Stockwell Green

Stockwell is first recorded in 1197. The name is formed from "stoc", referring to woodland or tree stumps, and "well", referring to nearby natural springs. Stockwell was granted manorial status in the 13th century, giving the hamlet an administrative identity to match its name.

The wood that gave the place its "stoc" probably disappeared in the 17th century. The springs proved more durable: the plentiful water supply around the green later made it a suitable site for a brewery, and a public well stood at its south-west corner.

A manor house with a moat once stood at Stockwell Green. In 1580 its gardens and orchards, covering about four acres, were leased to Henry Store for a term of 1,000 years. Legend connects the house with Thomas Cromwell, who may have stayed there while it belonged to Henry VIII, though this is not certain.

The leasehold passed to Francis Gofton and then, in 1640, to Samuel Lewes along with about 42 acres of land. The manor house itself was demolished shortly before 1756. Isaac Barrett, a wax-chandler, bought the lease to the site in 1770 and built a large mansion there, which was in turn pulled down in the middle of the 19th century. Some stretches of the old moat, said to have been 30 to 40 feet wide, could still be seen at the start of the 19th century.

In 1802 the Manor, together with Stockwell Green and Stockwell Common, was sold at auction to William Lambert, who became Lord of the Manor. By the late 18th century, improved river crossings including Thames bridges had let London spread across the water, changing the character of Vauxhall and Stockwell. Merchants began building houses on Stockwell Road and facing the green itself, drawn by its semi-rural air and clean water while staying within reach of the City — the start of Stockwell's shift from hamlet to suburb. The opening of Vauxhall Bridge in 1816 spurred further piecemeal building around the green. By the 1860s, with the railways arriving, the wider area was largely urbanised.

The green stayed open space until 1876, when the freeholder, Mr Honey, won a long and contentious dispute to build on it.

Two chapels dominated the green's religious life. Stockwell Chapel, built in 1767 on land from the Duke of Bedford's estate, was remodelled in 1867 by the architect Henry Edward Coe and reopened as St Andrew's Church, holding over a thousand worshippers. Its grey brick was rendered over in the 1880s, and its side galleries removed in a 1924 restoration. Stockwell New Chapel, meanwhile, was enlarged and reopened in 1850 to designs by the architect James Wilson, and served as the site of Booth's wedding.

Brewing also shaped the green. Hammerton's Stockwell Brewery stood on its north side, at the corner of Lingham Street, drawing on the area's plentiful springs. Lambeth's appraisal of the green dates it to the 1780s; the Survey of London found no reference to a brewery here before 1801. By the 1830s it was trading around 12,000 barrels a year. Charles Hammerton, a local brewer turned temperance campaigner, later gave the Hammerton Memorial Hall and keeper's house to the green in 1906, designed by the architect of the Old Bailey.

Thomas Jackson was inducted as pastor of Stockwell New Chapel in 1801 and remained until his death in 1843. He is buried in a vault in the chapel graveyard, with a tablet to his memory above the pulpit.

Isaac Barrett built a mansion there. Charles Hammerton gave his name and his money to the memorial hall that still stands on the green.

Early 19th-century cottages still line the green, mostly built singly or in twos and threes between about 1790 and 1840. No. 21, probably late 18th century, is a plain two-storey brick cottage, while Nos. 28 to 30 form a terrace inscribed "VICTORIA PLACE" on their parapet. Many of these houses, along with No. 1 — built around 1848 as an Educational Institute — are now protected.

St Andrew's Church and the former United Reformed Church, with its protected gate piers and railings, still stand on the green, among the oldest church buildings in Lambeth besides the parish church of St Mary. Two wells survive on the site of the former Congregational Church and two more on the old brewery site, quiet traces of the springs that named the place.