Great North Wood

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The Great North Wood was a large natural oak woodland that sat to the southeast of central London along the Norwood Ridge. At its biggest, it stretched from near Croydon in the south to Camberwell in the north. It included clearings that became hamlets like Penge and Dulwich, and over time the area was reduced. Today about 20 small sections still survive as woodlands, including Dulwich Wood, Sydenham Hill Wood, Biggin Wood, and Beaulieu Heights.

Place names keep the memory of the wood alive. Modern areas with Norwood in their name—South Norwood, Upper Norwood, and West Norwood (formerly Lower Norwood)—show its old spread. Other nearby names such as Woodside, Forest Hill, Honor Oak, and Penge (meaning “edge of wood”) reflect the area’s woodland past.

History and use: The wood is mentioned in records from 1272. It was owned by the Whitehorse family during King Edward III’s reign. When Oliver Cromwell took it from the Archbishop of Canterbury, the area covered about 830 acres and had around 9,200 oak trees.

People used the wood to get valuable resources. They coppiced oaks and hornbeams to produce timber, charcoal, oak bark, and small wood. Large oak trees supplied timber for ships at Deptford, and oak bark was sent to Bermondsey to tan leather. The charcoal industry burned wood in conical kilns under the direction of collier​s. Charcoal was an important fuel for bakeries and cooking, especially after King Edward I banned coal from the north-east because of smoke.

Notable trees and boundaries: The Vicar’s Oak marked the boundary of four old parishes—Lambeth, Camberwell, Croydon, and a part of Battersea near Penge. Its location is now at the Crystal Palace Park crossroads of Westow Hill and Anerley Hill. It stood for centuries, with some accounts saying it survived until about 1825. Another famous tree was the Question Oak at Westwood, associated with stories told by Charles Spurgeon.

Decline and change: By 1745 the wood was narrower and much land had been converted to common land or sold off for private use. The 1797 Croydon Inclosure Act and subsequent sales in the early 1800s accelerated the loss of the woodland. Victorian development and the opening of The Crystal Palace site helped transform the area, replacing many woods and gardens with houses and parkland.

A few early notes: Samuel Pepys wrote about gypsies visiting the woods in 1668. Daniel Defoe described Norwood as very woody near London in 1722. A hermit known as Matthews the hairyman lived in a cave in the wood around 1802.

Conservation today: In 2017, the London Wildlife Trust began a Living Landscape project funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund to celebrate and restore the Great North Wood. The project extended to 2023 and focused on improving 13 woods, including Dulwich Wood, Sydenham Hill Wood, Biggin Wood, Beaulieu Heights, and Crystal Palace Park, along with other local reserves.