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Bromley Common,
the early history
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Until the early nineteenth century,
Bromley Common was merely an area of common land to the south of the prosperous
market town of Bromley. It belonged to the Bishop of Rochester because he was
the Lord of the Manor of Bromley but the local people had some right to use it,
probably for grazing their animals or collecting firewood.
Stretching
from Shooting Common1
in the north to the Keston Mark in the south, it was an area of about three
hundred acres.
The
law did not allow anyone to farm or build houses on common land so most of
it was a
neglected wasteland.
The main road from London to
Tunbridge Wells was little more than a track where it crossed the common.
Footpads and highwaymen were a problem. In 1652, John
Evelyn wrote in his diary about being robbed in the area. As late as 1798, a
highwayman was hanged on the common for robbing the mail.
The soil was poor, and badly
drained so the area was of little use except for the plentiful game
which
attracted both sportsmen and poachers, and some flat land which could be
used for cricket.
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Hunting and
Cricket on the Common
Hunting was
allowed on the common - but only if you owned land or had a title. Otherwise
you were a poacher. Mr George Norman was a landowner and loved hunting on the common
with his neighbour, Major Rohdes of Oakley House.
His son, George
Warde Norman loved cricket and was a founder member of the cricket club that
played on a part of the common called Princes Plain between 1812 and
1821. The enclosure meant that the club had to move to Chislehurst.
In
the early 18th Century, many big cricket matches were played on
Shooting Common at the northern end of Bromley Common. One team playing there
was led by Fredrick, Prince of Wales. (He
was the son of George
II.)
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| The law said that nobody could buy or sell common land, nor
could people build houses on it, unless everyone who had any right to use it was
compensated. This was one reason why the area was largely unused. The only way
to change this was to get Parliament to pass an Act of Enclosure so that everyone who
had a right to use it could get a share. There had been a
partial enclosure2
in 1764 but fifty years later, there was a proposal to enclose the rest. There
was some resistance though.
Beans on the Common
In 1819, the Napoleonic war with France was over, a good thing. The down side was a rise in
unemployment, a lot of people in Bromley had no
job. In those days, if you were unemployed and had no money, there was no Social Security:
you went to the parish for help. They came up with a form of job creation, some of
these poor people were employed to plant a crop of beans on the common. Unfortunately, the project was judged illegal and stopped. The
unfairness of this persuaded many people to support the enclosure.
Parliament
finally passed the necessary act and, in 1821, Bromley Common was enclosed. As part of the enclosure, some of
the common was set aside for new roads, including Brewery Road, Church Lane and
Princes Plain.
Oakley Road, then known as the Westerham Turnpike Road, was re-routed
away from Oakley House.
Ten acres of land were set aside for a
workhouse3
and two acres for gravel
pits.4
(The gravel was needed for
all the new roads.)
Ditches were dug to
provide better drainage.
The rest of the common was divided between the people who had to be compensated or
was sold to pay for the enclosure. Mr George Norman bought much of the land that came on to
the market, thereby strengthening his position as the biggest land owner
in the area. The new owners of the common could now use their land for houses or farming.
The Bishop of Rochester got by far the largest share and
others got smaller awards of either land or money.5 The Parish of Bromley was awarded a mere tenth of an acre.
That small plot of land was used
for six Parish Cottages.
This was probably to compensate
the Parish for the loss of the right to collect
firewood to heat the church.
Within 20 years, the area had a population of
about 1000, mostly in the south of the area, and they had their own church and a
school. The northern portion of the common was mostly developed in the 1870s
This map shows how the southern part of the common was developed in the first twenty years after the
enclosure. Only the Plough Inn and Skym Corner were built before 1821; they were
just outside the boundary of the common. |
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Notes
Shooting common
This northern part of the common was known as Shooting Common, possibly
because it was used for archery practice; two nearby fields were known
as Long Shots and Short Shots. However, the name may have come from the
Shot family who were major landowners in the district.
The
enclosure of 1764. In
1764, an Act of Parliament extinguished “…the right of Common in, over and
upon certain commonable lands and grounds within the manor and parish of Bromley”
and gave those lands to the Bishop of Rochester on payment of forty pounds per
annum to the church wardens and overseers of the poor.
This
was to be “in full compensation of all manner of right of common of the
freeholders and inhabitants of the parish, and all other persons claiming right
of common.” Unfortunately,
the act does not say which area was enclosed and there was no map as there was
in 1821.
The workhouse
was never built. Later, some of the land was used to
build a vicarage for Holy Trinity (not the present vicarage). The
workhouse was built at Locks Bottom and became, in time, Farnborough Hospital.
The gravel pit
is now grassed over and used for recreation. Some of the ponds shown on the map
may also have originally been dug out to provide gravel.
The awards
of money varied between £3 7s 6d and £42 5s. |
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