TOTTENHAM

TOTTENHAM, a parish and populous suburban district of London, hundred of Edmonton, county Middlesex, 5 miles N.E. of St. Paul's, London. The Great Eastern railway has two stations in the eastern division of the parish, one at Tottenham Hale, and the other at Northumberland Park; the Great Northern has a station in the western division at Wood Green. It is situated on the western bank of the river Lea, which separates it from the county of Essex. The parish, which is about 2½ miles in length and 16 in circumference, comprises High Cross, Lower, Middle, and Wood Green wards.

Near Tottenham Green formerly stood a cross, commemorating that spot as one of the resting-places of the corpse of Queen Eleanor, and hence the appellation High Cross. Another account of the name is given in Hall's Notes of Tottenham. At a short distance from the high road is Bruce Castle, erected in the 17th century on the site of, a castle once possessed and occupied by Robert Bruce, father of Robert King of Scotland, who presented the church and rectory to the canons of the Holy Trinity in the middle of the 12th century, but Henry VIII., after rebuilding the castle, presented the living to the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's Cathedral, to whom it still belongs. The castle was also visited by Queen Elizabeth. One long street runs through the village. There are a police station, and several buildings erected by the London companies, as the asylum for aged fishmongers and poulterers, the printers' almshouses, and the drapers' college, founded in 1861 for the education of the sons of freemen of the Drapers' Company. The Alexandra Park is also situated in the village. The population in 1861 amounted to 13,240, of which 6,061 were in the ecclesiastical district of Holy Trinity, and 2,265 in that of St. Paul. The living is a vicarage,* in the diocese of London, value £800, in the patronage of the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's, London. The church, dedicated to All Saints, is an ancient Gothic structure. It stands on a slight eminence about a quarter of a mile to the W. from the high road, and consists of a nave, chancel, and two aisles, with a vestry at the E. end, built and endowed by Lord Coleraine in 1696 as a mausoleum, and over the S. porch a priests' room, occupied for 40 years by Elizabeth Fleming. The church contains two painted windows, a font of the 15th century, ornamented with sculpture in Gothic panels, and the vestry, or saints' bell, formerly the alarm bell of the garrison of Quebec, but having been taken at the siege of that place in 1759 by General Townsend, and presented to the parish in 1801 by H. Jackson, Esq. In addition to the parish church arc the district churches of Holy Trinity, St. Paul's, St. Ann's, Hanger Lane, and St. Michael's, Wood Green, the livings of which are perpetual curacies St. Ann's church was erected in 1861 at a cost of £12,000, defrayed by Fowler Newsam, Esq. There are chapels belonging to the Roman Catholics, Society of Friends, Independents, Baptists, Wesleyans, and several other dissenting congregations. The grammar school was founded by N. Reynardson in 1685, and subsequently further endowed by the Duchess of Somerset, on condition that the benefits of the institution should be extended to all children of the parish whose parents were not possessed of real property amounting to £20 per annum. There are besides a bluecoat school, established in 1735; a greencoat school in 1792; also National, infant, British and Foreign, Lancastrian, and various other educational establishments. An almshouse for eight persons, with a chapel annexed, was founded and endowed by N. Reynardson in 1685, and another by Balthasar Sanches, a Spaniard, who came to England with Philip II. of Spain as big confectioner, and is said to have been the first who exercised that trade in London. A new cemetery was opened in January, 1858, occupying five acres and containing two chapels.

[Description(s) from "The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland" (1868)
Transcribed by Colin Hinson ©2003]
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