Second World War: Northolt’s Polish heroes
Between August-November 1940, the Battle of Britain raged over our skies, during a critical early phase of the Second World War. RAF Northolt became an operational front-line base, with its pilots playing a vital role in saving the nation. Polish fighter squadrons were formed in Britain as part of an agreement with the Polish government […]
Gates to the past: Southall 1698
Southall Market has recently undergone a change, with the town’s new car park altering its lay-out. Gates have gone up to commemorate the original market’s royal charter, awarded in 1698. But what was Southall like 300 years ago? What we would now call Southall was, in the 17th Century, a collection of sparsely populated hamlets. […]
Singer honoured in Acton
A plaque has been unveiled in Acton on the site of the former house of the late singer and actor Adam Faith. Deputy mayor of Ealing, Councillor Patricia Walker, performed the honours on Wednesday (19 August) in Acton Park. Adam Faith was the stage name of Terry Nelhams. Terry was born in a house which […]
Murder or manslaughter?
In the morning of 5 August 1936 Linford Derrick, a tennis coach, entered Ealing Police Station and declared that he had just murdered his best friend and wanted to make a full confession. Yet, when Derrick went on trial later that year he pleaded not guilty and claimed that he had only acted in self-defence. […]
First World War: Indian soldiers
An exhibition at Gunnersbury Park tells the stories of the importance of soldiers from India to the eventual Allied victory in the First World War. During the war, more than a million Indian soldiers were deployed as part of the Allied war effort and 74,000 were killed in action. They served all over the world, […]
The Martin brothers
Southall’s most celebrated craftsmen were the four Martin Brothers and their work is still collected almost a century after their deaths. Some of their work is now on display in the refurbished and reopened Dominion Centre. They were potters whose output peaked in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Perhaps their most famous works […]
Gunnersbury’s past glories
We have reported in Around Ealing about the restoration project for Gunnersbury Park and its listed buildings. They have had an illustrious past. In 1663, Serjeant Maynard, a well-known lawyer, bought the estate. He led the prosecution in the 1640s against some of Charles I’s major supporters and his career prospered, not just under Cromwell, […]
Ealing and the Blitz
September 2010 marks the 70th anniversary of the start of the aerial attacks on Britain by the German air force – which were known collectively as ‘the Blitz’. These night-time attacks took place from September 1940 to May 1941. It was an attempt to cause as much damage and death as possible in order to weaken […]
An obscure little river?
Is that what you think of Ealing’s river, the River Brent, asks borough archivist Dr Jonathan Oates? It flows through Greenford and Hanwell before joining the canal and then into the Thames and it is true that it is not wide or deep enough to handle boats either for pleasure or for commerce. Yet it […]
Was Ealing the ‘Queen of the Suburbs’?
Some residents think of Ealing by this soubriquet; but what exactly does it mean, and why was it used? Clearly the term is meant to be a complimentary one. It was first coined by Ealing’s borough surveyor, Charles Jones, in a book published in 1902. In it he refers to Ealing as ‘Queen of Suburbs’. […]
How the council spent your money 100 years ago
From horses to hot baths, council budgets were a bit different a century ago, as Richard Nadal discovered in a 1902 account book from the archives. The old financial yearbook was for Ealing Town Council and its surrounding wards (Castlebar, Drayton, Grange, Lammas, Manor and Mount Park) together, formed the Borough of Ealing at the […]
What’s in a name? Our town’s origins
Our borough has reached a milestone. It was 45 years ago when, in 1965, the old boroughs of Ealing, Acton and Southall were abolished. They were merged into one new local authority, Ealing Council, administering the new London Borough of Ealing. Our borough now has a population of more than 300,000, but the origins of […]