West Hendon

West Hendon is a place in the London Borough of Barnet.

West Hendon was a settlement within that part of the ancient parish of Hendon known as the Hyde, and is now a part of the London Borough of Barnet. It was formally known, from 1878–1890, as New Hendon, a small railway development on the Edgware Road. Before the 1830s there were three farms, Upper and Lower Guttershedge (east of the road) and Cockman’s in the Wood (west of the road) and an inn, The Welsh Harp. Between 1835 and 1838, the Brent Reservoir was constructed by damming the Brent and the Silk brooks and flooding much of Cockman’s Farm. The water was used to supply the Grand Union Canal. At its greatest extent, in 1853, it covered 400 acres (1.6 km²) but was dramatically reduced to 195 acres (789,000 m²) in the 1890s. Subsequently it has been reduced to 110 acres (445,000 m²). It contains enough water to fill 3 million baths and in 1991 was believed to contain 10,000 lb (4,500 kg) of fish. The residue of Cockman’s Farm became Woodfield House, home to the Roman Catholic Passioist Fathers (1852 and 1858). The house was demolished in 1940 and the site used by the Borough of Hendon and its successor the London Borough of Barnet as a plant nursery.

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