Friends of Wandsworth Common — Heritage Talk
Lost Houses and Gardens of Wandsworth Common
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to another Heritage Talk. My name is Steven Midlane and I'm chair of the Friends Heritage Group.
Tonight we're talking about four houses in the Nightingale Lane area, as part of our Friends Heritage Group research project: the Lost Houses and Gardens of Wandsworth Common.
A little background. The project started at the beginning of 2023 when Philip Boys and I sat down and said we'd like to identify all the houses that used to be around the perimeter of Wandsworth Common, and see if people would like to research the history of those houses, the gardens, and the people who lived in them. We sat down with an 1868 Ordnance Survey map and identified 32 houses around the Common, then put a call out through the Friends for volunteers to adopt a house. We got 22 volunteers responding, allocated houses at a February meeting, and then the wonderful Emma Anthony — archivist for the heritage service in Wandsworth — gave us all workshops in the work of the heritage service and the facilities and information available in the heritage library.
Having done that, we went away and started our research, came back together in September, and reported on progress. Some people had done amazingly well; some had really struggled to find the time. But we decided we had enough information for an interim report — a work in progress — to present to Friends members. We also set up a website for the group, currently accessible only to volunteers, where we post our findings.
In December 2023 we did our first presentation, covering six houses. Since then we've done two further presentations: one on the five houses of Bing Brook, researched by a group of three, and last December the Burntwood houses. Tonight is our Nightingale Lane evening.
To recap: Philip coloured in all the houses we could identify on the map — 32 in total. The ones we've already given talks on are shown in yellow. The four we'll hear about tonight are the four at the bottom, shown in green.
Those four properties are: Wilby Lodge, which Janet will talk about; Stanton House, just next to Wilby Lodge, which Rebecca will cover; Ravenslea, which wasn't there in 1868 but was eventually built on that site, researched by Julie and Liz, with Julie presenting; and finally Fernside, which James will cover.
I'm going to talk about Wilby Lodge, which is on Nightingale Lane, and I'll start with this beautiful photograph. It came to me via a friend of mine, Ruth, who got it from what was the Wandsworth Museum. It had "Wilby Lodge" written on the back, and she was interested because she now lives in the house on Nightingale Lane which stands on the site of Wilby Lodge — and her land registration documents list it as originally being called Wilby Lodge. She gave me three photographs in all, and this is a really lovely one, probably early 1900s.
At the time, Nightingale Lane had a number of large residential villas, mainly along the south side, occupied by families with servants. Wilby Lodge was one of the smallest of the villas, though as you can see from the photograph it was still quite a substantial building. I particularly like the rabbit in the foreground. You can see the family at the front, and I think this is a gardener and possibly a cook or a nurse.
Wilby Lodge first appeared, we think, on the 1865 Ordnance Survey map, together with its larger neighbours Stanton House and Ferndale. It has a rather distinctive curved boundary, which we think follows the course of the Falcon Brook — and that proximity was likely the cause of some flooding reported in September of that year. Perhaps it wasn't such a good idea to be near the river.
In 1867 a family called the Olivia family were living there. The 1871 census records W.R.W. Olivia Esquire living in Wilby Lodge. He was born in Piccadilly and is described as a concert and theatrical agent; his wife Maria was also born in London. At that time they had one servant and no children.
Ten years later we have a new family, the Lells. John Lell had three young children — Percy, Elizabeth and Arthur — two female servants (a nurse and a general servant), and his sister-in-law living with him. A fourth child arrived in 1883.
The most remarkable of these children is Arthur, born in 1881, who went on to win the Victoria Cross in the First World War. From Wikipedia:
"On the 3rd of December 1917 at Masnieres, France, during a very heavy bombardment, Captain Lashell's, although wounded, continued to encourage his men and organise the defence until the attack was driven off. Shortly afterwards the enemy attacked again and captured the trench, taking several prisoners. Captain Lashell's at once jumped onto the parapet and, followed by his 12 remaining men, rushed across under very heavy machine gun fire and drove over 60 of the enemy back. Later the enemy attacked again and captured the trench, and Captain Lashell's, who later managed to escape, in spite of having received two further wounds…"
What a hero. Arthur received his VC from King George V in March 1918, but before he had fully recovered he went back to the front — and was killed in action four days before Armistice Day.
In 1883, when the fourth Lell child was born, the family appears to have moved out, as the house was listed for sale. It was offered as the second lot in an auction alongside the much grander Ferndale estate next door. The sale particulars describe Wilby Lodge as:
"A separate detached residence known as Wilby Lodge, containing five bedrooms, box room, two reception rooms, conservatory and usual offices, with stabling and coach house and extensive grounds well stocked with fruit trees and shrubs."
By 1891 another family, the Griffiths, had moved in, followed by the Pelham-Webbs in 1911, and John Bryant in 1921 — four families in as many decades.
I found some charming advertisements for domestic staff. In March 1907, presumably placed by the Griffiths, there's a request for two young servants — a cook and a nurse or housemaid — describing a "comfortable home, Wilby Lodge, 107 Nightingale Lane." A later ad from 1916 seeks a "general servant. Small family, good wages. Wilby Lodge, 107 Nightingale Lane."
From the photographs Ruth gave me, we can see a fairly prosperous Edwardian family — probably the Griffiths, as the timing is about right. Here is possibly Mr. Griffiths with his wonderful moustache, his wife, and what might be his two daughters playing croquet on the lawn. The gardener is in the background, as in the first photograph.
In the 1920s, Thomas Joseph Green occupied the house from 1924, with his purchase recorded in the Land Registry in 1926. Ruth had these documents when she bought her house. In September 1931 Mrs. Green placed an advertisement offering a reward for a lost fur stole:
"Lost in Streatham on Thursday afternoon, a fur stole with tails, Canadian Fitch. Reward one pound when returned to Mrs. Green, Wilby Lodge, 109 Nightingale Lane."
— the number having changed again. Thomas Green is shown still living there in the 1939 census, described as a retired bank manager. He died in 1941 aged 81, leaving effects worth £4,754.
Sadly, Wilby Lodge is marked as "damaged beyond repair" by a V1 flying bomb on one of the wartime bomb damage maps. On the 1947 Ordnance Survey map it is gone — nothing marked on that distinctive curved-boundary site. The curved boundary itself, however, survives to this day. Ruth's house is now 125 Nightingale Lane, and Birchlands Avenue has appeared down the side, built in the 1950s. No other trace of Wilby Lodge remains.
I'm going to talk about Stanton House, which you can see on this lovely 1891 map, named alongside Fernside and the Oak building.
I haven't been able to find out exactly when Stanton House was built. Looking at maps from 1800, there's nothing there — just fields. But on the Streatham Tithe map from the 1840s there are some dwellings where Stanton House would be, and we know from the tithe map that all that little bit of land on the south side of Nightingale Lane was owned by William Boville. Alfred Casease occupied what became Stanton House, and plots 1049 and 1050 — classified as meadows — became its garden. Plot 1053, occupied by someone called Henry Prickle, became Wilby Lodge.
We know from the census that in 1861 George and Annie Cut moved into the house and carried out considerable improvements. In 1864 there were tenders for the erection of a villa residence with coach house and stabling for Mr. George Cut at Clapham Common — published in The Beehive, a trade union journal and the official journal of the London Trades Council, which would explain why building contractors were submitting tenders there. The architect was J.F. Rowley. I was slightly thrown by it saying "Clapham Common," but from everything I've seen that seems to have been how people referred to the area — it was never called Wandsworth or Streatham; it was Clapham Common.
Later, in 1882, the Cuts submitted plans for a new morning room at the back of the house and for a gardener's cottage to be built on the grounds — and all of that appears to have been carried out. On the 1860s map you can see Stanton House looking like quite a large villa, with a little portico at the front and a coach house to the right. The 1896 map shows the new morning room at the back with a small glass conservatory beside it, and the gardener's cottage on the drive.
George and Annie Cut lived in the house for over 40 years. George had been living in Hoxton before moving to what was then the leafy suburb of Clapham on their wedding day. They had no children and lived with Annie's sister; for most of those 40 years they had three servants — a cook and two housemaids. In the coach house next door lived Helena, who was born in Germany; her children moved out over time but she remained in the area after George died aged 65. From the late 1890s the young Cooper family lived in Stanton Lodge Cottage on the drive, where he served as gardener.
George Cut was born in 1820 in South Kirkby in Yorkshire — a major coal mining area — and at some point in his twenties moved to London to make his fortune as a coal merchant. It didn't start well: in 1850 he and his business partner John Smith declared themselves bankrupt. In 1851 he was living in Hoxton on Baltic Wharf, in an area where practically every one of his neighbours were also coal merchants — this was clearly where coal arrived via the Regent's Canal and was distributed.
He must have continued in business with John Smith, as he became a director of Rickett, Smith and Company, major coal and coke merchants. In 1859 they were appointed sole London agents for Yorkshire pit owners, putting them in a key position at the Great Northern Railway coal depots at King's Cross — now Coal Drops Yard. Quite a coup.
He wasn't only a coal merchant: he bought shares in and took a board seat at a company acquiring flour mills in Chelsea and South London; he was a member of the Worshipful Company of Fruiterers in the City of London; and he used his wealth to buy property and land in Surrey.
When he died in 1894 aged 74, there was something of a mystery about his will. Advertisements appeared in the London Echo and London Evening Standard throughout December, placed by his solicitors, asking anyone who knew anything about his will to communicate with them at once. A will was presumably found and proved in 1895, and the value of his personal estate amounted to £109,000 — roughly £12 million today.
He left Stanton House with its furniture and contents, plus £10,000, to his wife, and the remainder was divided among his family. The remainder included a 355-acre estate in the Surrey Hills, auctioned in July 1895 and described as:
"A highly important freehold residential, sporting and building estate of 355 acres, a considerable part of which is ripe for development, together with a genteel residence, model buildings, 22 cottages and six villas."
Known as Welcomes and New Barns Farm, the advertisement spoke of views "almost unrivalled for extent and richness of scenery" and proximity to the meets of the Old Surrey Fox Hounds. It seems possible they used Welcomes Farm as a country retreat once Clapham had become less rural and more developed.
Annie Cut continued living at Stanton House and died in 1903, aged 84. Frustratingly I couldn't find any sales particulars describing the house, but I did find the auction details for the contents, which took place over two days and included grand pianos, an eight-foot richly carved sideboard, turkey carpets, oil paintings, carriage horses and much else.
The reason I couldn't find sales particulars is that the family who moved in — the Boons — had been living literally around the corner, in a house called Holborne on the Drive, almost in the gardens of Stanton House. There was no need for a public sale. As we've heard from other talks tonight, Alfred Boon had his fingers in many pies in this area. Described as a wallpaper factor, he was also an employer, a builder, and was involved in local development. He was a Londoner from Chelsea, and simply moved around the corner.
I found one photograph showing what Nightingale Lane looked like when the Boons were living there — not that different from today. You can see the tower of the Jewish home on the right, and Stanton House and Wilby Lodge are tantalisingly hidden behind the trees beyond.
By 1916 the surrounding roads had been developed and streets of Victorian terraces were going up all around. The Boons eventually moved out to Essex, and by the 1921 census someone called George Young had bought the house, possibly with a view to developing it. In 1926 an advertisement confirms the house was demolished and the site cleared, with all materials — oak doors, slates and so forth — being sold off. Two new roads — Birchlands Avenue and Leofric Avenue — were built, connecting Mayford Road with Nightingale Lane.
I counted up the houses built on the land released by the demolition of just those three big houses: 60 new terraced houses. Quite a few cottages, as someone might say.
Me and Liz did the workshop with Emma a long time ago — she was absolutely wonderful, so thank you to Emma. Liz has done 99% of the research; I helped with the PowerPoint and somehow seem to have got the job of presenting tonight. Any tricky questions — ask Liz, not me!
Here's a photograph of Ravenslea. It was described somewhere — I can't remember where now — as an ugly house, but I think it's really quite grand and beautiful. It's right on the corner of Ravenslea Road and Nightingale Lane, and of course we know it today as the location of the Church of Latter-day Saints, the Mormon Mission.
As we've already heard, the numbering all the way down Nightingale Lane changed over time. When first built it was 79 Nightingale Lane, and it ended up as 149 Nightingale Lane — which shows just how much development was going on in that part of the borough around 1900.
We can't find a specific date for its construction, but it appears in the 1901 census. We found one mention of Herbert Bignold as the architect, though we couldn't find much more about him. We think it probably was him because he was based at 242 Lavender Hill — and you'll see later why that's significant. He also designed some of the houses nearby in Thurley Road, so it's highly likely he was the architect for Ravenslea, though not absolutely certain.
Going right back to 1854, when Spencer sold 15 acres of land to the West London and Crystal Palace Railway — part of it, as we know, was used for Wandsworth Common Station, and the remainder was rough ground and gravel pits used by the railway company for ballast.
In 1867, James Anderson Rose, who was the solicitor for the Wandsworth Common Preservation Association, bought that land intending to return it to the Common to make it Common land. Unfortunately he died in 1890 and the land was sold on the open market, so it never actually reverted to the Common.
The land was bought by Alfred Boon — whom we've just heard about, so there's a connection there. We're not sure if he bought all the land or some of it, but we do know he was responsible for building Wexford, Ravenslea, and Mayford Roads, working with a builder called Abel Play to develop the area surrounding Ravenslea House.
On the 1916 map you can see Ravenslea with a really extensive garden — a nice, substantial house right on the corner facing the Common. If you look at the 1916 map, there are three houses opposite the gardens; remember that, because it becomes important later.
We have a description of the house from the Mormon Mission when they acquired the property, published in one of their newsletters. It had 11 large rooms and several smaller ones for servants' quarters. The grandest part of the building was the large entrance hall — there's almost a tower at the front, very substantial. A high mahogany fireplace, well-carved and ornamental, takes pride of place, while the walls are panelled with fine tapestries showing exquisitely worked sporting scenes of Tudor times. It had a mahogany staircase — described as "not in the grand style," which I think is a little critical — but it leads up to a landing overlooked by a magnificent stained glass window a dozen feet high, and it has an oak-panelled billiard room.
We also know from the description of Mrs. Evans's funeral that the garden had lovely lawns and flower beds, fruit gardens, walks, and a tennis court, all planned and laid out in accordance with her directions.
By 1936 the garden is much smaller, and what had been three houses opposite have now become four. I think the garden was sold off sometime in the 1920s or 1930s and four new houses were built — and indeed, if you look today, those first four houses along there are clearly 1920s or 1930s houses, quite different from the Victorian or Edwardian three-storey houses on the rest of Ravenslea Road.
The 1901 census shows Edwin Evans. If you've lived in the borough a long time, you may remember that when we first moved here there were estate agent signs all over the borough with the name Edwin Evans — he was an auctioneer and estate agent. Elizabeth Evans, who we have the garden description from, was his wife. In 1901 they were 46 and 44 years old, with four domestic servants, and interestingly a page who was only 16.
Sir Edwin Evans — surveyor, estate agent and property developer — was based at 253 Lavender Hill, very close to Herbert Bignold at 252 Lavender Hill, so they were clearly close business associates. According to the Millennial Star newsletter, which the Mormon Mission issued when they demolished the house in 1964, it was suggested that Herbert Bignold built the house for his own use but once it was built he didn't like it, so he didn't move in — and Sir Edwin Evans obviously did like it.
Sir Edwin was a significant figure in the local community: a Conservative member of the London County Council, he supported the Battersea Conservative Association and was knighted for political and public services. He died in 1927, having lived in Ravenslea House until the mid-1920s.
By 1921 his wife had already died and his daughter-in-law had moved in. By now the household had just three staff — no longer described as servants, which is socially interesting — comprising the gardener, the housekeeper, and the housekeeper's daughter, who was a typist.
By 1924 the Evans family had moved out. Subsequent occupants were Ernest Clan Bromley (1924–1930), a Mrs. Konita Wilson (1931), and then from 1933 a Mrs. Whitaker Price, who ran it as a boarding house — a residential hotel aimed at long-stay residents, though apparently not very successfully, as Liz found numerous adverts seeking lodgers. An advertisement in the Streatham News of 30 January 1931 describes it as:
"A beautifully furnished and modernised ideal permanent home for gentle folk, facing Wandsworth Common. Constant hot water, gas fires, excellent cuisine, from three guineas."
By 1934 the house had been sold and the Mormon Mission purchased it.
Ravenslea became the headquarters for the Mormon Mission to Great Britain and Europe — not just a church, but the administrative offices of the mission. There were some minor alterations to the house to create a chapel and a recreation room. It provided accommodation for the mission president and his family, served as the administrative centre for the mission to Great Britain, and was where the Millennial Star weekly magazine was edited and published. It also had space for entertaining and socialising.
Unlike some other houses we've heard about this evening, Ravenslea survived the war, though it did have windows blown out and there are descriptions of bombs in the area.
The mission headquarters moved out of London in the late 1950s, and Ravenslea House then reverted to being a meeting house. In 1964 it was demolished. The new church was built in 1966, designed by an architect called David M. Ray.
One final detail worth mentioning: in the 1901 census, all four domestic servants were from Essex, which illustrates the significant inward migration of people from Essex coming to work in London during the rapid growth and development of new homes at that time.
And an interesting footnote about Sir Edwin Evans: he apparently presented the land for the last mile of the Northern Line extension at Morden, and established a branch office for his estate agency at Morden Station. The land around there that he sold became Merton Park and various other estates.
Thank you very much. Good evening. This is Fernside.
I'll start with some background, using this map from the Ducane letters at the London Archives. It shows various portions of land measured in acres, roods and perches, totalling 148 acres, 3 roods and 24 perches. This was bought in 1700 by Peter Ducane.
The land was originally very wooded — in the 16th century you weren't allowed to cut down any trees at all. But as the population grew and people needed to be fed, the trees were gradually cleared for growing vegetables, beans and so forth. They also kept sheep here, apparently.
Nightingale Lane — shown here — was called Balham Wood Lane before the 18th century. The map is probably very early 19th century or late 18th century. You can see William Boville marked there — he bought some land from the Duke of Devonshire. Balham High Road is visible too, and roughly where Ravenslea Road runs down to Balham. The Falcon Brook would have run around there, meeting the Heathbrook somewhere going down.
I live in Airedale Road — about here on the map — and I'm lucky to have a garden where I can grow vegetables, which rather makes me feel part of the original plan for this land. But that all changed eventually when William Nun found it much more profitable to build houses on the land and lease them out.
In 1812 William Nun leased the land from Peter Ducane — here is the lease from the Lambeth Archives, with a nice little map of Fernside. The property was made up of several sections, mainly this part, with a bit of that and some of the bits below — totalling 12 acres, 3 roods and 36 perches. Unfortunately William Nun died in 1813 and left his properties to his son-in-law, William Boville — whom you may have heard mentioned in earlier talks this evening.
The first tenant mentioned was a man called Abraham Mann, who rented Fernside. He was followed by a chap called Joseph Kaine — Joseph K, as I think of him — who moved into the house. That photograph, probably from about 1860 or perhaps a little later, shows the house built around 1810, possibly a little earlier. It has rusticated stucco work at the front, a portico with a frieze on top and rather slender columns, Corinthian columns flanking the windows, and a heavy cornice concealing the roof. There are two quite wide side portions.
I found a drawing in a sketchbook that may well be by the architect who designed Fernside. He published a book in 1808 and won a gold medal at the Royal Academy for his designs. He was a very talented artist — his father was a friend of William Blake — and he designed Nightingale Cottage at the top of the drive leading down to Fernside. William Nun is said to have built both Fernside and Nightingale Cottage.
This architect was Charles Augustus Busby. He had a rather colourful career: some of his roofs collapsed, forcing him to flee his creditors to Pennsylvania, where he built a large suspension bridge — whether it stayed up, I'm not entirely sure. After several years he returned to England and eventually teamed up with Amon Henry Wilds of Brighton. Together they built a great deal of Brighton in the Regency style — Brunswick Square, Kemp Town and various other terraces — roughly between 1820 and 1824. There is a museum in Brunswick Square with information about him on its website. He was quite an interesting, and very handsome, individual. I was fortunate enough to see a miniature portrait of him and his two brothers at the V&A, where they also hold some of his architectural drawings, beautifully executed in permanent ink — well worth a visit.
Joseph and Sarah Kaine had 12 children, making for quite a large household. Joseph was a very successful solicitor who came from Huddersfield; both he and Sarah married in the City before coming to live in this area. They signed their lease in 1812 and lived there until both of them died. They ended up in a lovely tomb in St. Leonard's Church in Streatham. Joseph left a large and lengthy will, bequeathing £60,000 among his 12 children.
A few years after the Kaines, the Coventry family moved in — a well-known name around Streatham. He married Mary Bevington, whose family were leather merchants. I had a relation who worked for Bevingtons and so I was particularly interested to find this connection; I've since found out some fascinating details about their factory in Rotherhithe.
Miles Coventry's son — also called Miles Coventry — became a judge, but was also an excellent oarsman who went to Cambridge and in 1860 stroked the winning Cambridge crew in the Boat Race. He later retired to Streatham.
Miles Coventry Senior died in 1886 and the lease ran out in 1889. William Boville and others sold the land off for development. The developers built Fernside Road and two further roads — Gosberton and Calbourne Road — and constructed houses all the way along, backing up to Ravenslea Road. Calbourne, incidentally, implies there was a stream along it: the two streams met at the corner of Mayford and Calbourne Road. Alfred Boon — the builder and wallpaper factor mentioned in the last talk — appears here as well.
Was that the back of Fernside in the last slide?
Yes — it's a steep hill running down to the lake. There can't have been many houses in view at that time, just Balham Hill going up to Clapham, so they probably saw sheep and horses and carts going about. Quite pleasant to sit on the veranda and enjoy the peace — rather quieter than it is now.
Where was the lake?
The lake was where the Heathbrook meets the Falcon Brook, which then flows down through Balham to the Thames. There's also a tributary going up into Streatham.
Which roads follow the old watercourses?
Calbourne Road is a giveaway — "bourne" implies a stream. The two streams met at the corner of Mayford and Calbourne, and you can see the L-shape on the map. The Falcon Brook comes from under the houses in Gosberton Road, running diagonally from Tooting towards the house and then off somewhere probably east of Tooting Bec. You found out when you flooded!
Did Fernside become Nightingale House?
No — it was Ferndale that became Nightingale House (now Nightingale Hamlets, the home for older Jewish residents). Fernside and Ferndale were about 100 yards apart, which caused some confusion.
Why was the area called Clapham?
The land on that side of the Falcon Brook fell within the parish of Clapham — even though it wasn't physically joined to Clapham itself. The detached part of the parish provided the woodland that Clapham proper lacked; every parish needed woodland as a source of timber. Clapham's detached woodland portion was at Penge — where the Crystal Palace now stands.
What did they use for toilets before water closets?
Someone used to come around with a cart. And of course George Jennings, who lived at Ferndale, invented the first flushing toilet — though that claim is not without its rivals.
The front of Fernside looks rather piecemeal compared with the gracious rear elevation — was that Busby's original design?
I'm honestly not sure. The rustication and the stuck-on columns do look as if someone added them as an afterthought. But I can't say with certainty.
A final note on the Bevingtons
The photograph of Fernside was taken by Geoffrey Bevington, who was Mary Bevington's nephew. The Bevingtons moved here from Bermondsey — the leather-working district, famously the smelliest part of London. There were three Bevington families living around Wandsworth Common: Mary Bevington, who married into the Coventry family; Geoffrey Bevington's father James, who lived on West Side; and another branch living closer to Clapham. A wise move, if you're in the leather-tanning business — though their factory was the largest leather tannery in the world. Geoffrey Bevington, who took the photograph when he was still a young man, also photographed the factory and its workers in remarkable detail. There is a large volume of his photographs in the V&A. Something to look forward to is Philip's forthcoming talk on Ivy House, where the Bevingtons lived — which will be part of the Lost Houses series.
Thank you so much to all four of our speakers. Do keep an eye open for further Lost Houses evenings as our research continues. We hope eventually to commit something to print — we haven't quite decided what form it will take, but there will be some kind of publication in due course.