History of North Finchley - Moss Hall and Woodside Park

Moss Hall and Woodside Park

On the north western edge of Finchley Common there were four houses by the 17th century. At Nether Street was Moss Hall, a name taken from a house in the area which may have existed in the 15th century (named after the Mosse family), and certainly in existence since the 18th century. The house was demolished in 1927 after much of the estate had been built on after the 1860s. The name survives in the names of streets such as Moss Hall Grove and, until the 1990s, a pub called the Moss Hall Tavern (the pub still exists but has been renamed the Elephant Inn).

Further up was Court House which may have been the house in 1664 owned by the Peacock Family who owned Frith Manor. Prior to the building of Frith manor house in 1790 the Court House was the main house of the estate and it is possible that the manorial courts were held here (hence the name). The house was demolished and the remnants of the estate sold in 1936.

Finchley Lodge (from which Lodge Lane takes its name) may have existed by 1564 and was certainly there by 1667. Finally there was Woodside House, again possibly a medieval property but certainly known by 1699, around which a small hamlet had developed by the 1750s. By the 1800s it was called Woodside Farm and when the estate was left to Henry Holden, after whom Holden Road is named, the estate was developed into housing as the Woodside Park Estate. Holden built an assembly room, Woodside Hall, in 1885. In 1950 it was converted to a synagogue. St Barnabas church was established as a tin chapel in 1885 and as a proper church in 1912. Spike Milligan, the comedian, lived in Holden Road.