Brompton, Kensington
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Brompton, sometimes called Old Brompton, survives in name as a ward in the
Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is an Inner London borough with royal status. It is the smallest borough in London and the second smallest district in England; it is one of the most densely populated administrative regions in the ...
in London. Until the latter half of the 19th century it was a scattered village made up mostly of
market garden A market garden is the relatively small-scale production of fruits, vegetables and flowers as cash crops, frequently sold directly to consumer A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or uses purchased goods, products, or s ...
s in the county of Middlesex. It lay south-east of the village of
Kensington Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the West End of London, West of Central London. The district's commercial heart is Kensington High Street, running on an east–west axis. The north-east is taken up b ...
, abutting the parish of St Margaret's, Westminster at the hamlet of Knightsbridge to the north-east, with
Little Chelsea Little Chelsea was a hamlet, located on either side of Fulham Road, half a mile Southwest of Chelsea, London. The earliest references to the settlement date from the early 17th century, and the name continued to be used until the hamlet was surrou ...
to the south. It was bisected by the Fulham Turnpike, the main road westward out of London to the ancient parish of
Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea. The area faces Wandsworth ...
and on to Putney and
Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...
. It saw its first parish church, Holy Trinity Brompton, only in 1829. Today the village has been comprehensively eclipsed by segmentation due principally to railway development culminating in London Underground lines, and its imposition of station names, including Knightsbridge, South Kensington and Gloucester Road as the names of stops during accelerated urbanisation, but lacking any cogent reference to local history and usage or distinctions from neighbouring settlements. Brompton has been home to many writers, actors and intellectuals. The Survey of London gives a long list. Its name survives formally to this day, only just, in the shared reference to two of the council's electoral wards called, "Brompton" and "Hans Town".


Definition

Where the old turnpike highway ( Fulham Road) meets today's Thurloe Place and becomes Brompton Road is sometimes called ''Brompton Cross''. The old village of Brompton carried on straddling the secondary Brompton Lane, later Old Brompton Road, for the whole of its length. In modern terms Old Brompton centred on today's South Kensington tube station, Gloucester Road tube station and their contiguous streets, and continued all the way to West Brompton station, between Earl's Court and Thames-side Chelsea. The historian F.H.W. Sheppard has summarised it thus:
"there was always much traffic on the old turnpike road, which linked London not only with Little Chelsea and Fulham but also (via Putney Bridge) with parts of Surrey as well, and which from 1726 to 1826 was maintained by the Kensington Turnpike Trustees. Anciently, the eastern end of this highway was known indiscriminately as the road to Fulham or the road to Brompton. The name ‘Brompton’, now used loosely, then applied most precisely to the settlement which lay westwards of what is now South Kensington Station, just off the turnpike road along the lane to Earl's Court. This lane, generally called Brompton Lane or Bell and Horns Lane, diverged from the main road at the Bell and Horns, an inn sited opposite the rompton Oratory where Empire House now stands. After the frontages of Brompton Road nearer London had been built up, the original nucleus of Brompton became known as Old Brompton and Brompton Lane as Old Brompton Road—which name survives today except in the short stretch east of South Kensington Station, where its line is represented by Thurloe Place. Before 1863 therefore, ‘Brompton Road’ was in general an unofficial term, usually to be construed as meaning the part of the Fulham turnpike road connecting Knightsbridge with Brompton Lane and thus with Old Brompton."


Extent

Brompton's northern neighbours were the hamlets of
Kensington Gore Kensington Gore is the name of a U-shaped thoroughfare on the south side of Hyde Park in central London, England. The streets connect the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal College of Art, the Royal Geographical Society, and in Kensington Garde ...
, dated but not dead in use, and Knight's bridge a crossing over the lost
river Westbourne The Westbourne or Kilburn is a culverted small River Thames tributary in London, rising in Hampstead and Brondesbury Park and which as a drain unites and flows southward through Kilburn and Bayswater (west end of Paddington) to skirt underne ...
. As to its old eastern half its administration remains in the
City of Westminster The City of Westminster is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and London boroughs, borough in Inner London. It is the site of the United Kingdom's Houses of Parliament and much of the British government. It occupies a large area of cent ...
, again due to the tube network it is commonly marked on maps as part of "Knightsbridge" district. Brompton (or very rarely New Brompton) had a jagged north-eastern limit owing to the medieval permanent assignation of
Kensington Gore Kensington Gore is the name of a U-shaped thoroughfare on the south side of Hyde Park in central London, England. The streets connect the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal College of Art, the Royal Geographical Society, and in Kensington Garde ...
to Westminster. According to the Church of England this has been simplified so that a three-church parish ''Holy Trinity Brompton –
St Paul's, Onslow Square St Paul's, Onslow Square (known as Holy Trinity Brompton, HTB Onslow Square), is a listed building, Grade II listed Anglican church (building), church in Onslow Square, South Kensington, London, England. The church was built in 1860, and the archi ...
and St Augustine's, Queen's Gate'' takes up a ⅛ SW to WSW radial sector focused on what was for many centuries a geographical point, a bridge, " Knights Bridge (Knightsbridge)", from which Brompton was always narrowly omitted. That point later became a
Crossroads Crossroads, crossroad, cross road or similar may refer to: * Crossroads (junction), where four roads meet Film and television Films * ''Crossroads'' (1928 film), a 1928 Japanese film by Teinosuke Kinugasa * ''Cross Roads'' (film), a 1930 Brit ...
for arterial roads, known as "
Scotch Corner Scotch Corner is a Junction (road), junction of the A1(M) motorway, A1(M) and A66 road, A66 Trunk road#United Kingdom, trunk roads near Richmond, North Yorkshire, Richmond in North Yorkshire, England. It has been described as "the modern gate ...
". Boundaries can be traced in the street network with a few small gaps, clockwise from the north: *Imperial College Road, Ennismore Street, Montpellier Mews (southern straight), Knightsbridge (street), Basil Street, Walton Street, Fulham Road, Drayton Gardens, and Ashburn, Grenville, Launceston, Kynance and Elvaston Places. West Brompton became overshadowed by Earls Court which overtook its land, but it extended more broadly than is suggested by the above sectors, to have a long border along the hidden Counter's Creek, (today's West London line), with the Hammersmith and Fulham borough boundary, then back along the Cromwell Road/
Queen's Gate Queen's Gate is a street in South Kensington, London, England. It runs south from Kensington Gardens' Queen's Gate (the edge of which gardens are here followed by Kensington Road) to Old Brompton Road, intersecting Cromwell Road. The street is ...
through Gloucester Road .Limits of South Kensington Civil and of Ancient Parish
Vision of Britain. The University of Portsmouth and others (most correctly resolved in default 20th century view, see, movement away from road network in both other views but which gives the names of settled places of the 18th century and before)
The rest of "South Kensington" and Kensington proper, including the first manor, centred on what became a royal palace (
Kensington Palace Kensington Palace is a royal residence set in Kensington Gardens, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, England. It has been a residence of the British royal family since the 17th century, and is currently the official L ...
), instead of simply a manor house, and lay to the north. Chelsea was to the south. Its fragmented existence is commemorated chiefly through four of the places listed below.


History

The first recorded mention of Brompton dates back to 1292. It was a rural area which subsequently attracted attention as the story of developments centred along a
turnpike road A toll road, also known as a turnpike or tollway, is a public or private road (almost always a controlled-access highway in the present day) for which a fee (or ''toll'') is assessed for passage. It is a form of road pricing typically implemented ...
that ran south westward from London through Knightsbridge Green and horticultural Brompton to Little Chelsea and the ancient parish of
Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea. The area faces Wandsworth ...
on the banks of the Thames and thence over Putney Bridge onto the
County of Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and non-metropolitan county, non-metropolitan counties of England, county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant ur ...
. Brompton Park Nurseries were founded in 1681 by four leading gardeners, led by George London. In the late 18th century, Carey's map of 1787 shows Brompton as a collection of market gardens. A hundred years later,
Charles Dickens Jr. Charles Culliford Boz Dickens (6 January 1837 – 20 July 1896) was the first child of the English novelist Charles Dickens and his wife Catherine. A failed businessman, he became the editor of his father's magazine '' All the Year Round'', and a ...
(eldest child of Charles Dickens) wrote in his 1879 book '' Dickens's Dictionary of London'' that "Brompton was at one time almost exclusively the artists' quarter and is still largely frequented by the votaries of the brush and chisel, though of late years Belgravia has been encroaching upon its boundaries, and Belgravian rents are stealing westward." The village gained its first church in 1829, Holy Trinity Brompton, rapidly incepted a parish. The gradual fragmentation and overshadowing of Brompton was probably due to two factors: the
Great Exhibition The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, also known as the Great Exhibition or the Crystal Palace Exhibition (in reference to the temporary The Crystal Palace, structure in which it was held), was an International Exhib ...
of 1851 and the rapid institutional developments in the area, such as museums and colleges; and the arrival of railway transport. The station built in 1868 on the
Metropolitan Metropolitan may refer to: * Metropolitan area, a region consisting of a densely populated urban core and its less-populated surrounding territories * Metropolitan borough, a form of local government district in England * Metropolitan county, a typ ...
and
District Railway The Metropolitan District Railway, also known as the District Railway, was a passenger railway that served London from 1868 to 1933. Established in 1864 to complete an " inner circle" of lines connecting railway termini in London, the first par ...
s to serve the attendant crowds was named South Kensington, not "Brompton". A " Brompton Road station" opened in 1906 for the new
Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway The Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway (GNP&BR), also known as the Piccadilly tube, was a railway company established in 1902 that constructed a deep-level underground "tube" railway in London.A "tube" railway is an underground rail ...
; lack of passengers forced it to close in 1934. Gloucester Road tube station on the other hand, which had opened 1868, was originally called "Gloucester Road, Brompton", but for simplicity dropped the Brompton from its name. Thus, Brompton ceased to be a place or destination. A nod to Brompton resurfaced in 1866 with Sir John Fowler's "station in the middle of fields", West Brompton station. In 1965 when the historic boroughs of
Kensington Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the West End of London, West of Central London. The district's commercial heart is Kensington High Street, running on an east–west axis. The north-east is taken up b ...
and Chelsea merged to form one authority, the College of Arms created for it a new coat of arms which included its Brompton roots. The crest contains a broom bush which represents the link between the two former boroughs' connection with the 'Brompton' ward. The area is now part of the Chelsea constituency. In medieval times Brompton was famous for its gorse fields. The name was a corruption of ‘broom tun’, meaning a
gorse ''Ulex'' (commonly known as gorse, furze, or whin) is a genus of flowering plants in the family Fabaceae. The genus comprises about 20 species of thorny evergreen shrubs in the subfamily Faboideae of the pea family Fabaceae. The species are n ...
farm. The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea has confined its "Brompton Conservation Area" to but the small northern part of the historical village of Brompton. the rest of it is partitioned among several other neighbouring conservation areas.


Landmarks "in Brompton"

* Bolton's Theatre Club * Brompton Cemetery * Brompton Fire Station, 1868–1964 at South Parade, (Chelsea) * Brompton Oratory * Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, formerly
St. Stephen's Hospital Chelsea and Westminster Hospital is a 430-bed teaching hospital located in Chelsea, London. Although the hospital has been at its present site since only 1993, the hospital has a rich history in that it serves as the new site for the Westminst ...
, founded as "St George's Union Infirmary" in 1878. * Church of St Yeghiche, Armenian cathedral, formerly, St Peter's Cranley Gardens, 1866-7 * Deutsche Evangelische Christuskirche in 1904-5 *
Fulham Road Jewish Cemetery The Fulham Road Jewish Cemetery (also called Fulham Cemetery and formerly known as the Brompton Jewish Cemetery) is a Jewish cemetery on Fulham Road in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. A locked door on the Fulham Road serves as the ...
formerly known as the "Jewish Cemetery, Brompton", opened 1815 * Gloucester Road tube station formerly known as "Gloucester Road, Brompton" *
Goethe-Institut The Goethe-Institut (, GI, en, Goethe Institute) is a non-profit German cultural association operational worldwide with 159 institutes, promoting the study of the German language abroad and encouraging international cultural exchange and ...
* Grabowski Gallery (1959–1975), former Avant-garde art gallery at 84 Sloane Avenue SW3 * Holy Trinity Brompton *
Holy Trinity Prince Consort Road Holy Trinity Church, South Kensington, is an Anglican church located on Prince Consort Road in the City of Westminster, London, England. The current building dates from 1901 and was built by George Frederick Bodley and Cecil Greenwood Hare. Edwar ...
in 1899 * Imperial College London * French Institute * Ishmaili Centre * Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle * Michelin House * Natural History Museum *
Paris Pullman Cinema The Paris Pullman is a former arthouse cinema, in the Brompton district, of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea London, England. It was closed and the building sold for redevelopment in 1983. History In 1910–11, along a predominantly ...
* Royal Brompton Hospital, formerly known as "Brompton Consumption Hospital" * Royal Marsden Hospital, formerly known as the "New Cancer Hospital" *
Royal Society of Sculptors The Royal Society of Sculptors is a British charity established in 1905 which promotes excellence in the art and practice of sculpture. Its headquarters are a centre for contemporary sculpture on Old Brompton Road, South Kensington, London. It ...
* Science Museum * South Kensington tube station * St Augustine's, Queen's Gate *
St Paul's, Onslow Square St Paul's, Onslow Square (known as Holy Trinity Brompton, HTB Onslow Square), is a listed building, Grade II listed Anglican church (building), church in Onslow Square, South Kensington, London, England. The church was built in 1860, and the archi ...
* Victoria and Albert Museum * West Brompton station


Notable streets of Brompton

* Beauchamp Place * The Boltons * Brompton Place * Brompton Road * Brompton Square * Cranley Gardens * Cromwell Road *
Drayton Gardens Drayton Gardens is a residential street linking the areas of Chelsea, London, Chelsea and South Kensington, London SW10. It runs roughly north to south from Old Brompton Road to Fulham Road. History Drayton Gardens was once a "rustic lane" in t ...
* Egerton Gardens * Exhibition Road * Fulham Road * Gloucester Road *
Hereford Square Hereford Square is a garden square in South Kensington, London SW7. It lies to the west of Gloucester Road, which forms the east side of the square. Wetherby Place is the western continuation, running off the north-west corner of the square. ...
*
Lennox Gardens Lennox Gardens, a park in Canberra, Australia, lying on the south side of Lake Burley Griffin, close to Commonwealth Avenue Bridge and Albert Hall in the suburb of Yarralumla. Before the construction of Lake Burley Griffin a road ran through ...
* Old Brompton Road * Onslow Square * Ovington Square * Pont Street *
Prince Consort Road Prince Consort Road is a street in London, United Kingdom. It is named after Prince Albert, consort to Queen Victoria. It is located between Queen's Gate to the west and Exhibition Road to the east, running parallel to Kensington Gore. Several ...
*
Queen's Gate Queen's Gate is a street in South Kensington, London, England. It runs south from Kensington Gardens' Queen's Gate (the edge of which gardens are here followed by Kensington Road) to Old Brompton Road, intersecting Cromwell Road. The street is ...
*
Thurloe Square Thurloe Square is a traditional garden square in South Kensington, London, England. There are private communal gardens in the centre of the square for use by the local residents. The Victoria and Albert Museum is close by to the north across ...
* Walton Street


Nearest places

Brompton and Old Brompton are deemed ''de facto'' obsolete names by the
Tube Tube or tubes may refer to: * ''Tube'' (2003 film), a 2003 Korean film * ''The Tube'' (TV series), a music related TV series by Channel 4 in the United Kingdom * "Tubes" (Peter Dale), performer on the Soccer AM television show * Tube (band), a ...
and postal systems: *the eastern part: Brompton Road (and adjuncts) currently subsumed under ''Knightsbridge''. *the central part: subsumed under ''South Kensington'' *the southern part: subsumed under ''Gloucester Road'' whose tube stop dropped "Brompton" from its title, and is either obfuscated as ''South Kensington'' or as ''Chelsea'', depending on usage in Anglican parish boundaries or postal convenience-drawn limits. * Belgravia * Brompton Cemetery * Chelsea Physic Garden * Royal Hospital Chelsea * Earl's Court *
Fulham Broadway Walham Green is the historic name of an English village, now part of inner London, in the parish of Fulham in the County of Middlesex. It was located between the hamlet of North End (now renamed West Kensington) to the north, and Parsons Gr ...
*
Hyde Park Hyde Park may refer to: Places England * Hyde Park, London, a Royal Park in Central London * Hyde Park, Leeds, an inner-city area of north-west Leeds * Hyde Park, Sheffield, district of Sheffield * Hyde Park, in Hyde, Greater Manchester Austra ...
*
Kensington Gardens Kensington Gardens, once the private gardens of Kensington Palace, are among the Royal Parks of London. The gardens are shared by the City of Westminster and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and sit immediately to the west of Hyde P ...
*
Kensington Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the West End of London, West of Central London. The district's commercial heart is Kensington High Street, running on an east–west axis. The north-east is taken up b ...
*
Little Chelsea Little Chelsea was a hamlet, located on either side of Fulham Road, half a mile Southwest of Chelsea, London. The earliest references to the settlement date from the early 17th century, and the name continued to be used until the hamlet was surrou ...
* Sloane Square * West Brompton Developers of the Earls Court Exhibition Centre, Lillie Bridge Depot and extant Victorian residential streets at West Brompton have given birth to an entity called, "West Brompton Crossing" to refer to the '' pop-up retail'' currently occupying the John Young condemned buildings, in the vicinity of Lillie Bridge (Fulham) and West Brompton station.


Notable people

* Muzio Clementi (1752–1832), Italian-born composer, pianist and influential pedagogue lived in Brompton Grove * William Wilberforce (1759–1833), English politician, philanthropist and abolitionist *
George Canning George Canning (11 April 17708 August 1827) was a British Tory statesman. He held various senior cabinet positions under numerous prime ministers, including two important terms as Foreign Secretary, finally becoming Prime Minister of the Unit ...
(1770–1827), British Tory politician, lived in the area in at least 1809 * Caroline Clive (1801–1873), English writer * Henry Cole (1808–1882), civil servant, activist, inventor, started the idea of the Christmas card *
Jenny Lind Johanna Maria "Jenny" Lind (6 October 18202 November 1887) was a Swedish opera singer, often called the "Swedish Nightingale". One of the most highly regarded singers of the 19th century, she performed in soprano roles in opera in Sweden and a ...
(1820–1887), Swedish opera singer lived in Bolton Place * W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911), dramatist and librettist lived in Harrington Gardens *
Edmund Halswell Edmund Storr Halswell (28 February 1790 – 1 January 1874), born Edmund Storr Haswell, was an English barrister. He came to New Zealand on behalf of the New Zealand Company and lived there from March 1841 to April 1845, and held some official p ...
QC (1790–1874), barrister of Gore Lodge, Old Brompton *
Stéphane Mallarmé Stéphane Mallarmé ( , ; 18 March 1842 – 9 September 1898), pen name of Étienne Mallarmé, was a French poet and critic. He was a major French symbolist poet, and his work anticipated and inspired several revolutionary artistic schools of ...
(1842–1898), French poet *
Edwin Lutyens Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens ( ; 29 March 1869 – 1 January 1944) was an English architect known for imaginatively adapting traditional architectural styles to the requirements of his era. He designed many English country houses, war memori ...
(1869–1944), Anglo-Irish architect *
Norman Whitten Norman Hughes Chaplen Whitten (20 October 18813 March 1969) was a British silent film producer, director and actor and the first actor to play the Mad Hatter in film, which he did in the 1903 film ''Alice in Wonderland'', the first film adaptat ...
(1885–1969), English early film actor, director and producer *
Agatha Christie Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady Mallowan, (; 15 September 1890 – 12 January 1976) was an English writer known for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections, particularly those revolving around fictiona ...
(1890–1976), English crime writer lived at Cresswell Place * Mervyn Peake (1911–1968), English writer, poet and illustrator lived in
Drayton Gardens Drayton Gardens is a residential street linking the areas of Chelsea, London, Chelsea and South Kensington, London SW10. It runs roughly north to south from Old Brompton Road to Fulham Road. History Drayton Gardens was once a "rustic lane" in t ...
*
Rosalind Franklin Rosalind Elsie Franklin (25 July 192016 April 1958) was a British chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose work was central to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), RNA (ribonucleic acid), viruses, co ...
(1920–1958), British chemist and
X-ray crystallographer X-ray crystallography is the experimental science determining the atomic and molecular structure of a crystal, in which the crystalline structure causes a beam of incident X-rays to diffract into many specific directions. By measuring the angles ...
who made a ground-breaking contribution to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA


References


Further reading


City of Westminster Conservation Area Audits, Albert Gate: Knightsbridge: History – January 2020
{{Authority control Areas of London Districts of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea Places formerly in Middlesex History of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea