Edmonton, London
Template:Infobox London place Edmonton is an area in the east of the London Borough of Enfield, distinct from Enfield Town.
Location
Edmonton is 8.6 miles (13.8 km) north-north-east of Charing Cross and stretches from just south of the North Circular Road in the south to just past Edmonton Green in the north and from the Great Cambridge Road in the west to the River Lea in the east.
Edmonton comprises Upper Edmonton to the south and Lower Edmonton to the north. The Member of Parliament for Edmonton is Andy Love (Labour), who polled 18,456 votes (53.2%) at the General Election held on 5 May 2005. The main shopping centre in Edmonton is at Edmonton Green, the second largest is at the Angel, Edmonton which is a high street.
History
Pymmes Park with its historic walled garden is Upper Edmonton's park. Pymmes Park originated as a private estate. In the late 16th century it was owned by the powerful Cecil family. In 1589 Robert Cecil, later 1st Earl of Salisbury, spent his honeymoon at Pymmes. The estate was eventually acquired by Edmonton Council and opened as a public park in 1906. Pymmes House was destroyed by fire during World War II and the remains were demolished. Robert Cecil was a protege of Francis Walsingham, Elizabeth I's chief spymaster and he succeeded him as Secretary of State in 1590.
The historic All Saints' Church is situated in Church Street as is Lamb's Cottage, which was home to writers Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb.
Edmonton was the hometown of Sir James Winter Lake, director of the Hudson's Bay Company. A trading outpost in what is today the Canadian province of Alberta was named for Edmonton in London. The Canadian Edmonton is now capital of the province, and more widely known than its London namesake and predecessor.
Railway and transport
The railway arrived in 1840 with the opening of the first section of the Lea Valley Line from Stratford to Broxbourne. A station was provided in Water Lane (Angel Road). As the station was badly sited and the trains were slow and expensive, few people used the railway in the early days, preferring the horse buses. In 1845 there were buses every 15 minutes along Fore Street, travelling alternately to Bishopsgate and Holborn.
The single-track line from a junction just north of Angel Road to Enfield Town opened on 1 March 1849, with an intermediate single-platform station at Lower Edmonton, located at the edge of the village green. The service was infrequent and often required a change of train at the junction. This, coupled with the train taking the long way round through Stratford to get to the terminus at Bishopsgate, meant that the railway offered little competition to the existing horse coaches and buses.
The direct line from London to Enfield Town was opened in four stages, from Bethnal Green to Stoke Newington on 27 May 1872; from Stoke Newington through to Lower Edmonton High Level on 22 July 1872, with stations in Edmonton at Silver Street and a new High Level station at Lower Edmonton, which was renamed Edmonton Green in 1992; the short section from Lower Edmonton High Level to Edmonton Junction (where the new line met the original Eastern Counties Railway route from Angel Road to Enfield Town via Lower Edmonton Low Level) on 1 August 1872; and the suburban platforms on the west side of Liverpool Street station on 2 February 1874.
The stations were well sited and offered exceptionally cheap workmen's fares of just 2d on trains arriving at Liverpool Street prior to 07:00, 3d on those arriving between 07:00 and 07:30, and half-price returns on those arriving between 07:30 and 08:00. A horse tramway along Fore Street opened in 1881. The tramway was re-constructed and electrified during 1905, lasting until 1938 when trolleybuses took over.
The old highway Ermine Street passed through what is today Edmonton. Ermine Street was the main Roman Road from London through Lincoln and on to York. Edmonton appears in the Domesday Book of 1086, where it is recorded as Adelmentone.
The River Lea adjoins the east of Edmonton and runs from the Chiltern Hills through Hertfordshire and the Lea Valley down to the Thames.
Nearest places
- Tottenham to the south
- Palmers Green to the west
- Walthamstow to the east
- Ponders End to the north
- Winchmore Hill to the north
Railway stations
Famous residents
- Bob Hoskins
- Gladys Aylward
- Robert Cecil
- Bruce Forsyth
- Bobby Graham
- David Jason
- James Winter Lake
- Charles Lamb
- Mary Lamb
- John Keats
External links
References
- "The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland" (1868) at Genuki, UK and Ireland Genealogy. (A brief description and history of Edmonton from the 1868 Gazetteer)
- A brief history of Lower Edmonton on the Enfield Council Website. (A succinct account starting early 1800s)
- A brief history of Upper Edmonton on the Enfield Council Website. (A succinct account starting early 1800s)
- Edmonton: Economic History fom British history Online. (This is detailed and starts in 1086)
- Jackson, Alan A. (1999). London's Local Railways (2nd Edition). Capital Transport. ISBN 1-85414-209-7.