The Peckham story

Peckham has a long history. The Old Kent Road was originally part of a Roman Road called Watling Street linking the South East with the Midlands and continuing north. Mediaeval Peckham was mentioned in the Domesday book.

In the 1700s Peckham was mostly an area of green fields. In the 1800s the Peckham branch of the Grand Surrey Canal opened. The old canal head, left, was roughly where the library is now.

19th century Peckham

Transport links really took off in the 1860s with railway stations at Peckham Rye, Nunhead and Queens Road. There was now a daily bus to Hyde Park as well.

Peckham, until 1889 in the county of Surrey, now became part of the City. Peckham Rye Park was established in 1890.

20th century Peckham

In the 1900s Peckham experienced mixed fortunes. There was political change as, in 1900, it became part of the borough of Camberwell, which then later joined with Southwark to form Southwark Council in 1965.

There was radical new thinking and building. In the 1930s the Sassoon flats, an early example of social housing, and the Pioneer Health Centre, which became famous worldwide as the Peckham Experiment, were built in St Mary's Road.

The face of Peckham was changing. In the 1950s and 1960s immigrants from the Caribbean were invited to help solve the country's labour shortage. Many of them settled in London as London Transport was one of the main recruiters.

Peckham was a major shopping centre. Rye Lane was known as the Golden Mile and the famous department store Jones and Higgins drew shoppers, including celebrities, from miles around. The last Sainsbury with a full counter service was in Rye Lane, right.

In the 1970s the old canal was drained and filled in. By the 1980s Peckham, along with inner city areas all over Britain, had gone into decline.

By the early 1990s Southwark as a whole was the second most deprived borough in England and Peckham was the most deprived part of Southwark with multiple indicators of deprivation.

Contact us

Peckham Programme
Tel: 020 7525 1021
getinvolvedinpeckham@southwark.gov.uk
9 Blenheim Grove
London
SE15 4QS