Maldon's King Street and Queen Street streets - a history

There are thousands of them across the country, their generic titles representing successive English monarchs. Although they are common enough, thanks to the unique nature of their generations of residents – the people that lived (and still live) in them - each has a special, human, social history.

Maldon is no exception and has both a King Street (stretching from Warwick Drive down to Cross Road) as well as a Queen’s Street (linking the top end of King Street with Wantz Road) and even a Queen’s Avenue (which branches off King Street and connects with Manse Chase).

Look at the Ordnance Survey for 1873 and, what would become Queen Street, is called Essex Place. King Street has housing on its east side, but very little on the west and there is no sign of Queen’s Avenue.

Twenty-four years later, in 1897, Essex Place has become Queen Street (probably in recognition of Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee) and both sides of King Street have been developed.

Fast forward to the 1922 OS and the layout of King and Queen Streets and Queen’s Avenue look pretty much in plan as they do now – like an inverted ‘Z’ with a tail.

According to surviving deeds in the Essex Record Office, the majority of the building in King and Queen Streets peeked between 1878 and 1900.

Queen Street in the early 1900s (by permission Kevin Fuller) (Image: by permission Kevin Fuller)

In 1873 there were only eight houses in Queen Street (aka Essex Place), clustered on the corner of King Street. The rest was open land, orchards and a market-garden nursery.

By 1897 the older parts of then re-named Queen Street looked similar to how they do today (except a Salvation Army Mission Room stood where George Tyres is now). The Trades Directories list Joseph Coult, bill poster and town crier, living at number 1 (in 1896), Charles Pulford, a florist, at number 5 (1899), and Ronald Matthams, builder, at 13 (1906).

On the south side the Sherling family, builders, were at 18 (1906), and John Rivers, corn dealer, was at 20 (1899).

Turning into the long and narrow King Street, we find a by-way of contrasts – of yellow and red brick, of terraces, semis, detached and sub-divided properties.

There were at one time no fewer than four shops here. Mrs Proctor had her business at number 31, and 49 was successively with the Eves and the Clarks.

I remember that latter shop well (in the Seventies, when the Fristons had it). The Brooke Bond Tea sign is a reminder of that once thriving grocers.

On the other side of the Street, James Allaker was at 18 (1899), and Charles Coe had his sweet shop at number 12 (1910).

Other residents included shipping agent Joseph Knight at number 10 (1899), music teacher Thomas Beardmore at 36 (1906), and Heywood Rush at 67 (1906).

At the Cross Road end, the once extensive walled garden of Acacia Villa (at 22 Cross Road) wrapped around the corner and has since been partly replaced by two modern properties (69 and 71).

The old shop at 49 King Street (Image: Stephen Nunn)

The relatively short Queen’s Avenue has dated buildings at number 9 Avenue Cottage, built in 1899, and number 11, 1903 (constructed by and for W Sherling).

The curiously named ‘Zareba’ is at 13 – an Arabic word for a 'protected campsite'. The rest of the plots in Queen’s Avenue seem to have emerged later – during the 1920s.and 30s.

The overall picture of life in those three royal roads during the late Victorian and early Edwardian periods is one of upper-working to middle class residency.

The Bentall Empire bought up some of the houses for their workers and managers, but just like the activities of that local employer, life would be turned upside down as a result of the “Great Catastrophe” – the war of 1914-18.

Maldon men answered the call and, by the time of the armistice, some would not return home.

The royal roads were no exception. George Gridley Jnr, the son of George and Sarah, of 16 Queen Street, was killed in action on June 20, 1917.

Edwin Hatley’s mum and step-father lived at number 3 and he died during the Battle of Vimy Ridge on April 9, 1917.

And Joseph Parent, killed on December 2, 1917, wouldn’t return to his wife at number 12.

Three Queen Street fatalities in just eight months.

In King Street those that died for the King included Ernest Bacon of 2a, who left Mabel a widow on October 6, 1918.

Harry Chapman’s parents were left grieving at number 40 when they heard of his death (aged just 19) on September 29, 1918. Charles Ford’s parents, likewise, at 17 King Street on April 27, 1915, and Alfred Gozzett’s wife at 27 on May 7, 1917.

All of those men and their families once called the roads home and were part of their tight-knit community.

Life went on as it always does.

New people moved in and today the rhythm of life in the royal roads continues But as well as being their current homes, I hope that the residents (and those who pass by) remember how it all started and the human sacrifice from this part of Maldon during that ill-termed “war to end all wars”.