Facts about Wimbledon
Wimbledon History
At the time the Domesday Book was compiled, Wimbledon was part of the manor of Mortlake, and so was not recorded. The ownership of the manor of Wimbledon changed hands many times during its history. The manor was held by the church until 1398 when Thomas Arundel, Archbishop of Canterbury fell out of favour with Richard II and was exiled. The manor was confiscated and became crown property.
In the 1550s, Henry’s daughter, Mary I, granted the manor to Cardinal Reginald Pole who held it until his death in 1558 when it once again become royal property. Mary’s sister, Elizabeth I held the property until 1574 when she gave the manor house to Christopher Hatton, who sold it in the same year to Sir Thomas Cecil, Earl of Exeter.
General Info
Wimbledon is a district and town of southwest London, England, 7.0 miles southwest of the centre of London at Charing Cross, in the London Borough of Merton, south of Wandsworth, northeast of New Malden, northwest of Mitcham, west of Streatham and north of Sutton. Wimbledon had a population of 68,187 in 2011 which includes the electoral wards of Abbey, Dundonald, Hillside, Trinity, Village, Raynes Park and Wimbledon Park.
It is home to the Wimbledon Tennis Championships and New Wimbledon Theatre, and contains Wimbledon Common, one of the largest areas of common land in London. The residential and retail area is split into two sections known as the “village” and the “town”. With the High Street being the rebuilding of the original medieval village, and the “town” having first developed gradually after the building of the railway station in 1838.
