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The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland - 1868

Gazetteer

BROMPTON, a district parish forming part of the ancient parish of St. Mary Abbots, Kensington, in the hundred of Ossulstone, in the county of Middlesex. 4 miles to the W. of St. Paul's, London. Its population, by the census of 1861, is 14,886. Its present title is the "ward of the Holy Trinity, Brompton" (the whole of Kensington being divided by a late Act of Parliament into three "wards"). The ward of Holy Trinity, Brompton, is now subdivided into three ecclesiastical district parishes, called Holy Trinity, Brompton (or Old Brompton), a perpetual curacy, value £639, in the gift of the Bishop of London; St. Mary's, West Brompton, a perpetual curacy in the gift of the Incumbent of holy Trinity, Brompton; and St. Paul's, Onslow-square, in private patronage alternately with the bishop. These three churches accommodate 3,700 people. There is also an Episcopal chapel holding 700. The Roman Catholics have an oratory and chapel for 1,200, with several monastic houses affiliated. The Baptists have a chapel for 300, the Consumption Hospital a chapel for 200, and the cemetery a chapel for 100.

There are Church schools for 1000 children, and the usual charitable clubs, an almshouse for poor women, and a library for the poor. The "South Kensington," or, more properly, "Brompton," Museum of Art, is in Holy Trinity, Brompton. The Exhibition building of 1862, and the Horticultural Society's gardens, occupy in Brompton the site of the former "Nurseries." The rosaries are now all extinct. Brompton is the site of the large hospital for consumption and diseases of the chest, founded by the Rev. Sir H. Foulis, Bart., and erected in the Tudor style in 1846, from designs by Mr. Francis. It is intended to accommodate 230 patients, and a new east wing has recently been added, through the liberality of the accomplished songstress Madame Goldschmidt, better known by her maiden name of Jenny Lind. Nearly opposite, in the Fulham road, is the Cancer Hospital, erected at a cost of £7,000, from the designs of Messrs. Young. Its principal facade, 130 feet long, is of white brick, with bands of red brick and terra-cotta mouldings. Brompton cemetery was opened for interments in 1840, and occupies 40 acres. It contains a monument to Jackson, the pugilist, and the grave of J. C. Robertson, the promoter of mechanics' institutes. The Jews also have a burial ground near where Queen Elizabeth's elm once stood.

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