page_title: Hampstead
section_title: To 1900
hierarchical_section_title: Hampstead / History / To 1900
caption_attribution_description: English: View of The Mount, Hampstead.
context_page_description: Hampstead is an area in north London, England. Lying 4 miles northwest of Charing Cross, it extends from the A5 road to Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland. The area forms the north-west part of the London Borough of Camden.
  Hampstead is known for its intellectual, liberal, artistic, musical and literary associations. It has some of the most expensive housing in the London area. Hampstead has more millionaires within its boundaries than any other area of the United Kingdom.
context_section_description: Early records of Hampstead can be found in a grant by King Ethelred the Unready to the monastery of St. Peter's at Westminster (AD 986), and it is referred to in the Domesday Book (1086) as being in the Middlesex hundred of Ossulstone.
  The growth of Hampstead is generally traced back to the 17th century. Trustees of the Well started advertising the medicinal qualities of the chalybeate waters (water impregnated with iron) in 1700.  Although Hampstead Wells was initially most successful and fashionable, its popularity declined in the 1800s due to competition with other fashionable London spas. The spa was demolished in 1882, although a water fountain was left behind.
  Hampstead started to expand following the opening of the North London Railway in the 1860s (now the London Overground with passenger services operated by Transport for London), and expanded further after the Charing Cross, Euston & Hampstead Railway opened in 1907 (now part of London Underground's Northern line) and provided fast travel to central London.
  Much luxurious housing was created during the 1870s and 1880s, in the area that is now the political ward of Frognal & Fitzjohns. Much of this housing remains to this day.
caption: A current day view of the location used for the Madox Brown painting on The Mount, just off Heath St
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