SIR, — In his charming and otherwise unexcep- tionable article "The Hippodrome
and Mr. Ladbroke " in your issue of January 8th, Mr. James Pope-Hennessy perpetuates a popular error which seems to date from W. H. Loftie's History of Kensington (1884). topographical notes: they are all to be found in that admirable volume, Notting Hill in Bygone Days (Fisher Unwin, 1924), by the late Florence Gladstone, along With relevant extracts from maps of the period (e.g.: Rocque, 1745, and Fadon, 1810). I can add only one Original historical note, and this is that the wells and springs beneath Notting Hill House, mentioned by Miss Gladstone, gave unpleasant evidence of their continued existence in 1944, when the subsoil was affected by the flying bomb that destroyed Tower Cressy—that terrific monument of Victorian pretentiousness—just opposite the old house.
Incidentally, to ascertain the exact date when nineteenth-century snobbery changed
the name of Notting Hill Square to Campclen Hill Square would throw an interesting side• light on the social history of Kensington.— Yours faithfully, L. R. MUMEAD 80a Lansdowne Road, London, W.JI
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