The Twickenham Museum
Exhibitions : 1914 Maps and Images

Hampton in 1914
Dominated by glasshouses and nurseries.

In 1914 the north-west corner of Hampton, adjoining Hanworth, was completely dominated by nurseries and glasshouses (marked as cross-hatched buildings on the maps). The proliferation of Nurseries was a result of the failure to develop Marling Park (earlier Tangley Park) and all its farmland; the nurseries and glasshouses provided the next best financial return on the land after building. This land was destined to continue in use as nurseries until the Nurserylands housing development of the late 1970s onwards. One of the comparatively few buildings in this area at this time was All Saints Church, opened a few years before in 1908, which established a separate parish for the northern part of Hampton.

The north-east corner of Hampton which abuts Hampton Hill was only partly developed at this time. Roads such as Broad Lane still had much open land and nurseries in them as well as a certain amount of housing. The Uxbridge Road that turns off High Street and passes the northern edge of the Manor House Estate, which itself had not then been developed, was largely empty at its western and eastern ends with some older housing clustered in the middle. The isolation hospital (above), opened in 1904, had been positioned towards the western end of the road for good reason.

The central western half of Hampton was still largely unbuilt on or was occupied by nurseries and glasshouses. Percy Road Council School, (right, now Hampton Juniors) was new having only opened in 1907. Percy Road was only partially built and the area between Priory Road and Oldfield Road (to the west of Linden Road) was just fields. Hatherop House was then a large building at the end of Priory Road and close to the junction with what was, at that time, called Mark Hole Lane which later became Hatherop Road.

The central eastern half of the map is bordered by the High Street running northwards towards Hampton Hill, with Bushy Park on the other side of the road. This area was still dominated by the Manor House estate, much of which was still not built on. Ormond Avenue was partially built and both Gloucester Road and Wensleydale Road had only a very few houses. The railway had cut through the Manor House estate and portions were sold off from the late 1890s. The area in the vicinity of the Manor House itself was the last to be developed (see map above) and this only happened in the mid-1930s onwards.

The south west corner of Hampton was even then dominated by the Waterworks. Platt's Ait (or Eyot) had the Electric Launch Works on the eastern end, built in 1889, and this later became Thornycrofts. Hampton Grammar School (right) was then located in the Upper Sunbury Road and was prominent as were the Council Offices (for Hampton UDC) which then shared Rosehill with the Library as it had done since they moved there in 1902. The offices were given up in 1937 but the Library remains. Spring Grove was another large house in the same road from which much of the land had been sold off to form the Riverhill Estate (now Plevna, Varna, Belgrade and Avenue Roads) in the late 1870s. The house itself was demolished in the early 1980s and the cul-de-sac, also called Spring Grove, built.

The central core of old Hampton around St Mary’s Church including the triangle of streets comprising Thames Street, Church Street and High Street together with Station Road was the most recognisable and is the least changed part of the whole area. The Station Road filter beds (left) however had only been built in 1902 although they have since been replaced by the village green housing development built in 1997/98. Tram lines are marked on the map, past Garrick’s Villa and turning up Church Street into High Street in a northerly direction. In the opposite direction they follow Hampton Court Road, along the riverside, to the extreme south east corner of Hampton at Hampton Court Palace This riverside area also includes the islands now known as Tagg’s Island, then named Kent’s Ait, and Ash Island.

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