All cities change. Urban landscapes are never static. Fashion, economic forces, demographic shifts and, at times, war continually reshape them. London is one of the greatest examples of this constant evolution. During my lifetime I have watched many parts of the capital change beyond recognition, yet London had already undergone dramatic transformation long before I was born.
The Second World War left deep scars across the city. Nowhere was this more apparent than in the City of London, where bombing destroyed streets, ancient alleys, historic buildings and long-established communities. Yet London survived. From the ruins emerged a new commercial city of modern offices and skyscrapers, while precious fragments of the past—churches, lanes and historic corners—remained to remind us of the city’s extraordinary history.
A similar story can be seen across London’s suburbs. Many grew rapidly during the nineteenth century as the railways expanded and the population increased. Some, such as Highgate, Hampstead, Willesden, Crouch End, Ealing and parts of Norwood, have retained much of their Victorian and Georgian character. Their tree-lined streets, handsome houses, churches and traditional shopping parades continue to give them a distinctive atmosphere and a strong sense of identity.
Others have been far less fortunate.
For me, nowhere illustrates this better than Woolwich.
When I moved there after my marriage in 1979, I had little idea of Woolwich’s remarkable past. Only later did I discover how much had already disappeared. Buildings I could easily have visited as a schoolboy on a bicycle had been swept away during the great wave of demolition in the 1960s and 1970s.
Woolwich was never simply another London suburb. For centuries it ranked among Britain’s most important military and industrial centres. The Royal Arsenal was known throughout the world, and around it grew barracks, workshops, churches, schools and housing—a complete community built around the service of the nation. Few places contributed more to Britain’s military history.
Sadly, much of that inheritance disappeared in little more than a generation.
Among the greatest losses were the barracks. The Grand Depot Barracks, the Grade 2 listed Red Barracks with their magnificent classical architecture, and the Cambridge Barracks with their imposing Victorian colonnades represented an entire chapter of Britain’s military history. Today little survives beyond gateways and fragments of wall. Had they remained, they would almost certainly have found new life through sympathetic conversion, as has happened with so many former military buildings elsewhere.
Incidentally the Red Barracks on Frances Street in Woolwich—the former Royal Marine Infirmary—were used in the film The National Health (1973), directed by Jack Gold and written by Peter Nichols.
They were adapted as the fictional Princess Maria of Battenberg Hospital, which is the main hospital setting in the film. The building was subsequently demolished in 1975.
Scandalously the Rotunda, designed by Nash and built to house the tent in which the peace treaty ending the Napoleonic wars was signed and which once housed a fine firearms museum, remains on English Heritage’s buildings at risk register.
The churches suffered equally. Holy Trinity Church the ‘church on the square’ with its elegant Georgian portico dominating Beresford Square, was demolished—an act that would be almost unthinkable today.
The Royal Garrison Church met a different fate. Bombed during the Second World War, it survives as a haunting ruin. Its remarkable mosaics and remaining architectural features still convey something of Woolwich’s former importance and, unlike so many other buildings, it was recognised as being worth preserving and with its new canopy is back again in use for local events such as concerts.
Woolwich’s flourishing evangelical churches now use the two former mega cinemas but formerly.the Woolwich Tabernacle, demolished in 1965, was the largest Baptist chapel in Britain. Perhaps the saddest loss was St Margaret’s Church on Plumstead Common. This magnificent Gothic Revival church transformed the Common into something resembling an English village green. It gave the whole area a sense of dignity and identity. Falling congregations and rising maintenance costs eventually sealed its fate, and it was replaced by a building utterly lacking the architectural presence of its predecessor. I have often wondered what became of its carvings, stained glass and furnishings. They too formed part of Woolwich’s story.
The streets also changed beyond recognition. In Burrage Town enough Victorian housing survives for the original scale and character of the streets to remain, even if many individual houses have been altered with replacement windows, stripped cornices and unsympathetic modern entrances. Elsewhere entire streets disappeared beneath post-war housing schemes. While these developments provided much-needed homes, they swept away the rich mixture of houses, shops, pubs and small businesses that had given Victorian Woolwich its unique character.
The decline of the local pub reflected a national trend. Thousands have disappeared across Britain, and Woolwich lost so many of its neighbourhood public houses. Some survive as homes, preserving at least the buildings themselves, while others, including the Director General near the Town Hall, vanished altogether, taking another small piece of local history with them.
The demolition of the houses on Woolwich Common was another tragedy. They were comparable with those that still surround nearby Blackheath Common, where they were recognised as worthy of preservation. Among those demolished was the birthplace of General Gordon of Khartoum, once one of Britain’s greatest national heroes and greatly admired by Queen Victoria. By the late twentieth century, however, much of that history had already been forgotten.
Yet Woolwich is not simply a story of loss.
Much survives to remind us of its remarkable past.
The ancient parish church of St Mary’s remains at the heart of the town. Sensitive restoration, including the reopening of its blocked side aisles, has restored much of its original character and dignity.
The two principal Catholic churches in Woolwich and Plumstead also survive. The Woolwich church, designed by Pugin, may be modest in scale, but it contains fine Gothic Revival features and remains an important reminder of the town’s nineteenth-century expansion. Unfortunately it’s now dwarfed by the Tesco store opposite voted the ugliest building in London a few years ago.
Within the Royal Arsenal itself, several historic buildings have also been preserved. Chief among them is Sir John Vanbrugh’s Great Store, one of the Arsenal’s most important surviving buildings. Sadly, the impact of modern development around it has diminished its historic setting, reminding us that the surroundings of a great building are often almost as important as the building itself.
Among Woolwich’s finest survivors are its cinemas. The Granada and the Odeon remain magnificent examples of 1930s Art Deco architecture, built at a time when even an evening at the pictures was treated as a grand occasion. The Granada, with its spectacular Hollywood-inspired interior and remarkable medieval-style murals created by artists associated with film-set design, remains one of London’s architectural treasures.
Saved first as bingo halls and today serving as Pentecostal churches, both buildings continue to enrich the townscape.
Looking back, the greatest sadness is not that Woolwich changed—every town must change—but that so much disappeared before its value was fully recognised. During the 1960s and 1970s Victorian architecture was too often dismissed as outdated and expendable. Today many of those same buildings would almost certainly have been listed and carefully restored.
When historic buildings disappear, a town loses far more than bricks and mortar. It loses continuity, identity and the visible reminders of the generations who lived there before us.
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