Hilly Fields

Once known as Vicar's Hill, Hilly Fields was open land situated on a steep hill that was formerly brickworks and rough grazing land, including an area used for game shooting in the south. The site's historic interest resides less in its design than in the story of its acquisition. Deptford Common to the north had already been lost to development when the open land of Hilly Fields was leased to builders in the 1880s. The campaign that saved Hilly Fields was documented by local author Henry Williamson in his novel 'Donkey Boy'. It began in 1889 and involved the Kyrle Society, the MPGA, the Commons Preservation Society and local residents, culminating in the purchase and opening of Hilly Fields in 1896. Octavia Hill of the Kyrle Society had helped establish the fund-raising committee. One of the co-founders of the National Trust, in 1884 she had taken responsibility of 133 homes in Deptford on behalf of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and was concerned in the housing conditions of London's working classes and their environment. While visiting one of the Deptford tenants, she noticed a vase of wild flowers and was told they were picked on Hilly Fields. The campaign was helped by the fact that there was little open space in Deptford apart from Dulwich Park (q.v.), and it was one of the poorest parts of Lewisham. The cost was met through £23,572 from the LCC, £7,000 from Greenwich and £9,000 from other sources including public, charitable and city company donations.

The new park was laid out to designs by Lt Col J J Sexby, Chief Officer of the LCC's Parks Department, and included perimeter railings, a refreshment house and drinking fountain. It was opened to the public on 16 May 1896 by Sir Arthur Arnold, Chairman of the LCC. In the north, the brickfields and pits were levelled, swampy sections drained and an open-air grandstand made with a bandstand beyond. There are good London planes around the perimeter and one or two mature trees in park, but they are mostly only 40/50 years old. The Francis Drake Bowling Club opened in Hilly Fields in 1906, with a new pavilion built in 1952 designed by LCC architects Leonard Manasseh and Sadie Speight. In 1971 Hilly Fields was transferred to the London Borough of Lewisham from the Greater London Council.

Prendergast School is a notable landmark within the park. It opened in the mid-1880s as West Kent Grammar School, later becoming part of Brockley County School and in 1995 became Prendergast School when the school moved from its site in Catford, the move funded by the Worshipful Company of Leathersellers. The exceptional feature of the building is the series of mural paintings in the Assembly Hall carried out between 1933 and 1936 by four painters connected with the Royal College of Art: Charles Mahoney, Evelyn Dunbar, Mildred Eldridge and Violet Martin, who were part of the Romantic and Narrative School of English Painting influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites. The hall has five wall panels, a mural to the gallery front and murals under the gallery. The north side west panel depicts 'Fortune and the Boy at the Well by Charles Mahoney; the north side east panel depicts 'The Country Girl and the Milk Pail' by Evelyn Dunbar, the south side east panel is entitled 'The Bird Catcher and the Skylark' by Mildred Eldridge (dated 1934) and the south side west panel is 'The King and 2 Shepherds' by Violet Martin. The gallery front has murals by Evelyn Dunbar depicting the Hilly Fields with allegorical figures to left and right, one holding a plan of the school, the other a plan of Hilly Fields. Boys in contemporary dress return from school along the railings entwined with plants. Above are two figures of boys, one in rugby clothes, the other as a scholar. The wider gallery spandrels and lunettes are mainly by Evelyn Dunbar but three panels are by Charles Mahoney, mostly from Aesop's 'Fables'. These murals are considered some of the most important achievements of C20th mural painting and the building is listed solely because of their high quality and rarity; the high perspective viewpoint of the hall panels, raised 6 feet off the ground, is of particular interest. No work of comparable scale by Evelyn Dunbar exists; Charles Mahoney's work here is better than his murals in the Lady Chapel of Campion Hall and Mildred Eldridge painted only one other public work. The panel 'Fortune and the Boy at the Well' featured in The Last Romantics exhibition at the Barbican in 1989.

On the southern edge of the park is a wooded area that since 1992 has been a nature reserve with hawthorn scrub, blackthorn and elder, as a result of local residents approaching LB Lewisham's Nature Conservation Section. Improvements were carried out including railings, gate and paths with a Community Action for Wildlife grant from English Nature in 1993 with contributions from Brockley Society, Lewisham Environment Trust, the Civic Trust and Prendergast School. A garden area tended by local schools and the park users group to the north has beds, shrubs and concrete tubs near the Francis Drake Bowling Green. Since 1995 an area at the foot of the hill has been managed as a meadow and contains a high diversity of grasses, wild flowers and also clumps of prickly sedge, which is rare in Lewisham. In 2000 a Stone Circle was erected at the top of the hill to mark the Millennium. Functioning as a sundial, it consists of 12 large granite stones and 2 tall stones, the latter known as St Norbert's Gate after the founder of the Premonstratensian Order of Canons Regular that had established an Abbey in Brockley in the C12th.  An orchard was planted below the Stone Circle in 2012.

The Friends of Hilly Fields work with Lewisham Council to achieve sustainable improvements and facilities for the park, increasing its use and enjoyment. The Friends have successfully raised funds for a number of projects and organise events and activities in the park. To date (2024), the Friends have raised over £120,000, which has funded a new playground, an inclusive basket swing, table tennis table, new signage and the orchard. They have also acquired 100s of free tree saplings, bulbs and plants. Events include annual Dawn Chorus Walks, an annual Wassail with music and refreshments in the orchard and an annual Big Bird Watch on the last Sunday of January. Wild play days are run for local nursery schools, printing and nature workshops with local schools or groups. In 2006 the first of their series of guided ‘walks’ was organised: ‘A Wildlife Walk’, followed by a ‘History Hike’, led by local historian Gillian Heywood MBE. Regular volunteering sessions are also held, most recently training in traditional hedge-laying.