Retirement Properties Spotlight in Merton Park

Merton was mentioned in Domesday as having a church and two mills and derived its name from 'farmstead or estate by the pool'. In the Middle Ages it was used as a watering place for people crossing the river on the old Roman road from London to Chichester. Its famous Abbey was destroyed by Henry VIII and provided much of the building stone for his new Nonsuch Palace itself demolished a century later.

Walter de Merton, founder of Merton College, Oxford, was educated at the Abbey. Wimbledon, once a small village, is in the borough of Merton and lies two miles to the north of the town. Central London is about eight miles away.