Birkbeck and Churchfields History

BIRKBECK AND CHURCHFIELDS Cont'd..

A plan dated 1680 shows two areas of Church Lane in Baxe's Lane. One was the plot on which St. Augustine's Church and the former Churchfields School stood, being then known as 'Bellrope Field'. Borrowman here suggests, "this was because the rent was applied in providing Bell Ropes for the Parish Church".

This plot was divided up as follows:-

I. In 1885 part of the field was given to the Local Board to allow the road to be widened.

2. In 1886 another part was used for the erection of a Mission House, served from the Parish Church; this became the St. Augustine's Church.

3. In 1889 the remainder was sold· by the Trustees to the Beckenham School Board for £900 for the erection of a school, first called Arthur Road School, and opened in 1890 -later known as Church fields School. In 1907 the Trustees sold a further piece of land to the School Board for school extensions.

The second plot of Church Land was left to the Beckenham Parish Church Council in the will of Edmund Style, a member of the family who owned Langley from 1510 to 1718. A record of this bequest can stilI be seen on one of the Tablets in the Parish Church. In 1904 the Church sold this plot to the Local Council for use as a recreation ground, at an annual charge of £37.10.0., insisting that the origin of the land should be perpetuated by calling it 'The Churchfields Recreation Ground', which was opened on 1 st August 1907. Shortly after this sale the lower part of the road was renamed Churchfields Road, being previously known as Arthur Road.

At one time there was a Brick Field in this area, with Blandford Road as the top boundary and the whole of Beck Lane (as it then was) as the other. The steep bank formed by excavating the clay for the brick making can still be seen on the Churchfield's sides of Villiers and Arrol Roads.

House development in Arthur Road started in the late 1870s with about 50 houses at the lower end, but the rest of the original houses were not completed until about 1907, with the shops coming later. The new blocks of Council Flats at the lower end are named after Firemen who lost their lives on duty during Air Raids.

The present Beck Lane was not developed for houses until after World War II, being previously used as Allotments. At the far end, on the EImers End Road corner, stands the London Transport Depot. The former building (1929), which incidentally housed solid-tyre 'buses, was destroyed by a Flying Bomb and when rebuilt (1953) one of the entrances was called 'The Cunningham Gate' in memory of a faithful fire-watcher who remained at his post on the roof, to give warning.

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