From the Norwood News – Friday 19 February 1932 via the British Newspaper Archives.

NARROW ESCAPES IN FIRE
Outbreak At Tooting Junction
A LEAP FOR LIFE

Nine persons had narrow escapes when an upstairs flat in Tynemouth-road, Tooting Junction, caught fire at three o’clock on Sunday morning.

There are two self-contained flats in the building the ground floor being occupied by Mrs. A. Patterson and her daughter. The top flat is tenanted by Mr. and Mrs. A. Jobson and their family of five children. When the outbreak was discovered, Mr. Jobson woke his family, and actually carried his young children to safety. All were in their night attire, but were able to dress.

Mrs. and Miss Patterson were roused and quickly escaped.

A SPRAINED ANKLE.

Mr. Jobson returned to his flat after giving the alarm and making sure that everybody was safe but the flames had spread so rapidly from the moment of alarm that his approach to the staircase was cut off, and he had to jump from a first floor window into the garden below. This is a distance of 15 feet, and he slightly sprained his ankle by the jump.

Mitcham Fire Brigade were summoned by the Tooting Junction fire alarm, and Chief Officer A. E. Wells and five men, with engine and tender, arrived in quick time. Water was obtained from a hydrant in the road. The flames at that time were breaking through the roof. Once the brigade got their hose at work, the outbreak was speedily extinguished, but not before the top front room, used as a sittingroom, and a small box room, with the entire contents, had been destroyed. A portion of the roof was also burned through. Other parts of the two flats were damaged by water and heat, and the place will need thoroughly overhauling.

FIREMEN INJURED.

During the excitement, Station Officer A. P. Riley, of the Mitcham Fire Brigade, was cut on the lip by a slate when the roof fell in, and Fireman Pugh slightly injured his hands when the piano fell. Mr. Riley and Mrs. Jobson, who was suffering from shock, were taken in the police utility van to Wilson Cottage Hospital for treatment. ” I was awakened by smoke fumes,” Mr. Jobson told one of our reporters. ” The front room then resembled a furnace. I got any wife and family out of the house just in the nick of time. Two of our canaries were suffocated by the heat.”

Notes
1. The area known as Tooting Junction was part of the Mitcham Urban District (the boundary was the river Graveney).
2. The public fire alarm used was probably near the London Road end of Grenfell Road.