby’s of the discovery of a trunk full of
Nelson artefacts, including a blood-stained
purse and letters from Lady Nelson, his
wronged wife. Apparently they belonged to

descendants of Alexander Davison, Nelson’s
agent and friend.
Don had recently come across a reference

to William Morris in Staffordshire. Morris
was a regular visitor to Leek in the 1870s,
and left an indelible mark on Leek’s fine
legacy of arts and architecture.

Finally Don shared an interesting placename discovered on a visit to Matlock in Derbyshire.

Shiploades,
first mentioned in 1417 and again in 1769 apparently meant .a river crossing for sheep.! The

river Derwent
is and was very shallow in places, where it passed through Matlock.

©
Peter Hopkins had written to the architects who produced the 1997 report on Morden Park, for

permission
to use some of their drawings in our new booklet on the property. They not only gave their

permission, but
sent copies of watercolours in the Guildhall Library. Those by G Yates (see next page), in

1825, were
mistakenly labelled .Morden Hall. and had not come to light when the report was prepared. They

show an
intermediate stage in the remodelling of the rear of the house. Peter had written to Guildhall

Library for
permission to include these in the new booklet.

Peter Hopkins

113 and 115, South Street, Dorking

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 8

(Rectangle comment XPMUser
24/05/2017 23:12:59
blank)
Friday 23 August 2002 – 5 members present. Bill Rudd in the chair.

©
Sheila Harris had received a letter from a Mr Creasy of Morden about the commemoration (or lack

of) of
those from what is now the Borough of Merton who served in the armed forces. (see page 10)

©
Judith Goodman had found that the Witt Library (Cortauld Institute)
has a file on George Augustus Wallis (1761-1847), a mainly
topographical artist born at Merton (see page 5 Bulletin No.142).
According to a German catalogue it was our Merton (.Merton bei
London.). Unfortunately his career was entirely on the Continent,

and it is unlikely that any scenes of his native soil will turn up. He did
however do a romantic-style self-portrait.
She had also checked the Yates file at the Witt, as there exist various

watercolours of local scenes from the early 19th century by a G Yates
(for instance, see Page 40 of E N Montague The Cricket Green, and the
new publication on Morden Park). This may be G for Gideon, but,
according to a Christies catalogue from 1998, it seems that Gideon
Yates is only known to have done views of Lancashire, especially
Lancaster. The G Yates who did many views of London Bridge (old
and new) and other Thames bridges, including that at Kingston, is
thought to be someone else. It looks as if this one is .our. Yates, and we
should call him just G Yates. He is likely to remain a shadowy figure!

©
Horatio Nelson was on Don Fleming’s mind again and he spoke about
an article in History Today for August by Colin White, who had found a sketch by Nelson of the

battle plan
he proposed for Trafalgar. It was among a file of letters from Nelson to his brother William.

There was also
a list of officers whom he was recommending for promotion.

Nelson (and Colin White) had also appeared on Channel 5 in the Great Heroes series.

©
Peter Hopkins, most of whose time has been taken up recently with preparing five publications

(see page 10),
was able to quote the prices to be charged for them. He had also brought to the meeting a draft

triple-fold A4
leaflet for visitors to Morden Park and a set of explanatory posters (A3) to be displayed in

each room, the yard
and the gardens, at the Open House weekend (21-22 September). Everyone present thought these

were excellent.

©
Thanks to help from a postal member (see page 8) and now from Oldham Library Service Bill Rudd

has
tracked down the elusive Collinge sisters and been able to flesh out their background. See the

new Morden
Park booklet for more! (see page 10)

Judith Goodman

Dates of next workshops: Friday 4 October (Vanessa Bunton from English Heritage will be

present) and Friday 29 November.

Everyone is welcome, member or not. If you have a historical query, why not come and discuss it

in a friendly forum?

IN BRIEF
©
Merton Heritage Centre’s current exhibition at The Canons looks at the story of the Gypsy

connection
with our area. Plenty of interesting photographs and artefacts.
©
The Society receives regular mailings from the Ragged School Museum, Copperfield Road, London

E3.
This museum of East End Life is open on Wednesdays, Thursdays and the afternoons of first

Sundays. (020
8980 6405 or www.raggedschoolmuseum.org.uk)
©
For the Streatham Society’s Local History Group Brian Bloice will be speaking about Rubber,

Silk and
Coffee in Lower Streatham at Woodlawns, 16 Leigham Court Road, SW16 on Monday 7 October at 8pm.
Non-members welcome.
©
Those who went on the coachtrip to Merton College, Oxford, may be interested in attending a

talk being
given by the Archivist, Michael Stansfield, to the Nonsuch Antiquarian Society at St Mary’s

Church Hall,
London Road, Ewell, on 2 October at 7.45 for 8pm -.The Surrey Estates of Merton College..
©
Lambeth Archives annual Open Day is on Saturday 28 September from 10am to 5pm at Minet Library,
Knatchbull Road, London SE5 9QY. (020 7926 6076) Admission free. There will be a talks

programme
and a special display on local industry. Archive staff will be on hand to answer queries. There

is a new
imaging system called Landmark, which can call up many prints and photographs from the

collection.

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 9

From the postbag:

Jim Creasy of Morden has written to our Hon. Secretary commenting initially on the memorial

plaque to J H S
Dimmer VC at the Civic Centre – …. truly magnificent, and a fitting testament to a very brave

man!.

He goes on:
…. However … the tribute does say that .Jack. was Merton’s only winner of the VC. Not so –

my
researches have unearthed two more certainties, and a third debatable one. They are:

.1. George Edward CATES VC, a 2nd lieutenant in the Rifle Brigade, who died 9th March 1917. His

home was 221 Kingston Road, Merton. Educated at Rutlish School…
.2. Arthur Stewart King SCARF VC, squadron leader RAF (VR?). Died 20 December 1941 aged 28, of
1 Dunmore Road, Wimbledon. Educated at King’s College School, Wimbledon.

.3. Ian Willoughby BAZALGETTE VC. Also a squadron leader. Died 8 August 1944. He was residing
16 Sycamore Road, New Malden at time of death, but was from an old Wimbledon family, and is

buried
there. Royal Kingston have honoured the man by naming Bazalgette Close and Bazalgette Gardens

after
him. A rare name and he will surely be related to the Bazalgette who designed London’s sewage

system
in the 19th century [see page 2 Bulletin No.142].

…. Nearly sixty years on, no attempt has been made by Merton to honour the military, and

civilian,
deaths 1939-45. I now have the names of most and am currently looking into the circumstances of

the
deaths, also their backgrounds. I have hopes that the names will eventually be displayed in

front of
Crown House as a focal point on Remembrance Day. I also have a great many Great War deaths on

file…

…. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission website is magnificent – that is, when you know of

a

death! For a fee … they will programme .Wimbledon., .Mitcham., Merton & Morden….“

(Responses to this letter will be welcome! Deadline for next Bulletin is the first week in

November.)

NEW PUBLICATIONS

Three sources for the history of Mitcham have been
prepared by the late Steve Turner, former Chairman
of East Surrey Family History Society, and an active
member of our own Society. The sudden and tragic
onset of Motor Neurone Disease prevented Steve
from completing the books, and he entrusted them
to the Editorial Committee to finish. We are glad
to say that he saw the three booklets completed
shortly before his death.

Parishioners of Mitcham 1837/38: The Revd
Herbert Randolph’s Notebook, with introduction
by Eric Montague and others.

Mitcham in 1838: A Survey by Messrs Crawter &
Smith, with introduction and maps by Peter Hopkins
Mitcham in 1846: The Tithe Apportionment Map

transcribed, with introduction and maps, by Peter
Hopkins from photocopies supplied by Steve.
Each booklet priced £2.95, but available to
members at £2.40 at meetings or by post from our
Publications Secretary
.
Add 60p per title for postage
.

Morden Park

Miss Jowett’s booklet on Morden Park, published
by this Society in 1977, has long been out of print.
Since then further information has come to light,
not least during the survey undertaken prior to the
recent renovation and conversion of the house for
use as Merton’s Register Office. This new edition,
profusely illustrated with reproductions of original
watercolours and prints, architectural drawings
and plans, photographs and maps, has been
prepared by William Rudd and Peter Hopkins, with
considerable assistance from Judith Goodman,
Eric Montague and Tony Scott. It has been
published on behalf of the Society by Merton
Library and Heritage Services. It will be on sale
to the public at £3.95, but is available to members
at £3, from our Publications Secretary. (Add 60p
for postage and packing)

A Mitcham Childhood Remembered 1926.45 is
by Pamela Starling, yet another former pupil of
Mitcham County School for Girls to allow us to
publish her recollections. Full price 50p, members.
price 40p. (Postage and packing 25p extra)

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 10

BILL RUDD has some reflections on:
THE BIRTH OF A PUBLICATION

Members may wonder how the Society manages a steady stream of publications. Having been

involved in a

few, I can explain.
It starts with the author, usually a member, who submits, or is persuaded to write, an article.

Sometimes a nonmember
is invited, eg Lilian Grumbridge with Memories of Lower Morden. It then goes the rounds of the
Publications Sub-Committee, who each comment, suggest etc, and a second draft is produced. This

continues
until all, including the author, are satisfied with it, when it goes to print, and finishes up

on the publications
table for sale.

The Society first launched into print in 1967, with a 5″ x 7″ booklet on The Canons, Mitcham,

in minuscule
print which needed a magnifying-glass – the result of financial stringency at that time. From

1969 there was a
run of 5½. x 8¼. glossy booklets, including in 1976 a larger-print version of The Canons, which

were well
received. The last was in 1983.

All these publications were produced by outside printers. The Society now has its own in-house

printer, Peter

Hopkins, who produces a wide variety of publications.
The process is not always straightforward. One booklet in particular has needed a whole new

approach and is
the main subject of this article.

In 1977 the Society published Miss Evelyn Jowett’s booklet Morden Park, Morden. In November

2000 Morden
Park house, substantially refurbished, opened as Merton Register Office. I was able to show the

Superintendent
Registrar a copy of the original booklet, and it was suggested that a new one would be

invaluable, as the answer
to numerous enquiries they get.

The suggestion was put to the Society’s Committee, and was agreed. The Sub-Committee got to

work. An A4
printout was made of the original booklet, and circulated. One suggestion was that the old

booklet be scrapped
and replaced with a completely new one. I suggested parts of the old one were still valid and

should be included,
out of respect for Miss Jowett. This was agreed, and the next printout contained those parts,

along with new
material from research.

Since the house interior had changed
considerably over the years, the
inclusion of the architects. drawings
would give a clearer picture of what it
used to be. Extracts from the
archaeological report were also to be
included, describing the foundations.

The original photographs, by the local
newspaper in 1974, could not be found.
A new set was commissioned, taken
from the original viewpoints, plus extras,
by a local qualified photographer. To
these were added several from private
sources. In addition a number of early
coloured drawings of various periods
would show any changes in the exterior
that may have taken place.

Only when Miss Jowett’s archives were transferred recently from Morden Library to the Society’s

store were

the original photos found, but they were already out-of-date.
The list of occupants has been considerably expanded, and the gaps in the sequence filled. The

occupants who
did not appear in the 1851 Census were discovered in their London residence, and have been

included, as are
the two Collinge sisters who were left out of the original booklet because nothing was known.

Very intensive
research has revealed who they were, the dates and place of birth – Oldham, Lancs, their father

and mother,
others of the family, and best of all, that their father was a prominent cotton manufacturer,

and a JP.

At the time of writing the new booklet is now complete and awaits the printing process. It

should be an outstanding
success. It is due out in September for the .Open Weekend. at Morden Park house.

One of Colin Smith’s photographs of Morden Park taken for the new book

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 11

PETER HOPKINS summarises an article in the Newsletter of the Bognor Regis Local History Society

on
THE TWO WIVES . AND ONE SON . OF SIR RICHARD HOTHAM

Sir Richard Hotham, founder of the resort that became Bognor Regis, was a former owner of

Merton Place,
famous as the home of Lord Nelson and Emma Hamilton. In the same way that Merton historians

gather all the
information they can find on Nelson, so Bognor historians collect anything to do with Hotham.

So it came
about that I received an order for copies of my little book on Merton Place from the Editor of

the Newsletter of
the Bognor Regis Local History Society, Ron Iden. At the same time, Mr Iden sent a copy of

Newsletter No.45
(August 2001) which included his article on his recent discoveries about Hotham’s wives and

son.

Richard Hotham, of the parish of St Giles, Westminster, had married Frances Atkinson of

Stockton-on-Tees at
Chelsea Hospital Chapel on 1 December 1743. He was then 21 years of age, she was .25+.. He came

to Merton
in 1764, though he also retained a London house.

On Friday 7 February 1777, the London newspaper, The Morning Post and Daily Advertiser, carried

the following notice:

.On Saturday last died at Brompton, Lady Hotham, wife of Sir Richard Hotham, of Merton Place,

Surrey..
Similar reports appeared in other London newspapers and in the Gentleman’s Magazine and Annual

Register.
Bognor historians had long been defeated in their efforts to identify the burial place of

Frances Hotham in 1777.
However, during a recent investigation of the International Genealogical Index (IGI) for

London, Mr Iden
began to uncover the true facts. First he discovered an entry for John Hotham, son of a Richard

and Frances,
christened in the parish of St Martin-in-the-Fields, Westminster, on 12 June 1751. As far as

anyone had known,
Hotham’s marriage had been childless, and no offspring are mentioned in his will. A search of

the parish
registers, held at Westminster City Archives, confirmed the entry: born 11 June 1751, baptised

12 June. Under
13 June, however, both the burial accounts book and the Sexton’s Day Book record the burial

fees for a John
Hotham, no age given, but .C. for child, address: ‘strand.. It would appear, then that the

infant survived only a
day or so, although curiously, Mr Iden has yet to find his name in the burial registers proper.

Out of curiosity he checked the St Martin burial register for Frances in 1777. On 8 February

was recorded Lady
(Barbara) Hotham. The Sexton’s Day Book confirmed her age as 44. He looked again at the IGI,

and turned to
the St Martin marriage register. On 7 April 1761, Richard Hotham .of this parish., and Barbara

Huddart of the
parish of St Margaret, Westminster, were married by licence.

But the picture wasn’t complete without finally tracing the death of Frances . now confirmed as

Richard’s first
wife . sometime between her son’s birth in 1751 and Hotham’s remarriage in 1761. St Martin-in-

the-Fields had
proved a fruitful source so far, so it was back to the burial register. Two to four burials a

day were recorded
(1000 a year! Where on earth, or rather under the earth, did they put them all?) He finally

found Frances
Hotham, buried 14 August 1760, eight months before Hotham’s remarriage. No age recorded, but

.W. for adult
woman, and the burial account book confirmed .Church Vt. [vault], £6 14s 6d, address: ‘strand..

Hotham was knighted in 1769, so it was Barbara who assumed the title of .Lady Hotham.; Frances

had remained
Mrs Hotham.

But new discoveries produce fresh .loose ends.. Lindsay
Fleming’s 3-volume History of Pagham in Sussex (1949)
includes the development of Bognor, because Bognor and
Bersted were once part of Pagham. Volume 2 (p.548)
contains these undated portraits of Sir Richard Hotham and
his wife. But which wife is pictured here? Is Mr Hotham
under or over 38 years of age.

The caption to Fleming’s illustration, Sir Richard Hotham,
1722-1799, and his Wife, was probably added by Emery Walker
Ltd, who engraved several portraits and maps for the author.

(Rectangle comment XPMUser
24/05/2017 23:14:57
blank)
Who was the original artist? Fleming’s list of illustrations says merely: .from miniatures by

P.B., formerly in the
possession of Richard S. White, friend of Sir Richard.. The National Portrait Gallery hazarded

a guess at: .Peter
Brown (flourished 1766.91) who signed PB and, perhaps less likely, a P. Brooke or Brookes, (fl.

1740.49) of whose
work there is an example in the Victoria and Albert Museum … Brown is perhaps more likely on

date.. And on date,
Mr Iden considers that in the portrait, Hotham’s age would be closer to 44 (in 1766) than 27

(in 1749), so Barbara is
more likely as the wife in the miniature. The current location of the miniatures is

unfortunately not known.

I would like to thank Ron Iden for permitting me to quote at length from his most interesting

article. If anyone
would like to borrow the Newsletter to read the full article, let me know.

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 12

With Mitcham mainly in mind, ERIC MONTAGUE has been putting together some ideas on
THE EVIDENCE OF PLACE-NAMES

The romance of English place-names has entranced many writers, and their extraordinary

diversity and the
significance of their geographical distribution has for long attracted the attention of

historians. From the tre-,
pol-and pen-prefixes of the Cornish south-west, through the .combes. and .bartons. of Devon,

the -ing suffixes
of the Saxon shore, the .hams. and ‘shires. of middle England to the -by and -thorpe of

Danelaw, there is a
pattern which speaks of a complex history of settlement over some 600 years before Domesday.

Research over
the last century has greatly refined our appreciation of the value of place-names, and has

shown how the
distribution of specific elements mirrors in a remarkable way the broad picture that has come

down to us
through documentary sources, and is now emerging in ever more detail from the work of field

archaeologists
and local historians.1

To illustrate what can be deduced from a detailed study of place- and, in particular, field-

names in a relatively
limited area, I propose to take the by no means exceptional example of the former parish and

Borough of
Mitcham. The fields may now have disappeared beneath houses and factories, but the evidence is

still to be
found in the maps and other documents held by Merton Local Studies Centre, Surrey History

Centre and the
Surrey collection in the Lambeth Archives at the Minet Library.

Field-names are a particularly useful source of information for the archaeologist. In Mitcham

we have fields
named .Bery. and .Burfurlong. mentioned in a 13th-century deed,2 the element burh, which means

a barrow,
hinting at a feature long since destroyed. The manor-name of Ravensbury may be in the same

category.3 On
Mitcham Common the ‘sundridge Ground. – a sub-circular area ‘separated. from the surrounding

heath by an
ancient bank and ditch – could well have been a prehistoric enclosure, whilst nearby .Maiden

Hill. was probably
a Bronze Age burial mound. Both disappeared many years ago, but were still conspicuous enough

to be marked
on early 19th-century maps.4

There were two great open fields in Mitcham during the Middle Ages, the East Fields (still

surviving as the
name of a district), and the West Field, both now built over. There was also a third

commonfield, part of which
was known as ‘southfylde Mead. (an indication that it was permanent wetland pasture) until the

16th century,
by which time it was already fenced.5 The West Field, its memory preserved in evocative street

names such as
Westfields Avenue and Fieldgate Lane, remained largely intact until the mid-19th century.

Incredibly, headlands
and way-baulks from the West Field survive as roads and bridle-ways, whilst housing estates

perpetuate the
medieval pattern of furlongs and even the individual selions. Place-name evidence shows that

piecemeal enclosure
of the West Field had actually commenced as early as the 13th century, .Battesworth., or

.Baetti’s homestead.
being recorded in 1234,2 along with ‘spirchey. (from the OE spearr), an enclosure in a wood,

and .Inland. – an
intake or assart. Batsworth can still be found on modern maps of Mitcham, as the name of a road

and a recreation
ground.

In Mitcham the whole of the West Field, which embraced some of the most fertile land in the

parish, comprising
a rich dark loam, was known as the .Blacklands. until the mid-19th century.6 To date, at least

three Romano-
British habitation sites, one of which included a well, have been identified around the margins

of the West
Field, and also a burial ground. The frequent association of fields known as Blacklands with

Romano-British
sites was noted by the late W G Hoskins, and it looks very much as if the Blacklands at Mitcham

can be claimed
as another example. If so, the historian might well be tempted to wonder if the system of open

field cultivation,
with its strip holdings, could have originated in agricultural practices already well

established before the end of
the Roman period.

The character and productivity of land is often disclosed by field-names and, although not

exactly adding to the
historian’s information (the maps produced by the Geological Survey portray the solid and/or

drift geology
with great accuracy) the nicknames used by the peasantry, and handed down through the

generations, are at
least colourful. ‘stoney Piece. and ‘small Profits. need little explanation, whilst .Pudding

Field., .Pudding
Acre. and .Drag Mire Lane Shot. – all in Mitcham – were obviously on heavy land. .The Roughs.,

.Firze Field.,
.Firzey Piece. and .Firsey Close. were on poor land, typically with a thin acidic topsoil

covering gravel.7
Relatively recent names like .Botany Bay., .America. and .Newfoundland. all sound like names

concocted to
emphasise their remoteness from the village centre. Land use can also be deduced from names

like .Great
Wood., .Little Wood., .Pollards Hill. and .Pollards Wood. – the latter indicating woodland

management. Part
of the West Field, known as the .Hay Furlongs., was presumably permanent grassland, reserved

for the annual
fodder crop and subsequent grazing, each ‘stint. being allocated according to ancient custom.

.Meads. abound,
as might be expected in a well-watered parish, and were most likely managed as watermeadows,

whilst extractive

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 13

industries are indicated by .Gravel pit field. and .Brickbat field.. The place-name Colliers

Wood, and the field
.Collyers Close. – the latter mentioned in a rent roll of 16808 – are both indicative that

here, as in the woods to
the north of Croydon, charcoal had been manufactured. Field-names like .Fleming Mead. and

.Flemyng Gate.
(gate itself is a Norse element) in north Mitcham suggest the settlement of immigrants during

the Middle Ages.
Were these people from the Low Countries some of the first to use the meadows flanking the

Graveney as
.crofting grounds. for the bleaching of textiles? Wetlands were valued for various purposes,

including the
cultivation of osiers – a Willow Lane exists in Lower Mitcham – and on the tithe map we have

.Gamekeeper’s
Acre. and .Gamekeeper’s Field., together with .Old Snipes. and .Blake’s Snipes. (‘squire. Blake

was a 19thcentury
landowner enjoying shooting rights). .Cranmarsh. and .Figge’s Marsh., at opposite ends of

Mitcham,
were both at one time undrained common land. .Marsh. in these instances must have had the

literal, obvious,
meaning, rather than being derived from .March., or borderland, as one Victorian writer was

tempted to speculate.

.Deadman’s Close., in the middle of the Anglo-Saxon cemetery, had been known to contain human

remains
long before it attracted the archaeologists. attention late in the 19th century, but .Hell

Corner., .Hanging Field.
and .Hanging Hook., at the crossroads where the parishes of Mitcham and Merton met, stir the

imagination.
Nothing of significance has been excavated from these fields (they are now covered by

industrial buildings),
but their prominent location abutting a piece of wasteland by the side of a public highway,

outside the precinct
walls of Merton priory, suggests that here we may have the site of the gibbet, reported in 1258

to have been
erected by the prior.9

Land tenure is of course often reflected in the field-names, and .Beneytsfeld. and .Bennetts

Hole Meadow.,
mentioned in various documents since the 14th century,10 enshrine the name of an early

landowner of whom
there is no other record. (.Bennett’s Hole., ie .hollow., from OE hol or holh, is still marked

on OS maps, to the
puzzlement of many, for few know the origin of the name.) Glebe Avenue can also be found on

modern street
maps, and scattered parcels of .Glebe. on the tithe map remind us of the original endowment of

the vicarage,
and that the original incumbents would have worked, or .farmed. (ie leased), glebe land to

augment the income
of the vicarage. Significantly, much of the glebe lies within the tithing of Mitcham, a part of

the parish held of
the manor of South Lambeth or Vauxhall, which in the 12th and 13th centuries was in the hands

of the de
Redvers, earls of Devon and Wight, believed to have founded the parish church of St Peter early

in the 12th
century.

At an inquisition post mortem conducted in 1263 it was confirmed that Eustace, the 12th prior

of Merton, was
a free tenant of the deceased Baldwin .de Insula., earl of Devon and Wight, paying a rent of

assize of 20s for
.the mill which is called Pippesmoln..11 This was Phipps mill, or Puppesmulle., which was

almost certainly
one of the two mentioned in Domesday. It disappears from the records before the 16th century,

and its actual
site has been lost, but the name survives in Phipps Bridge, a district of Mitcham. The place-

name element pipp,
meaning a small stream, also occurs at Dorking. In Mitcham it would appear to relate to a

watercourse, now
culverted in a surface water sewer and largely forgotten, which joins the Wandle above Phipps

Bridge itself,
where an ancient bridleway crosses the river.

During the 12th century numerous gifts of land in Mitcham and Wickford (Lower Mitcham) were

made to the
newly founded priories of Merton and St Mary at Southwark. One such grant, involving

.Wihtrichescroft., .la
Holme., .la Haie. and .Lestfurlang. – all in Lower Mitcham, was made to Southwark by Richard de

Wickford
c.1150-1170.12 This land was to form the nucleus of an estate held by the prior and convent of

St Mary until the
Dissolution, much of which can still be identified. Wihtrichescroft, which from the pattern of

enclosures still
visible on the tithe map, and the place-name element .croft. (OE for a plot of enclosed land)

would seem to
have been created at the expense of another open-field system, became the site of the .Chaffe

Hawse., later to
be known as the .Rectory House.. This, and a large tithe barn adjoining, were sold with the

rest of Southwark
priory’s Mitcham property in the 16th century. .Rowcrofts., another enclosure on the estate,

contains in its
name the OE Ruh, or .rough., a clear indication that it had been formed from the adjoining

heathland. .La Haie.
is identifiable with a .Mowing Ground. comprising part of the Rectory grounds in the early 18th

century.13

1.
The study of place-names is a minefield for the unwary, and efforts to decipher them are not

helped by eccentricities of spelling which, one suspects,
often reflect attempts to render changing vernacular pronunciation phonetically. Fortunately

for the modern student the speculative and sometimes
whimsical interpretations one encountered in the works of 18th- and 19th-century antiquaries

have been superseded by the results of a more
academic approach, and the historian is now able to use with greater confidence an impressive

legacy. This applies in particular to those working
in the field of local studies.
Readily available standard works today include:
Ekwall, E The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names 4th ed. 1960
Reaney, P H The Origin of English Place-Names 1960
Gray, H L English Field Systems 1915
Gelling, M Signposts to the Past 1978 and Place-Names in the Landscape 1984
MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 14

Field, J English Field Names: A Dictionary Alan Sutton 1989 (1972)
The county series of the English Place-Names Society, and, also for the EPNS, Smith, A H

English Place-Name Elements 1956
The English Place-Names Society produce regular publications.
It is axiomatic in place-name studies that wherever possible resort should be had to the

earliest documents available, and that a knowledge of Old
English and medieval Latin, as well as an ability to read the scripts used, is invaluable. For

the professional historian, or the academician possessing
these skills, there is little difficulty. The amateur, immersed in the study of what Hoskins

dubbed his .chosen parish., need not be deterred however,
for, with caution, the rich heritage to be found in local history records can still be

utilised. Deeds and wills, manor court rolls, estate maps and
terriers, the registers and maps produced by the tithe commissioners in the mid-19th century,

are but a few of the primary sources now readily
accessible in the various record offices. Many have been reproduced by county archaeological

and record societies.

2.
Gray, H L English Field Systems 1915 p367, quoting Pedes Finium 225-9-30 19 Henry III
3.
Bidder, H F and Morris, J .The Anglo-Saxon Cemetery at Mitcham., Surrey Archaeological

Collections LVI (1959) p57
4.
Typically, maps produced at the time of the Beddington Inclosure enquiry around 1813. Merton

Local Studies Centre
5.
London Metropolitan Archives. Transcript of Sewer Roll 1610
6.
London Borough of Lambeth Archives, Minet library. .Twelve acres of Blackland. mentioned in

deed 2614, and .Ten acres in Common Field
called Blacklands. mentioned in a deed of 1690, ref.no.3114. Merton Local Studies Centre, Plan

of Estates at Mitcham for Sale by Auction with the
Manor of Biggin and Tamworth August 1853
7.
Merton Local Studies Centre. Mitcham Tithe Commutation Survey 1846/7
8.
Surrey History Centre. Rent Roll of the Manor of Ravensbury 212/9/2
9.
Heales, A Records of Merton Priory 1898 p135
10. Calendar of Close Rolls Edward III XI 302, and Surrey History Centre 599/354 respectively
11. Inquisition post mortem 47 Henry III No.32b
12. British Library MS Add.6040 f.1 No.1 (Transcribed by John Blair – personal communication)
13. Surrey History Centre. Map in James Cranmer’s Estate and Memorandum Book, 1717 470/THE
NORTH MITCHAM MISSION DISTRICT

I am indebted to a kind friend for drawing my attention (very diplomatically, I must stress) to

an error on page
108 of my booklet on North Mitcham, where I state that the Links Estate was already part of the

Mission
District of St Paul, Furzedown, in 1903. It was not, in fact, assigned to St Paul’s until 1910.

North Mitcham was developing rapidly at the beginning of the 20th century, but remained a

remote part of the
parish of Christ Church, Colliers Wood. A mission church (in a prefabricated building) had been

established
and temporary arrangements made for the new housing estate, but, as my friend comments:

.It was not until January 1910 that it [the Mission District of Furzedown] came into being

officially,
although the idea was mooted in 1909..

The new mission district then took over responsibility for the families living on the Links

Estate.
With the creation of the parish of St Barnabas and the dedication of a fine new church in

Gorringe Park Avenue
in 1914, North Mitcham residents finally acquired a parish church of their own.

Eric Montague

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY EXCAVATIONS CARRIED OUT 1966-73

Today archaeology has become highly scientific and is best left to the professionals, though

there are still the occasional
opportunities for local volunteers. Once upon a time however this Society actively .dug.. Most

of the material from
the following list of sites (provided by Eric Montague) is held in the Society’s ‘store. at The

Canons.

TQ 2673 6918 1966-68 Short Batsworth Church Road Mitcham Romano-British
TQ 2732 6859 1966-68 Hall Place Lower Green West Mitcham Saxo-Norman
TQ 2780 6898 1969 Gutteridge’s 29 Upper Green East Mitcham Med./18th century
TQ 2772 6895 1971 Durham House Upper Green West Mitcham Mainly 18th century
TQ 2748 6851 1972 346/8 London Road Mitcham 18th century
TQ 2665 6804 1973 Ravensbury Manor House Ravensbury Park Mitcham Med./18th century
(There was also a Surrey Archaeological Society training excavation on the site of Mitcham

Grove in 1974.)

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 15

52nd ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
SNUFF MILL ENVIRONMENTAL CENTRE, MORDEN HALL PARK
SATURDAY 2 NOVEMBER 2002 at 2.30 pm

AGENDA

1 Chairman’s welcome. Apologies for absence
2 Minutes of the 51st AGM held on 3 November 2001
3 Matters arising from the Minutes
4 Chairman’s Report
5 Membership Secretary’s Report
6 Treasurer’s Report: reception and approval of the financial statement for the year 2001-02,

copies of

which will be available at the meeting
7 Election of Officers for the coming year

a) Chairman
b) Vice Chairman
c) Hon. Secretary
d) Hon. Treasurer
Appointment of the Hon. Auditor for the coming year
8 Election of a Committee for the coming year
9 Motions of which due notice has been given
10 Any other business

At the conclusion of the business part of the Meeting there will be a talk by Don Fleming on

the early life of
Elizabeth I.

NOMINATIONS for Officers and Committee members should reach the Hon. Secretary 14 days before

the
AGM, though additional nominations may be received at the AGM, with the consent of members.
MOTIONS for the AGM must be sent to the Hon. Secretary in writing at least 14 days before the

meeting.

Please bring this copy of the Agenda with you to the AGM.

The MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY reminds members that subscriptions are due on 1 October. The new rates

are:
Single member £7
Additional member in same household £3
Student member £1

A renewal form is enclosed with this Bulletin. Please complete it and return it with your

subscription to the
Membership Secretary,
or in person at a meeting. Members who pay their subscriptions by Banker’s Standing Order are

advised
to cancel the current standing order and arrange with your bank a new standing order for £7.00

per annum,
from 1 October 2002.

Letters and contributions for the Bulletin should be sent to the Hon. Editor. The views

expressed in this Bulletin
are those of the contributors concerned and not necessarily those of the Society or its

Officers.

Printed by Peter Hopkins

MERTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY . BULLETIN 143 . SEPTEMBER 2002 . PAGE 16