Between Bellevue Road and St James's Drive
This was part of a larger, 20-acre wedge of ground between Trinity Road and St James's Drive enclosed between 1848 and 1853 by Henry McKellar, a wealthy local landowner, to add to his extensive Wandsworth Lodge estate adjoining to the west.8 It was claimed at the time that McKellar had agreed to take only a small plot, and had appropriated the rest without authority. Here is J. C. Buckmaster, champion and protector of the common, on the subject:
one gentleman had a three-cornered nuisance of five acres conveniently near to his own house. The court leet gave him permission to enclose it, with the distinct understanding it was never to be built upon. The gentleman thanked the court leet and "stood glasses round"; in a few days the business of ditching and fencing goes on, and somehow it is not only the three-cornered piece which is enclosed, but another piece by the side of it, four times larger than that which was represented as a nuisance.9
There was still nothing but empty fields here in 1863 when McKellar died and this land was sold along with rest of his estate.10 The chunk between Trinity Road and St James's Drive, known as McKellar's Triangle, and two other lots adjoining on the west side of Trinity Road, were acquired by the Liberal-backed National Freehold Land Society and British Land Company to form a new estate. This was intended to attract buyers of small freeholds for house-building (which came with voting rights) from among London's growing mass of respectable working people, tradesmen and lower middle-class professionals.
Very quickly the British Land Company's surveyors began laying out new streets: Althorp, Nottingham and Wiseton Roads within the area covered by this chapter; Brodrick and Wandle Roads just outside. Road frontages were divided into house-plots, which were sold at auction in the summer of 1864.11 Characteristically, these plots were only as big as was required to give the new owners the right to vote - hence the small size of many early houses. However, some buyers seem to have taken multiple plots in order to accommodate larger houses; and as well as the owner-occupiers, small-scale builders took the opportunity to buy up lots in twos, threes and fours, and build short runs of speculative houses.12
Three of the earliest buildings, erected in 1864 - 5, were the Hope Tavern, standing at the apex, opposite the site later taken for the railway station (suggesting that this was already anticipated) - the ideal spot for a pub - and two good-sized double-fronted houses situated some way down the two main roads: White Lodge, at 23 Bellevue Road, and Clifton Villa, now 111 St James's Drive.
The Hope was a three-storey squareish box, with bay windows to its first floor at the front and sides; the single-storey bar extension in front was added subsequently (Ill. 19.2). The two houses were of pale brick, and originally would have shared a similar old-fashioned flat-fronted style; the prominent two-storey bay windows of White Lodge are a later addition, of 1883.13
Around these three cornerstones further development followed quickly.
Between 1866 and c.1871 much of Bellevue Road filled up, mostly with small two-storey houses and shops, as at Nos 4 & 5 and 6 - 11, though there was also a large dairy at No. 14. Later infill of the 1870s and 80s introduced considerable variety, for example: the bulkier three-storey red-brick shops at Nos 12 & 13 (1876); a pair of red-brick houses at Nos 18 & 19 (1884), built in the grounds of an earlier house (Churzee Cottage, of 1866), by its owner; and especially the fine group of house, stables and workshop in rubbed red brick, erected in 1887 at No. 16 by Leonard Bottoms, a local builder, for his own use (Ill. 19.3).14
Like Bellevue Road, the west side of St James's Drive became built up in the late 1860s, but almost entirely with houses, the only commercial properties here being a shop and later a bank at the corner with Nottingham Road.
At first most were smallish semi-detached pairs, such as 1 - 4 Hope Villas (now Nos 133 - 139), built c.1865 - 6 at the north end, beside the pub. Bigger three-storey semis were erected at Nos 115 & 117 in 1869 - 70 for S. & T. Dunkley, to designs by the architect Frederick Sullivan. Also, the two-storey, double-fronted house in the manner of White Lodge and Clifton Villa was popular here, as at Nos 83 (originally Milford Villa), 89 (Graythorne), 97 (Dalton Villa) and 99 (Woodbine Cottage), all of c.1871. These were often of white brick, with simple but attractive cut or moulded brick decorations (Ill. 19.4).
Other examples of this type, more elaborately ornamented, can be found further down St James's Drive, outside the area covered by this
volume. Bigger houses included the three-storey and basement pair at Nos 85 & 87, of 1871, and a detached residence with a prominent central staircase tower, originally called Bentley House (now No. 91), built in 1879 for George Dempster of Serpentine Lodge in Hyde Park, alongside an earlier development of his, Hyde Park Villas (now Nos 93 & 95).15
Most of these St James's Drive houses were given raised ground floors to make the most of the prospect overlooking a small wedge of common land, protected under the 1871 Act, which was well planted with trees to screen the view of the railway lines and platforms beyond.
The first houses in the side-streets between the two main arteries, in Althorp, Wiseton and Nottingham Roads, were generally smaller, often with just a 16ft frontage, and the speculative builder seems to have been a bigger presence here.
The regular rows at 6 - 26 Nottingham Road (of c.1866), 32 - 44 Althorp Road (c.1867), and 21 - 39 Wiseton Road (c.1867) are typical examples, all being small, two-storey cottages with two rooms to a floor, characteristic of the type of housing erected around London under the freehold land societies at this time (Ill. 19.5).
Smith's Terrace, at 35 - 47 Althorp Road, of c.1869 - 70, was a rare attempt at a palazzo-style terrace, albeit in a crude, old-fashioned neoclassical style, with the name in a small pediment; the developer was Henry Smith (Ill. 19.6).
Later, bigger houses here include Nos 1 & 3 Althorp Road, a pair of three-storey semi-detached villas with barge-boards, erected in 1878 by G. Wallis, a Balham builder.16
All these side-streets also had a smattering of trade or commercial properties (see Social and commercial character, below).
Of later alterations and additions, the most important before the war were the red-brick flats and shops of Bellevue Parade, erected at the corner of Bellevue and Wiseton Roads in 1928 to designs by J. W. Stanley Burmester and G. Whittaker. The modishly flat façade, without bays or projections, was not simply a stylistic choice, but was required by the local authorities under the existing building regulations.17
[Survey of London, vol 50, chapter 19 (50.19_deep_south.pdf).]
