THREAD/ Greetings one and all - welcome to SE London on what is yet another stunning day here in the suburbs. Sadly, this is going to be final one of our virtual walks but worry not, as there will be other cunning plans in place to keep us occupied from next week. We're standing

by the Royal Standard pub, very much a local landmark which has given its name to this area at the top of Westcombe Hill on the eastern side of Blackheath. Any of you that have run the London Marathon might recognise this as the first of many pubs that you pass on your trek.

If you look on the opposite side of the road, you will see a post-war parade of shops called Stratheden Parade. Unfortunately, this attracted the attention of the Luftwaffe on 9 October 1940, when one of the shops was destroyed but then on 21 June 1944, the whole parade was..

devastated by a V-1 Buzz Bomb, that caused 20 people to receive serious injuries but happily, none fatally. In the accompanying photograph, you can just the top of the Royal Standard appearing above the ruins of the shops. We'll now set off on our walk and will proceed a short..

distance along Charlton Road and pause outside Bernard's Club, where we see an innocuous looking green wooden door by the bus stop. Closer inspection in the car park reveals this to be a surviving ARP Wardens' Post, in this case the former "Park 20" post of the Greenwich Wardens'

Service. The car park level has been raised over the years, hence the slightly odd look to the building on this side but the door reveals the true height, as does the contemporary newspaper article about the network of posts constructed across the borough. These were a fairly...

standard design and the photo shows a group of wardens outside their post in neighbouring Lewisham. We'll cross the road now and take a short detour to Invicta Road School, a modern primary school, the predecessor of which was once Station 54X of the Auxiliary Fire Service.

In common with most schools in London, the children of Invicta School had been evacuated in 1939 and the vacant buildings were in use by the Fire Brigade. on 13 September 1940, a HE bomb had fallen through the roof of the school but had failed to explode. Fireman Arthur Grant had

picked up the bomb and carried it, with great difficulty out to the playground, where it was then covered with sandbags, after which it subsequently exploded. For this act of extreme bravery, Fireman Grant was awarded the George Medal, which was gazetted on 12 November 1940.

However, on 14 November 1940, the school was devastated by a Parachute Mine, which almost completely destroyed the school buildings. Because this was a hitherto quiet night in London - it was the same night as the Coventry Raid - the firemen were all at their station, awaiting..

their first "shout" of the night. Sadly, 12 firemen and 3 local civilians, including the school caretaker lost their lives that night, one of whom was Fireman Arthur Grant, who never had the chance to collect his George Medal, which he so richly deserved. Today, a plaque donated

by the wonderful Firemen Remembered charity commemorates the men and woman who lost their lives on this fateful night. The adjacent Siebert Road was also devastated, late in the war by a V-2 rocket on 8 March 1945, which killed 3, destroyed 20 houses + seriously damaged 200 more.

We'll now continue along Charlton Road and will pause outside the Rectory Field, home of Blackheath Cricket & Rugby Clubs and one of the many former out-grounds of Kent County Cricket Club. During WW2, in common with many open spaces, the field was home to anti-aircraft guns and

a legacy of this can be seen in the garden of the white painted house to the left of entrance, which is now a dental surgery. The house and the one next door had been requisitioned by the Army for the use of the gun crews and a substantial air raid shelter for their use remains..

in the garden, although sadly it is full of furniture and cannot be accessed at present.We'll continue walking along Charlton Road but will take a slight detour into Marlborough Lane, where another legacy of our wartime past can still be seen from the road.

Several of the houses have fences made from recycled ARP stretchers. These were mass-produced in anticipation of expected casualties from bombing but fortunately, the majority of them were never required and post-war, many were used to replace wrought iron railings that had been

sacrificed for the war effort. In case there are any doubters (one woman on a walk accused me of spreading fake news about these stretchers), a contemporary photograph is attached which shows a stretcher in it's intended use! We now take a sharp left into Sutlej Road and then..

right into Canberra Road, before taking a left into Hornfair Road, where we see the magnificent Jacobean Manor of Charlton House on our right, built in 1607-1612 to the design of John Thorpe for Sir Adam Newton and tutor to Prince Henry, elder son of King James I. Sadly, Henry..

died almost as soon as the house was completed and upon Newton's death in 1629, the house was sold eventually becoming the home of the Maryon-Wilson family. During the Great War, the house was requisitioned for use as a military hospital and after the war, was purchased outright

by Greenwich Council for use as a library and borough museum. The house is now owned by Royal Greenwich Heritage Trust as a Community Centre and wedding venue. On 25 January 1945, the house was "near missed" by a V-2 rocket which nonetheless, demolished much of the Chapel Wing..

and although repairs were effected after the war, material shortages meant that non-matching bricks had to be used and today, this gives a vital clue as to where the repairs were undertaken. In the grounds also sits an attractive Summer House, which is (optimistically) said to be

the work of Inigo Jones. This was seriously damaged by the blast from the V-2, with one wall shored-up but as with the main house, was subsequently repaired after the war, seeing many years humble service as a public toilet. It is currently awaiting refurbishment for hopefully a

more noble use. The basement of the Summer House was one earmarked for use as an Air Raid Shelter for 40 people but it had fallen out of use as such by the time of the V-2 attack. The entrance can still be seen clearly. We will now exit the park and pause on the wide pavement..

opposite St Luke's Church, which dates from 1630, although a church has stood on this site since 1077. The church tower can be seen from the Thames and was once a navigational landmark for ships on the river and as such, the church is entitled to fly the pre-1800 Naval Ensign,

on St Luke's and St George's Days. The church tower was also used for ARP Firewatching duties during WW2 and my Grandfather, William Henry Beresford (seen here in his Army days) was frequently stationed here in this role. As we walk into Charlton Village, we pause opposite the..

White Swan pub, now recently and sadly closed but once my local. If you study the two photographs, you'll notice that the earlier image shows the pub with an ornate attic area. This was lost on 17 October 1940 when a HE bomb hit the Siemen's Social Club (next door beyond the pub)

the blast from which partially destroyed the upper part of the pub. When repairs were undertaken, this was demolished, leaving the pub with its slightly truncated look today. We'll now turn left from The Village into Fairfield Grove and pause at the junction with Charlton Lane..

by an unassuming apartment block by the name of St Paul's Close. This gives us a clue to the former use of the land, for on this site once stood St Paul's Church, which dated from 1867 and which has the sad distinction of being the first church in London to have been destroyed by

enemy bombing. This came on 4 September 1940, before the "official" start of the Blitz, when at 21:40 a single aircraft came in at low level and dropped a bomb which fell squarely on the church, which was destroyed. There were no casualties but the church was deemed beyond repair

The following day, large crowds came from across London to view the sad spectacle but the novelty of such sights was soon to wear off. Some artefacts were salvaged from the church and transferred to nearby St Luke's. We now head down Charlton Lane + turn left into Harvey Gardens.

We pass behind the "Covered End" (seen at the far end of the photos) of The Valley, home of Charlton Athletic FC, which was hit on 16 October 1940, passing through the roof of the Covered End. The repairs to the roof were visible for many years afterwards. The photos show a...

spotter in place high on the terracing and at the first sight of an enemy aircraft, he would wave his flag so that the referee could suspend the game, with the crowd expected to shelter beneath the stands or to make their way to any nearby public shelter. One shelter that was..

nearby, were these arches beneath the railway at Ransom Road. They were extended with a brick/concrete structure and could accommodate 80 people. Another public shelter was located nearby in Charlton Lane and this gives us the opportunity to look at another act of extreme bravery

that took place here. On 8 December 1940, a row of houses in Charlton Lane was demolished by a HE bomb, trapping five people inside. A Rescue Squad under the command of Albert William Brittan was soon on the scene and Brittan entered the ruins. Crawling through the rubble, he..

located a baby and brought it out to safety. He then went back in and freed the baby's mother and carried her to safety. Going back in once more, he rescued a further person and recovered the body of another. Whilst doing this, the roof of the next door house collapsed and almost

buried him but undeterred, he carried on and released another man who was pinned down by floor joists. Brittan spent almost five hours in the ruined buildings with no regard for his own safety. Brittan, who lived in Deptford and who had been a bus conductor before the war, was..

awarded the George Medal for his incredible bravery. Sadly, I haven't yet been able to locate a photograph of this brave man but his citation in The Times of 26 April 1941 is shown below. We now continue along Floyd Road and turn right into Charlton Church Lane towards our final