Balham
Balham is a district in south London within the London Borough of Wandsworth. The settlement features in the Domesday Book as Belgeham. Bal means ‘rounded enclosure’ and ham a homestead, village or river enclosure. The area has been settled since Saxon times, and Balham Hill and Balham High Road follow the line of the Roman road Stane Street to Chichester.
Balham encompasses the A24 north of Tooting Bec plus the roads coming off it. The southern part of Balham which is near Tooting Bec features a block of 1930s Art Deco flats called Du Cane Court. There is also the Heaver Estate which can be found in Tooting, which comprises substantial houses. It was constructed in the grounds of the old Bedford Hill House by local Victorian builder Alfred Heaver.
Balham lies amongst 4 south London commons, namely Clapham Common to the north, Wandsworth Common to the west, Tooting Graveney Common to the south along with the connecting Tooting Bec to the east.
In WW2, on 14th October 1940, Balham tube station was badly damaged by air raids on London. Men and women sheltered in the tube station during the raids, but a bomb fell in the High Road and through the rooftop of the Underground station, bursting a water and gas mains and killing around 64 people. Ian McEwan describes the event in his novel ‘Atonement’, published in 2001.
