Place Name
A reference to Putney Park, a 300-acre deer estate first mentioned in 1274 and described as a working deer park. The Dover House Estate Conservation Area Appraisal gives this potted history: “Putney Park, (which has also been recorded as Mortlake Park), amounted to about 300 acres and was bounded by Upper Richmond Road, Clarence Road, Putney Park Lane and Roehampton Village. The park formerly extended into Mortlake Parish, and was attached to the Archbishop’s house there. When the manor of Wimbledon was granted to Sir Thomas Cecil in 1590, the Crown reserved as a Royal Park “all that park or land enclosed with pailings commonly called or known by the name of Mortlack Parke otherwise Putney Parke” (This is from Ernest Hammond’s Bygone Putney). In 1626 the Park was sold to Sir Richard Weston. John Roque’s map of 1740 shows the original Putney Park House within the bend of Putney Park Lane which is shown as an avenue of trees, running through the grounds of the house to Putney Heath from the Upper Richmond Road. The Park remained a single estate until the 1750s when the western half of Putney Park was developed with five large houses; these included Dover House, and Putney Park House. Dover House was built in 1764. It was home to the Earl of Liverpool in 1801, he went on to become Prime Minister. Dover House was demolished in order to provide the land for the London County Council’s ambitious public housing development. However its lodge house on Putney Park Lane still survives and is now called Regency Lodge.” The present Putney Park House was built in 1826 to replace the earlier house and sometime between 1846 and 1860 a local solicitor turned developer Henry Scarth had the cottages at Parkfields and neighbouring roads laid out. The surrounding land was redeveloped in the 1920s by the London County Council as the Roehampton Estate, inspired by the Garden City Movement.
