Falkor wrote:I'm having trouble interpreting this map; can anyone please help?
I'll have a go.
1) Why is the Croydon Canal cut off between the Greyhound and the bit that says Canal?
The "Reference Plan to the Sydenham Enclosure Award, 1819", to give its full name, was produced for a very specific purpose. In 1810 the Lewisham Enclosure Act was passed by Parliament. This allowed all the common land in Lewisham to be divided amongst those who already owned land in the parish. They could then enclose their plots (ie fence them and prevent others trespassing) and use it as they chose, mainly for farming, later building. The result was that the landowners benefited greatly and the landless lost their access to the commons, which they had used for many centuries for grazing animals, gathering firewood, hunting, fishing, fairs and similar activities.
The map shows how the common land was divided up, with the name of the recipient of each plot. The commissioners were not concerned with land that was not common land and as the route of the canal was, at this point, over private land they simply did not bother to show it.
2) Was the Canal separate to the Reservoir? In other words, was it like a stream (canal) running beside a pond (reservoir) with ground in-between or was it a similar case to Peter Pan's pond in Southend?
I don't know. I imagine, as the reservoir was intended to store water to top-up the canal, that they were separate with perhaps a gate that could be opened to release water to the canal as needed.
3) Is that a stream running parallel to the bottom of Dartmouth Road on the left-hand side? It looks like the bottom of Dartmouth road was once right in the middle between the canal and a stream? Am I right in my interpretation? Would this be the same stream Steve Grindlay once mentioned in the Sydenam Wells topic that crossed near the library? So it crossed right over (or under) Dartmouth road and entered the reservoir? Also, if I'm not mis-interpreting this map, the stream also ran parallel with the bottom of London road, too!? Shocked
Not a stream, but a "canal feeder". Its purpose was to collect surface water, and water from any streams that could be diverted into it (like the one behind the library), to top up the reservoir. There was a similar feeder where the allotments between Wells Park Road and Longton Grove now are (I think kenny b mentions this elsewhere).
4) Does the original size map include Lower Sydenham?
Yes, it shows all the common land in the Parish of Lewisham so it includes small greens along Sydenham Road, Bell Green, Brockley Green, Hither Green, Rushey Green. What it does not include is Blackheath, for the simple reason that the Earl of Dartmouth, Lord of the Manor of Lewisham and a principal beneficiary of the enclosure, had a house on the edge of the heath, and enclosure would have spoilt his view. There was, at the time, a vigorous deate about whether Sydenham Common or Blackheath should be spared. One cannot imagine how Sydenham (and Blackheath) would have been if the decision had gone the other way.
