Bournemouth Council has published a very good report on the history and architecture of Churchill Gardens in Boscombe.
Churchill Gardens: Conservation Area Appraisal sets out how to restore the square’s heritage features.
It should be added that the now public garden in the middle was, certainly in the 1950s and 1960s at least, fenced off as the playing field for Gorse Cliff School in Boscombe Spa Road. The boys walked in twos six afternoons a week to the playing field.
Two photographs in the report show 3 Borthwick Road, on the south side, was the childhood home of Rosamond Essex who became the first, and so far only, female editor of The Church Times.
She lived in the house during the First World War when her brother was killed. Their father was chaplain to the Sisters of Bethany orphanage next to St Clement’s Church.