Plaque: Roper's Garden
Erection date: 11/3/1964
Metropolitan Borough of Chelsea
The worshipful the mayor councillor Lady Heath laid this stone on 11th March 1964 to commemorate the construction of Roper’s Garden on the site of buildings destroyed by parachute mine on 17th April 1941. The site of this garden formed part of the marriage gift of Thomas More to William and Margaret Roper in 1521, Architects Bridgwater Shepheard & Epstein, Contractors Marshall-Andrew & Co.
The year given for the parachute mine looks a little like 1944 but it must be 1941. Parachute mines were used in the early 40s; the end of the war was characterised by the use of V-1s and V-2s. Parachute mines are recorded as having fallen on other London sites on 16 and 17 April 1941. A plaque in the porch records the next door Chelsea Old Church as having been attacked on 16 April 1941 but that raid began on the 16th and continued into the morning of the 17th so it seems likely this Roper's Garden site was destroyed in the same raid, possibly by the same bomb.
This sunken garden was formed from the basements of the buildings that were destroyed.
Site: Roper's Garden (1 memorial)
SW3, Cheyne Walk, Corner of Old Church Street
Thanks to Jamie Davis for reminding us about this one.
