56 BOROUGH OF LEWISHAM. 
Volunteer Infantry under Lieut.-Col. the Right Hon. Charles Long 
(of Bromley Hill House). Several officers of the old corps held 
‘commissions in the new regiment, and others joined, including 
Mr. S. C. Brandram, of Lee. In 1810 a corps of Local Militia was 
formed at Blackheath under Lieut.-Colonel Sir T. Maryon Wilson, 
Bart. With the final overthrow of Napoleon at Waterloo the 
need for these local efforts ceased, and the corps were disbanded. 
Up to this period Lewisham maintained its old rural character, 
but the population had gradually increased from about 2,000 in 
Colfe’s days, with 500 houses, to 4,000 in 1801, with about 
700 houses. Of these about 120 were round Sydenham Common, 
about 40 at Southend, and over 100 on and around Blackheath. 
It was in the time of the fourth Earl of Dartmouth, who succeeded 
to the title in 1810 and died in 1853, that the place began to grow 
jnto a London suburb. In 1810 an Act of Parliament was obtained 
for enclosing all the common and waste ground in the parish, 
except Blackheath, together with the Lammas or half-year lands, 
containing about 350 acres. This was following the course which 
was going on all over the country. The old open field system, 
which worked well enough in the Middle Ages, was found to be 
inconvenient with the altered conditions and ideas of the 19th 
century. One cannot but regret that a portion at least of Sydenham 
Common, for which Colfe had striven so strenuously, was not left 
as an open space. This has, however, been remedied in recent 
years to a small extent by the formation of Wells Park on the 
upper slopes of Sydenham Hill. 
The opening of the North Kent Railway to Lewisham and 
Blackheath in 1849 and of the Mid Kent Line to Ladywell and 
Lower Sydenham in 1857, brought a great influx of population, 
and consequent- building’ in their train, -whilst the erection of 
Hither Green Station on the main line in 1895 has led to a con- 
siderable town being built on what was the Earl of St. German’s 
estate in that part of the parish. Under the London Government 
Act of 1899 Lewisham and Lee were united and formed into a 
Metropolitan Borough, and the population is now 152,000. 
The old manorial rights and customs have gradually dis- 
appeared, or have been transferred to the Police Courts, the 
County and Borough Councils, and other bodies, as will be more 
fully explained in another chapter, but the Court Leet is still held 
yearly at the ‘‘Green Man,” and solemnly elects a jury, with con- 
stables, aletasters, common drivers, pound keepers and appraisors, 
and duly declares all who have not done ‘‘suit and service” 
as amerced in the sum of 1s. It is to be hoped that this relic of 
Lewisham of the past may yet long continue, for it carries us back 
in an unbroken chain to the local assemblies of the days of 
Leof-sunu and of Elfrida. It reminds us of the rise and fall of the 
feudal system, the decay of which has led by many steps to the 
gradual emancipation of the people as they became fitted for the 
change, to their present position as a self-governing community. 
