Sheet 2 of Stanford’s Library Map of London and Its Suburbs covers the northern districts around Highgate, Kentish Town and Crouch End in 1862. The sheet records an area in transition: established villages and growing streets sit beside fields, wooded ground, ponds and large open spaces that would later be absorbed into north London.
Map Details
- Original title: Stanford’s Library Map of London and Its Suburbs
- Sheet: 2 of 24
- Publisher: Edward Stanford
- Published: London, 15 February 1862
- Scale: Six inches to one mile, approximately 1:10,560
- Area shown: Highgate, Kentish Town, Crouch End, Stroud Green, Mount Pleasant, Gospel Oak, Holloway and adjoining districts
- Orientation: North at the top
- Original appearance: Printed linework with hand-coloured roads, water, boundaries and open ground
Highgate, Hampstead Heath and the Northern Villages
Highgate occupies the centre-left of the sheet, with Highgate Cemetery forming a prominent green area. The ponds and wooded ground along the edge of Hampstead Heath remain clearly visible, while Crouch End, Mount Pleasant and Stroud Green are still separated by extensive fields and comparatively scattered development.
Kentish Town and Holloway show a denser pattern of streets and buildings. The contrast between these growing neighbourhoods and the surrounding open land makes the map particularly useful for understanding the northward expansion of Victorian London.
Railways and New Development
The Hampstead Junction Railway crosses the lower part of the sheet, accompanied by other lines, stations and developing roads. These transport connections helped turn the villages and semi-rural districts shown here into closely connected London suburbs during the decades that followed.
Modern Postcode Coverage
The mapped area broadly corresponds with parts of:
- NW3 – Hampstead and Gospel Oak
- NW5 – Kentish Town
- N4 – Stroud Green
- N6 – Highgate
- N8 – Crouch End
- N19 – Upper Holloway and Archway
Modern postcode boundaries do not precisely follow the historic divisions shown on the map.
