Mr Brand's Cavern

Chalk mining and sand extraction to the north side of the Blackheath Hill roadway was disrupted (although not stopped) in 1751 when "the Crown proceeded against Morden College, to restrain the trustees from granting leases to dig for sand and chalk under Maidenstone Hill". Leases previously granted (illegally as it turns out) to three enthusiastic excavators (Messrs Harding, Steers, and Hatch and Nightingale) had expired in 1734. Whether sand and chalk extraction continued after 1751 is unknown - it would have depended on how brazen and unscrupulous the diggers were, as well as exactly when the original leases granted by Sir William Boreman were shown in court to have been illegal. Ultimately it wasn't until 1771 that concrete legislation was enacted that explicitly stated "no sand or chalk [to be] carried off the waste".

Click for larger version (303k 856 x 1154)

The name of Steers always seems to be tied to the Blackheath Cavern, even though there is no documentary evidence whatsoever that the Steers family ever set foot in it. In any event the characteristics of the Blackheath Cavern galleries are those of two or three centuries earlier; it was already long disused in Steers' era . All that is certain is that Steers was fined for undermining the King's highway - no inference should be drawn from that regarding how prolific a tunneller he was. Harding or Hatch and Nightingale are just as likely to have been carving out galleries in the chalk without keeping any plans of their activities - the root of the problem we face today, exemplified by Winn's Chalk Mine, which is almost certainly the work of one of the three above-mentioned operators.

Galleries in the chalk were open in the vicinity of Maidenstone Hill before the rediscovery of the Blackheath Cavern; we know this because of the 1751 court case in which the Crown took action against Morden College; Mr Brand, for Morden College, suggested that the excavations under Maidenstone Hill "might puzzle future antiquaries". There is no evidence that he was referring specifically to the Blackheath Cavern, although if he was, that means that the Cavern was already open in 1751, thirty years before its official "rediscovery". Just how many times can the Cavern be rediscovered? It's just as likely that Brand was talking about other accessible chalk galleries nearby. Incidentally, there is a small chance that Brand's comment is from the 1771 Exchequer Court case, which nevertheless would still prove the existence of open chalk mine galleries nine years before the Cavern "rediscovery"; Hasted is frustatingly vague in the chronology.

Previous commentators have misread this page of Hasted, failing to notice that Brand's suggestion that the chalk excavations would puzzle future antiquaries was made at least nine years before the Cavern's 1780 "rediscovery" and probably thirty years before it. This is a critically important detail. Further research may be able to tighten up the exact date of Brand's statement.

The page above from Hasted mentions in passing the Commissioners of Greenwich Hospital asking the Crown Officers for help to prevent damage to the conduits on Primrose Hill (now Vanbrugh Hill) and Conduit Vale (now Hyde Vale) - both caused by ballast digging.