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Friends of Havelock Rec

Transcript of Stop 2 on Virtual & Audio Tour Featuring Memories & Local History

Posted on January 24 by Kerry Hood

A short way down Raglan Avenue, by the twin-trunked Silver Birch tree.

Stop 2 – Of the Old Bay Tree, the Brick pit and Brick Making

Previous Stop – Next Stop

Narrator:  Look in front of you, on the left, for the large (evergreen) bay tree. One of the earliest records, in the 1850s is of a farm on Brick Kiln Lane (the old name for Homesdale Road) just north of where Havelock Road is now, with a large bay tree – which still resides in one of the back gardens of Havelock Road.  

The Old Bay Tree

The old bay tree, mentioned in sale documents before the brick pit in 1860

Phil:  From the 1860’s to 1934, clay and gravel was excavated from the brick pit. The Brickworks and kilns were situated where Mornington Avenue and Waldo Road are now.  

The brick-pit belonged to Mr Coles-Child, Lord of the Manor, a coal-merchant from Deptford, who had bought the Manor of Bromley from the Diocese of Rochester.  He expanded the pit from the existing small one (about where the dip is now) on Brick Kiln lane, into a large area – not just did it cover the whole of the park, it stretched all the way up to the south side of Waldo Road.   The Brickworks themselves are now the Waldo Road Waste Transfer Station.

old map showing large brick pit

1909 Ordnance Survey map of the Brick pit and surrounding roads

 

Sandra:  A condition of the railway passing through the Lord of Manor’s land, was it was to be on attractive brick arches, and using his bricks (this included the ill-fated ivy bridge, local historian Max Batten has described the Ivy Bridge disaster at Wendover Road on our website). These arches were buried by a cheaper embankment when the 2nd line went through (and Coles-Child was no longer on the company board).

Narrator: As Lord of the Manor, one of Coles-Child’s public-spirited projects, was to build a “new town hall” in Market Square.  He funded it, so it was built from ‘his’ bricks, from our brick-pit.  It contained the town’s first fire station, first police station, first library and an upstairs meeting room…. but it was never used by the body who ran the town, so was never actually the town hall.  By the1930s the high street was so congested that both the town hall and the ‘island’ row of buildings on the east side, were demolished, and the current square laid out, in 1933.

black and white photo of faintly Elizabethan brick style market hall

Postcard in 1899 of Old Town Hall, built in Elizabethan style Arts and Crafts architecture from the Brick-pit’s bricks

Andrew, reading a memory from an Anonymous Gentleman: Before this [that it was a dump] my Grandad used to work in the Brick pit, building bricks, and this is why it was originally called Havelock Brickfields.  It was a large hole until it was used as landfill of the wartime bombing rubbish.” 

Narrator:  Continue down the made path until you reach a young sweet chestnut tree on your left (the tree before the well grown young oak tree)

 

 

Posted in Audio Tour Transcript Page Virtual & Audio Memory Tour | Tagged Audio-tour-transcript-page Virtual-Audio-Tour-With-Memories

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Local History, Photos & Reminisces

Browse our collection of remarkable local reminisces in our oral history pages look at the park's previous incarnation as a working brickpit or a summary of it all here.

See also:

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Check out the Gallery

Early morning landscape by Jon Emmanuel
Landscape by Jon Emmanuel
IYellow Lab Daphne playing with her friend Molly
It's snowing!
evening light over our park
snow angel!
10422371_10152598816492595_4131414265842496626_n
2002jul02 tansy with little cricket bat
2008 double rainbow brickfield
HotBalloon060630-3
033 field water fight
IMG_1001-3
dragging the sledge back up the dip
snowmen and snow forts in 2009
The firemen parachuted in to raise money in 2005
fun-in-the-snow
fun-in-the-snow2
fun-in-the-snow3
fun-in-the-snow4
fun-in-the-snow snowman making
sledging-the-dip
dog in the snow
15jul01_sunset_over_brickfield_havelock_rec.jpg
14jun08 50490 view pink clouds brickfield.JPG
15feb28 dog walkers in field.jpg
andy_loakes_snow_on_the_brickfield.jpg
14jun08 50495 view sunset brickfield.JPG
P1090838.JPG
15jun29_4567-brickfield-field-bindweed-768x1024.jpg
15jun29_4583-brickfield-elderflower-768x1024.jpg
15mar14-brickfield-bulbplanting.jpg
15mar14-di-and-felix-litterpicking-brickfield.jpg
16jan18_volunteers-planting-hedge-brickfield.jpg
16jul18 bug-day-tent-view.jpg
16jun12 big-lunch-tug-war.jpg
16sep12-hoedown-2.jpg
17sep09-brickfield-hoedown-20059-baker-girl-beauty-dancing-1024x768.jpg
17sep09-brickfield-hoedown-20064-andy-emma-connie-pimms-tent-768x1024.jpg
17sep09-brickfield-hoedown-20071-girls-umbrella-rainbowjpg-1024x768.jpg
1924 o-peills-brick-pit-half-mile-SW-Bickley-Stn-looking-S-16386_synch-l.jpg
1940 havelock-rd-bomb-damage-1940-4-e1437292677505-1024x699.jpg
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