Folly Island is a popular choice for house buyers as it is situated by the River Lea (or Lee), close to Hertford town centre, bus and train stations and easy access to most local major road networks.

There are only 189 houses on Folly Island. They are mostly two-bedroom, mid-terrace cottage style homes built in the last years of the nineteenth century by the Andrews and Thornton families.

There have since been a few modern additions at Coopers Court and on previous community land that was last used as a car park.

In addition there is one pub - the Old Barge which is in the Good Beer Guide and a small light industrial area for three businesses units.

Trees in bloom Thornton Street Spring 2009

Trees in bloom in Thornton Street

Much of the evidence for this activity has perished beneath modern house building and commercial development. Old malting firms and timber companies have long deserted Hertford but McMullens brewery remains at its Hartham Lane premises.

The Navigation Act of 1738 was of such importance to the prosperity of Hertford that the corporation paid ten shillings for the bells to be rung. It enabled the then mill stream to be widened and navigation improved to allow barges right into the centre of Hertford and alongside the mills rather than along the course of the old river.

Although it was essential for the malt to be transported down to London the River Lea also opened up opportunities for barge owners to return from London with coal, dung to fertilise the market gardens along what is now the A10 corridor; and animal feed for the continuing reliance on horse drawn transport.

For many years the only access to Folly island was over a footbridge at Bull Plain. Mill owners successfully applied for the widening of the bridge to allow carts but the high sides still made getting goods off the island easier by barge than by road. Folly Bridge remains the only road access to the island today; the only way on for cars and the only way off.

The narrowness of the bridge was as much the reason for the decline in the Folly as a trading centre as the coming of the railways. Movement by barge was still far cheaper but the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846 had reduced the price of corn and encouraged large landowners to sell off land to commuters that sought the greener fields of Hertfordshire.

Folly Island has now been designated a Local Conservation Area and trees planted along Thornton Street recreate an original feature from the end of the last century. Freed from commercial pressures Folly Island can be enjoyed by residents and visitors alike.

The Old Barge pub from Folly Bridge on 8 August 2010 as we celebrate

Folly on the Folly with house boats decorated with bunting

It is a true island between the two streams of the River Lea and there is only one access for vehicles over Folly Bridge. The absence of through traffic and with the open spaces of Hartham Common and the Sports Centre so close adds to the attraction of Folly Island.

The history of Folly Island begins in the days of William the Conqueror when a mill was built on the site of a priory close to modern day Priory Street. In 1636 it was relocated down stream to where the Dicker Mill Industrial Estate is today as other mills closer to the centre of town took more water for their own workings.

A 1700 map of Hertford shows Folly island as an open space between the two branches of the River Lea and split into three separate parcels of land; Old Hall Mead (Old Hall Street is named after this), Little Hartham and Priory Orchard, now cultivated as allotments.

The earliest recorded use of the 'the Folly' (the street called The Folly runs from Folly Bridge to the crossroads with Thornton Street) was in 1732 when Little Hartham was conveyed by Thomas Ashby to John Nicholson and referred to as 'Ashby's Folly; that small piece of land was later to be the site for a militia hospital and a dumping ground for the waste from Hertford goal.

The transfer of the lease to Nicholson signalled a dramatic increase in the development of commercial interests on the adjoining stretch of the island. Late nineteenth century maps show an abundance of malthouses, timber mills and warehousing operations.

The River Lea was the dominant inland route for the transport of malt and barley, tapping into some of the richest barley country in Hertfordshire, most especially around Ware, Hoddesdon and Stanstead Abbotts. Ware prospered to become the centre of England's malting industry.