
Downham is a district of South East
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
,
England
England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
, mainly within the
London Borough of Lewisham
Lewisham ( ) is a London boroughs, London borough in south-east London, England. It forms part of Inner London. The principal settlement of the borough is Lewisham. The local authority is Lewisham London Borough Council, based in Catford. The ...
. and partly within
London Borough of Bromley
The London Borough of Bromley () is a London Borough, borough in London, England. It is the largest and southeasternmost borough in London, and borders the county of Kent, of which it formed part until 1965. The borough's population in the 2021 ...
.
Downham was named in honour of
Lord Downham, who was chairman of the
London County Council
The London County Council (LCC) was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today ...
between 1919 and 1920.
The
Prime Meridian
A prime meridian is an arbitrarily chosen meridian (geography), meridian (a line of longitude) in a geographic coordinate system at which longitude is defined to be 0°. On a spheroid, a prime meridian and its anti-meridian (the 180th meridian ...
passes just to the west of Downham.
British Film-maker
Luna Carmoon
Luna Carmoon (né Hollie Moore; born 1997 or 1998) is an English screenwriter and film director, known for her 2023 debut feature film ''Hoard'' starring Joseph Quinn and Hayley Squires produced by BBC Film, Delaval Film, Erebus Pictures, Anti-W ...
was raised in the area and made her first two shorts and her debut feature Hoard in the area. She refers to them as her Downham Trilogy'.
History
Origins of the Downham Estate
Before 1920, the area had no houses, apart from a shooting range close to Rangefield Road and areas of farmland in the period around 1890. Some belonged to Holloway Farm and others to Shroffolds Farm. Following the
First World War
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, local boroughs like
Deptford
Deptford is an area on the south bank of the River Thames in southeast London, in the Royal Borough of Greenwich and London Borough of Lewisham. It is named after a Ford (crossing), ford of the River Ravensbourne. From the mid 16th century ...
and
Bermondsey
Bermondsey ( ) is a district in southeast London, part of the London Borough of Southwark, England, southeast of Charing Cross. To the west of Bermondsey lies Southwark, to the east Rotherhithe and Deptford, to the south Walworth and Peckham, ...
as well as the
London County Council
The London County Council (LCC) was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today ...
CCfelt it was essential to reduce overcrowding by erecting more residential property and exceed that which was provided by private landlords. The final spur for the LCC to commence works in the area was the new law of 1923 that provided government funding to enable residential developments to be built by local governments. As a result, the
Downham Estate
The Downham Estate is a London County Council cottage estate in Downham, south east London. It is in the London Borough of Lewisham
The Downham Estate provides an example of the programme of building council housing occurring in Britain bet ...
was developed towards the end of the 1920s by the LCC.
Historic demography
The area of the estate was in the region of 522 acres (2.1 km
2), with 461 acres (1.9 km
2) in the
Metropolitan Borough of Lewisham
The Metropolitan Borough of Lewisham was a metropolitan borough in the County of London between 1900 and 1965, when it became part of the London Borough of Lewisham along with the Metropolitan Borough of Deptford.
History
The borough was formed b ...
, (from 1965 the
London Borough of Lewisham
Lewisham ( ) is a London boroughs, London borough in south-east London, England. It forms part of Inner London. The principal settlement of the borough is Lewisham. The local authority is Lewisham London Borough Council, based in Catford. The ...
) and 61 acres (0.2 km
2) in the
Municipal Borough of Bromley
A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate.
The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...
(from 1965 the
London Borough of Bromley
The London Borough of Bromley () is a London Borough, borough in London, England. It is the largest and southeasternmost borough in London, and borders the county of Kent, of which it formed part until 1965. The borough's population in the 2021 ...
); the estate stretched for about 1.25 miles (2 km). Prior to this, most of the terrain was countryside. However, parts around
Grove Park railway station
Grove Park is a railway station in southeast London, England. It is located on Baring Road (the A2212) within Travelcard Zone 4, and serves the areas of Grove Park and Downham in the London Borough of Lewisham. It is down the line from .
...
to the east had already begun to experience some building works. In this territory, which was the then furthest extreme of London, 5659 homes of different sizes were built. 408 apartment complexes of four storeys were also erected.
At the time of development, the area was considered 'a showpiece, a cottage estate'. With less than 20 houses to an acre, and shops and abundant greenery, the area was of relatively low population density. An official Lewisham publication around 1930 considered Downham to be 'a Garden City'.
Downham estate in the 1920s
Those who were the first to live on the Downham estate late in the 1920s had mostly been relocated from certain less pleasant parts of the inner city like
Rotherhithe
Rotherhithe ( ) is a district of South London, England, and part of the London Borough of Southwark. It is on a peninsula on the south bank of the Thames, facing Wapping, Shadwell and Limehouse on the north bank, with the Isle of Dogs to the ea ...
and
East London
East London is the part of London, England, east of the ancient City of London and north of the River Thames as it begins to widen. East London developed as London Docklands, London's docklands and the primary industrial centre. The expansion of ...
, and these new homes were of a much higher standard than their previous homes.
The arrival of new people in the Downham area led to some unexpected results. In 1926, residents of Alexandra Crescent (at that time, a private street in Bromley) appointed Albert Frampton, who had developed Alexandra Crescent, to build a dividing wall (the
Downham Wall). Some private home owners in Bromley wanted to prevent the working class 'vulgar people' from the Downham estate from accessing the neighbouring middle-class area. They also wanted to prevent them from using this as an access route into the town centre of Bromley.
Frampton made a formal application to Bromley Council on 16 February 1926 to build the dividing wall. The council refused to make a decision on the application, but the brick wall was built nonetheless across Valeswood Road at its junction with Alexandra Crescent and was known as a 'class wall'. It was seven feet high and was fortified at the top with broken pieces of glass.
That pre-war class wall was a stark reminder of the great increase in gated communities, barrier-walls and the use of private security by wealthier people in various parts of the growing metropolis.
The first Shopping Week took place in June 1929, and both the Downham Tavern and Splendid Super Cinema opened in 1930.
Downham estate from the 1930s to the 1950s
By the 1930s, lack of clarity had arisen in regard to responsibilities in relation to the dividing class wall following complaints by LCC to authorities at Lewisham Council. The Town Council of Bromley was firm in its decision not to take down the wall, and curiously neither the LCC nor Lewisham Council felt able to do it either. There were many arguments and controversies about this class wall for close to 25 years. Eventually Bromley Council removed it in 1950 by which time World War 2 had ended. Action was taken largely because passage routes were required for the fire engines.
Despite this minor glitch, the Downham Estate illustrates the nature of developments of
council housing
Public housing in the United Kingdom, also known as council housing or social housing, provided the majority of rented accommodation until 2011, when the number of households in private rental housing surpassed the number in social housing. D ...
in
Britain
Britain most often refers to:
* Great Britain, a large island comprising the countries of England, Scotland and Wales
* The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, a sovereign state in Europe comprising Great Britain and the north-eas ...
in the period between the first and second world wars. The Downham estate and other projects of this nature around the time (for example
Becontree
Becontree ( or Both pronunciations are given as Received Pronunciation in the Longman Pronunciation Dictionary, but the form is prioritised (). The dialectologist Peter Wright wrote in 1981 that is the traditional pronunciation in the cockney ...
) were built in efforts to reduce the serious housing problem around the city. It was timely in the aftermath of the Second World War when much more housing was needed. The government felt the need to demonstrate the huge potential of public-sector home development especially as there was a need to de-slum and modernise the city. The central government also funded and subsidised such development project which were done in the name of the
London County Council
The London County Council (LCC) was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today ...
.
Among many new developments, Downham Health Clinic opened in Churchdown Road in 1932, Good Shepherd School opened in Moorside Road in 1933, Beckenham Place Park Recreation Area opened in 1936, and both the Downham Library and the Swimming Pool were opened to the public in June 1937.
Geography

Downham is bordered by
Grove Park, Plaistow, Bromley Hill,
Beckenham
Beckenham () is a town in Greater London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley. Prior to 1965, it was part of Kent. It is situated north of Elmers End and Eden Park, east of Penge, south of Lower Sydenham and Bellingham, and west ...
,
Bellingham, Southend and Whitefoot. Green spaces in and close to Downham include Forster Memorial Park, Beckenham Place Park and
Downham Fields
Downham Fields is a 20-acre park located in Downham, South East London. It is sometimes referred to in documents by the name Durham Hill, but this is not in common usage. It was left as parkland during the construction of the interwar Downham Es ...
. Whilst the area lost Woolworths and all its banks, new facilities include Downham Sports and Leisure Centre as well as a Tesco Local.
Marks and Spencers now serves as the grocery shop at the BP station which stands on the spot where the 2244-seater Splendid Cinema was in the 1930s.
A
Quasar Laser
A quasar ( ) is an extremely luminous active galactic nucleus (AGN). It is sometimes known as a quasi-stellar object, abbreviated QSO. The emission from an AGN is powered by accretion onto a supermassive black hole with a mass ranging from mil ...
tag is located at the south of Downham Way near the Bromley Court Hotel.
Bonus Pastor Catholic College
Bonus Pastor Catholic College is a voluntary aided, Roman Catholic coeducational school for 900 pupils. The school was founded by the Catholic Church in September 1958 to provide education for children of Catholic families.
The College toda ...
is located in Downham with two sites, Churchdown and Winlaton and has a large playing field at Whitefoot Lane with the
Green Chain Walk
The South East London Green Chain, also known as the Green Chain Walk, is a linked system of open spaces between the River Thames and Crystal Palace Park in London, England. In 1977 four London boroughs and the Greater London Council created t ...
running through.
Neighbourhood Renewal Unit and Lewisham Strategic Partnership have been implementing many projects in the area which include Housing and Environment, Health, Crime and Community Safety, Neighbourhood Management, Community Development, Children and Young People and Employment and Enterprise.
Education
Downham has two secondary schools,
Bonus Pastor Catholic College
Bonus Pastor Catholic College is a voluntary aided, Roman Catholic coeducational school for 900 pupils. The school was founded by the Catholic Church in September 1958 to provide education for children of Catholic families.
The College toda ...
and
Haberdashers' Knights Academy
Haberdashers' Knights Academy (formerly Malory School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Knights Academy) is a secondary school with academy status located in the Downham area of the London Borough of Lewisham
Lewisham ( ) is a London borough ...
(formerly Malory School until 2005).
Primary Schools include
Launcelot Primary School, Downderry Primary School, Merlin Primary School (now also part of the academy
), Good Shepherd Primary School, Rangefield Primary School, Burnt Ash Primary School and Pendragon Special School for students aged 11 to 16 years.
Transport
Buses
*
136 136 may refer to:
*136 (number)
*AD 136
*136 BC
*136 (MBTA bus), a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority bus route
*136 Austria
136 Austria is a main-belt asteroid that was found by the prolific asteroid discoverer Johann Palisa on 18 Ma ...
to
Elephant & Castle
Elephant and Castle is an area of South London, England, in the London Borough of Southwark. The name also informally refers to much of Walworth and Newington, due to the proximity of the London Underground station of the same name. The nam ...
via
Catford
Catford is a district in south east London, England, and the administrative centre of the London Borough of Lewisham. It is southwest of Lewisham itself, mostly in the Rushey Green (ward), Rushey Green and Catford South Ward (electoral subdivi ...
,
Lewisham
Lewisham ( ) is an area of southeast London, England, south of Charing Cross. It is the principal area of the London Borough of Lewisham, and was within the Historic counties of England, historic county of Kent until 1889. It is identified in ...
,
New Cross
New Cross is an area in south-east London, England, south-east of Charing Cross in the London Borough of Lewisham and the London_postal_district#List_of_London_postal_districts, SE14 postcode district. New Cross is near St Johns, London, St Jo ...
&
Peckham
Peckham ( ) is a district in south-east London, within the London Borough of Southwark. It is south-east of Charing Cross. At the 2001 Census the Peckham ward had a population of 14,720.
History
"Peckham" is a Saxon place name meaning the vi ...
and to
Grove Park
*
181
Year 181 ( CLXXXI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Aurelius and Burrus (or, less frequently, year 934 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 181 for this ye ...
to Lewisham via Catford and to Grove Park
*
208
Year 208 ( CCVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Aurelius and Geta (or, less frequently, year 961 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 208 for this year ...
to Lewisham via Catford and to
Orpington
Orpington is a town in Greater London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley. It is 13.4 miles (21.6 km) south east of Charing Cross.
On the south-eastern edge of the Greater London Built-up Area, it is south of St Mary Cray, sou ...
via
Bromley
Bromley is a large town in Greater London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley. It is southeast of Charing Cross, and had an estimated population of 88,000 as of 2023.
Originally part of Kent, Bromley became a market town, charte ...
&
Petts Wood
Petts Wood is a town in south-east London, England, previously located in the historic county of Kent. It lies south of Chislehurst, west of St Paul's Cray and Poverest, north of Orpington and Crofton, and east of Southborough and Bromley ...
*
320
__NOTOC__
Year 320 ( CCCXX) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar.
At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Constantinus and Constantinus (or, less frequently, year 1073 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomin ...
to Catford and to
Biggin Hill
Biggin Hill is a town in the London Borough of Bromley, about south-southeast of Charing Cross. It is separated from London's built-up area by the Metropolitan green belt and is located adjacent to the Greater London boundary with Kent and ...
via Bromley
*
336
Year 336 ( CCCXXXVI) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Nepotianus and Facundus (or, less frequently, year 1089 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 336 for ...
to Catford and to
Locksbottom
Locksbottom is a suburb of south-east London within the London Borough of Bromley, Greater London. Prior to 1965 it was within the historic county of Kent. It is located south of Bromley Common, west of Crofton, north-west of Farnborough, and ...
via Bromley
*
N136 to
Oxford Circus
Oxford Circus is a road junction connecting Oxford Street and Regent Street in the West End of London. It is also the entrance to Oxford Circus tube station.
The junction opened in 1819 as part of the Regent Street development under John Nash ( ...
via Catford, Lewisham and Peckham and to
Chislehurst
Chislehurst () is a suburban district of south-east London, England, in the London Borough of Bromley. It lies east of Bromley, south-west of Sidcup and north-west of Orpington, south-east of Charing Cross. Before the creation of Greater ...
via Grove Park (Night Service)
*
N199 to
Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square ( ) is a public square in the City of Westminster in Central London. It was established in the early-19th century around the area formerly known as Charing Cross. Its name commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar, the Royal Navy, ...
via Catford, Lewisham and
Greenwich
Greenwich ( , , ) is an List of areas of London, area in south-east London, England, within the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Greater London, east-south-east of Charing Cross.
Greenwich is notable for its maritime hi ...
and to
St Mary Cray
St Mary Cray is an area of South London, South East London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley. Historically it was a market town in the county of Kent. It is located north of Orpington, and south-east of Charing Cross.
History
...
via Bromley and Orpington (Night Service)
Rail
The closest
National Rail
National Rail (NR) is the trading name licensed for use by the Rail Delivery Group, a group representing passenger train operating companies (TOCs) of England, Scotland, and Wales. The TOCs run the passenger services previously provided by ...
stations to Downham are (with services to
London Blackfriars
Blackfriars (), also known as London Blackfriars, is a London station group, central London railway station and connected London Underground station in the City of London. It provides Thameslink services: local (from North to South London), ...
via
Catford
Catford is a district in south east London, England, and the administrative centre of the London Borough of Lewisham. It is southwest of Lewisham itself, mostly in the Rushey Green (ward), Rushey Green and Catford South Ward (electoral subdivi ...
and to
Sevenoaks
Sevenoaks is a town in Kent with a population of 29,506, situated south-east of London, England. Also classified as a civil parishes in England, civil parish, Sevenoaks is served by a commuter South Eastern Main Line, main line railway into Lo ...
via
Bromley South &
Swanley
Swanley is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Sevenoaks District of Kent, England, southeast of central London, adjacent to the Greater London boundary and within the M25 motorway periphery. The population at the 2021 ce ...
) and (with services to
London Charing Cross
Charing Cross railway station (also known as London Charing Cross) is a London station group, central London railway terminus between the Strand, London, Strand and Hungerford Bridge in the City of Westminster. It is the terminus of the South ...
,
London Cannon Street via
Lewisham
Lewisham ( ) is an area of southeast London, England, south of Charing Cross. It is the principal area of the London Borough of Lewisham, and was within the Historic counties of England, historic county of Kent until 1889. It is identified in ...
,
Orpington
Orpington is a town in Greater London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley. It is 13.4 miles (21.6 km) south east of Charing Cross.
On the south-eastern edge of the Greater London Built-up Area, it is south of St Mary Cray, sou ...
, Sevenoaks and
Bromley North).
References
External links
General public information about Downham Short history of the area
{{LB Lewisham
Areas of London
Districts of the London Borough of Lewisham
District centres of London