Street Plates 10

 Six more street plates around our East End to ponder over, perhaps as we sit on a boundary wall at the end of a road waiting for a friend to turn up.

No legend being alluded to here, but the loyalty of a friend being rewarded.  Arthur Road is at the Eastern end of Bycullah Terrace, the range of little shops opposite Morrison's supermarket.  But when these shops, and the cul-de-sac road known as Arthur Road, were first built at the turn of the twentieth century, the name Fleetville hadn't even been invented.  However, Thomas E Smith had a printing works in a little turning off Fleet Street, London's former "newspaper road".  He wanted to expand into colour printing which required more space – a lot more space – and chose a site in the fields on the east side of St Albans.  Its sale would benefit the St Albans School. The two men Smith chose to take charge of the new colour works along the road to Hatfield were Ernest Townson and works senior manager Arthur W Hall.  

Arthur W Hall

The "printing village," or Fleet Ville is it was first known, would have  consisted of about five residential roads had it been completed, but Smith lived to see three of them begin; what happened to the others is another story.  

However, the first was named in honour of the works senior general manager, Arthur Hall.  It is often assumed that employees and their families of the works were the sole tenants, but such was the number of homes being built in the vicinity at the time, Smith's new employees had many options open to them and therefore Arthur Road's homes were equally open to employees of an increasing number of other factories and workshops in the district.  

It didn't take long for the above printing works to become surrounded with other residential roads, and one site on the edge of the former Beaumonts Farm lay between Hatfield Road and the branch railway and named Castle Road – from the nick-name, Rats' Castle, given to the recently closed turnpike toll house nearby.  Councillor, manufacturer and developer Horace Slade purchased much land off Hatfield Road and now also purchased smaller sites adjacent to Castle Road, one of which, with the consent of St Albans' Council, was named Cape Road.

The turn of the twentieth century saw a number of roads in many parts of the country named in recognition of the British success following the conclusion of the two Boer wars in South Africa.  The Cape referred to was the Northern Cape.

As with Arthur Road in a city like St Albans assumptions about street names often jump to Royalty and titled families.  But the location of Edward Close offers another suggestion since several of the streets in the area surrounded the former orchid nurseries.  They are often species of orchid or the specialist plantsmen who have made rare plants famous or popular.  In this case keeping records of the names and natural environments of species, the books or registers gradually becoming more organised, and pre-eminent was Edwards' (or Edwards's) Botanical Register, which launched in 1815. The register was frequently updated under Sydenham Edwards and later editors.  By the time the fifth update had been published Edwards' name became synonymous with the publication and became part of the title: Edwards's Botanical Register consisting of a complete Alphabetical and Systematical Index of Names, Synonyms, and Matter

Edward Close is a short cut-de-sac and there are probably fewer houses than there were words in the full title of Edwards' publication!

But this is another orchid related street, and we should ask how many of its residents know of this connection.

Ardens Way is a 1960s residential road on a hill from Sandpit Lane via Briar Road up to The Ridgeway, Marshalswick.  Given that the word Arden has connections with woodlands and forests, and although there have been woodlands hereabouts, though not extensively, we need to look elsewhere for a connection, if there is one.

Arden's Marsh

Continue eastwards a short distance along Sandpit Lane until we reach House Lane, the entry road to Jersey Farm, and we come across a tiny hamlet of what is now limited to a short terrace of traditional farm  labourers' cottages of uncertain age. Its name is still known as Arden's Marsh.  Referring to older maps the name had been known variously as Hardings Marsh or Harden's Marsh.  Since the 1970s House Lane has met Sandpit Lane at a roundabout, but before then the connection was an oblique junction running behind the terrace of homes.  Now it is no more than a short footpath.  It is possible that its original name began with Hardings and only in more recent times did it morph into Ardens. Perhaps!

However it does seem probable that Ardens Way was named as such because of its proximity to Ardens Marsh.

Various attempts are made to bed the streets of modern residential estates into their historical landscapes, even if a certain amount of invention is required.  It is quite common for the traditional field names to be re-used as one of the modern streets.  When laying out the London Road estate in the early post-second world war period, a field bordering a section of Cell Barnes Lane had been known as Hopground Field.

Typical Kentish hop ground field.

Although no part of our East End was particularly known for the production of beers and other alcoholic drinks, fields used for the growing of hops were common and widespread.  Today many brands of drinks are nationally named and produced on industrial scales.  Transport is only one reason why this has not always been the case.  A key alternative reason is the variability of the natural water supply and beers, mead, ciders, and various other fermented drinks were created locally and consumed locally, even by children in lower strengths.  The fact that a former field has been known as Hopground Field suggests it had been used as such in relatively recent times.

Sunderland Avenue is in the district north of Fleetville and developed on land previously owned by Earl Spencer and building had begun from the late 1920s.  The roads have frequent references to ancient and titled families with connections to St Albans.  Titled families are fortunately straightforward to connect; they almost always leave strong historic footprints!  Charles Spencer, the third Duke of Marlborough (another St Albans connection) as Earl of Sunderland in the eighteenth century inherited a title passed from his elder brother.  It is not only the titles themselves which are recorded in history but the beneficial bodies and charities they become associated as their names are recorded.  Their influence assists those bodies on whose trustee and governor lists they appear.

Representing the Coram Foundling Hospital

In this case the Earl of Sunderland was a founding governor of the London Foundling Hospital in 1739.  Coram, the organisation is still known today as a key children's charity, and influential individuals remain keen to be associated with similar charitable causes.  We are sure that residents of Sunderland Avenue who are aware of the origin of their road's name will be additionally proud that Sunderland's association with Coram and his charity ensures its continued success in the 21st century.