CHAPTER V.
FROGNAL AND WEST END.
Frognal claims to be considered the very heart of Hampstead, the site of its first settlement, the spot on which the ancient manor-house and the humble little chapel to St. Mary primitively arose, and around which gathered by degrees the wattle and dab cottages that succeeded the ruder huts of the villani and bordarii of the Conqueror’s time. The path through the churchyard leads straight to the entrance of a narrow lane, guarded in my time by a small toll-house and gate. This lane is partly made by the wall enclosing the Mansion, an old-fashioned, grave-looking, two-storied house, standing in its own grounds, in which grew some remarkably fine yew-trees; and between these grounds and the end of the new burial-ground on the eastern side of St. John’s stands a small Roman Catholic chapel, dedicated to St. Mary, erected by a French émigré—l’Abbé Morel—early in the present century.
The family living at the Mansion between forty and fifty years ago were of Irish extraction, and of the creed of their country, circumstances that in those days (especially in small places) subjected the persons so conditioned to a measure of suspicion and unreasoning antagonism scarcely to be comprehended in these more liberal times.
Whether this was or was not the case with the Sullivan family, I cannot say. Their society was not generally courted, and outside their own special circle they made few friends. They lived a quiet, retired life, and after her father’s death Miss Sullivan was most frequently heard of in connection with the toll-gate, which appertained to her residence.
I am informed that a toll of one penny for each cart or carriage was exacted for the use of the gate and lane, but no one had the privilege of driving through it without permission of the lady of the Mansion; and as it was the straight and short way to any part of Frognal, it became a constant source of friction between the public and the owner. There was something very arbitrary and vexatious in the way Miss Sullivan resisted all requests and representations on the part of her neighbours and the inhabitants generally.
It was her right, and she resolved not to abate an iota of her power; so the struggle became continuous till quite recent times, when the parochial authorities resolved on doing away with the gate, offering the owner a fair pecuniary equivalent for the ground belonging to her; but whether she came to terms I do not know. Her death probably facilitated the matter, and when I last visited Hampstead (1895-96) I found the little toll-house standing, but the gate that for so many years had pertinaciously obstructed the thoroughfare lay wide open, while an appearance of unresisted desolation and neglect enshrouded the house and grounds, which I heard were to be sold.[73] Since then many houses have been built upon the grounds of the old Mansion.
Frognal gives its name to several good houses in the vicinity, as Frognal Hall, Frognal Lodge, Frognal House, Frognal Grove, etc., and preserves (Park suggests) in its own the diminutive of the title of the ancient manor-house, the appellation of Hall being very early given to the mansion of a manorial district. He imagines that Frognal may probably come from Frogen Hall. How the hall originally came by this designation, if it ever had it, he does not tell us. By some it has been deemed merely a name of derision—Froggenhal or Frogs’ Hall.