Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for ELTHAM

ELTHAM, a village, a parish, and a sub-district, in Lewisham district, Kent. The village stands near the Lee and Dartford railway, 3 miles S by W of Woolwich; and has a post office‡ under London, SE, a railway station, and a fair on 20 Oct. It was known at Domesday as Alteham; it enjoyed distinction and prosperity, from the 13th century till the 16th, in consequence of its possessing a royal palace; it flourished also, for some time, as a market-town; it afterwards sank into comparative neglect and insignificance, yet continued to present attractions to visitors and residents; and it now has some good houses, and rejoices in picturesque environs, studded with villas and mansions. The parish includes also the hamlet of Mottingham. Acres, 4, 350. Real property, £20, 567. Pop., 3, 009. Houses, 537. The manor belonged to the Crown in the time of Edward the Confessor; was given, by William the Conqueror, to Odo, Earl of Kent; soon partly reverted to the Crown, and partly was given to the Mandevilles, from whom it took the name of Eltham-Mandeville; was conveyed, by Edward I., to John de Vesci; passed first to the Aytons, next to the Scroops; revexted, in 1318, to Queen Isabel; went, for a short time, about the middle of the following century, to Robert Dawson; was given, by Henry VIII., to successively Sir Henry Guildford and Sir Thomas Speke; passed, under Edward VI., to Sir John Gates; was held, under the Crown, in the time of Elizabeth, by William Cromer and Lord Cobham; went in lease, at the accession of Charles I., to the Earl of Dorset; was seized by the parliament in the time of the Commonwealth, - occupied for some time by the Earl of Essex, -and sold to Nathaniel Rich; was purchased, at the Restoration, by Sir John Shaw; and has ever since continued in the possession of Sir John's descendants, with the exception that a portion which was included in the royal park is still vested in the Crown. A large and splendid mansion appears to have been erected on it about the middle of the 13th century; was almost entirely rebuilt by Edward IV.; received large additions from Henry VII.; consisted then of four quadrangles, within a high-walled and wide-moated enclosure, encompassed by parks of about 1, 700 acres; suffered some neglect from the time of Henry VIII. till that of Charles I.; underwent enormous devastation during the time of the Commonwealth; and is now represented by only a few remains, which were rescued from utter decay by a slight restoration, at a cost of £700, in 1828. Henry III. kept Christmas here in 1269. Edward's second son John was born here; and hence was called John of Eltham. Edward III. held parliaments here; and, in 1365, gave sumptuous entertainment here to his former prisoner, King John of France. The regent Lionel, son of Edward III., kept Christmas here in 1347. Richard II. entertained here Leo, king of Armenia, in 1386. Henry IV. was here in 1409; Henry VI., in 1429; Edward IV., in 1483. The Princess Bridget, danghter of Edward IV., was born here. Henry VIII. was here in 1515 and 1526; but began, after the latter year, to cherish a preference for his new palace at Greenwich. Mary was here in 1556. Elizabeth, when a child, was often brought hither for a change of air; but, on reaching the throne, gave preference, as her father had done, to Greenwich. The Earl of Essex died here in 1646. The chief remains are the tilt-yard entrance archway; the moat, partially drained and dressed; the battlemented wall, with flanking loop-hole turrets; subterranean passages or drains, which served as sally-ports; a three-arched, ivy-clad bridge, spanning the moat; the buttery, with barge-board gables, and fine-corbelled attics; and, above all, the banqueting-hall, in good preservation, 100 feet long, 56 feet wide, and 60 feet high, with double windows on each side, two grand bays, and a magnificent open roof, and forming a beautiful specimen of the domestic architecture of the time of Edward IV.-The living is a vicarage in the diocese of London. Value, £355.* Patrons, the Trustees of the late Sir G. Page Turner, Bart The church was greatly improved in 1819 and 1828. The p. curacy of Shooter's Hill, constituted in 1866, is a separate benefice. There are chapels for Independents and Wesleyans. Philipott's alms-houses have £166; Passey's charities have £235; Leggatt's school has £24; and other charities have £138. Over, the translator of "Juvenal, " was vicar. Bishop Horne, the comedian Doggett, and Sir William James, the conqueror of Severndroog, whose castle stands on the neighbouring Shooters' hill, were buried in the churchyard. The Philipotts, authors of the "Survey of Kent, " were natives. Vandyke the painter, Lilbourne the republican, and Dr. Sherard and Dillenius the botanists were residents; and the house which Sherard inhabited still stands. -The sub-district is conterminate with the parish.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a village, a parish, and a sub-district"   (ADL Feature Type: "populated places")
Administrative units: Eltham St John the Baptist AP/CP       Eltham SubD       Lewisham RegD/PLU       Kent AncC
Place names: ALTEHAM     |     ELTHAM
Place: Eltham

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