History of Kilburn and West Hampstead

It was not a high-profile murder. A poor man was killed in a poor part of London during the War, so it did not receive much press coverage. This detailed blog story takes us into the seedy underworld of London gangs and tells how a petty criminal fought to prove his innocence and became a television playwright. The Crime It was wartime in Kilburn and like the rest of London, people were suffering from the continued bombing in the Blitz. In 1941 on 12 April, 56-year-old George Ambridge was murdered at his home, 2 Hampton Road, Kilburn. This was a short street linking Kilburn Park and Cambridge Roads, which has been swept away by the large-scale redevelopment of South Kilburn. George worked as a rag and bone man and delivered coal. But he was also a ‘fence’ for stolen goods. At the time of the murder he was a widower, living alone with his dog in the small flat over a disused stable in Hampton Road.     No.2 Hampton Road The police made little progress, until nine months later i...

For many manual workers, life in Victorian London was a mean, hard grind. There wasn’t much relief from the daily routine of work and making enough money to survive. South of Canterbury Road as far as Carlton Vale, many Kilburn streets were lined with terrace houses rented out room by room and occupied by several families. It was a poor, deprived district, and the temporary blurring of reality that alcohol provided was a popular way to forget your problems. But drink too heavily and there could be trouble.  A Troublesome Woman and a Brute of a Husband This neighbourhood and nearby Kilburn High Road were well populated with public houses that were much frequented by locals. If the weather permitted, you left your cramped room and went on the street, adults and kids alike, with the pub an important focus of social life.  Fights in and outside these establishments have featured in several of our blog stories, but this time we are concentrating on just one couple, Richard and Ann ...

The scene of the crime Rupert Road ran between Canterbury Road and Carlton Vale in south Kilburn. It’s still on the map but no original properties have survived. Number 2 was a terraced house, its rooms occupied by several families. In all, an amazing total of 23 persons were shown living there on census night in 1881, a similar number to other properties in the road. OS Map 1915, showing Rupert Road, Kilburn On 22 March 1881, Ann Moulford and her husband Charles were woken at 2.30am by loud screams of ‘Murder’ from the next room. Reluctantly Charles got up and knocked on his neighbours’ door, the home of John and Eliza Wegener and their two children. ‘What are you doing?’ he asked. John’s reply was ‘Nothing much.’ Charles asked for the door to be opened and when he was told to go away, he broke it open, and saw John and his two children. Ann Moulford followed her husband into the room, and while Charles watched John, she helped Eliza Wegener who was standing near the window into a cha...

The firm of Saxby and Farmer was Kilburn’s largest employer. In 1863 they opened a factory in Canterbury Road and their patented railway signals were sold around the world during the railway boom. In 1871 they employed 414 men and 36 boys rising to 2,000 at their peak, until the factory closed in 1903 and the company moved to Chippenham.   The Neville’s Cross pub at 40 Denmark Street was built in 1865 on the corner with Neville Road. The owner Neville Newton was a publican at The Plough in Kensal Green. He may have named the pub after the 1346 battle of Neville’s Cross near Durham, when the invading Scottish army was defeated by the English. Or he named it after himself and the street where the pub stood at a crossroads. Soon after it opened, the licence was transferred to publican Charles Ashby.  1860s OS Map 1894 OS Map The two OS maps show the growth of South Kilburn between the 1860s and 1894. The red marks show the Neville’s Cross and Sir Robert Peel pubs. At 11.30 pm on...