Twickenham, Middlesex

Historical Description

Twickenham, a village and a parish in Middlesex. The village stands on the river Thames, and on the L. & S.W.R., on which it has three stations known as Twickenham, Strawberry Hill, and St Margarets, 1 mile SW of Richmond, 3 miles. SW from Brentford, and 10 from Hyde Park corner, London. It was anciently called Twitnam and Twittnaham, and was noted in the 18th century as a place of fashionable resort. The village stretches along the road towards Bushey and Teddington for about 2 miles, and it has been much enlarged by building during recent years. It has a head post office, a. bank, and a metropolitan police station. The town-hall, in King Street, erected in 1876, is a fine building of red brick. It contains, with other apartments, an assembly-room 80 feet in length by 40 in width, used for public meetings and concerts. There is also a good free library with reading-room. In Whitton Lane there is an economic museum, founded ia 1856 by Mr Thomas Twining, " with a view to impart in a manner at once scientific and entertaining that knowledge-of common things which is so necessary for securing health and comfort." Area of the parish, 2415 acres; population,. 16,027. There are many good residences in the parish. Strawberry Hill, situated at the corner of the upper road leading to Teddington, was the seat of Horace Walpole, and now belongs to the Baroness de Stern. Orleans House is a large mansion originally erected in the reign of Queen Anne, which was for many years the residence of the Orleans family. York House is said to have been the residence of James II. when Duke of York, and here Queen Anne was born in 1664. Aragon Tower, in Church Street, part of an ancient manor-house, is said to have been inhabited by Queen Katherine of Aragon. Pope's villa at Twickenham, where he died in 1744, was destroyed in 1807, and has left little if any trace, but the name is still retained. The living of the mother parish of St Mary is a vicarage in the diocese of London; net value, £130, in the gift of the Dean and Chapter of Windsor. The church of St Mary is a plain building of red brick with an ivy-clad embattled western tower. The body of the church was erected in the early part of the 18th century, but the tower is of the 14th century, and is supposed to have been built by William of Wykeham. Many illustrious persons have been interred in the church and churchyard, among whom are the poet Pope, Mrs Kitty Clive the actress, Sir Godfrey Kneller, Sir John Berkeley, first Baron Berkeley of Stratton, and Admiral Byron. The ecclesiastical parish of Holy Trinity was formed in 1841 out of the parish of St Mary. The living is a vicarage of the gross value of £580 with residence, in the gift of the Bishop of London. The church, erected in 1840, is a building of brick in the Early English style. The ecclesiastical parish of St Stephen, East Twickenham, was formed in 1875 out of the parish of St Mary. The living is a vicarage of the gross value of £150. The church is a modern building of Kentish rag in the Geometrical Decorated style. The ecclesiastical parish of Whitton is noticed separately. Population of the ecclesiastical parish of St Mary, 5459; of Holy Trinity, 5864; of St Stephen, 3767. There are Baptist, Congregational, and Wesleyan chapels. The Carpenters' Company have almshouses for fifteen poor persons. The Metropolitan and City of London Police Orphanage stands in the Hampton Road, and is a spacious building, with accommodation for about 260 children. A branch of the National Refuge for Homeless and Destitute Boys is maintained at Fortescue House, an old mansion near Twickenham station. The soil of the parish is alluvial, and much of the land is laid out in market gardens.

Administration

The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.

Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.

Directories & Gazetteers

We have transcribed the entry for Twickenham from the following:

• Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Twickenham (St. Mary))

Land and Property

A full transcript of the Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Middlesex is online.

Maps

Online maps of Twickenham are available from a number of sites:

• Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• Google Streetview.
• National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
• OpenStreetMap.
• old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
• Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)

Villages, Hamlets, &c