Between the roar of Clapham and South Lambeth Roads lies a maze of residential streets. Mostly lined with Victorian terraces, they are surprisingly peaceful – especially towards the centre where you will find St Stephen’s Terrace. In 1951, that street’s peace was disrupted by the chanting of a mob. The crowd had gathered outside number […]
Anthony Eyton RA on the ‘lure of Brixton’
The 20-year-old Van Gogh lasted only a year in Stockwell before leaving his digs in 87 Hackford Road (1873), it’s said, because he was getting nowhere with Eugenie Loyer, the landlady’s daughter. The painter seems to have left behind just the one ‘Van Gogh’, a sketch of the house that was not accepted as by […]
Slum Clearance in Southwark: A personal perspective
Malcolm Green was there in the 60s and 70s when the Council demolished more streets of Victorian terraced houses than the Luftwaffe – all to make way for soulless, isolating high-rise flats, desolate and dangerous open spaces resulting in widespread social breakdown.
The Boundaries of Anglo-Saxon Vauxhall and Stockwell
Planned changes to constituency boundaries bring into focus the perennial need to define the interfaces between blocks of land at every level – be it the garden fence or the Iron Curtain. In the distant past, with much lower populations and pressure on resources, boundaries were often ill-defined zones, rather than fixed lines, and in […]
Vincent van Gogh in Stockwell
Vincent van Gogh moved to London in May 1873 at the age of 20 and lived intermittently in the city until 1876. During this time he is known to have visited, and written about, several of the Royal Academy of Arts’ Summer Exhibitions, Christie’s and iconic sites including St Paul’s Cathedral and Hampton Court. He also […]
Edward Thomas
Philip Edward Thomas was born on 3 March 1878 in 10 Upper Lansdowne Road North (now 14 Lansdowne Gardens – where he is remembered with a blue plaque) and died on the battlefields of Arras, France on 9 April 1917. Thomas was educated at St. Paul’s School, London and Oxford University. An unhappy and solitary […]
Violette Szabo
Violette Reine Elizabeth Bushell was born in Paris on 26 June 1921 to an English motor-car dealer from Brixton, and a French mother. She grew up at 18 Burnley Road, Stockwell, and was know to be a fiery daredevil. She met and married Etienne Szabo, a Captain in the French Foreign Legion 21 August, 1940. […]
Stockwell Training College
At age 18 Joseph Lancaster opened his first school in a room in his father’s house. Two years later, in 1798, his school moved into new purpose-built premises in Borough Road, Southwark. The new school building initially had 300 pupils but a sign outside read: “All who will may send their children and have them […]
Stockwell Ghost
In 1772 the residents of the then retired village of Stockwell were alarmed by an apparition, known as “the Stockwell Ghost”. Mrs. Golding, an elderly lady, who resided alone with her servant, Anne Robinson, was sorely surprised, on the evening of Twelfth Day, 1772, to observe an extraordinary commotion among her crockery. Cups and saucers […]
Stockwell War Memorial
Stockwell War Memorial to the dead of the First World War who lived within half a mile of Stockwell Common has 574 names. After the end of the war in 1918 the site – the area known as the Triangle, at the junction of Clapham and South Lambeth Roads, the last vestige of what had […]
Stockwell
The name Stokewell (first recorded in 1197) means the well by the stump or wood and comes from the Old English stocc + wella. There was a Stockwell Wood till the 17th century. The manor of Stockwell was formed in the late 13th century, when King Edward I acquired the manor of South Lambeth and […]
Southwestern Hospital
It is now hard to comprehend how badly epidemics hit the population of the UK in the days before the advent of decent housing, clean water, modern sewerage systems and antibiotics. For example measles and whooping cough alone accounted for 50,000 deaths in England and Wales between 1838 and 1840. The first smallpox hospital was […]
Smallpox and fever hospitals
The following article is reproduced from Geoffrey Rivett’s very interesting book The Development of the London Hospital System 1823-1982, published by the Kings Fund in 1986, with the kind permission of the author. For more information see his excellent NHS History Website Fevers, including smallpox, typhus and enteric fever, were one of the greatest problems […]
Peter Schmidt (1931-1980)
Peter Schmidt (1931–1980) was a painter, artist, teacher and composition and colour theorist. His work has been collected by the Tate, who have two of his prints, both called Flowing in the Right Direction. Five works are in the UK Government Art Collection. With his student and later friend Brian Eno, Schmidt developed a process […]
St Michael’s, Stockwell
St Michael’s Church, Stockwell Park Road, a Grade 2 listed church by W. Rogers, was constructed in 1840-1 in the Gothic Style. The building was originally planned with the sanctuary beneath the spire and the main entrance was from Stockwell Park Crescent. The orientation was changed in 1880 when the altar was moved and the […]
St Andrew’s, Landor Road
Possibly the oldest public building in Stockwell, St Andrew’s Church is a shadow of its first incarnation, a rather attractive chapel first put up in 1767. Extended in 1810 and then remodelled in the Romanesque style, it is now a grubby-looking non-descript building. Here is what the 1956 Survey of London (ed F. H. W. […]
Royal Southwark and Lambeth
The following is the text of a talk given by Dr Graham Dawson, Chairman of the Southwark and Lambeth Archaeological Society at their symposium held on 26th March 2002. It is reproduced with the kind permission of that Society. I thought it would be a good idea to mark the Queen’s jubilee by looking at […]
Arthur Rackham
Arthur Rackham was born at 210 South Lambeth Road on 19th September 1867. He came from a big family, his mother Annie having 11 other children though not all survived childhood. He was educated at the City of London School and showed a natural aptitude for art and drawing. In 1884 Arthur became an insurance […]
Stockwell Station
The text of this page is based on two articles that appeared in the Vauxhall Society’s newsletters during 1983. In previous Newsletters we have described the history and architecture of some tube stations within the Society’s area. But the station at Stockwell, and former railway depot nearby (of which hardly a trace remains) are of […]
Kennington and Stockwell in the 18th century
This article was found on the excellent London Ancestor website. It is taken from a newspaper cutting, source and date unknown. KENNINGTON AND STOCKWELL IN THE 18th CENTURY I have sent you a photo taken from Roques’ Map of 1741, thinking it might interest your readers and elicit some information from others of the names […]
