Opening of the New Town Hall Deptford July 19th 1905

Grove Street. Catch a Cart, Cab, Omnibus or a Train!

The Victoria, Grove Street Deptford.

Great photos of trains coming up Grove Street. Was it going to the Cattle Market? I beleive the pub shown here on the right Is "The Victoria" Matt Martin "The True Londoner" should be able to help out here, and he has with permission to post his later photo of the Victoria. My thanks to him.

1914-18? Any ideas what the building in the left forground was?

East end of Albury Street. 1960's-early 1970's ?

This photo looks east towards Church St and Creek Road. On the right are the original houses, Nos, 34 first on the right, and then 36, 38 and 40. The next block, one with the window open has since been demolished. On the left far end of the street you can see a white building. This was the "Kings Head" public house. Coming towards us we can see a tall building with ornate stone capping. This was the Albany Institute now replaced by Albany House. The houses on the left appear to be missing their door brackets which leaves me to believe this photo was taken late 1960's when the tenants were moved out and rehoused due to the threat of impending demolition of the street. Many of the original ornate door  brackets were stolen or lost.

No. 27, 29 and 31 Albury Street. 1930's ?

This is a charming picture showing the young girl with her hoop staring at the weary labourer taking a rest from work and pulling that hand cart. 

This is a good photo of the original carved door brackets for these 3 properties. No. 27 on the left shows full length cherubs. An earlier posting on this site entitled "Unknown Door in Albury St" is now known ...its number 27. No. 29 did not have any cherubs (center) just intricate scroll and foliage work, but No. 31 did as shown here. When I was a kid I can remember always looking at the cherub faces and the wings on their backs.

The Unknown Door

History of Albury Street. Part 5.

Thomas Lucas had several different ways of raising money open to him. He had a small income from the rents of the plots, whether he had built on them himself or, as in the case of Reyalls and Pearce, assigned them undeveloped. The price of 8 pence per feet frontage charged by Lucas as annual ground rent has already been described as low compared with prices in the metropolis, but while each plot only brought in ten to fifteen shillings annually, the whole street could be expected to yield about £30.00. To increase this income, and it would be at the expense of his capital, he could let off the house as well as the plot rather than sell it.

‘The Swan’ (King of Prussia) for instance was leased in this manner rather than sold, but that was probably because Lucas wished to control its activities, not because he preferred to get an income from the building itself instead of a capital sum. At the time he drew up his will, he had an income from the ground rent of thirty plots, but in addition, he still owned 9 of the houses built on them and consequently may have had an income from their rents as well. The facts are obscured because some of these houses had been mortgaged.

The sale of each house which he himself built provided Thomas Lucas with a capital sum. No.4 Union Street on the south side was demised on the 10^th August 1711, for £125. This is the only example of a house sold directly by Lucas of which a record has been found. The low sum of money suggests that Lucas was only selling the carcass, roofed, but still to be fitted out inside. How much the dancing master, Mr Rowbotham, and the other people for whom Lucas built houses paid is not recorded, but it clearly was not enough. Lucas headed more capital still to continue the development of the street. It was not provided even by selling the houses freehold; although Lucas had sold the freehold of seventeen sites by the time he wrote his will. Raising money was a hazardous business both for Thomas Lucas and the other builders of Union Street. The earliest known deeds relating to Union Street, the recited ones of 1704, contain significantly, a mortgage. In 1710, Lucas mortgaged his own house together with its malt-house to Jon Goodwin of Chiswick for £200. Both Lucas and Goodwin were long dead before the mortgage was finally paid off in 1748. Then, the Bricklayer, John Bone, who took a lease of a site on the north side of Union Street, some 36 feet wide, on the 20^th February 1707/8 was obliged to mortgage the house he was building to John Frost of Deptford, a waterman, first for £53 on the 12^th March 1708/9, to be paid within a year, and then ‘having occasion for further money he borrowed a further sum of £50’ from Frost on the 11^th May 1708. By the end of September, Bone was in a position to sell one of the houses and its contents so not only was its carcass complete but it would have been panelled. 

Example of original panelling 29 Albury Street.

Originally No 19 now No. 34 Albury St.

 The other house was then described as complete and it alone had to bear security for the complete mortgage. The two houses have not been exactly identified but it seems from the frontage of the plots that they were No. 11 and 12 Union Street on the North side. Reyalls and Pearce who built No. 19 Union Street, South side now No. 34 did not need to raise money on it after they took a lease of the site on the 25^th July 1709. On the 23^rd February 1712/13, Pearce disposed of his share in the property to Reyalls for £240 and on the 4^th November 1715, Reyalls, doing rather badly out of the deal, sold the entire house to Thomas Leving, senior, for £210. 





Part 5 extract from A Quiney's paper on Albury Street 1979.    

Short Film on the Stratton Brothers Murder of the Farrows in Deptford High St 1905

Narrated by Shaw Taylor.

My thanks to the Guilfordghost for posting on Youtube.

John Maloney saves the future Queen Victoria 1822

Ashburton Guardian 21st October 1913

 

 

Visit to 127 Deptford High Street, Formerly Nolans Clothes Shop.

I had the pleasure to meet Terry the proprieter of the shop which was once called Nolans's. Terry has been present in Deptford for many years and it was great to talk to him about the people and places he remembers on the High St. We started discussing the story, listed below, regarding the tunnel beneath his shop. He kindly agreed to let me go down into the cellar and view the tunnel entrance. I was surprised when Terry lifted a hatch by the till in the shop, which was the cellar entrance! It was a bit of a squeeze but we both got down there and I took the following photos.

The cellar entrance

Entrance to the tunnel now bricked up

Any ideas what these curious hinge type fixings were for??

Shop Owner  "Terry" My thanks to him for allowing me to disturb his business and go exploring.

Reproduced original posting for infomation.

In the early part of 1978 a survey was carried out at the request of Nolans Clothes Shop, No 127, by the proprietor Mrs Order. The purpose was to examine alleged tunnels under the shop which ran east to deptford Creek, or a Pub, or the place of Nelson's assignations with Lady Hamilton in Albury Street. A trap door at the front of the shop gives access to a series of cellars under the whole building, some of which were blocked and one which had a barreled roof and could be the begining of a tunnel leading directly under the street.It was described as being about 6ft high, with a stone rubble floor. There was a rectangular manhole leading to sewers beneath which were said to flood. The tunnel terminated in a brick wall at approximately the edge of the outside pavement. The bricks were of mixed stock and red bricks, with no obvious signs of great age, and were probably contempoary with the building which seemed from map and visual evidence to be c. 1844-50, contempoary with the adjacent Catholic church. It was noted  there was nothing on site on the 1844 tithe map but earlier maps 1800-33 may show buildings but were to small a scale to be confirmed with any certainty. There was a similar tunnel which had been blocked more recently and was said to lead from the indentical adjacent shop. It was discovered to have been blocked in by the owners of the shops across the street. The tunnel at No 127 seemed to be an extention of the cellars, and without pulling the wall down, there was no evidence of it going any further other than the edge of the pavement. If it did originally cross the street it would presumably join the cellars of the opposite shops. Does anyone know of underground tunnels in Deptford?