64 BOROUGH OF LEWISHAM. 
The immense quantity of gravel which has been taken from 
the Heath at various periods has resulted in the surface being con- 
siderably broken, not altogether a disadvantage. Part of the 
gravel so removed is said to have been used as ballast for the 
colliers returning to the Tyne, and it may, we are told, be seen on 
the banks of that river, a reminiscence of the days before the 
advent of the steamboat. That the diggings were sometimes not 
devoid of danger, we are reminded by an entry in the burial register 
of 1741, of ‘* John Davies, killed by a fall into the sandpitt, Black- 
heath.” 
The dangers to which travellers were exposed in crossing the 
Heath have been referred to. These appear to have reached such 
a pitch in 1753, that the inhabitants of the neighbourhood sub- 
scribed to suppress the lawlessness, offering rewards for the 
conviction of highwaymen, footpads, and house-breakers. Not- 
withstanding this the newspapers of the time are evidence that 
matters did not improve, although occasionally the rufhans were 
brought to justice. The following from a newspaper of 21st July, 
1759, may be taken as a sample :— 
‘*Tuesday morning, 17th, about 10 o’clock, a highwayman, 
well mounted, robbed three gentlemen’s coaches on Blackheath, 
in the last of which was Mr. Morris, etc., from whom he took two 
guineas, a purse, and then made off. As soon as he had turned his 
back, Mr. Morris ordered the coachman to take the horses off, one 
of which he mounted, and the coachman the other, and went in 
pursuit. They followed him to Dartford, and found him drinking 
in a booth at the camp, where they apprehended him, and brought 
him to Mr. Birches, the ‘Green Man,’ on Blackheath. On searching 
him they found a brace of pistols, loaded each with a brace of balls, 
a hat and a piece of stocking sewed to it for a mask, a watch, eleven 
guineas, some silver, a pair of silver buckles, and two Spanish 
pieces. He says his name is Sam Walker, alias Jack of the Green, 
and that he belonged to the ‘ Blenheim,’ man-of-war. He was 
known to have been a post-boy on the Kentish Road. On Tuesday 
night he was secured in the cage at Greenwich, and next day com- 
mitted to Maidston goal.” 
A further association was mooted in 1792, at a meeting of the 
inhabitants. Relatives of the late Dr. Bramley, going to Paris in 
1816, drove across the Heath with pistol pointed on the driver, 
whom they suspected of wishing to land them in the arms of con- 
federates lurking in the gorse. 
The gradual extension of buildings round the Heath, the 
destruction of the gorse, and the better police arrangements of the 
1gth century, slowly eliminated the highwayman, and removed the 
last remnant of uncomfortable romance from the neighbourhood. 
The present area of the Heath is 267 acres, and that of Green- 
wich Park 185 acres in addition, the whole of the latter being in 
the Parish of Greenwich. The boundary between the two parishes, 
starting from the Ravensbourne at the Silk Mills, passes up Morden 
