The history of Hamfrith Farm

Mark Gorman (@Flatshistorian) continues his series on the farms of pre-suburban Forest Gate and district with a look at the history of Hamfrith Farm, some of which is today occupied by Godwin and Woodgrange schools.

Hamfrith (literally “Ham Wood”) was originally part of the lands of Stratford Langthorne Abbey, the great Cistercian monastery on the banks of the river Lea. In 1538, after the abbey’s dissolution Hamfrith, together with the rest of West Ham manor, was acquired by the king. At the end of the C17th George Booth was given a 99-year lease for the manor of West Ham for services to the crown. Booth later made a grant which divided the manor into two parts. He assigned Hamfrith farm (which had been made out of Hamfrith wood) to Sir John Blount, a director of the South Sea Company, for 69 years, starting in 1733.

After the South Sea Bubble burst Blount was ruined, and his estates were sold. The Stratford and Hamfrith property was bought in 1734 by John Tylney, later Earl Tylney. It was then inherited in his family until the end of the 18th century.

Map of Essex by John Chapman and Peter Andre 1777. The map shows Hamfrith incorrectly marked as "Wood Grange" (sic), Woodgrange farm is the collection of buildings to the south of the Eagle and Child pub.

Both parts of the manor remained Crown freehold until the end of the 18th century, but the demesne land (land in the manor retained by the owner for his own use) and the manorial rights were then sold separately. In 1787 the whole manor contained 290 acres demesne lands, and 54 acres of commons, most of which formed part of Wanstead Flats. The demesne lands were mainly scattered in the southern marshes, the only substantial tenement (occupied buildings) being Hamfrith farm, 128 acres lying north of the London-Ilford road, on both sides of the boundary between East Ham and West Ham, occupied by John Greenhill.

Map c 1800 showing the Greenhill holdings. Their land streches from Forest Gate in the west to what is now Manor Park, and bordered the southern edge of Wanstead Flats, as well as fields south of the road to Romford. Hamfrith farm was east of the Eagle and Child on the map.

 

By 1799, when the occupiers were William, John and Richard Greenhill, Hamfrith comprised 148 acres. William Greenhill bought the freehold of Hamfrith Farm (without manorial rights, which were sold separately) from the Crown for £8,642. At this stage the Greenhills had substantial holdings both north and south of the Romford Road. William Greenhill's father, John, was said to have been the first large-scale potato grower for the London market, probably from the middle of the C18th, and his son had continued to develop the business. By the 1820s the Greenhills were employing upwards of 100 workers, mainly Irish.

By this time, however, William Greenhill seems to have run into financial difficulties, as between 1824-8 he mortgaged the farm for a total of £9,000. He died in 1832, leaving over £50,000 (approx £4.7m today) and directing that Hamfrith should be held in trust for life, and should later be sold. Financial problems continued for his heirs, however, for in 1835 William's son, John, was declared bankrupt and the contents of Hamfrith farm were auctioned off, while three months later part of the farm itself, described as "130 acres of superior land, in the highest state of cultivation" was offered to let. John's brother, William, occupied Plashet Hall at the time, which also had farm buildings and 145 acres of farmland, much of it south of Romford Road.

 

Hamfrith Farm and "Potatoe Hall" on the 1797 draft Ordnance Survey map.

Their house, Plashet Hall, on Romford Road, was known locally as "Potato Hall". The name "Potatoe Hall" also appeared on the draft Ordnance Survey map, made in 1797 (see above), showing that the Greenhill's business was nationally recognised.

The trustees finally sold the entire estate of 300 acres, as well as Plashet House, "a most Desirable and Gentlemanly residence" in 1850. The farm was described as "superior and productive Market Garden land", but significant emphasis was also put on the extensive building frontage "to very excellent roads".

The estate was eventually bought by Samuel Gurney (see here), owner of the neighbouring manor of Woodgrange and Ham House, for £17,710. Hamfrith then comprised 131 acres, bisected by the main line Eastern Counties Railway. John Greenhill, despite having to sell off his interest in his father's estate in 1836, appears to have enjoyed a comfortable life after moving to Leytonstone, where he died in 1869.

The 1863 6-inch OS map, showing that Hamfrith Farm has become West Ham Hall with an entrance where Chestnut Avenue meets Avenue Road. The red line running through the map is the projected route of the Tottenham and Forest Gate Railway, opened in 1894.

 

West Ham Hall c1890

John Gurney, grandson of Samuel, sold most of Hamfrith in 1872 to the British land Company, who in turn, in 1874, sold it to the Manor Park Cemetery Company. The eastern part was used for the cemetery, while the remainder was gradually developed by the Cemetery Company for building. Sebert Road, built up by 1878, runs through the centre of the Hamfrith lands.

The site of West Ham Hall is now occupied by Godwin primary school

Hamfrith farm-house had existed at least since the early 18th century. In the 19th century it became a gentleman's residence, with ornamental gardens. From the 1860s it was known as West Ham Hall. It stood on the north side of Sebert Road between Avenue Road and Cranmer Road. A carriage drive stretched north to the modern-day junction of Avenue Road and Chestnut Avenue.

About 1890 it was acquired by the Tottenham and Forest Gate Railway Company, which was then building its line, via Wanstead Park, to Woodgrange Park. West Ham Hall was still standing in 1893, when the company put it up for sale, with other surplus land. The house was bought by West Ham School Board, which demolished it. Today it is the site of Woodgrange and Godwin schools.

The main entrance to Hamfrith Farm was at the junction of Avenue Road and Chestnut Avenue. The farm gates were where the post box is today.

 

“Save the Forest!” Forest Gate and the campaign for Epping Forest

by local historian, Mark Gorman - celebrating the 140th anniversary of the Epping Forest Act and highlighting the role of ordinary east Londoners in rescuing the forest from destruction.

140 years ago this month, on 8 August 1878, the Epping Forest Act was signed into law. This marked the culmination of nearly two decades of action to save Epping Forest from enclosure and destruction for housing, a struggle which had involved not only leading politicians and lawyers, as well as bodies like the City of London Corporation, but also popular protest by thousands of ordinary Londoners. In this story Forest Gate played a key role.

Up to the 1870's Forest Gate was still a small west Essex village, on the edge of Wanstead Flats, which marked Epping Forest’s southern boundary. The forest, once part of a great stretch of woodland across the county, was by this time just 6,000 acres in extent, between Epping in the north and Forest Gate in the south.

The “toll gate” in Forest Gate (pictured here c.1850)
 marked the southern edge of Epping Forest.
 The Lord Lister Health Centre is located here today.

Even this shrunken area of forest was under threat as the 19 Lords of the Manor, who were the forest landowners, began to see the financial gain to be made from enclosing and developing this open space on London’s doorstep. By the early 1870's Forest Gate was beginning to change, as suburban development spread outwards, driven by the coming of the railway, which had reached Forest Gate in 1844.

As houses covered more and more of London’s countryside, voices of alarm began to be raised. Maryland resident Sir Antonio Brady, a leading campaigner to save Epping Forest, called on ‘citizens of the East End, to protest against the encroachments on the forest, and to do battle with those who had filched from the people rights they had inherited from their ancestors.’ 

Such calls met a ready response among east Londoners, who saw Epping Forest as their space. On summer weekends and holidays thousands of East Enders came by train, ‘holiday van’ or on foot, to enjoy the green space of the forest, and Wanstead Flats was a favourite destination.

Thousands of east Londoners enjoyed Epping
Forest, many coming in ‘holiday vans’ like
this one picture in the 1850's.

The government was called on to legislate to stop the enclosure of London’s open spaces, and Epping Forest in particular was the focus of attention. But Gladstone’s Liberal administration dragged its feet, to the frustration and anger of Londoners. Matters came to a head in the summer of 1871, when Lord Cowley, the absentee landowner of Wanstead manor, instructed his agents to fence off Wanstead Flats, in preparation for clearance and house-building. Outrage boiled over in east London. 

Protest meetings were held in Hackney, Shoreditch, Stratford and elsewhere, and a mass demonstration on Wanstead Flats was called for 8 July. At every meeting came calls not just for protest, but for destruction of the hated fences. At a meeting in Hackney one speaker wondered 'whether the fence would be in existence on Monday morning’. This remark was received with cries of ‘Down with it!’ and loud applause.

A crowd estimated at 30,000 descended on Wanstead Flats that day. The organisers of the protest, now fearful of the increasingly vocal calls for destruction of the fences on the Flats, adjourned the demonstration to the grounds of nearby West Ham Hall (now the site of Woodgrange School). They claimed that the military exercise taking place on the Flats that day meant that they couldn’t hold the meeting there. 

But the demonstrators were having none of it. As soon as the first speaker began, there was a storm of hissing, and shouts of ‘to the Flats’, followed by the manhandling of the carts, from which the gentleman leaders were speaking, up Chestnut Avenue and onto the Flats.

The 8 July protest meeting began in the grounds
 of West Ham Hall, pictured here in the 1890's.

The official meeting on the Flats agreed to petition the Queen over the forest enclosures, then the gentlemen leaders left, as did the large police detachment sent to guard the fences. Everything it seemed had passed off peacefully, until later that evening the mood changed. 

A large section of the crowd began to demolish fences near the Foresters Arms pub, which then stood near the corner of Capel Road and Centre Road. This was land rented from Lord Cowley by John Gladding (after whom a road is Manor Park is named) which had been laid out for building.

The police, hastily recalled from Ilford, arrived to find 100s of metres of fencing reduced to matchwood. The police charged the crowd and managed to arrest one of them, A Whitechapel cabinetmaker named Henry Rennie. A pitched battle then took place, as the crowd tried unsuccessfully to rescue him. He was later prosecuted, but Gladding asked for a light punishment, and he was fined 5/- (25p), which was paid for him by one of the Forest Gate organisers of the meeting.

The Wanstead flats meeting marked a turning point in the open spaces campaign. The demonstration attracted nationwide news coverage, much of it highly critical of the government. A few days later the Prime Minister, William Gladstone, came to view the Flats, after which his administration rushed through the first of a series of acts on Epping Forest, prohibiting further enclosures while a Commission investigated.

‘Epping Forest in Danger’ appeared in the 
Penny Illustrated Newspaper on 15 July 1871. 
Overseen by the local Lord of the Manor, a 
woodsman is cutting down ‘the rights of the people’, 
the tree about to fall on a picnic party in the forest. 
In the foreground John Bull vainly tries to awake 
the slumbering law. A sign reminds readers that 
there are royal rights over Epping Forest.

However, the campaign was just getting going. A pressure group called the Forest Fund, was established in Forest Gate, with local residents such as Charles Tanner, owner of West Ham hall, forming a key part of the committee. The secretary was William George Smith, a County Court Clerk lived in Odessa Road. Although now forgotten by history, Smith played a major role in the popular campaign for Epping Forest, working tirelessly over the next few years, organising petitions to parliament from east London vestries (the main units of local government before Councils) and lobbying MPs and voters during elections.

Newspaper advertisements in the 1874
General Election appealed to voters to elect
MPs who would campaign for Epping Forest
and other open spaces

In 1872 the Forest Fund organised a second demonstration on Wanstead Flats, timed to coincide with a further parliamentary debate on the future of Epping Forest. By this time the City of London Corporation had entered the fray, using their rights as Epping Forest commoners to bring legal action against the Lords of the Manor in the forest to stop enclosures. In doing so the City was seizing an opportunity to win popular support among Londoners. London’s government was increasingly seen as outdated for a modern city, and the City of London represented for many an undemocratic and unaccountable elite.

Their championing of forest preservation did win the City Corporation much popular support, though many were suspicious of its motives. One group of east London vestrymen laughed out loud when asked to sign a petition supporting the Corporation’s defence of ‘the weak’ against the forest landlords (though sign it they did). Nevertheless, a combination of the Corporation’s legal action and parliamentary action by radical London MPs finally led to the Epping Forest Act passed 140 years ago.

 But they did so in an atmosphere of protest and direct action by ordinary Londoners, with a determined group of Forest Gate residents in the vanguard of the campaign. 

So next time you are enjoying Wanstead Flats, remember that July day in 1871 when the crowd took matters literally into their own hands, and helped to shape the history of Epping Forest. 

The street where you live (8) - Sebert Road

This is the eighth in an occasional series of articles by local historian, Peter Williams, who specialises in Newham housing, maps and local history. In each he looks, in detail, at the history of particular streets in Forest Gate.

Peter has complemented his own knowledge by accessing the increasingly digitised national newspapers' collection - which can be found here - and has added extracts from this that refer specifically to the roads he features. 

Looking east about 1908
 from junction of Avenue Road

Sebert Road early 2017 looking west – a wintry
 scene the tower of the massive former congregational
 church  contrasted with the Manhattan Loft
 Corporation under construction in Stratford
and recently in the news for spoiling
 views from Richmond Park.

The origin of the name 

It may be the only such road name in the UK. Sæberht, Saberht or Sæbert (d. c. 616) was a King of Essex (r. c. 604 – c. 616), in succession of his father King Sledd. He is known as the first East Saxon king to have been converted to Christianity.

1863 Ordnance Survey map, published 1873 (here)

Hamfrith estate 

In 1787 Hamfrith Farm, the site today of the Godwin and Sebert Roads and of Manor Park Cemetery, belonged to John Greenhill, whose home was Hamfrith House. This was built about 1800 and demolished in 1891; it was known from the 1860's as West Ham Hall (see below), now the site of Woodgrange School in Sebert Road.

The land was sold in 1851 to Samuel Gurney, d. 1856 (see here), brother of Elizabeth Fry the prison reformer (see here). In 1872 his grandson John Gurney sold much of Hamfrith to the British Land Company who two years later sold it to the Manor Park Cemetery Company.

In 1877 a house in Sebert Road was 

constructed for just over £400 (here).

The Cemetery was established in 1874 (see here). Initially opened purely as a cemetery, the original chapels, lodge and main entrance were built in 1877.

Only the tower of the chapel survived when it was hit by enemy action on 23 July 1944 (see here). The rebuilt chapels, incorporating crematorium facilities, were opened on 2 November 1955.

Manor Park Cemetery has full records from 1875. The first internment being one William Nesbitt who was buried on the 25 March 1875. His grave can still be seen on the right hand side of Remembrance Road.

Manor Park has the honour of having the youngest recipient of the Victoria Cross buried in the grounds. John Travers Cornwell VC (see here for a Pathe news clip of his funeral) was only 16 when he died of wounds received at the Battle of Jutland.

The memorial to Mary Orchard who died in 1906 was erected in grateful memory by some of Princess Alice's children whom Mary served for forty years (see here). These were Victoria, Princess Louis of Battenburg, Elizabeth, Grand Duchess Sergius of Russia: Irene, Princess Henry of Prussia, Ernest Louis, Grand Duke of Hesse, Alix, Empress of Russia.

Ordnance Survey 1898 (see here)

The area, in the map above, has now been almost fully developed but the cemetery is very prominent. The cemetery company originally wanted to use the whole area between Forest Gate station and Manor Park station for burial, but this was turned down by the West Ham vestry (effectively the local government body) and a compromise reached where they would develop about half the area for housing.

Institutional buildings on Sebert Road

West Ham Hall

In about 1890 this was acquired by the Tottenham and Forest Gate Junction Railway (see here), which was then building its line from Wanstead Park to Woodgrange Park. The company put it up for sale, together with other surplus land, and the house was acquired by West Ham School Board.

The Board later demolished the house, sometime after 1893. In 1966 the site was a depot belonging to Newham Council. It was then used to build the Woodgrange Primary school in 1986.

The wall of the old house survived at the front of the school until a redevelopment a few years ago. The coach house survives in Cranmer Road and is now a small workshop. The now demolished school house was Forest Gate Boys club in the 1950's.

Jireh Chapel , 133 and 244 Sebert Road

This is right next to the entrance to the cemetery but is nothing to do with it.

Jireh chapel, Sebert Road, originated in 1888, when Mr. Allen began to hold meetings in a small building attached to Jireh Lodge, no.133 Sebert Road (see below).

In 1921 the more recent one was built at no. 244 with materials from a chapel demolished at Woburn Sands (Bedfordshire); the membership was then about 20. In 1965 Jireh had a membership of a not very sustainable 2.

We don't know a great deal about the origins of this chapel, but Jireh Chapels elsewhere in England are Calavanist/Presbyterian places of worship.


244 Sebert became a refugee housing project till a few years ago.

The original Jireh Lodge (no 133) was sold after 1921 and later was used for a time by the Seventh Day Adventists. In 1965 it was occupied by a builder. 

It was destroyed in an early morning fire on 1 September 2010 – the extended family living there were cooking using a gas cylinder which malfunctioned. 

The wreck has remained like this ever since.
 The remnants of the old chapel can
 be seen protruding above the hoardings,
 on the left of the photo.

Here is the official London Fire Brigade account: 

Four fire engines and around 20 firefighters fought a fire in a two storey terraced house on Sebert Road in Forest Gate, yesterday morning.

Most of the ground floor, the first floor and a roof was damaged by fire. Around five people left the building before the Brigade arrived. A gas cylinder was found in the property and a temporary hazard zone was set up around the affected area as a precaution as some cylinders can explode when exposed to heat. Around 125 people were evacuated from the affected area as a precaution.

The Brigade was called at 07.25 and the fire was under control by 09.48. Firefighters from Leytonstone and Stratford stations were at the scene. The cause of the fire is under investigation.

Fortunately nobody was seriously injured. In 2012 there was a planning application: “Demolition of fire damaged property and erection of three storey building with basement comprising 4 x 3 bedroom maisonettes with amenity space for each to the rear and parking to the front for each flat.” 

This was refused but then the following one was approved in 2013 “Demolition of fire damaged property and erection of 2 x 6 bedroom dwelling houses with amenity space.”  This has never been built.

A large London Fire Brigade aerial ladder platform
 capable of reaching 32m. makes its way carefully
 along Sebert Road outside Woodgrange infants
 school on 1 September 2010, to attend the above
 incident and deal with the fire in the roof timbers.

Congregational Church

See here for a history of this church, perhaps
 the most significant building on Sebert Road

A collection book from the late 1890s

 to get donations from local residents

 to pay off the debt on the new church.

 For more on this church see here 

Individual houses on Sebert Road

The house, above, looks like a terraced house, in fact, it is detached. If you look very carefully there are gaps on both sides. Notice the chimney breast.  It is not clear why houses were built like this but there are several in Sebert Road. It must have been a considerable building feat to construct the second house - as its outside wall would have had to have been built from the inside.

234 Sebert Road

An advert from the 1890s placed by the
Tottenham and Forest Gate Railway selling
 off dwellings surplus to their requirements.
 This was after they completed construction
of the overhead railway.

234 Sebert Road today backing 

on to the Barking Gospel Oak line

The Tottenham and Forest Gate Railway, built on a huge brick viaduct despite substantial local opposition, opened on 9 July, 1894. It was a joint project between the Midland Railway and the London,Tilbury and Southend Railway, the Midland contributing by far the bulk of the capital.

Some houses were left extraordinarily close

 to the viaduct like this example in Sebert

 Road. Building of the line provoked controversy

 and protests.

The line left the Midland and Great Eastern joint line at South Tottenham and ran via Walthamstow and Leyton to Barking. It joined the Forest Gate to Barking line at Woodgrange Park. The railway (which is now part of the London Overground Barking to Gospel Oak line) provided connections into Moorgate and St. Pancras and confirmed Forest Gate as a haven for City workers.

The junction with Woodgrange Road

Sebert Road at the junction of Woodgrange
Road (on top of the current dentist).
This sign “Market Place” is clearly original
and about to be restored by Newham
Council. It is not clear why this wording
was here, as contemporaneous photos
show no sign of a market on the site.

About 5 years ago a community market was initiated by Forest Gate Women’s Institute. For more on this market (see here).

Forest Gate fire station Sebert Road,(see here)

6 Sebert: In 1915 was Joseph Borheim's
 furriers, who were victims of anti-German
 riots in the area, following the sinking
 of the Luscitania on 7 May 1915. See here.

Picture showing on the extreme  right 
Coffee7 (no 10)when a florist 1900's. 

The same view today

14 Sebert: John Bassett had a music
 studio there in the 1970's - 80's, and
 it was there that Depeche Mode
 did their first recordings. See here.

16 Sebert: 1896 a bootmaker and repairer

1 Sebert Road

 At the turn of the nineteenth/twentieth centuries Forest Gate was a cycle manufacturing locality of some significance (see here and here). One of the more prominent local manufacturers was J Elston, whose Rose Cycles company was based there - see cover of 1899 catalogue, below.

The address later became the studio of Forest Gate's premier Edwardian studio photographer, see backing from a family portrait from the first decade of the twentieth century.

Former residents of Sebert Road and their occupations

The Commercial Directories like Kelly’s reveal what was going on in any particular road: most of the records below are from the late 19th century:

2 Sebert Road - Thomas Hood, ham and beef dealer
3 Sebert Road - Fanny Lane, dressmaker
6 Sebert Road -  insurance office (and, see above)
8 Sebert Road -  Hobbs, builder (now The Emporium)
16 Sebert Road - Charles Ward bootmaker
18 Sebert Road -  Hollands sisters, grocers and wine merchants
20 Sebert Road - James Phillips, plumber
21 Sebert Road -  bookseller in 1920s.
29 Sebert Road -  Henry Homever, decorator
31 Sebert Road - Occupied in 1927 by James Lansbury brother of the famous George Lansbury MP. Previously it had been occupied by Ernest Goodwin, hop merchant in 1890s (see press cutting, below).
36 Sebert Road -  Lily Hopkins, dressmaker
115 Sebert Road - Richard Jones, insurance agent
125 Sebert Road - Whistler - boys private school
155 Sebert Road -  was sold for £750 in 1933.
183 Sebert Road - Thomas May, stonemason
236 Sebert Road - James Remmington, land and estate agent
242 Sebert Road - Elizabeth Wilson, laundress

This house on the corner of Lorne Rd was
 refurbished about 3 years ago and the
 owners erected this high fencing at the
 front. Enforcement action by Newham Council
 meant they had to take part of it down,
 as 2m high fencing like this is not
 permitted at the front of dwellings.

Press cuttings featuring Sebert Road

Sad Sebert Road - related suicide - 1883

Essex Herald 25 June 1883

Libelous comments about an affair - 1886

Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper,
 1 Aug 1886

 Suicide on railway line - 1890

Essex Newsman 1 November 1890

Practical joke goes horribly wrong - 1898

Chelmsford Chronicle, 25 March 1898

Grisly death of George Lansbury's brother - 1927

Dundee Evening
Telegraph 31 Jan 1927

 Footnote – If you have any suggestions for new streets to tackle contact Peter at pows.wanstead@gmail.com.