Barons Court
Anyone for tennis?
Not so long ago, I wrote about the history of Earl's Court (with its apostrophe). One station west on the Piccadilly Line is Barons Court (without an apostrophe).
By the turn of the nineteenth century, the Barons Court area was being turned over to market gardens. It had previously been meadows but nearby London was growing, and the population needed to be fed.
There was an agricultural revolution going on in the late eighteenth century to match the ongoing industrial revolution. Enclosure was all the rage in the countryside as common land and strip farming were turned over to larger privately-owned fields. Many impoverished rural workers being deprived of their common rights were flocking to the cities where the new factories needed employees. This was true of London too which was rapidly expanding.
In 1800, Thomas Milne published his land use map of Middlesex, north Surrey, north Kent and west Essex but before we turn to that, we’ll take a look at his key.
It is notable that three extra categories were needed: Common Arable Field, Common Meadow Field and Common Market Garden Field. This was to depict common land to which locals had joint rights to use and exploit.
As enclosure continued, Milne was using fewer symbols on his maps for common land in agricultural use. As the nineteenth century wore on, common land which wasn’t reassigned to owners became large public parks - especially in the area which became south London. While there is Ealing Common and a few others north of the Thames, Clapham Common, Wandsworth Common, Wimbledon Common and many more abound in the south.
I’m getting ahead of myself. We’re looking at Barons Court and here is Milne’s map of the area dating from 1800.
The m of meadow is outnumbered by the g of market gardens. London is quite far by horse and carriage and thus the arrival of large villas has not occurred - only one p. Once transport improves, there will be a trend for the richer folk to work in the City and weekend in the countryside in luxurious houses. Some of that attractive countryside is here in Barons Court.
It’s hard to get our bearings from Milne’s splodge of pastel colours and unnamed lanes. We’ll wind forward about 66 years to show exactly the same area.
The lane names are unfamiliar - North End Lane, Old Greyhound Road and Great Church Lane. There’s the Fulham Union Workhouse so Fulham is nearby but ‘North End’? Where’s that?
As the old lanes were tarred and improved, villas with substantial grounds begin to appear next to them - Claybrook House, Normand Villa, North End Grove….
This was an area awaiting the arrival of the (Metropolitan) District Railway which would bisect the area to the top of the map. Tracks were laid in 1874 through an area of market gardens, largely owned by Sir William Palliser.
Like many landowners of the time, it was not escaping the notice of Sir William that the arrival of a railway made agricultural land much more valuable when it was reassigned as building land.
The name of Barons Court is believed to have been devised by Palliser. The style of the name to attract potential house buyers may have been suggested by nearby Earl’s Court - also on the District Railway - or possibly in allusion to the ‘Court Baron’ held by the Lord of the Manor, the Bishop of London.
I’ve adapted the Ordnance Survey map above to show where Barons Court station (BC) and West Kensington station (WK) would be built.
The purple outline shows the boundaries of the Hammersmith (Margravine) cemetery. This would be established in 1868 even before the OS published this map in 1870. The map was thus already out of date at the publish date.
The green outline marks the location of Queen’s Field - a simple field of vegetables.
In 1883 and 1884, St Andrew's church was granted permission to play some cricket matches on Queen's Field, north of Old Greyhound Road. St Andrew's Cricket and Football Club was fortunate to have the support of its vicar, the Reverend John Cardwell.
The Queen's Club, a tennis club, was established in 1886 and took over Queen’s Field, evicting the St Andrew’s club. The Rev. Cardwell found new facilities for St Andrew's Cricket and Football Club further into Fulham and the outfit slowly morphed into Fulham FC.
The Queen’s Club also went from strength to strength and is now the precursor to the annual Wimbledon tennis championships. Every year there’s tennis on the grass courts of Queen’s, then a week off before Wimbledon begins in late June or early July. Had housebuilding not extended through the area, the orchards of Barons Court would have been in a good position to supply the strawberries needed for the tennis.
During the 1870s and 1880s, connecting roads were improved. North End Lane was upgraded and renamed Talgarth Road; Old Greyhound Road was renamed Greyhound Road.
The District Railway opened a station on North End Road but decided that North End wasn’t the name they wanted. They decided that Kensington had cachet as a name and the station became called West Kensington despite not either being in Kensington or indeed, if it had have been, west of it.
Palliser lobbied the District Railway to open a station to serve his land but this actually didn’t happen for over a decade.
By the time of the 1894/5 Ordnance Survey, the majority of local residential development had occurred. Margravine (then Hammersmith) Cemetery was designed by local architect George Saunders on a site formerly used as market gardens and orchards, known as Fulham Fields. The cemetery's inaugural burial occurred on 3 November 1869.
On 9 October 1905, the District Railway finally opened a Barons Court station to serve the new developments and in preparation for the 1906 opening of the Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway (now the Piccadilly line), then under construction.
The station building was designed by Harry Ford, who employed a style similar to that used in the construction of Earl's Court and Hammersmith stations. The building has been granted Grade II listed status due to its retention of many original features, such as terracotta facing and the distinctive Art Nouveau lettering.
One of the most unique aspects of Barons Court station, which sets it apart from all other stations on the London Underground, is the presence of wooden benches on the platform. These benches feature the station name displayed along the back on enamelled metal panels, adding to the station's charm and character.
But consider being a resident of Barons Court in the mid 1860s and then living there for the next thirty years.
In the 1860s, your area is so remote that it hasn’t even got a name. Not so many houses are here - those that are here, are large. The existence of the Fulham Union Workhouse in the neighbourhood is a depressing reminder of the fickleness of fate.
Then the District Railway arrives carving a route across the landscape. Smaller houses and new roads begin to fill the area - the 1880s and 1890s witness the arrival of acres of streets and development.
You can recreate some of the former peace you had just a few years by wandering through a new cemetery or watching some folk play tennis on some other former fields. You spend your old age telling the uninterested young about how things have changed round here. It was ever thus.
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My video version of this article features below: