Victoria Park

VICTORIA PARK Victoria Park was the first of the modern Parks to be laid out, and it is the largest. When the advantage of an East End Park was admitted, the work of forming one was carried out by the Commissioners of Woods and Forests. An Act passed in 1840 enabled them to sell York House to the Duke of Sutherland (hence it became Stafford House), for �72,000, and to purchase about 290 acres of land in the East End in the parishes of Hackney, Bethnal Green, and Bow. Part of this was reserved for building improved dwellings, and 193 acres formed Victoria Park, the laying out of which began in 1842. Thirty years later, when some of the land adjoining was about to be built on, the Metropolitan Board of Works bought some 24 acres to add to the Park, the whole of which, including the new part, was under the Office of Works. Other additions have been made from time to time, chiefly with a view to opening entrances to the Park, so as to make it as easy of access as possible from the crowded districts in the direction of Limehouse and the docks, and round Mile End Road. The ground which the Park covers was chiefly brick-fields and market-gardens, and Bishop's Hall Farm. The latter place is the only part with any historical association. The farm was in the manor of Stepney, which was held by the Bishops of London, and Bishop's or Bonner's Hall was the Manor House. Many of the Bishops of London resided here in early days. Stowe, in 1598, referring to Bishop Richard de Gravesend in 1280, writes: "It appeareth by the Charter [of free] warren granted to this Bishop, that (in his time) there were two Woods in the Parish of Stebunheth [Stepney], pertaining to the said Bishop: I have (since I kept house for my selfe) knowne the one of them by Bishops Hall, but now they are both made plaine of wood, and not to be discerned from other grounds." These woods were on the ground covered by the Park. Stowe notices in his short accounts of the Bishops of London that Ralph Stratford, who was Bishop from 1339 to 1354, "deceased at Stebunhith." The name Bonner's Hall somehow became attached to the Manor House. The same chronicler also records that Bishop Ridley gave the manors of Stepney and Hackney to the King in the fourth year of Edward VI., who granted them to Lord Wentworth. Bonner, therefore, would be the last Bishop who could have resided there. The old Manor House was not destroyed till 1800, when part of the material was taken to build a farm-house, which was cleared away when the Park was formed.