What place in SE23 do you not know anything about?
A place that my family used many years ago was to the rear of Hornimans Gardens it was called Furze Hill we called it Fuzz Hill it was an open green and scrub area and you could see over London.
I remember a circle of concrete blocks in the ground with iron rings in them, I was told it was where the Zeppelin Balloons were secured to the ground in the early 1900s. I have a picture of the family picnics there.
I think it must be now named Teweksbury Av Ringmere Rise area.
Zimmerman's description sounds rather like the concrete area on the top of One Tree Hill which was, we are told, a first war anti-aircraft emplacement. Intended for shooting down Zeppelins, not mooring them! There a photo here. I know of no such structure in the Tewkesbury Avenue / Ringmore Rise area.
The picture of the Observation / Gun Platform on One Tree Hill is in a wooded area and close to the once iron railined enclosed Honour Oak Tree.
These would all be a danger to a Balloon with a crew cabin hanging below it and coming into contact with a fabric covered wooden frame.
That site has nothing to do with the Zeppelin anchorage base on Furze Hill backing onto Hornimans Gardens.
Here the conrete blocks with iron rings were below ground level giving no obstruction to a balloon that might be uncontrollable in high winds to bring down safely and secure.
I can't find any evidence on google but are you thinking about Brenchley Gardens prior to it being planted up? Something rings a bell. I'm sure I've seen something similar to Furze Lane locally in that area but I don't think thats the correct name.
I am talking about the open area that was there when Tewksbury Lodge was demollished, it was immediatly outside the rear gate of Hornimans Gardens, In 1927 The London County Council wanted to make it an extension of Hornimans Gardens, but the owner Charles bayer ( the cosret manufacturer ) died in 1930 the devellopers built the houses.
I show a picture of my mother and children sitting in the open area we called Fuzz Hill 1928.
It is so long ago that all of those in the picture have died many years ago.
I have a copy of an OS map of 1913. This shows that the area on both sides of what is now Horniman Drive, but was then called Westwood Park, as you come out of Horniman Gardens, was already developed. There were 4 large houses on the left between where the Gardens gate is, and the crossroad on the brow of the hill, and 3 on the right. There were then further houses both sides of the road where Horniman School and Ashton Heights are before getting to what I believe was the edge of the Tewkesbury Lodge Estate, roughly on the line of Ringmore Rise.
The Tewkesbury Lodge Estate land north of Ringmore Rise, looks to be rough pasture and would have been flat on the top so perhaps the structure was here? This area includes the Folly tower now in the back garden of a house in Liphook Crescent and would also have included the covered reservoir built in the 1870's.
An 1870 map when there were fewer houses shows the words 'Forest Hill' along the ridge line. Could Furze (Fuzz) Hill have been a distortion of Forest Hill?
The map confirms what my dad told me many years ago - he said that what is now Liphook Crescent, Ringmore Rise, Tewksbury Avenue etc, used to be fields right down to the railway line.
I can remember the large houses that are shown along the top of Westwood Park. I used to play in the back garden of one of them. They were demolished and replaced by the school. There were some more leading up to the gates of the Park.
You have placed the point of what we called Fuzz Hill, the whole area from the railway in Wood Vale up to the top of the hill was just open land with grass and bushes the grounds of Tewkesbury Lodge, this extended from Hornimans Gardens right over to Forest Hill Road, Wood Vale to Honour Oak Road.
I remember the folly Tower it was of grey stone I think it had about eight sides, it was near the old water resevior.
There was no structure there other than two very large houses.
The first houses were built on the top of the hill, might have been from Honour Oak Road then from Forest Hill Road, the roads were made after the houses were built, being a very steep hill and the 1930s lorries only able to carry about five tons of material had a hard task to reach the site.
The Railway Goods Sidings at the Honour Oak Station in Wood Vale, were used to get building material near to Langton Rise the nearest point of the develloping Housing Estate.
All the goods brought to the station were in wagons were pulled by steam engines.
I've rescanned the 1913 map to show as much as possible of the area of interest. Were the white areas between the bushes of the Tewkesbury Lodge Estate and the railway line grazing fields, perhaps for cows?
The map shows the bridge over the railway line at Langton Rise - looks like a substantial bridge considering it only gave access to fields.
Does the map help Zimmerman to place the structure that started this thread?
The folly is still there. A picture is attached.
Estate.pdf (Size: 347.26 KB / Downloads: 770)
The structure was not above ground just flat cement let into the grass.
It might have been used for tethering weather balloons.
I am now inclined to think it was something my older brother invented about the Zeppilins.
The Bridge over the Railway at Langton Rise was substantial to the strength as the other bridges on this line.
I can remember as we walked up to the bridge the building on the left was part of the Public House that filled a large area at the back. we used to look in a small window no larger than a toilet window and watch the horses in their in their stalls.
Zooming in on the 1913 OS map, I note that there is a windpump between Honor Oak Road and Westwood Park - Nothing new about alternative energy then! There's also an aviary shown, which looks like it might have been part of the Tewksbury Lodge Estate?
Does anybody know what the number of the map is that lies immediately east of the map shown, or where I might view it? I'm particularly interested in seeing the rest of Honor Oak Road.
Many thanks Andrewr. I could see that the map shown was 127, but wasn't sure which way the numbering went. Also interesting to see that the road linking Hornimans Gardens to the Tewksbury Lodge Estate was originally called Westwood Park too. Of course it is now one end of Hornimans Drive, but I don't think that came about until sometime in the 1930's when the houses were built on the Tewksbury Lodge land.