Highgate. (fn. 64)

For over 400 years Highgate has contained fine houses, for the rich and sometimes the famous, and a school established by Sir Roger Cholmley. (fn. 65) The centre, known as Highgate village, is remarkable for its many 17th- and 18th-century buildings and still attracts wealthy residents, while Cholmley's foundation has come to be well known as a public school.

Highgate has always straddled a boundary, formed by High Street and a line running west from the Gatehouse a few yards south of the present Hampstead Lane. (fn. 66) To the north and east lay the old parish and the bishop of London's manor of Hornsey, to the south and west St. Pancras parish and the St. Paul's prebendal manor of Cantlowes. (fn. 67) The south-western half was included in the county of London from 1889, (fn. 68) becoming part of St. Pancras M.B., (fn. 69) and in Camden L.B. in 1965; (fn. 70) the northeastern half remained in Middlesex until 1965, when, with the rest of Hornsey, it passed to Haringey L.B. (fn. 71) The slopes below Hornsey Lane and Dartmouth Park Hill, south of the old village and from the 19th century loosely described as part of Highgate, lay within Islington.

Although the Hornsey and St. Pancras halves acquired some special status within their respective parishes in the 16th century, (fn. 72) Highgate as a single unit was not delimited until the Lighting and Watching Act of 1774. (fn. 73) Ecclesiastical separation was first achieved only in 1834, when the consolidated chapelry of St. Michael was given wide boundaries stretching eastward and northward beyond Archway Road, westward to Finchley, and southwestward into St. Pancras as far as the later church of St. Anne, Brookfield. (fn. 74) The following account excludes Islington (fn. 75) and, on the St. Pancras side, covers only Highgate village: the houses at the top of Highgate Hill and along High Street, those in Pond Square, South Grove, and the Grove, and at the top of Highgate West Hill. (fn. 76) It also covers the Hornsey side of Highgate and its late-19th- and 20th-century extensions to Archway Road and the foot of North Hill, Highgate golf course, and the Finchley boundary.

Highgate is indebted to its elevated situation. Presumably its name derives from a hill-top gateway at the entrance into Hornsey park of the Great North Road from London to Finchley. (fn. 77) The bracing air and the fine views across London have been praised since John Norden's day (fn. 78) and an inscription inside the west doorway of St. Michael's church records that it is level with the top of the cross on the dome of St. Paul's. At the same time early building was hemmed in, between the demesne lands of Rowledge farm to the east, the common and woods of the bishop's park to the north and west, and steep slopes, an obstacle to traffic, to the south. (fn. 79)

The road pattern is therefore simple and, in the village, has changed little over four centuries. The village is centred on High Street, the stretch of the Great North Road approaching Hornsey park where the bishop was apparently levying tolls by 1318, (fn. 80) and on the adjoining area around the ponds known by 1490 as Highgate green. (fn. 81) The northward continuation of High Street beyond the Gatehouse was called North Road and North Hill only in the 19th century (fn. 82) but Highgate Hill itself, to the south, was mentioned in 1565. (fn. 83) Four other ways up the hill were the present Dartmouth Park Hill (formerly Maiden Lane), (fn. 84) Swain's (occasionally Swine's) Lane, mentioned in 1481, (fn. 85) Bromwich Walk, a bridle path connecting the top of Highgate West Hill with the bottom of Swain's Lane in the 18th century but closed in 1904, (fn. 86) and Highgate West Hill. The last was of unknown origin but presumably medieval, since it was part of the route to Kentish Town which bounded the manor of Cantlowes; it too, was known as Highgate Hill c. 1800 (fn. 87) and later, until 1941, it was simply West Hill. (fn. 88) Hornsey Lane provided a link with Crouch End by 1604 (fn. 89) but it ran south of Highgate village and perhaps was originally a north-easterly continuation of Maiden Lane. (fn. 90) Southwood Lane (in 1774 known also as Chapel Lane) (fn. 91) led past Southwood common to Muswell Hill and was so named by 1601. (fn. 92) Jackson's Lane (reputedly named after J. B. Jackson of Hillside) branched eastward from Southwood Lane and continued as a footpath to Crouch End before the construction of the road called Shepherd's Hill. (fn. 93) Hampstead Lane ran westward from the Gatehouse by c. 1677, (fn. 94) and perhaps was used much earlier as a way to the bishop's hunting lodge; (fn. 95) it was called Caen Wood Lane in 1774, (fn. 96) shortly before stretches were diverted a few yards farther north to avoid Fitzroy House and Kenwood House. (fn. 97) The construction of Archway Road in 1813 cut Highgate off from the rest of Hornsey parish, but new residential roads around the village were not laid out until the late 19th century. (fn. 98)

Although so named by 1354, Highgate in the 14th century was recorded only in connexion with the road to the gateway (fn. 99) or with the hermits who lived near by and repaired the road. Early growth was presumably due to general traffic and to the hermitage, which attracted pilgrims by 1464. (fn. 1)

From the mid 15th century residents often left money to the hermitage. (fn. 2) So too did John Green, a London butcher, who in 1463 held property in Highgate. (fn. 3) Thomas Combes of Clerkenwell also had land in Highgate in 1467. (fn. 4) Others with land there by 1480 were Richard Rawson, (fn. 5) alderman and master of the Mercers' Company of London, (fn. 6) Richard Lylborne, gentleman, of St. Botolph's Aldersgate, (fn. 7) and John Bridlington, saddler. A London stationer conveyed his cottage called Lightwells at Highgate green to a pinner or wire-drawer in 1490. (fn. 8) The Swan inn, mentioned in 1480, was acquired in 1482 by Richard Kemp and sold in 1502 by John Kemp. (fn. 9) Giles Eustace, mentioned in 1462 (fn. 10) and an illicit brewer in 1480, acquired the Cornerhouse, beside High Street, in 1490. (fn. 11) Two houses stood there when he made his will in 1495 (fn. 12) and a brew-house and horse-mill were leased by Thomas Eustace in 1525. (fn. 13) The site of the Cornerhouse was that later occupied by the Angel at the junction of South Grove with High Street. (fn. 14) There were also at least two houses at Dancok or Dancope (later Dampoipe) Hill, on Highgate West Hill, by 1481. (fn. 15) Tilers dug gravel at Dancok Hill from 1485, without licence, and sand and gravel were taken from Highgate green in 1515. (fn. 16) On the east side of the main road, where the hermit's chapel stood, there was probably building, since much of the gravel belonging to Cantlowes was carted into Hornsey manor. (fn. 17)

During the 16th century Highgate began to outstrip neighbouring settlements. At Cantlowes manor court a constable for Highgate was appointed in the 1530s (fn. 18) and at Hornsey there were separate officials for Hornsey Side and Highgate Side by 1577. (fn. 19) Highgate had five ale-houses in 1552, when Hornsey had three and Muswell Hill one. (fn. 20) Londoners increasingly acquired property in Highgate and some ambitious building was mentioned in the 1550s, when Richard Lylborne's cottage had been replaced by a fair mansion house at the expense of his brother-in-law Robert Whetnall. (fn. 21) Richard Hawkes, a gentleman with land on the slopes farther south in 1516, lived at Highgate in 1530. His sons sold the house in 1536 to Sir Roger Cholmley, serjeant-at-law (d. 1565), (fn. 22) whose property lay in both parts of Highgate and included a block bordering the green, apart from the Cornerhouse site, from the high road to Swain's Lane. Cholmley lived on the St. Pancras side, probably near the top of the hill on the site of Fairseat, and was Highgate's first known eminent resident (fn. 23) and the heaviest taxpayer in St. Pancras parish. (fn. 24) His endowment of a free school in 1565 led to the rebuilding of the former hermits' chapel, which served as the local church, and so compensated for the disappearance of the hermitage at the Reformation. (fn. 25)

From 1565 Londoners' interests in Highgate were demonstrated in the choice of governors of Cholmley's school: among the original six both Sir William Hewett and Sir Richard Martin were lord mayors. (fn. 26) Courtiers too began to acquire houses. Sir Roger Cholmley's estate was divided on his death (fn. 27) but John Dudley, 'servant' to the earl of Leicester, left property at Highgate in 1581. (fn. 28) Lord Henry Howard wrote from Highgate in 1581, as did Sir William Hatton in 1592 (fn. 29) and Sir Thomas Cornwallis (1519-1604), formerly comptroller of the royal household, (fn. 30) in 1587. (fn. 31) Princess Elizabeth had lingered at Highgate, when being led by Cornwallis from Ashridge (Herts.) after Wyatt's rebellion in 1554. (fn. 32) Sir Thomas's son Sir William Cornwallis (d. ?1631) (fn. 33) bought a house and land by the green, west of Swain's Lane, in 1588.

Presumably William Cornwallis himself built the mansion later famous as Arundel House in 1588 and received Elizabeth I there in 1589, 1593, and 1594. (fn. 34) His house and its views were praised by Norden in 1593 (fn. 35) and it was there that James I was entertained with the Penates, newly composed by Cornwallis's friend Ben Jonson, in 1604. (fn. 36) The countess of Huntingdon went to take the air at Highgate in 1595. (fn. 37) Norden, remarking that the hill offered 'most pleasant dwelling, yet not so pleasant as healthful', (fn. 38) was the first to record attractions which were making Highgate fashionable.

The restricted site and water supply were to lead to very cramped building, around Pond Square and in narrow yards off High Street, producing an almost urban appearance. In the early 17th century, however, there was still room in the centre of the village. Ponds on the green were known to Norden, who ascribed them to gravel-digging, (fn. 39) and an open stretch, 'the bank before the Elms', bordered the green and high road in 1619, when a cottage had been newly built there. (fn. 40) The gateway and the school and its chapel marked the northern limit of building, although by 1601 the school's land, the 1½-a. chapel field extending northward between the high road and Southwood Lane, had been divided among lessees. In 1601 a new windmill stood in the north part of the field but much of the rest may have been used for brickearth, since it was leased to a brickmaker who was to repair the school-house and chapel. In 1606 only low buildings of 1½ storey were to be permitted on part of the field. (fn. 41)

The forerunners of many large houses, in addition to Cornwallis's, existed by Norden's time. A residence on the site of Lauderdale House was occupied by Sir Richard Martin's son Richard, a goldsmith, and before 1599 by John Povey, both of whom married into a family of London haberdashers, the Bonds. (fn. 42) Thomas Throckmorton (fn. 43) lived in 1603 in a house by the green, apparently east of Cornwallis's and described as very old and large in 1715. (fn. 44) On the Hornsey side of the high road Anne Smith, widow of Robert, held a 10-a. pasture called High Reding with two new houses in 1603. (fn. 45) Near by, a building on the site of Cromwell House was sold in 1605 by George Crowther, a London vintner, to Robert Sprignell, son of Richard Sprignell, a barber-surgeon. (fn. 46) John Arundell of Lanherne (Cornw.), a recusant like Throckmorton, was confined to Highgate from c. 1599 to 1603. (fn. 47)

Grand houses multiplied in the early 17th century. (fn. 48) At Richard Martin's former seat in 1611 Sir William Bond received Lady Arabella Stuart and her guards on their way north. Mary, countess of Home (d. 1645), later bought the house and her son-in-law the earl of Lauderdale remodelled it. Immediately north stood a long low building of timber and plaster, apparently substantial in the 1660s; it came to be known, without good foundation, as 'Andrew Marvell's Cottage' and survived until 1868. (fn. 49) To the north-west on a site occupied since 1565 Bisham House was later owned successively by Sir Edward Gould, (fn. 50) the controversialist Joseph Mendham (d. 1856), and Capt. Peter Heywood (d. 1831), (fn. 51) a former midshipman in the Bounty. The grounds stretched from High Street to Swain's Lane and were built over in the 1880s. (fn. 52) Cornwallis's house on the green was sold in 1610 to Thomas Howard, earl of Arundel (d. 1646), the art collector, a lavish entertainer whose guests at Highgate included James I in 1624. (fn. 53) It was at Arundel House that Francis Bacon, Viscount St. Alban, died in 1626. The western part was on the site later covered by Old Hall, and farther west stood a banqueting house, presumably built by the earl. Arundel House, or possibly just the banqueting house, was depicted as a square, three-storeyed building with a central tower; (fn. 54) it was divided between 1665 and 1674 and later largely demolished. Farther west a house was conveyed by William Cholmley to Sir James Harrington of Swakeleys, in Ickenham, (fn. 55) in 1656. Part of it survived in Hollyside, formerly no. 49 West Hill. Almost opposite stood the Blue House, between the later no. 1 the Grove and Witanhurst. John Warner the younger, whose father's estate had bordered the west side of the green and covered 38 a., conveyed the Blue House to Sir Robert Payne in 1620. Payne later acquired Arundel House and sold the Blue House to Henry Pierrepont, marquess of Dorchester (d. 1680), lord of Cantlowes manor during the Interregnum. The Blue House then became known as Dorchester House and was a three-storeyed mansion of brick with stone dressings, (fn. 56) designed by John Thorpe the elder or younger. (fn. 57) The gardens were on two levels, with a brick wall for the upper terrace which may have been the 'bulwarks' mentioned in 1688 and which is still visible from the garden of no. 7 the Grove. (fn. 58) Dorchester House, whose garden also covered the ground later taken for nos. 1-6 the Grove, was replaced by an 18th-century house, known by 1875 as Grove Bank. Two acres farther north, afterwards the site of nos. 7-12, were leased by the elder John Warner to Richard Lyllie, a builder who erected his own house there. The house passed to Sir Robert Payne and in 1651 to Thomas Collett (d. 1675) of the Middle Temple, who enlarged and embellished the grounds. It was later replaced by Grove House. (fn. 59)

Probably the most desirable sites were on the Cantlowes side, near the top of the hill and bordering the green, which commanded the finest prospects. The largest surviving 17th-century house, however, was built on the Hornsey side of the high road c. 1638 by Sir Richard Sprignell, Bt. (d. 1659). Later known as Cromwell House, it replaced the house conveyed to Richard's father Robert in 1605. (fn. 60) A still bigger house to the north, at the later corner of Cholmeley Park and High Street, was that of the lord mayor Sir John Wollaston (d. 1658), who bought the lordship of Hornsey manor in 1647. (fn. 61) Sir Thomas Abney (d. 1722), another lord mayor, was said to have been a later resident. (fn. 62) Abney's second wife Mary was perhaps related to Thomas Gunstone, who lived on the site of Fairseat in 1665. (fn. 63)

Sir Richard Sprignell, connected by marriage with the regicide Sir Michael Livesey, lived opposite Lauderdale House, which was held during the earl's sequestration by Sir John Ireton, lord mayor in 1658 and brother of Cromwell's son-in-law. (fn. 64) Ralph Harrison (d. 1656), father-in-law of the regicide Maj.-Gen. Thomas Harrison, also lived at Highgate, probably in a house which his widow leased from Wollaston in 1658. (fn. 65) Sir James Harrington, resident until c. 1643, was named to try Charles I and later served on the council of state. (fn. 66) Sprignell and Ireton witnessed each other's wills and, with Wollaston and the Harrisons, formed a powerful parliamentarian group. Royalists included the solicitor-general Sir Thomas Gardiner (d. 1652), Sir Robert Payne, to whom Gardiner sold Arundel House, Lord Dorchester, himself a nephew of the theologian Nicholas Ferrar, and, before his imprisonment in 1651, Lord Lauderdale. National divisions were reflected in the expulsions of Gardiner and, at the Restoration, of Ireton as governors of Cholmley's school (fn. 67) and in the vicissitudes of the schoolmaster and chapel reader. (fn. 68)

Meanwhile smaller buildings were multiplying along the road frontages. The first inclosure on the bank before the Elms, by 1619, covered the site of the later nos. 47, 49, and 51 High Street. The next, on the site of nos. 39-45, was made by a blacksmith in 1664 and led to the erection of a forge which stood at the corner of the high road and Pond Square, facing Angel Row, until 1896. A strip between the two inclosures remained open until 1685. (fn. 69) Beyond the school a house had replaced the windmill by 1641 and various buildings, presumably including Wollaston's alms-houses, stood on the old chapel field in 1657. (fn. 70) Inclosures were made from the green for cottages, gardens, and stables. Some twenty encroachments, including at least ten houses, (fn. 71) were presented in 1656 at Cantlowes manor court. Thomas Collett, steward of the manor, and Lord Dorchester were among those who had encroached on the green. In 1662 Collett was licensed to connect his house with the high road opposite the chapel by means of a tree-lined causeway across the green, which came to form an arm of South Grove and eventually formed the top of Highgate West Hill. Collett's new road cut off building land to the north-west from the area around the ponds, and, with the control of further encroachments, determined the future shape of the centre of Highgate. (fn. 72)

By the 1660s Highgate was much the largest centre of population in Hornsey and St. Pancras. The Hornsey part contained 49 houses assessed for hearth tax and 85 which were not chargeable in 1664, (fn. 73) when the St. Pancras side had 27, all chargeable. (fn. 74) The Hornsey side had grown rapidly since 1642 (fn. 75) and was more populous presumably because poor families had congregated in the forerunners of Townsend's Yard and other alleys, which had been built off the east side of the high road without detriment to the green. By 1674 there were 80 chargeable houses in the Hornsey part (fn. 76) and 60 in the St. Pancras part. The largest was Dorchester House with 31 hearths, followed by Lauderdale House with 26, Cromwell House with 25, and Arundel House, with 23 in 1664. A forerunner of Winchester Hall had 19 hearths, the former home of Sir John Wollaston had 18, a house on the site of Fairseat had 15, and another ten houses, including Collett's, had 10 hearths or more.

Although Highgate grew up partly to serve the rich, it also catered for travellers. The Red Lion, in North Hill, had 9 hearths in 1664, when the Angel had 6 and the White Hart, in Highgate West Hill, had 7. (fn. 77) The Gatehouse, first mentioned as a dwelling in 1661, had 9 hearths c. 1674. (fn. 78) Between 1668 and 1670 tokens were issued by the landlords of the Gatehouse, the Angel, and the Red Lion, as well as an otherwise unknown establishment, the Sugar Loaf. (fn. 79) The 17th-century Angel may have occupied a different site from the existing inn of that name, which was recorded in 1725 as formerly having been the White Lion. (fn. 80) The Mermaid, with 10 hearths, (fn. 81) was mentioned from 1619 until 1679 (fn. 82) and the popular ceremony of Swearing on the Horns, later associated with the Gatehouse and other inns, apparently dated from the same period. (fn. 83)

Despite the fines for encroachments growth continued in the late 17th century. Several of the large houses assessed in 1664 and 1674, in addition to Arundel House, were divided between those dates. (fn. 84) Near the top of West Hill the site of the Fox and Crown, inclosed in 1663, and adjoining inclosures contained 4 houses in 1665 and 7 in 1674. (fn. 85) Three-quarters of an acre lying west of the ponds had long served as a bowling green in 1672, when the lord conveyed it to trustees. It bordered some wasteland which was inclosed in 1663 and where there was a house, probably the forerunner of the Flask inn, by 1682. (fn. 86) More inclosures were permitted north-east of the bowling green and also beyond, where the causeway joined the high road opposite the Gatehouse, in 1692. A building stood on each site by 1739, one being the forerunner of Rock House and its neighbours, the other of a row to the north, later nos. 46-51 South Grove (in 1977 nos. 49-54 Highgate West Hill). Together with the buildings along High Street they came to form three sides of Pond Square, although only Rock House and others on the west, which faced inward, were thought to belong to the square (nos. 1-6). (fn. 87) The Gatehouse itself was extended southward after an inclosure from the green in 1670. (fn. 88)

The 1680s and 1690s saw new gentlemen's houses on the south and west sides of the green, where attractive sites had been monopolized by Arundel House and Dorchester House. The Arundel House estate was sold in 1670 by Sir Robert Payne's son William to Francis Blake, who divided the mansion and allowed his younger brother William to occupy the banqueting house farther west. Andrew Campion, a later purchaser, moved to a new residence, afterwards South Grove House, on the western part of his land in 1675. He sold the banqueting house itself to William Blake, (fn. 89) who adapted it for his ill-fated Ladies' Hospital. (fn. 90) William Blake made way in 1681 for his son Daniel, who soon conveyed the property to his father's creditor Sir William Ashurst, later lord mayor of London (d. 1720). Ashurst replaced the western part of Arundel House with Old Hall in the 1690s (fn. 91) and also chose the site of the banqueting house for a grander residence. Ashurst House, sometimes called the Mansion House, impressed Defoe. (fn. 92) It was a large square building set back from the green, at the end of an avenue later marked by the approach to St. Michael's church, and commanded formal gardens stretching much farther down the hill than those of its neighbours. (fn. 93) The house was sold by Sir William's grandson William Pritchard Ashurst to John Edwards (d. 1769) and leased by Edwards's descendants Sarah Cave and Sarah Otway Cave, whose tenants included the judge Sir Alan Chambré (d. 1823). After serving as a school, Ashurst House was bought as the site for a church in 1830. (fn. 94)

Along the west side of the green Thomas Collett's old house at the northern end was bought in 1678 by Sir Francis Pemberton (d. 1697), the future lord chief justice, who replaced it with Grove House. Pemberton's seat, approached by an avenue from the green, was bought in 1782 by Charles Fitzroy, Lord Southampton (d. 1797), and demolished before 1808, when George Fitzroy, Lord Southampton (d. 1810), incorporated most of the land in Fitzroy farm. (fn. 95) At the southern end Dorchester House was acquired briefly for the Ladies' Hospital by William Blake, who built three pairs of semidetached houses in the garden (later nos. 1-6 the Grove). Pemberton, as mortgagee, acquired the whole property in 1683, pulling down Dorchester House between 1688 and 1699 but profiting from the new houses in the Grove, which by 1769 were known as Pemberton Row and by 1804 as Quality Walk. (fn. 96)

The last noble householders included Lord Dorchester's great-nephew Robert Pierrepont, earl of Kingston (later marquess of Dorchester and duke of Kingston) from 1694 to 1702, Lord Holles from 1694 to 1700, and the duke of Newcastle from 1702 until 1710. (fn. 97) Lord Holles was presumably John Holles, earl of Clare, created duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1694, who died in 1711. (fn. 98) His house is not known, although Francis, Lord Holles of Ifield (d. 1690), briefly owned and altered Throckmorton's old mansion between 1686 and 1688. (fn. 99) Francis, Lord Holles, was a kinsman of John Holles, later duke of Newcastle, himself a greatnephew of the marquess of Dorchester who had died in 1680. (fn. 1)

Eighteenth-century Highgate, no longer aristocratic, continued to attract the rich. Its reputation for healthy air and fine prospects was secure. The panorama over London, admired by Defoe, (fn. 2) was celebrated in 1743, in verse, (fn. 3) and in the 1760s, (fn. 4) when it made James Boswell 'all life and joy'. (fn. 5) The engraver John Chatelaine, who showed Highgate from the south in 1745 and 1752, was the first of many to depict the village on its wooded heights; by the 1790s views from the top of the hill were equally popular. (fn. 6) Advertisements for houses, dating at least from 1728, (fn. 7) stressed the convenience, beauty, and gentility of the village. (fn. 8) The rebuilding of the alms-houses (fn. 9) and enlargements of the chapel, itself a favoured subject for artists, (fn. 10) enhanced Highgate's claims to elegance.

Evidence of 18th-century growth survives in many genteel houses. (fn. 11) Ireton House and Lyndale House were built as a single residence on the site of an older one next to Cromwell House, (fn. 12) facing Hertford House, where one dwelling may have replaced two as early as 1725. The present Ivy and Northgate houses, a substantial semi-detached pair, (fn. 13) were refitted. Nos. 17, 19, and 21 High Street (the Gould charity estate) were rebuilt c. 1733, probably after Englefield House had filled a gap in the street frontage. Along the south side of the green Throckmorton's old mansion was split up and in 1715 made way for a pair which included Moreton House; Russell House was built at about the same time and Church House later in the century. South Grove House, bought in 1720 by the high church preacher Henry Sacheverell who died there in 1724, (fn. 14) was afterwards extended towards the road. Later residences included Cholmeley Lodge, replacing the Mermaid inn on the later north corner of Cholmeley Park and High Street. (fn. 15) Humbler buildings also multiplied: there were thirteen on the chapel field in 1717 (fn. 16) and eight new ones adjoined the White Lion in 1749. (fn. 17) In North Road, opposite the school's estate, a strip was acquired for one house in 1713, occupied by two houses in 1752 and by six cottages in 1784; between 1788 and 1790 a local builder, William Anderson, replaced them with a row known as York Buildings in 1815 and numbering twenty cottages from c. 1830. (fn. 18) Demand for sites diminished the grounds of even the largest houses in High Street; of 18 a. attached to Cromwell House in 1664 only 1 a. was retained, as a garden, from 1742. (fn. 19) The one small estate comparable to that of Cholmley's school comprised three cottages with curtilages and meadows left to Christ's Hospital by Jane Savage by will dated 1669. The property lay on the north-east side of High Street, containing 3½ a. with seven tenements in 1840; (fn. 20) Christ's Hospital sold nos. 42 and 62 in 1915, nos. 20 and 22 (Broadbent's Yard) in 1922, nos. 6 and 8 in 1928, and the rest of the estate in 1960. (fn. 21)

Houses began to line the roads approaching the village and by 1754 stretched a short way along Hornsey and Southwood lanes, and along North Road to a point a little beyond Castle Yard on the east and much farther, almost half-way down the hill, on the west. (fn. 22) In Hornsey Lane the houses stood on both the Hornsey and Islington sides of the boundary. (fn. 23) At the corner of the lane and Highgate Hill the later Winchester Hall, presumably named after Susannah Winch who held property there before 1691, (fn. 24) was called Winches House by 1738, when it was bought by Thomas Rogers. (fn. 25) In Southwood Lane John Raymond had a house as early as 1687 and held a forerunner of Southwood in 1707. (fn. 26) To the north Field-Marshal George Wade (d. 1748) rebuilt a house which existed by 1736 (fn. 27) and which he had acquired with 2 a. of Highgate common between Southwood and Jackson's lanes in 1745; (fn. 28) afterwards known as Southwood House, it had a three-storeyed centre and was later extended with two two-storeyed wings. In Jackson's Lane itself a rambling house of two storeys and attics, later known as Southwood Lawn, probably dated from the 17th century but was much altered in the 18th. (fn. 29)

Travellers increasingly contributed to Highgate's prosperity. The Black Dog, mentioned from 1735, (fn. 30) was presumably the inn on Highgate Hill which later made way for St. Joseph's retreat. (fn. 31) Opposite stood the Crown, slightly below the existing Old Crown, (fn. 32) which marked the southern end of Highgate village in 1774. (fn. 33) The Mitre, at the corner of Hampstead Lane facing the Gatehouse, was so named by 1727 (fn. 34) and licensed by 1717. (fn. 35) In North Road, in addition to the Red Lion, a building called the Red Heart stood on the chapel field estate in 1717. (fn. 36) The White Hart at the top of West Hill was leased with 5 a. to William Bowstread in 1780; Bowstread had a nursery there in 1804, the inn having closed, and William Cutbush by 1822. (fn. 37) Inns in the Hornsey part of Highgate in 1786 (fn. 38) were the Castle and the Green Dragon, both on the chapel field estate (fn. 39) and existing by 1765, (fn. 40) the Bull, the Bull and Wrestlers (one of them presumably the Black Bull in North Hill where the artist George Morland stayed in 1802), (fn. 41) the Wrestlers, the Assembly House (as the Gatehouse had been temporarily renamed), the Bell, the Coach and Horses, the Coopers' Arms, the Duke's Head, the Mitre, the Rose and Crown, the Red Lion, and the Red Lion and Sun. (fn. 42) On the St. Pancras side there were only the Angel, the Flask, and the Fox and Crown, (fn. 43) all three of them used on occasion for courts or vestry meetings. (fn. 44) Highway robberies, many near the foot of Highgate Hill, led to the establishment of evening patrols from the Rose and Crown to Islington. (fn. 45)

The demands of traffic led to widening of the road up Highgate Hill to the Gatehouse in 1767, when the roadside elms were felled and the footways levelled. (fn. 46) The narrow archway of the Gatehouse, supporting two storeys (fn. 47) and said to be the cause of many accidents, was probably taken down at that time. (fn. 48) Aided by the governors of the free school, Highgate had supported its own fire service and antirobbery fund in the 1730s. By 1720 there was a cage, presumably on the High Street site adjoining the watch-house in 1811. (fn. 49) It was a natural step, emphasizing that it had outstripped its neighbours, for the 'populous' hamlet to obtain a Lighting and Watching Act in 1774. The provisions applied to an area from the Crown as far north as the Black Bull, around the Grove and South Grove, and some way down Hornsey, Southwood, and Hampstead lanes, although the last had only to be watched. (fn. 50) Highgate thus acquired the amenities of a small town and, with assemblies and a theatre, soon enjoyed a corresponding social life. (fn. 51) Patrons for local activities were found in the families of the earl of Mansfield and Lord Southampton, (fn. 52) whose estates stretched towards Hampstead. By 1800 Highgate and its westerly neighbour were unrivalled on the north side of London, except perhaps by Stoke Newington, as select residential villages and summer retreats. Busy roads, however, made Highgate more convenient for city men and more of a commercial centre than Hampstead. (fn. 53)

Although restricted in its early growth, Highgate by 1800 bore a much more straggling appearance than Hampstead, presumably because it had been easier to encroach on the common or the waste bordering the bishop of London's lands than on estates such as Ken Wood. (fn. 54) In 1815 there were detached houses and gardens along most of Hornsey Lane to the new Archway, in much of Southwood Lane, and at the top of Jackson's Lane. Buildings also stretched half-way along the north-east side of North Hill and formed two more groups beyond, probably including the Wellington inn at the junction with Archway Road. On the south-west side they stretched nearly the whole way down the hill but stopped short of its foot. North of the junction, by contrast, Lord Mansfield's Manor Farm stood by itself on the west side of Archway Road. Hampstead Lane, after passing a few houses next to the Gatehouse, led westward from the village between Lord Southampton's grounds and the fields of Hornsey park. (fn. 55)

The opening of Archway Road in 1813 was opposed by the innkeepers of Highgate village, whose custom consequently dwindled before the coming of the railways. (fn. 56) The new road, with no houses between the Archway and the Wellington in 1815, delayed the north-eastern penetration of Highgate into Hornsey. It was, however, probably responsible for the opening of the Wellington (in 1826 perhaps the only new inn since 1786), (fn. 57) for the spread of housing along North Hill, (fn. 58) and the opening by 1828 of the Woodman (fn. 59) opposite the junction with Southwood Lane. Building continued on the remaining central sites. On the western side of High Street a fire-engine house was to be provided in 1811 and the cage was moved from one side to another of the watch-house, which faced the entrance to Southwood Lane. (fn. 60) In the Grove the line of Blake's fashionable row was extended northward over the grounds of Grove House, when Lord Southampton granted building leases for nos. 7 to 12 from 1832. (fn. 61) Much of the land in the triangle between the Grove and Collett's causeway (itself called Highgate Grove in 1804) (fn. 62) was nursery ground by 1842 (fn. 63) and later taken for a waterworks. (fn. 64)

Near the top of West Hill the first leases for Holly Terrace, on part of the land attached to Hollyside, were granted in 1806. Immediately south stood Holly Lodge, new in 1809 (fn. 65) when it was leased to the actress Harriot Mellon (d. 1837), afterwards wife of the banker Thomas Coutts (d. 1822) and of William de Vere Beauclerk, duke of St. Albans (d. 1849). (fn. 66) Itself a modest villa of two storeys and attics, in the Regency style, Holly Lodge stood in well stocked grounds of 21 a. which were to be made available for many local êtes by Harriot's stepdaughter Angela, later Baroness, Burdett-Coutts (d. 1906). (fn. 67) The estate, broken up in 1922, stretched down the slope to cover Holly Village and higher up to include the roadside houses from Voel to Holly Terrace. (fn. 68)

Whereas Archway Road affected Highgate's economic life, it helped to stimulate a sense of exclusiveness. So too, perhaps, did the closure of the free school's chapel in 1832. (fn. 69) Cut off from the rest of Hornsey and no longer able to rely on the funds of the school, residents concentrated on the village's own problems and societies multiplied. (fn. 70)

Although Highgate was praised in 1849 for its air, scenery, well lit streets, and water supply mainly from wells, (fn. 71) it had pockets of urban squalor. Lack of water was considered a deterrent to builders in 1819 (fn. 72) and the poor had to rely on the polluted ponds on the green. The two ponds were made into one in 1845, with help from St. Pancras parish and local subscriptions, (fn. 73) but drainage remained inadequate. (fn. 74) Reports of 1848 revealed overcrowded and insanitary conditions, particularly in Townsend's Yard and York Buildings, which persisted for another 20 years. (fn. 75)

Highgate became more sedate with the decline of its coaching trade, the closure of its theatre c. 1825, and an attack on Sunday business. (fn. 76) In 1840 it was said to present a picture of desolation, whence visitors had to seek refreshment in Hampstead. (fn. 77) The zeal which enforced Victorian Sundays also tackled bad drainage and slums, and produced schools, chapels, allotments, and societies for the benefit of the poor. In 1864 a local committee was formed to improve the crown of Highgate Hill and the Highgate Dwellings Improvement Co. was established to repair or build houses for letting to the working class. (fn. 78)

The crown of Highgate Hill had first been altered in 1845 when the road from High Street, which had curved between the two ponds, (fn. 79) was realigned south of the new pond to form the modern South Grove. (fn. 80) At the same time the prebendary of Cantlowes had vested Pond Square in locally chosen trustees. (fn. 81) The arrival of piped water from the New River Co. in the 1850s left the pond to be used for rubbish, until in 1863 it was proposed to build over the site. Opposition from the surviving trustees, under Dr. Nathaniel Wetherell, (fn. 82) led to the establishment of an improvements committee (fn. 83) and its adoption of a plan by Rawlinson Parkinson for filling in the pond and planting it with shrubs. (fn. 84) The committee also planted two small plots forming a triangle opposite the church, which were received from the prebendary of Cantlowes in 1865. (fn. 85) It was thus responsible for all that remained of Highgate green but, lacking funds, failed to keep it tidy. In 1877 there were abortive plans to rebuild Highgate Literary and Scientific Institution there, as part of a community centre, (fn. 86) in 1881 there were complaints about encroachment, and in 1885 St. Pancras vestry took over the square, which it paved with tar. (fn. 87)

The Highgate Dwellings Improvement Co. was managed by Alderman (later Sir) Sydney Waterlow of Fairseat, who, with the Congregationalist minister Josiah Viney and Col. J. W. Jeakes of Winchester Hall, was also prominent in saving Pond Square. (fn. 88) Viney had already completed the model Verandah Cottages in North Hill and Waterlow had recently erected flats in Finsbury. The aim was not only to build but to renovate and, by competition, force landlords to spend more on their property. (fn. 89) An early result was the terrace called Springfield Cottages near the foot of North Hill. At the other side of Highgate, opposite the corner of Archway Road and Jackson's Lane, Coleridge Buildings was opened in 1867 as a four-storeyed block with 96 rooms and survived until 1944. Owners reduced rents at York Buildings and carried out improvements at Townsend's Yard, although c. 1868 the one place was still described as a plaguespot and the other as an eyesore. (fn. 90)

Meanwhile the restriction of the free school's funds to educational purposes, after making necessary the building of St. Michael's church, had enabled the school itself to expand. Two classrooms had been added to the old school-house in 1820 and a library and fourth classroom were built in 1845. The playground, entered from the present North Road, stretched southward to the ruined chapel and eastward to a wall along Southwood Lane. (fn. 91) On the opposite side of the lane the 18thcentury Cholmeley House was bought in 1845 (fn. 92) as the headmaster's residence. The main site began to assume its modern appearance with the opening of the Big School block in 1866. Two boarding houses were in use by the 1850s and two more in the 1860s. (fn. 93)

In the mid 1860s Highgate, away from its hilltop centre, still straggled along the old roads. (fn. 94) Parkand farm-land stretched behind the houses. The Wellington and some brick-fields were all that bordered the Highgate side of Archway Road except at the foot of Southwood Lane, where there were a few cottages. The genteel villas of the Grove extended a little way across Hampstead Lane, to form North Grove, and St. Michael's Vicarage had been built to the west. Opposite the Vicarage was Caen Terrace and farther west stood Dufferin Lodge, home of the song-writer Helen Selena, Lady Dufferin, afterwards countess of Gifford, who died there in 1867. (fn. 95) Beechwood and Fitzroy House, well back from Hampstead Lane, were in St. Pancras parish, as were some large houses in Lord Southampton's Fitzroy Park. (fn. 96)

Highgate in 1873

Other large houses in the 1860s included Farquhar and Linden houses in Hornsey Lane, the threestoreyed Winchester Hall (fn. 97) at the corner of Highgate Hill, Southwood Lodge, Southwood Cottage, the Limes, Southwood, Southwood House, all east of Southwood Lane, and Southwood Lawn and Oak Lodge in Jackson's Lane. The Limes had been built by 1815 (fn. 98) and for most of the early 19th century belonged to the owners of Southwood. Southwood itself, altered by 1842 and further extended by the 1860s, stood in grounds which stretched south-east of the Limes; they were improved for Mark Beauchamp Peacock (d. 1862) and commanded a noted view, (fn. 99) depicted by the antiquary F. W. Fairholt. (fn. 1)

In North Hill the largest house, and the farthest back from the road, was Park House, which had been converted into a refuge for prostitutes in 1848 and leased as the London Diocesan Penitentiary (later the House of Mercy) in 1855. It had beds for 60 girls in 1877, was taken over by the Clewer Sisters in 1900, and closed in 1940, (fn. 2) although the building survived until the flats of Hillcrest were laid out. (fn. 3) An adjoining chapel, designed by Arthur Blomfield, was opened in 1877 (fn. 4) and dismantled in 1946. (fn. 5) On the fashionable Hampstead side of the village Dufferin Lodge was demolished in 1869 to make way for Caen Wood Towers, a gabled and battlemented mansion designed by E. Salomons & J. P. Jones, which also replaced the neighbouring Fitzroy House and stood in St. Pancras. (fn. 6) Public buildings included a police station in High Street, succeeded by one in the northern arm of South Grove, (fn. 7) and offices for the local board in Southwood Lane. (fn. 8)

Model dwellings were needed not only for existing slum-dwellers but for railway construction workers and railwaymen. To serve the poorer district that was growing up around the foot of North Hill and the newcomers who were attracted by the railway, All Saints' church was opened in 1864 in a new road (later Church Road) linking North Hill with Archway Road. (fn. 9)

Elsewhere building on land away from the old roads, although encouraged by the opening of Highgate station in 1867, had to await the sale of large houses or of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' lands. The death of Col. J. W. Jeakes in 1874 was followed by his son's sale of Winchester Hall to the Imperial Property Investment Co. in 1881. The house was pulled down in 1881-2, its fittings, including 1½ mile of iron park fencing, were sold, Hornsey Lane was widened, and Cromwell Avenue driven north-eastward through the estate to Archway Road. Houses of two classes, faced with Suffolk brick, were being built and offered in 1882, (fn. 10) when their construction presumably led to the opening of the cable tramway up Highgate Hill and furthered the foundation of St. Augustine's church, on the far side of Archway Road. A smaller but more central scheme was started in 1883, when Bisham House was demolished and 30 terraced houses and two larger ones were planned for Bisham Gardens, with eight shops fronting High Street. Property values were expected to rise because of the tramway (fn. 11) but neighbouring land was saved from building by the creation of Waterlow Park. (fn. 12) In Hornsey Lane Linden and Farquhar houses did not long survive the sale of Winchester Hall, whose land had surrounded them on three sides. Waterlow Park itself was cited as an attraction when houses were offered on the Linden House estate in 1894. (fn. 13)

A small working-class area grew up around the Wellington at the foot of North Hill, (fn. 14) opposite land acquired by the local board as a depot in 1869, (fn. 15) and the G.N.R.'s sidings east of Archway Road. In 1877 a board school was opened next to Springfield Cottages (fn. 16) and by 1894 larger houses, most of them terraced or semi-detached, had spread around All Saints' church to fill Bishop's and Bloomfield roads, although none stood in Talbot Road and only a few along the north side of Park House Road (later the Park), facing the grounds of the penitentiary. A building lease for detached or semi-detached houses in part of Talbot Road had been granted by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in 1892 and other leases, for Talbot and Church roads, were granted in 1896. Terraces were also permitted in Archway Road, near the corner of Talbot Road, in 1892. (fn. 17) By 1894 they lined the west side of Archway Road from the foot of North Hill to Southwood Lane and there were more houses from the foot of Jackson's Lane to the Archway cutting. There remained a gap between the foot of Southwood Lane and Jackson's Lane, since the housing that had grown up near the station and church had not yet met the more southerly block formed by the Cromwell Avenue estate. Jackson's Lane itself contained only Southwood House and cottages at the corner of Southwood Lane, on its northern side, and Southwood Lawn and Oak Lodge on the south side, although detached villas on the Southwood Lawn estate had been projected as early as 1876. (fn. 18) Southwood Court had been built by 1882 on land leased from the Peacocks by John Grove Johnson (d. 1908); it was a redbrick house in the Tudor style, of two storeys, basement and attic, with gables, twisted chimneys, and black-and-white infilling. The neighbouring Southwood was much altered and given a third storey at about the same time. (fn. 19) Southwood Lawn Road led only a short way from Southwood Lane, past the northern side of Southwood Court, and Cholmeley Park, from High Street, similarly ended near two isolated houses, Lilford House and Copley Dene. There was thus an open tract, with nursery gardens behind High Street, bounded by building along Cromwell Avenue, High Street, Southwood Lane, and Archway Road. A footpath across the fields, from Southwood Lane to Tile Kiln Lane, was neglected by 1891 (fn. 20) and soon afterwards disappeared.

While Highgate spread eastward to Archway Road, more widely spaced houses were built northwest of the village on the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' land. In the 1860s the bishop's former park still consisted of farm-land along Hampstead Lane west of the Vicarage, except for some allotments (fn. 21) and a cricket ground (later the Senior field) leased to Highgate School in 1858. The allotments were bought in 1869 and afterwards converted into the Junior field. (fn. 22) On the edge of the Senior field a pavilion was built in 1870, a block of fives courts c. 1880, and a swimming bath (from 1896 also a gymnasium) in 1885. (fn. 23) A building lease for large houses in Broadlands Road was granted in 1878 to John Groom, architect, who was also to construct two northerly offshoots, later Grange and Denewood roads. (fn. 24) In 1879 Highgate School was authorized to buy the freeholds of several new houses in Bishopswood Road, which curved round the Senior field, together with the playing fields, and to build School House for the headmaster and 40 boarders. (fn. 25) Both sides of Broadlands Road were built up in the 1880s; the Grange had been built and Grange Road so named by 1882 and the house called Denewood by 1888. (fn. 26) North-west of Bishopswood Road the country remained open as far as the Finchley boundary.

Although much extended on the north side by late Victorian housing for the middle classes, Highgate remained distinct from the rest of Hornsey. Physical barriers were perpetuated when an open tract to the north-west was preserved as Highgate golf course and when Highgate and Queen's woods passed into public ownership. (fn. 27) The old village was further protected by its elevation. When Shepherd's Hill was at last built up, as an expensive suburb, its residents were regarded as living on the wrong side of Archway Road and in the 1890s they preferred to shop in Highbury rather than to ascend the lanes to Highgate. (fn. 28) On the London side building spread to Dartmouth Park and the Archway district of Upper Holloway; it crept up the slopes, where a smallpox and vaccination hospital was built in 1850, followed by St. Joseph's retreat in 1858 and an infirmary for St. Pancras (later part of the Highgate wing of the Whittington hospital), in 1870, (fn. 29) but only on the east side did it join Highgate along Hornsey Lane. The village itself was shielded by the reservation of land for Highgate cemetery, opened in 1839, (fn. 30) by the formation of Waterlow Park to the east, and to the west by the grounds of Holly Lodge and its neighbours, whose owners contributed to the purchase of Parliament Hill Fields, acquired by the Metropolitan Board of Works as an extension to Hampstead Heath in 1889. (fn. 31) Events thus did not vindicate William Howitt, tenant of the Hermitage (replaced by Hermitage Villas) and afterwards of the neighbouring West Hill Lodge: in 1866 when writing The Northern Heights of London, Howitt had left for Surrey, dreading the rapid advance of suburban London, that 'monster of burnt clay'. (fn. 32)

Most of the remaining space north and east of Highgate had been taken for housing by 1914. (fn. 33) Talbot Road was built up and so was the west side of Archway Road between Southwood and Jackson's lanes. Hillside Mansions, an early fourstoreyed block of flats (fn. 34) near the foot of Jackson's Lane, and the similar Southwood Mansions, at the foot of Southwood Lane, had been built in 1897. (fn. 35) Hillside Gardens skirted the grounds of Southwood House. The grounds of Southwood Court still bordered the western end of Southwood Lawn Road but the road itself had been carried eastward to meet Highgate Avenue, which cut across the site of Oak Lodge and where new houses had been advertised in 1897. (fn. 36) Houses lined the south side of Jackson's Lane, Southwood Avenue, Highgate Avenue, the east end of Southwood Lawn Road, and Causton Road, as well as the northern end of Cholmeley Park, which had been extended beyond Copley Dene. The Santa Claus home for sick children moved from a private house in South Grove (later Highgate West Hill) to Cholmeley Park in 1900; it stood next to Lilford House, a school from 1886, and was to survive until after 1948, when the L.C.C. acquired it for tuberculous patients. (fn. 37) Two nursery-gardens remained behind High Street and the slopes from the back of Southwood Lane towards Causton Road and Cholmeley Park remained open.

Building north-west of Highgate was slower. Stormont Road led north from Hampstead Lane in 1915, when woodland still stretched from Finchley along the north side of the lane, opposite Kenwood. Large houses were being built on both sides of View Road in 1898 but by 1915 had spread no farther north-west than Stormont Road. (fn. 38) Gaskell Road and its offshoots, in contrast, formed a rectangle of cramped terraces around Highgate board school, off North Hill. The depot was immediately to the north and beyond stood Manor Farm, backing upon fields. (fn. 39)

The biggest changes near the centre of the village in the late 19th century were effected by Highgate School. In Southwood Lane the former British school was bought in 1877 (fn. 40) and used for science lessons, a sanatorium was built at no. 87 in 1884, (fn. 41) a new sorting office was leased to the G.P.O. by the governors in 1888, (fn. 42) and the headmaster's house was turned into a junior school, known as Cholmeley House, in 1889 and extended in 1894. A new block facing North Road and containing the hall was opened in 1899 and a separate block was added to Cholmeley House in 1904. (fn. 43) The governors also rebuilt old houses in North Road: the Castle lost its licence and became a working men's club, (fn. 44) cottages between Castle Yard and the Red Lion were demolished in 1888, building leases were offered in 1898, (fn. 45) and the Red Lion itself was demolished c. 1904. (fn. 46) Castle Yard, formerly the yard of the inn, was opened as a road in 1892 (fn. 47) and Green Dragon Alley, linking North Road with Southwood Lane, was closed in 1898 after the school had agreed to surrender land for widening Castle Yard and Southwood Lane. (fn. 48)

Isolated changes took place elsewhere in the village. In High Street the forge at Dodd's Corner, named after the blacksmith's family, was replaced in 1896 by a printing works, which survived until a turning ground for trolley-buses was made c. 1947. (fn. 49) The Angel inn was rebuilt c. 1880 (fn. 50) and the Gatehouse c. 1900. (fn. 51) Red-brick flats, similar to those at the foot of Southwood Lane and named Chesterfield Mansions and Burlington Mansions, were built in South Grove between 1898 and 1903. (fn. 52) On West Hill Walter Scrimgeour rebuilt the early18th-century Parkfield and after 1892 demolished the Fox and Crown, where the royal arms had been displayed since the landlord had rescued Queen Victoria and her mother after their carriage had run away in 1837; the site of the inn was taken for stables. (fn. 53) On the slopes south of the village two paths between Swain's Lane and Dartmouth Park Hill were stopped up before Lady Burdett-Coutts secured the closure of Bromwich Walk, in return for improvements to Swain's Lane, in 1905. (fn. 54) The east wing of Fairseat was demolished for widening the top of Highgate Hill in 1909, (fn. 55) and Parkfield, renamed Witanhurst, was enlarged on a grand scale as late as 1913. (fn. 56)

The period between the World Wars saw the last fields and woodland along the north side of Hampstead Lane give way to Courtenay, Compton, and Sheldon avenues, all of them laid out by 1920. A few large houses thus linked Highgate with the eastern part of Hampstead. Highgate School opened new science buildings in Southwood Lane in 1928. (fn. 57) Ingleholme, in Bishopswood Road on the corner of Hampstead Lane, was later acquired for junior boys and the neighbouring Dormy House was replaced by Cholmeley House; the junior school moved there in 1938, whereupon its old building in Southwood Lane was renamed Dyne House. (fn. 58) Farther north, beyond the golf course, Manor farm still belonged to United Dairies in 1932. Aylmer Road had been constructed across the farm from the foot of North Hill to East Finchley by 1935, when the three-storeyed Manor Court, containing 36 flats, stood on its north side next to a shopping parade. On its south side Aylmer Court had been built by 1936 and Whittington Court by 1937. Near the village much of the remaining space east of High Street was also built up by 1938, to complete Cholmeley Crescent. (fn. 59) It was overlooked by a three-storeyed house and studio, designed by Tayler and Green, which was completed behind High Street in 1940. (fn. 60)

From 1921 the gardens of Southwood Court were improved by Mrs. Elias, whose husband Julius Salter Elias, newspaper proprietor and later Viscount Southwood (d. 1946), demolished the neighbouring Southwood c. 1932. (fn. 61) More typical of the period than such private embellishments was the replacement of large houses by smaller ones or, more frequently, by blocks of flats. Furnival House had been built in Cholmeley Park as early as 1916; (fn. 62) designed by J. H. Pott, it was used by female staff of the Prudential Assurance Co. until c. 1928 and thereafter as a home for nurses from the Whittington hospital. (fn. 63) The Holly Lodge estate was sold in 1922 (fn. 64) after the death of Lady Burdett-Coutts's husband, W. L. A. Bartlett-Burdett-Coutts, (fn. 65) the house itself making way for part of Holly Lodge Gardens, where detached pseudo-Tudor houses in 'London's loveliest garden colony' were advertised by the Central London Building Co. in 1926. (fn. 66) Grove Bank was pulled down c. 1933. (fn. 67) The demolition of South Grove House in 1934 and the erection of 50 flats, in a block of three storeys in front and four behind, which began in 1935, threatened the skyline of the northern heights and the centre of the village. (fn. 68) Protests from Mr. J. B. Priestley and other eminent residents (fn. 69) brought assurances that the natural contours would be respected (fn. 70) and perhaps prevented further inroads on what Lady Ottoline Morrell called the simplicity and harmony of the Grove. (fn. 71)

People also protested at the building of flats at the top of Highgate Hill, where Cholmeley Lodge was auctioned in 1931 (fn. 72) and replaced by the block of that name, (fn. 73) and in North Road, where the expensive Highpoint One and Two were built between 1936 and 1938. (fn. 74) Less obtrusive flats included Rowlands Close, North Hill, replacing the sixteen dwellings known as Ward's Cottages which were condemned in 1932, and twenty-four flats at Grimshaw Close, replacing twenty-one cottages in North Road which were condemned in 1933. (fn. 75) Both closes existed by 1935, as did the eight flats forming Cholmeley Court (fn. 76) in Southwood Lane. (fn. 77) A 150-ft. wooden television mast, later replaced in metal, was built by the B.B.C. at the top of Swain's Lane in 1939. (fn. 78) Even with its new flats Highgate, with 17.2 persons per acre, had a lower population density than any ward in Hornsey except Muswell Hill in 1921 and the lowest of all, 18.7, by 1931. (fn. 79)

After the Second World War the process of infilling and rebuilding continued but on a limited scale and generally in an unobtrusive form. (fn. 80) The longest stretch of new building was Sheldon Avenue's north-easterly extension beyond Denewood Road. A few houses stood on both sides in 1958 and its length had been built up by 1968, although allotments survived to the east in 1976. Similarly, on the slopes below the south-east end of Southwood Lane, the yellow-brick terraced houses of Kingsley Place had been built by 1968, while a small nursery ground was left to the south. The population density remained the lowest for any ward in Hornsey or Haringey: Highgate had 40.32 persons per hectare in 1971 (16.3 per acre), when the average for Hornsey was 79.21. (fn. 81)

The bomb-damaged Coleridge Buildings were replaced by Goldsmith Court and a small public garden in 1950. (fn. 82) Goldsmith Court, containing sixteen flats, was built by Hornsey Housing Trust with help from the National Corporation for the Care of the Old and the Goldsmiths' Company of London. (fn. 83) The court-house and police station, at the corner of Archway and Bishop's roads, had also been bombed but were rebuilt in 1955 and 1960. (fn. 84) Council building was planned at Hillcrest in 1947 and finished by 1949. (fn. 85) Its architect, T. P. Bennett, also designed two-storeyed terraces in North Road before 1957; (fn. 86) they replaced the former Castle inn, in 1919 used as tea-rooms, and neighbouring properties. (fn. 87) Near by in Southwood Lane the old municipal offices had gone by 1958 and a terraced row (nos. 99-109) existed in 1968, while Southwood House, empty in 1950 (fn. 88) but still standing in its own grounds in 1958, made way for terraces of 30 houses in Southwood and Jackson's lanes. (fn. 89) Southwood Lawn, which had survived the sale of its gardens, was demolished in 1964. (fn. 90) The most striking change was at Southwood Court, which was sold on Lady Southwood's death in 1949 to Mrs. Bohener, who in turn sold it to Ross Hammond Investments (later renamed) in 1962. The house was demolished in 1965 and in its grounds was built Southwood Park, a large block of flats. Some of the land which Lord Southwood had leased from the Limes was laid out for the flats' residents, but the southern part was bought in 1970 by M. P. Kent (Homes) and built up as Somerset Gardens, where the first house was occupied in 1975. (fn. 91)

Apart from a new house on the site of the Lawns (no. 16), South Grove, there was little building after 1945 in the centre of Highgate village. Plans to divert heavy lorries there in 1962 were abandoned after the 'Save Highgate' campaign and in 1967-8 both Camden and Haringey councils declared the village a conservation area under the Civic Amenities Act. (fn. 92) In Southwood Lane Highgate School replaced the old National school building with two-storeyed flats in 1963 (fn. 93) and rebuilt Dyne House, with five storeys, between nos. 12 and 16 in 1967. (fn. 94) The former Vicarage in Hampstead Lane survived in 1958 but had been replaced by Highgate Close by 1968. Private dwellings farther afield included the three-storeyed flats called Heron's Lea, at the north-eastern end of Sheldon Avenue, by 1960 (fn. 95) and houses in View Close, under construction in 1962, (fn. 96) and Broadlands Close by 1968; exceptionally, two seven-storeyed towers containing 45 flats and called High Sheldon had been erected almost opposite Heron's Lea by 1964. (fn. 97) Building land was more readily found in Shepherd's Hill, (fn. 98) although some property along the intervening Archway Road was dilapidated in 1977, when longdelayed plans to widen the road were causing dissension. (fn. 99)

In the Hornsey part of Highgate 83 adult males took the protestation oath in 1642. (fn. 1) The village's 161 houses in 1664 (fn. 2) may have supported more than 800 inhabitants. (fn. 3) In 1841 St. Michael's chapelry had 4,302 inhabitants, 3,018 of them in the Hornsey part, compared with only 2,919 in the rest of Hornsey. The population of the Hornsey side of St. Michael's had risen very little, to 3,180, by 1861 and that of the whole village was said to be 5,339 in 1876. St. Michael's contained in all only 4,069 inhabitants in 1891 but north Highgate was then included in the new parish of All Saints, with 4,741. Later growth was slow: Highgate ward had 12,385 inhabitants in 1921 and 13,479 in 1931, when it covered 719 a., and 14,994 in 1951 and 15,580 in 1961, when the area was slightly larger. In 1971 it contained 736 a. (298 hectares) and 12,014 persons. (fn. 4)

Most of Highgate's well known residents lived in houses which have been described above, or were connected with churches, chapels, or schools. (fn. 5) Natives included the miscellaneous writer and oculist John Taylor (b. 1757), the educational reformer Charles Richson (b. 1806), and the ophthalmic surgeon George Critchett (b. 1817). Charles (afterwards Sir Charles) Scudamore (d. 1849), the physician, spent ten years as an apothecary at Highgate and later, c. 1814, practised there. (fn. 6) The painters Richard Corbould (d. 1831) and Dean Wolstenholme the younger (d. 1883) both died at Highgate. The aeronaut Charles Green (d. 1870) lived at Naomi Cottage, North Hill, in 1845 (fn. 7) and the poet Coventry Patmore (d. 1896) at a house called Bowden Lodge, whence he moved in 1866. (fn. 8) Later the scientific writer Charles Tomlinson (d. 1897) lived at no. 7 North Road, the theosopher Christopher Walton (d. 1877) at no. 9 Southwood Terrace, and Talbot Baines Reed (d. 1893), writer of boys' books, in Cholmeley Park. In 1884 Robert Hammond publicized the lighting at his house Hilldrop (fn. 9) (probably no. 4 North Grove), (fn. 10) which was later claimed as the first in Europe to have been lighted throughout by electricity. (fn. 11) The cartoonist William Heath Robinson, who was born in Hornsey Rise, Islington, died in 1944 at no. 25 Southwood Avenue. (fn. 12) Highgate is described in the autobiography of Sir John Betjeman, whose childhood home was no. 31 West Hill, (fn. 13) beyond the village as treated here.

Footnotes