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Home , Abbey Wood, Beckenham Place Park, Charlton cemetery, Chinbrook, Chislehurst, Chislehurst Caves

Geology and Landscape Strata of the Age in This guide introduces you to million the best geological sites on Clay at about 53 million years old lies under most Green Chain years of London. In the southeast, erosion has peeled away Submerged Forest 4000 yrs the Green Chain. much of it so we can peer into older strata beneath. Brickearth 400-100,000 yrs Predominant are the rounded black pebbles of Gravel c.2 Each point on the map highlights a particular geological Blackheath beds forming the plateau between Blackheath 48 milion years of erosion feature to illustrate conditions from 350 million years or no deposition when and . There are many places where this plateau is cut the area was land ago to the present. If you want to learn more about by rivers, exposing even older strata. At the Gilbert’s Pit these features and the massive forces of nature that quarry you can see the older rocks of the beds created them, they are brought to life in a fascinating and Thanet Sand while audio “time trail” that starts from a nearby train station. Caves provides a view of Thanet Sand and even older Chalk. The imported ‘rock face’ at Crystal Palace takes us A trail back about 350 million years. The last 400,000 years has seen many ices ages through time and warmer periods in which Geology on the Green Chain Walk brickearth was deposited, of economic importance in the area for making Claygate beds tidal marine 50

bricks. At Erith, tree trunks from a 4,000 London Clay Marine year old submerged forest can be seen at low tide.

Working together Blackheath Beds Marine 54 The London Geodiversity Partnership Woolwich Beds Estuarine 55 was formed to identify, conserve and Reading Beds Terrestrial interpret geological sites in London. Upnor Beds Marine Some of the sites are protected as Sites Thanet Sand Marine 58 of Special Scientific Interest (Gilbert’s Pit and the Fossil Enclosure). Others 25 million years of erosion have been recommended because of or no deposition when their regional or local importance. We the area was land are working with the Green Chain to interpret these sites for all. Take nothing but pictures We need to conserve our geological

sites for future generations by Chalk 84 respecting them now. Please ‘take nothing but pictures and leave nothing but footprints’. Whatever the time of year, you will find something to delight you. Use the checklist to tick-off the sites you have visited and anything that inspired you on your visit! Erith riverside A trail Woods The South East London Green Chain Common Walk is well served by numerous train through time A journey through 350 million years Charlton stations, so visiting these amazing sites has never been easier. Free maps and audio tracks to listen to Blackheath or download at: www.greenchain.com/timetrails Green Chain Information Line: Place Park 020 8921 5028

All details in this leaflet are believed to be correct at the time of going to press. Whilst every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, the publishers can accept no liability whatsoever for any errors, inaccuracies or omissions, or any matter in any way connected with, or arising from, the publishing of this information.

Sydenham Wells Park Green Chain maps are reproduced from Ordnance Survey material with the permission of Ordnance Survey on behalf of the Controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. Picture Gallery © Crown copyright and database rights 2016 Ordnance Survey 100019695. FREE © Green Chain Working Party 2016 audio Cemetery downloads

Twelve amazing sites to explore along the Green Chain Walk South East London Green Chain: The London Boroughs of , , Royal , and working in partnership to safeguard, enhance and promote the Green Chain open 13184 April2016 spaces for the enjoyment of all. 1. Submerged Forest 2. Fossil Enclosure 3. Pebble Conglomerate Erith is the best place in The Fossil Bed at Lesnes Abbey was The Dog Rocks on for viewing the Neolithic / Bronze Age discovered by William Whitaker in 1872 are named from their shape in silhouette submerged forest. The Thames has only while out walking his dog and observing and formed of cemented Blackheath followed its present course through the the shells thrown out by rabbits at this Pebbles. This part of the common is centre of what became London since location. The fossils are predominantly the floor of a quarry dug before 1866, the great Anglian Ice Age ended 400,000 marine snails and bivalves with probably for sand or pebbles. Springs years ago. The route of the Thames has numerous sharks’ teeth amongst them. rising from loose pebbles can be seen a varied since then and on both banks Occasionally bones and teeth of small little further east along the Green Chain at low tide it is possible to find remains mammals turn up and even the finger- Walk in the Slade Gorge, formed when of forests that used to cover the banks nail-sized hooves of an early member more water was available for erosion between 3,000 and 6,000 years ago, long of the horse family, but most of the at times of colder climate and sparse after the most recent ice age was over. mammals that were living here 55 million vegetation following recent ice ages. Nearest station: Erith years ago are less familiar to us today. Nearest station: Plumstead er Thame Nearest station: Riv s Riverside Crossway Lake

Thames footpath and cycle route

Manorway Crossway Green Beam 4. Handmade Bricks Park Engine Thamesmead After the Great Fire of London in 1666 Crossness EASTERN WAY Nature Reserve (LNR) a law was passed forbidding rebuilding Birchmere Southmere T Park Southmere A2016 h Park a m

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u t A cemetery is a good place for looking e young (less than 100 million years) and Thames footpath and cycle route Capital Ring A206 Woolwich Abbey Wood WOOLWICH ROAD Railway Station at building stones. Typical London Erith for the most part are not hard enough Abbey Ruins 5 Railway Station Abbey Wood Belvedere Maryon Park Plumstead to make a good building stone, so building stones can be seen in the Charlton Gilberts (LNR) Railway Station Franks Park Railway Station Pit (LNR) Woolwich A2041

Road Rd Pembroke Road Lesnes Abbey (LNR) L o New Anglican Chapel and the entrance ROAD n instead the local clay was used to make Plumstead ERITH Erith d Fossil Bed A206 o n Railway Station L Thorntree o Great o Maryon Woolwich p Bartletts Bostall Heath Hurst Wilson Park Pond gates at , but the Woods BOSTALL bricks. The cemetery wall shows typical HILL WOOLWICH ROAD 2 TON PARK ROAD Charlton Road CHARL Erith Long Common Plumstead leagh Riverside main interest lies in the gravestones WICKHAM yellow London stock handmade bricks Winns Bostal Woods Charlton Park Common Lane 4 LANE where different examples of granite Woolwich 1 containing charred remains of ashes Common Plumstead 3 Cemetery ROAD A209 abound, many still looking fresh A207 Open Space added to the Brickearth to aid firing, Hornfair Park Shrewsbury despite their Victorian installation. Park and squelch marks where the clay was Shooters Hill Common SHOOTERS Woodlands Marbles have not fared so well and HILL Farm thrown into the moulds. Severndroog Nunhead 6 Castle Railway Station Lewisham Blackheath BELEGROVE ROAD Nearest station: Woolwich Dockyard it is informative to compare weathering Railway Station Jackwood Oxleas (LNR) Meadows hester W on the different types of stones. The 12 Roc ay A2214 Way Eltham Shepherdleas bed-rock is the 50 million-year old Nunhead Park North Wood 5. A Sand Quarry B219 7. Chalk Caves Peckham Cemetery London Clay with temporary Rye Park This former quarry allows a rare Eltham Chislehurst Caves provide a rare Park South exposures on newly dug graves. B238 opportunity to view geological FOREST opportunity to view unweathered Chalk Rie eld Road Sutclie Capital Ring New Cemetery Park (LNR) Eltham Nearest station: Nunhead HILL exposures 55 million years old. The black Honor BEXLEY in Greater London. When mined the East ROAD Dulwich One Tree Hill ELTHAM ROAD Dulwich HIGH STREET A210 BEXLEY Village B318 Brenchley pebbles of the Blackheath beds and Christ’s Gardens Park Chalk was mainly used on the land or Chapel Camberwell 11. Rock Sculpture Dulwich Old Cemetery Forest Hill the sands and clays of the underlying Park A2216 for building. Now the caves are a tourist

C Eltham Conduit O University L L Horniman Palace Meadows E Campus G Railway Trail Walking the Dog by leading British 11 E Woolwich beds are studied by engineers

R A20 O attraction, open for guided tours all year

A Dulwich D Royal Blackheath Horniman Picture Gallery COMMON Cox’s A205 ROAD Golf Course sculptor, Peter Randall-Page, was DULWICH Middle and geologists for the many engineering Walk Gardens Middle Park Avenue Park Sparrows Lane ROAD long. Geologically one of the main points LONDON ROAD The Tarn FOOTSCRAY Bird Sanctuary HILL ROAD presented by the Art Fund to the Railway Station LANE projects under London. Thanet Sand AVERY of interest is the well-exposed junction Eltham Sydenham Nature Reserve College GREEN Hill Wood was quarried here for to mark its ROAD Sydenham Fairy Hill Nature Park between the eroded top of the Upper Hill A2216 Cemetery COURT Reserve Wood bicentenary in 2011. The three granite Arsenal and for making glass bottles. ROAD Chalk and the Thanet Sand. During the Woodland Southwood Road PARKMottingham Walk (LNR) GROVE Sports Ground boulders (imported from Finland) are Sydenham ROAD Scree now covers the slope and the floor Railway Station A21 time gap of 25 million years between the 10 Wells Park Bell Green A211 Chinbrook Lower Meadows A20 their natural shape, moulded by ice BROMLEY Marvels is covered by war-time rubble so it is not Wood two layers, and many other C ROAD RYST SYDENHAM ROAD Crystal 4 AL P Marvels as they were transported by glaciers ALAC possible to see the Thanet Sand or the E Wood Palace PARK animals and plants became extinct.

Park ROAD Alexandra Downham Elmstead Wood and deposited far from their origin as Recreation Chalk beneath. Ground Beckenham New Street Hill Nearest station: Chislehurst East Place Park (LNR) HILL Stumps ‘erratics’ when the ice sheets melted. Norwood 9 Railway Station Chislehurst West Nearest station: Charlton Capital Ring Hill LANE ASH Cator Road 8 BROMLEY Elmstead Lane Lennard Chislehurst Nearest station: West Dulwich PENGE Road BURNT Caves ROAD HILL Park Avenue 8. Rivers and Springs H IGH Thicket Road Prickend END Plaistow Warren STREET Cator 7 Pond Park London

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SOUTH Elstree Lane The runs through Avenue 6. A Pebble Pit A2212 Chislehurst Hall Hill Ravensbourne Railway Station A208

Kings Railway Station 10. Spring Wells A21 . The stream Eliot Pit is located on the southwest Sydenham Wells was once a spa visited A214 9. Geological Strata rising at Ceasar’s Well in corner of the Blackheath plateau. by the rich and famous. The water in Crystal Palace is famous for its models Common joins the main Ravensbourne Rumour has it that the open space that the shallow wells is rich in magnesium of dinosaurs and other beasts created at Bromley and flows into the Thames is Blackheath is so-named as victims of sulphate and was compared to Epsom in the 1850s at a time when many at . Rainfall on the North the Black Death are buried there. In fact Salts. It has a strong and unpleasant of them were newly discovered. The Downs soaks into the Chalk and Thanet it is named for the small black rounded taste and acts as a purging water - when Victorians also sought to show off the Sand (both of which are permeable pebbles that underlie the grass. Pits left King George III visited it is reported he economic importance of Imperial Britain strata). The strata above them in the by the small scale digging of the was accompanied by a band to drown by reconstructing a cliff from the Coal lower part of are mainly pebbles for roads and other purposes out the noise of his suffering! In summer Measures. The strata represented, with impermeable and so keep the Chalk have mostly been backfilled with the London Clay near the surface dries their true thicknesses, are from near water beneath them contained under wartime rubble but Eliot Pit remains, and shrinks to produce open cracks. Rain Ashover in . Adjacent is a pressure however springs formed by mostly overgrown but pebbles can be penetrates and reacts with the London three-quarters scale lead mine cave in upward “leakage” enlarge the river in seen in the path up the scree-covered Clay to produce the Epsom Salts. Carboniferous Limestone. Beckenham Place Park. quarry sides. Nearest station: Sydenham Hill Nearest station: Penge East Nearest station: Ravensbourne Nearest station: Lewisham