“Old Oxford” home

“Oxford History” home

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Broad Street

Carfax conduit

Cornmarket 

Cowley

East Oxford

Headington

The High

Iffley

Kingston Road

Queen Street

St Aldates

St Ebbes

St Giles

South Oxford

Summertown and
    Banbury Road

Walton Street

West Oxford

Woodstock Road

Inns and hotels

 

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The above postcard is postmarked 2 August 1906, and shows Kingston Road in about 1905. The photographer was standing just south of the point where Walton Street (which runs north from central Oxford) suddenly becomes Kingston Road. On the left is the entrance to Walton Well Road (leading to Lucy’s Eagle Ironworks, the canal, and Port Meadow), and on the right is St John’s Road (now renamed St Bernard’s Road and leading to the Woodstock Road).

There are tram-lines in the middle of the road with a crossing point: the horse-drawn trams came up from Oxford via Beaumont Street, and terminated at the corner of Leckford Road.

At 1 Kingston Road on the left is the shop of Edward Hewlett, baker & confectioner, advertising cocoa and chocolate. He only had the shop from about 1905 to 1909 (until 1904 it was run by Mrs E. Vines, and from 1910 by Norman E. Minty). Five doors further up at No. 6 is Soanes & Taylor, coal merchants (which became Charles T. A. Wiblin’s butcher’s shop in 1913).

On the right at No. 179 is Edwin Smith’s ironmonger’s shop (later a locksmith's shop, Partymania, and Frog Orange), with metal buckets and pans stacked outside for sale.

Street numbering The numbering of Kingston Road follows the old, pre-1880s style. (It has never been changed to the more modern style introduced in the 1880s which places odd numbers on one side and even numbers on the other.) Hence it starts at the south (town) end with No. 1, runs consecutively 1–2–3–4–5 northwards up the west side, crosses the street, and runs back down towards town, with the result that the highest and lowest numbers, 1 and 179, are opposite each other in the forefront of this picture.
West side, running S→N From north end of Walton Street to south end of Hayfield Road
	Walton Street→ Longworth Road	Nos. 1–13
	Longworth Road→Southmoor Place	Nos. 14–34
	Southmoor Place→Southmoor Road	Nos. 35–62
	Southmoor Road→Hayfield Road	Nos. 63–90
East side, running N→S From south end of Hayfield Road to north end of Walton Street	Polstead Road→St Margaret’s Road	Nos. 91–98
	St Margaret’s Road→Farndon Road	Nos. 100–113
	Farndon Road→Tackley Place	Nos. 114–138
	Tackley Place→Leckford Road	Nos. 139–164
	Leckford Road→Plantation Road	Nos. 165–174
	Plantation Road→St Bernard’s Road*	Nos. 175–179
	* formerly St John’s Road

The street’s name and origin

Like most of the other roads in Walton Manor that were owned by St John’s College, Kingston Road is named after the college’s living at Kingston Bagpuize.

The street did not exist in the 1860s, when there were just gardens here, with a lane called Cabbage Hill winding through them. Two terraces of artisans’ cottages (numbered 119–28 and 159–64) were designed by C. C. Rolfe in 1870 and are now Grade II listed.

Parish

Kingston Road was originally in SS Philip & James parish, which had a mission room in Hayfield Road. In 1894 this mission room was replaced by a St Margaret’s chapel of ease, on the corner of St Margaret’s Road and Kingston Road. Twelve years later in 1896, just twelve years after it opened, the chapel of ease became an independent church, so since then Kingston Road has been in St Margaret’s parish.