Highgate
Highgate | |
Highgate seen from Hampstead Heath |
|
|
|
OS grid reference | |
---|---|
London borough | Camden |
Haringey | |
Islington | |
Ceremonial county | Greater London |
Region | London |
Country | England |
Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
Post town | LONDON |
Postcode district | N6 |
Dialling code | 020 |
Police | Metropolitan |
Fire | London |
Ambulance | London |
EU Parliament | London |
UK Parliament | Holborn and St Pancras |
London Assembly | Barnet and Camden |
Enfield and Haringey | |
North East | |
|
Highgate ( or ) is a suburban area of north London at the north-eastern corner of Hampstead Heath, 4.5 miles (7.2 km) north north-west of Charing Cross.
Highgate is one of the most expensive London suburbs in which to live.[1] It has an active conservation body, the Highgate Society, to protect its character.
Until late Victorian times it was a distinct village outside London, sitting astride the main road to the north. The area retains many green expanses including the eastern part of Hampstead Heath, three ancient woods,[2] Waterlow Park and the eastern-facing slopes known as Highgate bowl.
At its centre is Highgate village, a collection of largely
- Use dmy dates from September 2015
- Use British English from September 2015
- Articles needing additional references from May 2010
- All articles needing additional references
- Articles with OS grid coordinates
- Coordinates not on Wikidata
- Articles needing additional references from June 2015
- Districts of Haringey
- Districts of Camden
- Districts of Islington
- Areas of London
- Highgate
Section 11: | Capital Ring Walking Route | Section 12: |
---|---|---|
Hendon Park | Highgate | Stoke Newington |
|
|
- The Highgate Society
- Comprehensive details about Highgate
External links
- ^ Daily Telegraph: Highgate trumps Chelsea as priciest postcode
- ^ Walk London: Capital Ring Section 11, Hendon Park to Highgate
- ^ Visit London: Highgate village
- ^ Upstairs at the Gatehouse (theatre company)
- ^ BBC Crimewatch - Michael Williams Murder
- ^ Paddy Hitler, 26 Priory Gardens, N6, The Times, 15 December 2007
- ^ The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, James Gillman, Reprinted by BiblioBAZAAR, LLC, 2008, ISBN 978-0-554-32226-1
- ^ Internet Movie Database: filming in Highgate
References
See also
- Highgate's historic feel - in particular the gothic atmosphere of its cemetery - has provided the backdrop to a considerable number of films, including Hammer Horror films of the 1970s and, more recently, Shaun of the Dead and Dorian Gray.[8]
- A famous scene in pantomime is set in Highgate. Dick Whittington and His Cat are characters in an English story adapted to the stage in 1605, which since the 19th century has become one of the most popular pantomime subjects, very loosely based on the historical Richard Whittington, a medieval Lord Mayor of London. Dick, a boy from a poor family in Gloucestershire, walks to London to make his fortune, accompanied by his cat. He meets with little success there. As Dick and cat are making for home, discouraged, by way of Highgate Hill, they hear the Bow Bells from distant London; Dick believes they are sending him a message to "turn again" - and that he will become Lord Mayor of London. They return; Dick makes his fortune and indeed becomes Lord Mayor. The Whittington Hospital on Highgate Hill is named after the story, and a statue of Dick's faithful pet stands nearby.
- "London Song" by Ray Davies: "If you're ever up on Highgate Hill on a clear day, You can see right down to Leicester Square". The cover shoot for the 1971 Kinks album Muswell Hillbillies took place in various locations around Highgate. The back inset on the original album cover showed the band on the traffic island that used to stand on the intersection of Southwood Lane and Castle Yard. The cover for their 1968 album Village Green Preservation Society was photographed on Parliament Hill, with Highgate as the backdrop.
- "Waterlow" by Mott the Hoople, from their 1971 album Wildlife, is a tribute to Highgate's Waterlow Park.
- Rod Stewart sings about his Highgate upbringing in "Highgate Shuffle", from the live album Unplugged... and Seated.
- In the song "Cross-Eyed Mary" by Jethro Tull, the title character is referred to as the "Robin Hood of Highgate".
- The pub tradition of Swearing on the Horns originated in Highgate.
- In Dickens' novel David Copperfield James Steerforth lives in a house at the top of Highgate West Hill.
- In the popular BBC sitcom, Are You Being Served, Mr. Lucas (played by Trevor Bannister) lives in Highgate.
- Un lieu incertain, a book by French novelist Fred Vargas, picks up the urban legend of the "Highgate Vampire".
In popular culture
In 1817 the poet, aesthetic philosopher and critic Samuel Taylor Coleridge came to live in the Highgate home of Dr James Gillman in order to rehabilitate from his desperate opium addiction.[7] After Dr Gillman built a special wing for the poet, Coleridge lived there for the rest of his life, becoming known as the sage of Highgate. While here some of his most famous poems, though written years earlier, were first published including "Kubla Khan". His literary autobiography, Biographia Literaria, appeared in 1817. His home became a place of pilgrimage for figures such as Carlyle and Emerson. He died there on 25 July 1834 and is buried in the crypt of St Michael's Church. The writer J. B. Priestley subsequently lived in the same house.
Coleridge
Siouxsie and the Banshees' bassist Steven Severin was born and brought up there.
In Victorian times St Mary Magdalene House of Charity in Highgate was a refuge for former prostitutes - "fallen women" - where Christina Rossetti was a volunteer from 1859 to 1870. It may have inspired her best-known poem, Goblin Market.
Peter Sellers lived as a boy in a cottage in Muswell Hill Road, where his mother had moved in order to send him to the Catholic St Aloysius Boys' School in Hornsey Lane.
A blue plaque on a house at the top of North Hill notes that Charles Dickens stayed there in 1832, when he was 20 years old.
Many notable alumni have passed through Highgate School, either Masters or indeed Old Cholmeleians, the name given to old boys of the school. These include T.S. Eliot, who taught the poet laureate John Betjeman there, Gerard Manley Hopkins the poet, the composers John Taverner and John Rutter, John Venn the inventor of Venn diagrams, actor Geoffrey Palmer, Anthony Crosland MP and Labour reformer, and the cabinet minister Charles Clarke.
The MP for the Hampstead and Highgate constituency since 1992 has been Labour's Glenda Jackson. It is now part of the Hampstead and Kilburn constituency, formed at the 2010 general election. Lynne Featherstone is the Liberal Democrat MP for the Hornsey and Wood Green constituency, which covers the northern half of Highgate village. The Boundary Commission report of 2003 recommended separating the Camden part of Highgate from the remainder of its present constituency and joining it with Kentish Town and Holborn to the south.
- Adjacent to Angela Georgina Burdett-Coutts.
- Between 1930 and 1939, the wife and son of Adolf Hitler's half-brother, Alois, lived in Highgate, before moving to the United States. Bridget and Patrick Hitler lived at 26 Priory Gardens.[6]
- Leslie Compton, formerly an Arsenal footballer and a Middlesex cricketer, owned a pub in Highgate after he retired from sports.
- Former Newcastle United striker Nile Ranger was born in Highgate.
- Rock star Rod Stewart was born and raised in Highgate.
Jacob Bronowski, Sir Ralph Richardson, Christina Rossetti, Sir Sidney Nolan, Alexander Litvinenko, Malcolm McLaren, Radclyffe Hall and Joseph Wolf.
Notable inhabitants
The case remains unsolved despite being featured heavily in the national press and on BBC TV's Crimewatch programme.[5]
On Friday 26 August 1988, Michael Williams, a 43-year-old father from Highgate who worked for the Home Office in Pimlico, disappeared whilst travelling back home after an employee social. His body was found at Highgate Wood the next day. His killer has never been found.
Modern notoriety
- For details of education in the Haringey portion of Highgate see the London Borough of Haringey article.
Education
The name of the village is commonly ; however, the London Underground in announcements at Highgate tube station uses the alternative pronunciation of , where the final syllable matches the last syllable in "frigate".
Pronunciation
- Highgate Cemetery
- Highgate School
- Highgate Wood
- Jacksons Lane
- Kenwood House
- Highpoint I and II
- Athlone House formally known as Caen Wood Towers - (Home of the RAF Intelligence School 1942-48)
- Archway Bridge
- Furnival House
- St Michael's Church
Highgate is known for its pubs which line the old high street and surrounding streets. Some notable favourites are the Angel, the Flask, the Duke's Head and the Wrestlers.
Places of interest
Nearest tube stations
Nearest places
Transport and locale
Like much of London, Highgate suffered damage during World War II by German air raids. The local tube station was used as a bomb shelter.
Highgate Hill, the steep street linking Archway (traditionally called part of Upper Holloway) and Highgate village, was the route of the first cable car to be built in Europe. It operated between 1884 and 1909.
The area north of the High Street and Hampstead Lane was part of Hornsey parish and also later the Municipal Borough of Hornsey and the seat of that borough's governing body for many years.
Hampstead Lane and Highgate Hill contain the red brick Victorian buildings of Highgate School and its adjacent Chapel of St Michael. The school has played a paramount role in the life of the village and has existed on its site since its founding was permitted by letters patent from Queen Elizabeth I in 1565.
In later centuries Highgate was associated with the highwayman Dick Turpin.
Historically, Highgate adjoined the Bishop of London's hunting estate. The bishop kept a toll-house where one of the main northward roads out of London entered his land. A number of pubs sprang up along the route, one of which, the Gatehouse, commemorates the toll-house.

History
Contents
- History 1
-
Transport and locale 2
- Nearest places 2.1
- Nearest tube stations 2.2
- Places of interest 2.3
- Pronunciation 3
- Education 4
- Modern notoriety 5
-
Notable inhabitants 6
- Coleridge 6.1
- In popular culture 7
- See also 8
- References 9
- External links 10
The area is divided between three London boroughs: Haringey in the north, Camden in the south and west, and Islington in the south and east. The postal district is N6.
The village is at the top of a hill which provides views across London: it is 446 feet (136 m) above sea level at its highest point.
is buried. Karl Marx in which the Communist philosopher cemetery Victorian buildings. Highgate is also famous for its atmospheric Highpoint's 1930s Berthold Lubetkin and [4] arts centre housed in a Grade II listed former church, the Gatehouse Inn dating from 1670Jacksons Lane (1565), Highgate School interspersed with diverse landmarks such as St Michael's Church and steeple, St. Joseph's Church and its green copper dome, [3]