Park of the week

219. Totteridge Common 

This is an attractive wayside common, a Site of Borough Importance for Nature Conservation, Grade II, in Totteridge. It has scattered trees, overgrown hedgerows and a chain of five old ponds: Long Pond (used for angling), Ellern Mede Pond, Pink Cottage Pond, Warren Pond and Burnham's Pond. The registered common land is owned by the Totteridge Manor Association. The area was called Tataridge in the 13th century. It may have been named after someone called Tata.

I turned off the road (by this point named Totteridge Village, by the sign with the drawing of some cricket stumps) into narrow Totteridge Green, where I ended up at a typical village green, shown in the picture above. It comprises open grassland, small pockets of scrubby woodland and Laurel Farm Pond, the only surviving pond of fourteen that were recorded on the Green in the mid-nineteenth century. At the pond, I was met by a heron, walking around as though he owned the place. Which, I suppose, he does. The Green is also accessible from Coppice Walk and Laurel Way, N20. The nature reserve is the land on both sides of the road, Totteridge Green. 

When I pull my notes together to write these posts, I like to look in the British Newspaper Archives. Often there are interesting relevant snippets, and I particularly like the older ones. Here are two concerning Totteridge Common. In both cases they relate to dog attacks. The Hendon and Finchley times from April 1903 report on a postman who was bitten by a dog owned by an unnamed local gentleman. Apparently the wounds were dressed by a Dr Sprear of Whetstone, and the postman was said to be going on satisfactorily. A similar thing happened two years later. A 15-year-old telegraph boy was crossing Totteridge Common when a dog of unknown owner “flew at him” and bit him on the left thigh. He too was attended by Dr Spreat, so I had to look him up also. I found his obituary and he was the local medical officer of health and general surgeon, he must have been working at whichever hospital the victims visited.

I could find nothing similar reported recently, but even so, think on if you do decide to walk there.

Judith Field

Totteridge Common, London N20 8LU