Southampton Central Parks, Southampton, England

The following is from the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest.

HISTORIC DEVELOPMENT

Archaeological excavations have revealed evidence of Roman occupation in the west area of Houndwell and the eastern part of Hoglands overlies part of the Anglo-Saxon town of Hamwic (8th-9th century), but the overall formation of the Central Parks originates with the medieval field pattern which surrounded Southampton. This medieval system, whereby the town was surrounded by open fields where burgesses had Lammas pasture rights, largely persisted into the 19th century. A map of Southampton of around 1600 (Welch 1964) shows a complex of paths and boundaries leading through and around all these Lammas lands, except for East Park. This complex of paths is very similar to that shown on the Royal Engineers' map of Southampton of 1846.

During the 1840s, several town improvement schemes which included open spaces for recreation were considered. The Marsh Improvement Act of 1844 provided the city authorities with the legislation necessary for acquiring and building on the Lammas lands, but following public protests at the council having ceded development rights to private builders, the authorities were forced to acquire 50 acres (about 20 hectares) of the lands for a public park. In the meantime, the process of buying out individuals' Lammas rights continued well into the early 1850s.

The laying out of the parks was equally protracted. Work started slowly in 1846 but gained momentum in the 1850s when they were depicted in a series of views by the artist and designer Philip Brannon. His painting dated 1850 and entitled, Suggested Planning of Parks, shows an elaborate scheme for their layout. Another, dated 1856, shows the layout of the parks as they might have been, while that of around 1861 shows them much as they are today. The OS map of Southampton of 1870 shows the path layout throughout the park complex and, except for minor alterations, this has not changed.

East Park and West Park (including the land on which the Civic Centre now stands) were the East and West Magdalens (or Marlands), lands granted for the maintenance of the leper hospital of St Mary Magdalene.

Palmerston Park and Houndwell Park together comprised Houndwell Field, the name being derived from the stream which rose close to the junction of what are now Pound Tree Road and Sussex Road. The eastern boundary originally lay in the western edge of Hoglands, where a fragment of a boundary bank still survives. The new boundary was established when the southern part of Palmerston Road was built in the middle of the 19th century, alongside an infilled canal.

Hoglands was originally known as Hogsland. The boundary bank near its western edge also marked the parish boundary and seems to be the remnants of a boundary referred to in the 13th and 14th centuries and shown as a more significant, longer feature on the map of around 1600.

The parks have provided a suitable setting for a series of notable public memorials commemorating Southampton's role in international and national events, as well as others of a more civic nature.