Place Name
In 1773 landowner Sir Henry Gough sold Acton Meadows, to the Swinton brothers. James was a builder and surveyor of Gravesend, and Peter of Salisbury Court, Fleet Street, a Doctor in Physick. They in turn granted a building lease to John Seager, a builder and carpenter, of Brooke Street, Holborn. Seager began laying out the road in 1776 it was a short cul-de-sac which ended in a fence, so that the first occupant enjoyed a view down the meadows to the Fleet Brook. By September 7, 1778, it was described as “a street now building.” For his part he built himself a house on the south side of Swinton Street which he shared with his brother Thomas, who died in 1778. John Seager died in 1784. Dr Swinton died between 1786 and 1789, when his only son, Anthony Daffy Swinton, succeeded to his property. His son also owned “a certain medicine called Daffy’s Elixir” which he may have inherited from his father.
