Thursday 15 February 2024

The history of Eltham in just 20 objects ........Nu 9 a water trough chosen by Jean

The challenge is to write a history of Eltham in just 20 objects which are in no particular order, and have been selected purely at random.

Anyone who wants to nominate their own is free to do so, just add a description in no more than 200 words and send it to me.

And here my friend Jean has chosen a horse tough and describes her choice.

This is a photograph of a disused Horse Water Trough still in position in Bexley Road, the road linking Eltham with the neighbouring town of Bexley.

With the growing awareness in the late 19th century of the need for such street furniture, to ease the way of the hundreds of workhorses pulling wagons and vehicles of all kinds up and down the highways of the kingdom, stone troughs of the kind shown in this photograph were provided throughout the country through the generosity and compassion of individual benefactors, and many survive to this day.

The one provided on the Bexley Road was presented by Sir Spencer Maryon-Wilson of Charlton House, Greenwich.  Charlton House is one of the finest Jacobean mansions in the London area and it remained the home of the Maryon-Wilson family until 1916, when Sir Spencer Maryon-Wilson moved out of the house which was being used as a hospital for officers during the 1st World War.

Charlton House and Park were sold to Greenwich Borough Council in 1925, and Sir Spencer Maryon-Wilson died in 1944

Location; Eltham

Picture and text; courtesy of Jean Gammons

1 comment:

  1. I used to attend Crown Woods and walked past that everyday to walk along Gravel pit lane. One morning there was a car embedded into the trough, which was knocked off its mount by the impact. This would have been around 1968.

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