Hampton, London

Hampton
The Thames at Hampton St Mary's Church by Pier, Ferry, Garrick's Shakespeare Temple, Garrick House & public riverside
Hampton  Hampton shown within Greater London
Area	8.83 km2 (3.41 sq mi)
Population	19,372 (2011 census) (excludes much of 'Hampton Hill')
– density	2,194/km2 (5,680/sq mi)
OS grid reference	TQ135705
London borough	Richmond
Ceremonial county	Greater London
Region	London
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	HAMPTON
Postcode district	TW12
Dialling code	020
Police	Metropolitan
Fire	London
Ambulance	London
EU Parliament	London
UK Parliament	Twickenham
London Assembly	South West
List of places UK England London

Hampton is a suburban area with an old village heart on the north bank of the River Thames, in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames in England. The population is between 19,000 and 20,000, excluding the fluctuating ward encasing its near neighbour Hampton Hill which also has a high street. Hampton includes the park-facing main streets and mews buildings of Hampton Court which strictly denotes its central manor which became rebuilt and reconfigured as a Royal Palace and adopts its broad informal sense from a plain road sign 500m west erected after World War II to direct tourists. Hampton is served by two railway stations, excluding one north of Hampton Hill, including one immediately south of Hampton Court Bridge in East Molesey.

It adjoins Bushy Park on two sides and is west of Hampton Wick and Kingston upon Thames. Long strips of public riverside are in Hampton and the Hampton Heated Open Air Pool is one of the few such swimming pools remaining in Greater London. The riverside, on the reach above Molesey Lock, has residential islands and grand or decorative buildings including Garrick's House and the Temple to Shakespeare; also on the river is the Astoria Houseboat recording studio. Hampton Ferry provides access across the Thames to the main park of Molesey and the Thames Path National Trail.

Density does not exceed mid-rise. The most common type of housing in the north of the district is terraced homes; in the south is it semi-detached. Being at the western edge of London, much of the economy is bolstered by workers who commute to the nearest parts of adjacent counties, for example the M3 and M4 corridors or to Central London; however education, health and social work, retail, transport and catering businesses are also significant local employers.

History

The Anglo-Saxon parish of Hampton converted to secular use in the 19th century included present-day Hampton, Hampton Hill, Hampton Wick and hamlet of Hampton Court surrounding Hampton Court Palace which together are called The Hamptons. The combined population of the Hamptons was 37,131 (as at the 2001 census). The name Hampton may come from the Anglo-Saxon words hamm meaning an enclosure in the bend of a river and ton meaning farmstead or settlement.

The ten years to 1911 saw the highest percentage of population increase, the figures for 1851, 1871 and every 10 years to 1911 being: 3,134; 3,915; 4,776; 5,822, 6,813 and 9,220 respectively. A further 25% rise took place in the 1920s. Writing between 1870–72 his national gazetteer, John Marius Wilson technically described Hampton Wick as a hamlet; the real property of which was worth almost as much as the main settlement. He furthered that the total area was 3,190 acres (12.9 km²) and the exact respective figures were £14, 445 excluding Hampton Wick, of which £300 was in gas works; inclusive of Hampton-Wick: £25,037, equivalent to £2,082,053 in 2021. Both halves had developed Urban Sanitary Districts recorded in the 1891 census Hampton and Hampton Wick were Urban Districts from 1894–1937, preceding the creation of the Borough of Twickenham, which Hampton joined.

At the edge of London, from time immemorial (before the Norman Conquest) until 1965 Hampton was in Middlesex, a former postal county also and this designation is still common in this part of the former county among residents and businesses.

Tagg's Island and much of Hampton's riverside by association became known as Thames Riviera from the 1920s: the island was leased to Fred Karno, an entertainment impresario, who opened an elevated, three-storey rambling mansard roof hotel, the Karsino in 1913, which was demolished in 1971. World War I impacted the business, which rebranded as The Thames Riviera, rivalling the hotel in Maidenhead for the name, followed by The Palm Beach and The Casino. The Riviera aspect is sometimes described in literature by the Council however is controversial among dissenters to the land use, almost wholly private housing, where Hampton's riverside is not open parkland – it is no longer endorsed by London's bus operator with a stop of that name, in the 2010s named after instead a long public meadow known as St Albans Riverside.

General Roy

The Hampton end of the baseline

A cannon in Roy Grove marks the Hampton end of the baseline measured in 1784 by General William Roy in preparation of the Anglo-French Survey (1784–1790) to measure the relative situation of Greenwich Observatory and Paris Observatory. This high precision survey was the forerunner of the Principal Triangulation of Great Britain which commenced in 1791, one year after Roy's death. In the report of the operation Roy gives the locations of the ends of the baseline as Hampton Poor-house and King's Arbour. The latter lies with the confines of Heathrow Airport. The exact end points of the baseline were originally made by two vertical pipes which carried flag-poles but in 1791, when the base was remeasured, the ends were marked by two cannons sunk into the ground. It is certain that the cannons have been disturbed and slightly moved over the intervening years

Education

Main article: List of schools in Richmond upon Thames

• Hampton Academy (formerly Rectory School, latterly Hampton Community College), an Academy in Hampton
• Hampton School, an independent school for boys, which recently celebrated its 450th anniversary and is 101st in total point score nationally, following an unusually poor year, having been 61st in the schools' league table in recent years
• Lady Eleanor Holles School is an independent school for girls. It is 83rd in the schools league table.
  The latter two schools achieved 100% 5 A*-Cs at GCSE and share a new-for-2000 Millennium Boathouse. Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race and Women's Oxford v Cambridge Henley Boat Race participants of this century have attended the schools.
• Hampton Court House, a co-educational independent school
• Hampton Junior School (which recently celebrated its centenary)
• Denmead School, an Independent Preparatory School
• Hampton Hill Junior School
• Hampton Infant and Nursery School
• Carlisle Infants school
• Buckingham Primary School
• Twickenham Prep School

Churches

The Christian churches in Hampton and Hampton Hill work together as Churches Together Around Hampton. The church buildings are a significant presence in the area many of them being architecturally stand-alone listed buildings in otherwise often quite homogenous 20th century housing estates. The ministers and members provide a range of services for the community.

File:St Mary's Parish Church Hampton From the River.jpg

S Mary's Parish Church, Hampton

The affiliated churches are:

• Hampton Methodist Church, Hampton
• Hampton Baptist Church, Hampton
• Hampton Hill United Reformed Church, Hampton Hill
• St Theodore's Roman Catholic Church, Hampton
• St Francis de Sales, Hampton Hill and Upper Teddington (Roman Catholic)
• All Saints (Church of England), Old Farm Road, Hampton
• St Mary (Church of England), Church Street (by Thames Street) Hampton
• St James' Church, Hampton Hill (Church of England)

Amenities and entertainment

The Library

Garrick's Temple hosts a free Sunday afternoon Shakespeare exhibition (14.00–17.00) from early April to 30 October and a series of summer drama, music and exhibitions.

Hampton Youth Project has been an economically and recreationally resourceful youth centre since 1990. Built in a converted coach depot on the Nurserylands Estate it offers a wide programme of activities for those aged 11–19. Parks include borough-sponsored football pitches and tennis courts in the north and west of the district and children's playgrounds there and in Bushy Park and Hampton Village Green in the east and south.

Hampton Station is on the London Waterloo to Shepperton train line.

The Library is in a Georgian building on Thames Street with a double blue plaque to two former residents, the singer John Beard and William Ewart MP, the Politician behind the Public Libraries Act 1850.

Economy

Thames Water's fresh water operations provide a source of local employment. A group of 17 offices and storage premises including warehouse units, which were built in 2008, are in the south-west of the town.

Hampton Water Treatment Works (WTW)

Hampton WTW Victorian buildings on the A308

The large operational Water Treatment Works, owned by Thames Water, is between the Upper Sunbury Road (A308) and the River Thames. It was built in the 1850s after the 1852 Metropolis Water Act made it illegal to take drinking water from the tidal Thames below Teddington Lock because of the amount of sewage in the river. Three companies had established waterworks by 1855 — the Grand Junction Waterworks Company, the Southwark and Vauxhall Waterworks Company, and the West Middlesex Waterworks Company. The site includes old Victorian buildings, filter beds and some larger water storage beds. The site well demonstrates the successful accommodation of nature conservation with operational considerations. The Water Treatment Works is next to the Sunnyside Reservoir and the Stain Hill Reservoirs – sites of Metropolitan Importance for Nature Conservation and contains flower-rich grassland and habitats for water birds.

The extensive areas of open water, especially the Grand Junction Reservoir in the north-west of the site, are used by large numbers of birds, particularly in winter. Most of the site is still in operational use so marginal vegetation, where it occurs, is generally sparse. However, the grasslands surrounding the filter beds and buildings are among the most herb-rich grasslands in the Borough and contain several scarce London species often associated with chalk grassland.

Thames Water completed a five-year modernisation in 1993 and has installed advanced water treatment facilities at the plant to filter out pesticides. Water is supplied via the Staines Aqueduct from the King George VI Reservoir and Staines Reservoirs which receive their input from the River Thames at Hythe End, just above Bell Weir Lock. The aqueduct passes the Water Treatment Works at Kempton Park, which used to be connected to Hampton via the Metropolitan Water Board Railway. The Hampton library is across the road from Hampton Water Works.

Notable inhabitants

Main article: List of people from Richmond upon Thames

Blue plaque to Alan Turing at 78 High Street, Hampton

Plaque on Hampton Library to John Beard and William Ewart

Notable people born in Hampton include:

• Richard Doll (epidemiologist)
• Martin Salter (politician)
• Harriet Reynolds (actress), starred in Abigail's Party (1977), died 18 June 1992 aged 47.

Other people associated with Hampton include:

• Christopher Wren (architect)
• John Beard (tenor)
• William Ewart MP (politician and promoter of free libraries)
• David Garrick (actor, playwright and producer)
• David Gilmour (musician)
• Jessie Matthews and Sonnie Hale, (actors) lived together
• Brian May (musician)
• Crispian Mills (musician)
• Hayley Mills (actress)
• Alan Turing (code breaker and computing pioneer)
• Harriet Reynolds (actress, died 18 June 1992 aged 47)
• Michael Faraday (scientist)
• Rufus Hound (Comedian)

Sport and leisure

Hampton Sailing Club with boat landing stages occupies all of Benn's Island above Molesey Lock

Team sports

Hampton has a Non-League football club Hampton & Richmond Borough F.C. who play at county level at the Beveree Stadium by Station Road, one of the parallel high streets by Hampton railway station.

Rugby Union is well catered for within four miles: Twickenham RFC play in the west of Hampton. Staines RFC and Feltham RFC play at their own Hanworth grounds; London Irish RFC juniors play at Sunbury, London Harlequins RFC play at Twickenham.

Leisure facilities

The borough supports Hampton Heated Open Air Pool and Gym by Bushy Park and the old High Street, 200m south of the border of Hampton Hill. Private gyms are by Bushy Park and Twickenham Golf Course. A local community association provide social and leisure activities including short mat bowls.

Watersports

Molesey Boat Club is across the river in Molesey, 500m west of Hampton Court Bridge.

Hampton SC has a clubhouse and boatyard occupying all of Benn's Island. Aquarius SC is by Hampton Court Palace stable yard.

These have rival rowing and sailing clubs on neighbouring reaches of the Thames, and in respect of sailing, on the Queen Mary Reservoir.

In film, fiction and the media

The area is featured briefly in two Charles Dickens novels. In Oliver Twist, Oliver and Sykes stop in a public house in Hampton on their way to the planned burglary in Chertsey. In Nicholas Nickleby, Sir Mulberry Hawk and Lord Frederick visit the 'Hampton Races', which refers to a racecourse at 'Moulsey Hurst'. It is also briefly mentioned in The War of the Worlds. The Bell public house in Hampton is mentioned in T S Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. Hampton is also mentioned in humorist Jerome K. Jerome's Three Men in a Boat. In 24: Live Another Day terrorist Margot Al-Harazi's first hideout is stated to be in Hampton.

A murder at the outset of 2001 took place in a spate across a wide suburban area at the hands of Levi Bellfield since which there has been relatively few unprovoked attacks of such a scale in this district.

Demography and housing

2011 Census homes

Ward	Detached	Semi-detached	Terraced	Flats and apartments	Caravans/temporary/mobile homes/houseboats	Shared between households
Hampton	750	1,247	983	1,125	66	3
Hampton North	653	1,056	1,276	1,053	9	39
Fulwell and Hampton Hill (mostly in district)	423	1,062	1,349	1,390	2	26

2011 Census households

Ward	Population	Households	% Owned outright	% Owned with a loan	hectares
Hampton	9,985	4,086	32	36	688
Hampton North	9,387	4,455	30	33	195
Fulwell and Hampton Hill (not included in summary)	10,131	4,450	30	42	192

Transport

Roads

In keeping with its lack of high rise buildings, the district has no dual carriageways, its main routes the A308 and A312, have in their busiest sections an additional filter or bus lane.

Bus routes that serve Hampton are the 111, R68 and 216. The 411 and R70 and 285 serve Hampton Court, Nurserylands and Hampton Hill respectively.

Rail

The main station is towards the south-west and by the main parades of shops on either side of the line: Hampton; just north of Hampton Hill is Fulwell railway station; both are on the Shepperton Branch Line. Just south of Hampton Court neighbourhood, clustered about the Tudor, Stuart and Georgian Palace and Gardens is Hampton Court railway station on the Hampton Court Branch Line. Hampton Wick railway station is on the Kingston Loop Line. The London terminus for both lines is London Waterloo.

Nearest places

• Twickenham
• Sunbury
• Fulwell
• Hanworth
• Teddington
• Whitton
• East Molesey
• Esher
• Hampton Wick
• Kingston

Notes and references

Notes

References

External links

• Media related to at Wikimedia Commons London portal
• Our Hampton
• Hampton Online
• Hampton People's Network
• Hampton Youth Project
• Hampton Water Works
• The 9am Tuesday Chlorine Warning Siren Test
• The Thames from Hampton Court to Sunbury Lock – Hampton Waterworks
• The Twickenham Museum