Uncovering Kilburn's History - Part 4

Welcome back to this fourth article in the Kilburn local history series. If you missed Part 3, you will find it here.

 

Railway lines began crossing Kilburn’s land in 1837, with the coming of the London and Birmingham Railway. Kilburn (now High Road) station opened in 1851. In the 1860s Edgware Road (later Brondesbury) station came on the Hampstead Junction Railway, and Kilburn and Brondesbury (Kilburn today) station was opened on the Metropolitan Railway in 1879.

 

1. Metropolitan Railway Station and Bridge, Kilburn High Road, c.1910. ( www.images-of-london.co.uk )

 

The earlier railways, however, did not stimulate a large growth in Kilburn. The main developments were still along the Edgware Road, which was served by horse buses and later trams. In 1856 22 omnibuses a day ran to London Bridge and by 1896 south Kilburn was served by over 45 buses an hour. The start of the 20^th century brought a motorbus service to Oxford Circus, and in 1915 Kilburn Park station on the Electric Railway line was the first underground railway in Kilburn.

 

2. Kilburn Park Underground Station, October 2020. (Photo by Irina Porter)

 

In Charles Dicken’s Dictionary of London, published in 1879, Kilburn was described as ‘a newly built district at the far end of the Edgware Road’. Its development, beyond a few large houses, had begun in the south, after Lady Salusbury sold her properties to the Church Commissioners in 1856. The following year the Commissioners made a series of agreements with James Bailey, a builder from Maida Vale, who later moved to Brondesbury Lodge. 

 

In 1859 Bailey had built Brondesbury Terrace and started work in Canterbury Road. By 1867, he had put up about 550 houses, including Cambridge and Oxford Roads, using architectural pattern books, and marketing his development as Kilburn Park. A number of houses he built, along with the Duke of Cambridge and The Brondesbury public houses (both now converted for residential use), are now locally listed buildings within the South Kilburn Conservation Area.

 

3. Cambridge Road, c.1910. (Image from the internet: www.images-of-london.co.uk )

4. Cambridge Gardens, October 2020. (Photo by Irina Porter)

 

Other speculative builders followed Bailey to the area. Speculative building – when houses were built before a buyer or a tenant was found – put developers at risk if they over extended themselves, so many went bust. Through the rest of the 19^th century, local house building expanded northwards. You can see the extent of development in 1875 (when Willesden Local Board was established, with a population of 18,559), and again by 1895 (when it had become Willesden Urban District, with 79,260 people) on this map.

 

5. Development in the east of Willesden parish as at 1875 and 1895. (From “The Willesden Survey, 1949”)

 

By the 1880s, businesses like the United Land Company would purchase plots of land, subdivide them into smaller plots and sell those at auctions, resulting in smaller developers doing the actual building. The names of the roads would often come from old estates in the area (Mapesbury, Brondesbury), or places connected with former landowners. The Salusbury name lives on today, in a road and the school situated on it, as well as a pub, wine store and other local amenities. In another example, the Powell Cottons owned the land on the Shoot Up Hill estate, and the names of the roads there reflected their Kent connections (Fordwych, Minster, and Westbere Roads, etc).

 

One famous resident of Kilburn was the artist Louis Wain (1860 – 1939), who lived at 41 Brondesbury Road. Louis Wain was famous for the drawings of anthropomorphized (with human features) cats. Born in Clerkenwell, Wain studied at the West London School of Art, where he was also assistant master. In 1882 he joined the staff of the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News and four years later that of the Illustrated London News. 

 

When Wain was 20, his father died, and Louis became the main supporter of his mother and five sisters. At 23 he married the family governess, Emily Richardson, who died of cancer within 3 years of their marriage. During her illness the family took in a stray kitten, named Peter, who cheered her up during her illness and gave Louis a direction for his art, which became his passion. From the 1880s onwards Wain’s cats walked upright in human clothing of the highest fashion, came with all sorts of facial expressions, enjoyed smoking, played musical instruments, hosted tea parties, played games, went fishing and to the theatre. These parodies of human behaviour became immensely popular. 

 

6. Louis Wain, and two of his cat paintings. (Images from the internet – photo by Lascelles & Co.)

 

Despite his popularity and huge output (he could produce up to 600 drawings a year), Wain was not good with money and during the First World War he sank into poverty. He lived with his sisters in Brondesbury Road. Having developed a mental illness, he died at Napsbury Hospital, near St Albans. He is buried in his father's grave at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Cemetery, Kensal Green.

 

At the start of Kilburn’s development, land owners or builders were responsible for the infrastructure of their own developments, including roads and sewers. Gas street lighting was first introduced in Kilburn near the bridge in 1849, and extended in 1861. Kilburn used the Metropolitan Board of Work’s sewers, although Willesden fell outside its area. 

 

So many houses had been built in Kilburn that many could not be sold or let as family homes. It was common to find rooms let out to several families. The poorer areas of Kilburn became overcrowded, in 1894 with 11 persons per house, compared with 6 in the rest of the parish. The death rate for children under 5 in Willesden in 1875 was 45 per 1,000, with Kilburn the worst area, where diarrhoea, tuberculosis and respiratory diseases were prevalent. Healthcare, if you could afford it, was provided by local clinics, but for hospital residents went to St. Mary’s Paddington or New End in Hampstead. 

 

7. Paddington Old Cemetery, Willesden Lane, and its war graves, 2018. (Photos by John & Anne Hill)

 

The large estates’ lands still had some farms, which mainly produced hay for London horses, as well as providing grazing for cattle, and there were also several nurseries. But each successive decade saw less farmland. In 1855 Paddington Burial Board bought 22 acres of a farm off Willesden Lane and set up a civic cemetery. Today it is run by Brent and is Grade II listed. The cemetery includes 213 graves for casualties of the First and Second World Wars.

 

8. Willesden Town Hall, Dyne Road, in the 1920s. (Brent Archives online image 657)

 

Local government only developed gradually. The local authority for Kilburn was originally the Willesden Parish vestry (and Hampstead vestry, respectively east of the High Road). This organised a vote in 1875, that set up the Willesden Local Board, which in turn was succeed by Willesden Urban District Council in 1894. Willesden Town Hall was built in Dyne Road, on the site of Waterloo Farm, and opened in 1891. (The building was demolished in 1970, after the newly formed Brent Council had chosen Wembley’s more modern Town Hall as its headquarters.)

 

9. Willesden Volunteer Fire Brigade, 1874. (Brent Archives online image 732)

 

A volunteer fire service was formed after the fire at Mapesbury Mill on Shoot Up Hill in 1863, with headquarters in Bridge Street, near the tollgate. A new station, under the control of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade was opened in Salusbury Road in 1884, which covered the Kilburn area until the Second World War. The fire station was next to Kilburn Library, the first public library to be opened in Willesden in January 1894, which was enlarged in 1908.

 

10. Kilburn Library (right) and Fire Station (centre), c.1910. (Brent Archives online image 10773)

 

11. Salusbury Road and the Police Station, c.1900. (From the internet: www.images-of-london.co.uk )

 

The police station, as shown on the photo above, is on the corner of Salusbury Road and Harvist Road, - still a police station today, although the building has been completely re-built in the 1970s.

 

12. High Road, Kilburn, in 1886, by local photographer A. Mackie. (Brent Archives online image 226)

 

Kilburn became a thriving commercial centre, with the Edgware Road through it, featuring a continuous line of shops by the 1860s. It gained the name Kilburn High Road in the 1880s. Foyle's bookshop started in Kilburn, moving to Charing Cross Road in 1926. By 1909 there were 300 shops here, many owned by foreigners, some of them Jewish immigrants.

 

13. Kilburn High Road, 1905. (From the internet: www.images-of-london.co.uk )

 

Industry was here, too. There was tile making in Kilburn as early as the 16th century. In 1862 a railway signal factory was built in Kilburn Lane (later called Canterbury Road). The Saxby & Farmer works became the largest employer in Kilburn, although it moved to a larger site in Chippenham, Wiltshire, around 1906, after taking over a similar business there. 

 

14. Kelly & Craven's works in Willesden Lane, 1884, and Kelly's tombstone. (Images from John Hill)

 

By 1890 there were coachbuilders, bicycle manufacturers, and monumental masons (for Paddington Cemetery). Kelly & Craven’s Cemetery Stone Works in Willesden Lane did plenty of business, as most people were buried (cremation did not become common until the 20^th century). Unfortunately for Mr Kelly, the stone dust from his work was a health hazard, and he was just 51 years old when he was laid to rest.  Light engineering and printing were also established by 1914.

 

With the rapid increase in population came a rise in the number of churches. We’ve already seen St Paul’s Church in Part 3, and non-conformist ministries were quick to follow the housing developments such as those by James Bailey. St James’s Episcopalian Church was built in Cambridge Avenue in 1863, using a prefabricated corrugated iron system. Commonly known as ‘the tin tabernacle’, it is surprisingly still there today, and although no longer a church, and officially called Cambridge Hall, it is a Grade II listed building. In 1865 the Reverend Thomas Hall had West Kilburn Baptist Church built, to designs by his brother, who was an architect. After more than 150 years, that is still in use, and a locally listed building.

 

15. Cambridge Hall (Kilburn's "tin tabernacle") and West Kilburn Baptist Church. (Images from the internet)

 

Next week we will continue to look at local churches, schools and much more, as Kilburn’s story continues into the 20^th century.

 

Irina Porter,
Willesden Local History Society.

 

A special thank you to local historian Dick Weindling, co-author of 'Kilburn and West Hampstead Past' and History of Kilburn and West Hampstead blog .

Uncovering Kilburn’s History

 By popular demand we are pleased to publish a new local history series about Kilburn by Irina Porter of Willesden Local History Society.

 

 1. A postcard of Kilburn, c. 1930s. (From the internet - www.images-of-London.co.uk)

Kilburn is an area in Brent, which grew around the intersection of the Roman road known as Watling Street (Edgware Road) and a local river of the same name. Kilburn lies south west of this stretch of the ancient thoroughfare, here called Kilburn High Road, between West End Lane and Queen’s Park. Kilburn has never been an administrative unit, and its boundaries are not defined. However, it has given us a rich and colourful history, which we will uncover here.

 

2. Kilburn, at the edge of a 1930s pictorial map of London and suburbs. (From the first AtoZ atlas and guide)

As with many a historic name, ‘Kilburn’ could have several origins. Some say it comes from a stream (Anglo-Saxon Kelebourne, which could have been ‘cold bourne’ (river), ‘cow’s bourne’ or ‘King’s bourne’). The stream used to run into the River Westbourne, which flows from Hampstead to the Serpentine in Hyde Park. Or it could be named after a Saxon called Cylla, used c. 1134 as Cuneburna). A variation of Kilnbourn could come from tile making industry in the area.

 

3. The course of the River Westbourne, marked on a modern street map. (Courtesy of John & Anne Hill)

The Kilburn Stream originated in Hampstead and went through what is now West Hampstead southwards. It ran parallel to the High Road along what is today’s Kingsgate Rd, then it passed under the Edgware Road at Kilburn Bridge. It joined the Westbourne near today’s Shirland Road, which flowed into the Serpentine and eventually into the Thames. In the 1860s the stream was culverted and became part of the sewage system.

 

4. The Kilburn area in 1790. (From an article by John & Anne Hill, in W.L.H.S. Journal No.49)

5. The bridge over the Kilbourne on West End Lane, as seen from the High Road, around 200 years ago.
    (From “Kilburn and West Hampstead Past” by Dick Weindling and Marianne Colloms)

Here is an interesting fact, uncovered by Willesden Local History Society members John and Anne Hill, from an article they wrote in Volume 49 of our Journal: “Springfield Walk (near Belsize Road) has a set of very old steps that give access to Kilburn Priory.  We climbed the steps and, whilst we were taking photos of the house, we noticed the sound of rushing water.  In the middle of Kilburn Priory Road there is a drain cover – and beneath this drain cover flows the River Westbourne, Kilburn’s ‘lost river’ making its way to the River Thames.” 

 

 6. The River Westbourne drain cover, and its Springfield Walk location. (Photos by John and Anne Hill)

The area of Kilburn grew around where the Kilburn Brook crossed the Watling Street (now Edgware Road), which was an important route to the north since the Roman Times. Even before them, this was an ancient trackway used by the Britons (although the route may have followed Willesden Lane, Neasden Lane and Honeypot Lane to avoid the marshy valley of the River Brent at what is now Staples Corner). Soon after the Romans landed in Kent in AD43, they paved and straightened this road as their major route to the north west, via St.Albans, which they called Verulamium. They needed a fast route to take their legions towards North Wales, where the local tribes were resisting Roman rule. Some flint blocks from the Roman road were found in Kilburn in 1923, at a depth of about six feet.

 

7. A map of Watling Street, overlaid on the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica map of Roman Britain.

As well as enabling quick movement of troops and resources within the Roman province of Britannia, Watling Street has also served as a boundary. In 878, King Alfred of Wessex signed a treaty with Danish invaders, under which Alfred kept the southern side, and the Danes established Danelaw to the north. In 1599 Watling Street is mentioned as London Way, and later the Edgware Road. Our stretch of it has become the traditional boundary between Willesden, now in Brent, and Hampstead, now in Camden.

 

8. The Priory, Kilburn, 1750, as shown in a book illustration from 1878. (Internet – British History Online)

A community of Augustinian canonesses, Kilburn Priory was set up where the Watling Road crossed the Kilburn brook in the 12^thcentury. Now Belsize Road meets Kilburn High Road here. Around 1130 a hermit called Godwyn set up a small cell (hermitage) near a holy well (medicinal spring) here. In 1134 he gave his place to Westminster Abbey. Three nuns – Emma, Gunhilda and Christina – established a Benedictine (later referred to as Augustinian) nunnery. They were probably former maids of honour to Queen Matilda of Scotland, the wife of Henry I of England, who became nuns after the Queen died.

Godwyn remained the warden until he died, and a Chaplain would be appointed to oversee the nuns. They worshipped in the church dedicated to St. John the Baptist and prayed for the soul of the brethren who once belonged to Westminster. The priory was endowed with lands in Kensington, Kent, Southwark, Tottenham and Hendon. It also owned ‘the manor of Wymbley’. 

 

9. The seal of Kilburn Priory in 1536, and Emma de Sancto Omero, Prioress of Kilburn c.1400.
    (Images from “Kilburn and West Hampstead Past” by Dick Weindling and Marianne Colloms)

The Priory was a stopping place for pilgrims on their way to the shrines at St. Albans, and later Willesden also. According to the customs of the time, it provided food and shelter to travellers, both rich and poor. Pilgrims had to travel through woods, which afforded hiding places for robbers, particularly at the foot of the nearby Shoot-up Hill, and a safe resting place was very helpful for pilgrims to form groups, so they could travel together for protection. This hospitality proved a burden on the Priory, and by the middle of 14^th century it was found in financial trouble by the Bishop of London and in 1352 was exempt from taxes. By the end of the century its buildings were in decay.

The Priory continued to support travellers for 400 years, so it never became wealthy. In 1536, Henry VIII dissolved the Priory, whose seal at the time, showing John the Baptist wearing a camel-hair garment, is seen above. The inventory details the rooms and furniture for the church, house, brewhouse and bakehouse, as well as some wall hangings, candesticks, two silver chalices and goblets. There was also ‘one horse of the coller of blacke’, valued at 5s.

Henry VIII gave Kilburn Priory to the Order of the Knights of St John of Jerusalem in exchange for a piece of land in Southwark. That Order was also dissolved, four years later, and the Kilburn estate reverted to the crown. It was given to the King’s courtier, the Earl of Warwick, then passed through the hands of various landowners. The Uptons, who owned the land in the 19^th century, built the Church of St. Mary on a site adjoining the ancient chapel. By then the main house and surrounding land was known as Abbey Farm, comprising about 45 acres. However, nothing remained of the original priory, except a ‘rising bank… and ruined walls’.

 10. The Remains of Kilburn Priory, from a book published in 1814. (Image from the internet)

Dick Weindling and Marianne Colloms write in their book ‘Kilburn and West Hampstead Past’: “When the railway was cut through in the autumn of 1852, some pottery, a few coins and a bronze vessel, all medieval, were found at the Priory site and these were put on display at the Archaeological Institute.” A sad epitaph for a historic local building!

I hope you will join me next week, as we explore why Kilburn became a visitor attraction.

Irina Porter,
Willesden Local History Society.

 

Note: 

Special thank you to local historian Dick Weindling, author of 'Kilburn and West Hampstead Past' and History of Kilburn and West Hampstead blog (http://kilburnwesthampstead.blogspot.com/).

Kilburn High Party letter for residents and meeting

There have been comments from Kilburn residents (both sides of the High Road) that they have not received a promised letter about the Kilburn High Road Street Party that is due to be held in July. They were told that everyone within 100 metres  'radius' of the High Road would get a letter. This is the distribution area- not a circle!

There will be a meeting for residents to discuss the details on Tuesday 7th April 2020 6.30pm-8pm at the Institute of Contemporary Music Performanc, 18 Dyne Road, Kilburn, NW6 7X6:

The Kilburn High will be an all-day street party of art, dance, theatre, music and installations to celebrate the high road and the music, migration and social movements which have shaped it.

On Saturday 11 July 2020, Kilburn High Road will be closed between Kilburn High Road and Kilburn (Jubilee line) stations for mile-long street party.

This meeting is for residents to find out more about the plans for the day.

Tickets HERE

Here is the letter that residents should have received and residents beyond the 100metres may be interested in (click bottom right corner to enlarge):

Do you know about the Kilburn Mob and the Rudies?

Lloyd Mentore

Guest blog by Bethan Mentore

Family history has always interested me.  Stories of workhouses, coal miners and war heroes are always good for sharing round the dinner table at family reunions.  When I married my husband in 2007 I knew his dad, Lloyd Mentore, was well-known in Brent.

Lloyd had coached Brent Youth football and taught Judo at Poplar Grove on Chalkhill Estate.  His legacy was plain for all to see when 600 people attended his funeral in 1998.  A few months ago I decided to see what I could find out about my father-in-law on the Internet.

 A search via Google came up with Lloyd's name in a forum about skinhead fashion.    This was the post in the forum:

The Kilburn Mob was made up of Black and White Lads, My best mate at School..a Black Lad was Lloyd Mentor,RIP, we both used to go to Judo together in the mid 60s, he was always better than me ..and went on to become a 5th Dan, Lloyd use to work in a Cloths shop on Willesden Lane.. after school and Saturdays, He got me into Skinhead cloths, Lloyd had a Cousin Lenny V, He was a wild Rudie, and about the best dressed bloke in Kilburn and feared,

When we had a fall out with the Blacks, and was at War for a few months, My mate Lloyd kept out of it..also another of my Black mates Ollie a African lad who lived next door to me, Lloyds Cousin.Lenny, also kept out of it , not that he was worried, He was just one of these individuals, who was his own man.

One night we was walking down Kilburn High Road.. Along the High Street. was a Machine Arcade, Outside was a Black Lad.. everyone steamed over to have a go at him, It was my mate Ollie, I just stood with him, He was my School mate and lived next door to me.., Some of the Lads started to turn on Me, But i was not having it. Me and Ollie just walked home.

Lloyd died of a Brain Haemorrhage aged 42.

After reading this we were not only interested to find out who Cousin Lenny V was but also wanted to know more about the Kilburn Mob and the Rudies

If you can throw any light on this please comment below or send me an email at mafran@globalnet.co.uk  and I will pass it on to Bethan