Dulwich OnView

If you walk between Dulwich Community Hospital and Alleyn’s School, you’ll pass through a post-war residential estate spanning both sides of the main road. I wandered by the other day and noticed that all the names of the streets there have some Dutch connection. I decided to investigate.

I remembered the Battle of Arnhem (Sept 1944) from history lessons. It was a brave battle, on the part of the British and the Poles, to take the Dutch town from the Nazis. It was ultimately unsuccessful and many men were captured by German forces. Strange then, that they named a street after it.

Likewise Nimegen (Nijmegen in Dutch) was the scene of a great battle in the 1550s and again the scene for military activity in the Second World War. (It’s also considered to be the oldest city in the Netherlands, having celebrated its 2000th anniversary in 2005.)

Delft has nothing to do with battles. It’s most famous as the home of blue and white pottery ceramic, inspired by Chinese porcelain arriving in Europe in the 17th century. Johannes Vermeer (1632–75) came from Delft and is perhaps the town’s most famous son. An exhibition about his paintings was held at the National Gallery in London in 2001. But I’m still no closer to why all these Dutch names are cropping up in Dulwich.
This must refer to the River Isel (or as it’s known in Dutch Ijssel) which is a distributary of the Rhine. It’s incredibly flat land, so the exact path of the river is hard to pinpoint.

Perhaps the theme for these streets is rivers and towns in the Netherlands?

Nope. Kempis isn’t a town or a river – it’s a person. Thomas à Kempis (1380–1471) was a monk who spent most of his life near the city of Zwolle, in the Netherlands. Famed around the medieval the world for his Christian devotional book De Imitatio Christi (Imitation of Christ), his relics are housed in the Lady Ascension Basilica in Zwolle.

So why all the Dutch references?

During the war, the Dutch government in exile used Dulwich as a training ground. Tappen House (a Georgian villa formerly called Glenlea) was used as a base for the Dutch Secret Service for agents who were trained as radio operators before being parachuted into German-occupied Holland to work with the Resistance. There’s more about this on the Southwark Council website.

But this doesn’t seem the kind of monumental relationship between Dulwich and the Netherlands worthy of naming a housing estate in the 1960s. What other links are there?

A source finally revealed to me that the old Camberwell Council was twinned with the town of Deventer in Holland and the development was named after several Dutch towns – and people – because of this connection.

So now you know. Take a look next time you’re passing by that way. There are many more.

Of course if any of this has inspired you to look for more Dutch in Dulwich, then carry on your journey, along to Dulwich Picture Gallery where there are countless pieces of Dutch art hanging on the walls.

With thanks to the East Dulwich Forum for their helpful tips on local history.