www.wonershchurch.com
Wonersh & Blackheath (Surrey)
Local History
Acknowledgements
and source material from
“Our
Village” by Wonersh History Society and “History of Blackheath” by Brigadier
Dick Hume.
Victoria History
of Surrey Parishes 1911
The records of Wonersh & Blackheath churches.
History of
England (1708), John Aubrey visited Wonersh circa 1690.
Manning &
Bray Vol. II pages 108-116.
Very many
letters and documents are summarised and published online in the Surrey
History Centre Collections Catalogue .
It has not been found possible to link these references directly,
however from the SEARCH page it is possible to bring up the relevant collection
of documents, with the search criteria highlighted. These include
County Records
& Deeds relating to Manors of Bramley,
Collection ref: 892 – Including a concise summary of the descent of the
title.
Norton Family –
Deeds of Surrey Estates, Collection Refs: G24, G60, G1275
Loseley papers,
Collection Section LM
Information can also
be found on the folllowing pages:-
Local Villages
Wonersh Church History
St Martin's Blackheath
Wonersh Registers & Vicars
Patronage
Old Wonersh Families
The parish is in what is today prosperous Surrey. This
prosperity is relatively recent as this part of England was poor and almost
exclusively agricultural in nature. There
are consequently relatively few grand historic buildings nearby as are found in
the Cotswolds or East Anglia. Inhabitants of Wonersh comprised a very few
rich aristocracy and a number of agricultural labourers, as all workers on
farms were called.
Those not willing or able to work relied upon charity of the parish. Since the 16th century this was
locally administered by the Parish
Vestry, what would be called the PCC today, with the Vicar &
churchwardens having prominent roles.
During the 19th century these responsibilities were evolved
to Civil Parishes
geographically similar to their ecclesiastical counterparts.
Humans have inhabited this area for many years.
Pre-historic remains are abundant: Paleolithic flints and Neolithic implements
and burial mound have been found at Blackheath and around Chinthurst Hill.
The early history of Surrey indicates that
this part of England was sparsely populated with little evidence remaining of much before the Norman
Conquest. Christianity arrived in
Britain in Roman times and took root in both the new culture and the indigenous
Celtic people. After the Romans withdrew from Britain in 410AD
Saxons and Jutes invaded and largely displaced the native population. The Saxons divided
their state into Shires and
Hundreds, with the
Hundreds Courts administering justice and collecting taxes. The
hundred of Blackheath, or Blackfelde, had its
own representative body from local villages. Tax was dependant on “hides” and
the number of plough teams in each estate.
A “hide”
was a unit of land measurement, said to be some 30 acres, based on the amount a
team could plough in a year. Originally this area was part of
the Saxon Kingdom of Mercia, but changed allegiance to Wessex around 685. It
was one of the last areas to be converted to Christianity. The Saxons introduced their own system of
church organization of Bishops, Monasteries and parishes, with parish
boundaries largely related to those of the local squire. The oldest church in the Diocese is St Mary’s,
Stoke d’Abernon founded in 673AD.
In 1011 Surrey was over-run by Danish
Vikings, however there is no record of them showing any interest in our
village!! Immediately before the
Conquest, this Manor belonged to Alnod Cild (younger brother of King Harold) a
Saxon landholder with many estates in this and neighbouring counties. He was imprisoned in Guildford
Castle and carried off to Normandy as a hostage by
William the Conqueror and his fate is unknown.
After the Norman Conquest
of 1066 estate boundaries were mostly unaltered but were parceled out to his
followers. In 1086 commissioners collected information for the Domesday Book. Neither the villages of Wonersh or
Blackheath are mentioned but would have been included in the vast Manor of
Bramley (Brunlei) which covered the inhabited parts of Surrey from Shalford to
the Sussex border: All the Manors were subsequently
formed out of it.
A church existed at Wonersh in Saxon times
however it was replaced on the same site after the conquest as a chapel in the
parish of Shalford. By 1295 the church
of St John the Baptist was known as a
parish church.
Almost all the names of Surrey
towns and villages are Anglo-Saxon in origin, and Wonersh is no
exception. In earliest form, recorded in
1199, was Wogenhers, Wunhers, Unhers, Wogenhersh, Ognersh, Wonarsh, Onersh,and
even Woronish appeared (though some of these variations must have been clerical
errors) and this does not exhaust the list.
The familiar spelling first appeared in 1334. Wogenhers is comprised of “Wogen” meaning
crooked or winding, and “ersh”, a stubble field, and this depicts the
beginnings of the village in the land that winds around the base of Chinthurst
Hill, well above the river. It was on
the road to Arundel (then a
south coast port) and was approached from Guildford
via Shalford by Chinthurst Lane. The commons we cross today would have
remained marshy until comparatively recent times and the alternative was also
far more direct. The road & bridge
to Bramley was established around 1820?.
There is only one Wonersh in the
whole world, perhaps a reflection of the aspirations of the inhabitants over
the years
The title Lord of the
Manor of Bramley was granted by William to his half brother Odo, Bishop of Bayeux,
but on William’s death 1087 it was forfeited when he proved himself disloyal to
William Rufus. It then passed through
several hands and again reverted to the King.
In 1155 King Henry II granted it to Raoul de la Fay, the uncle of his
Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine,
but he lost it when he joined the rebellion of the King’s sons against their
father. King John later granted it to
John de Fay and in 1241 it descended to his two sisters Maud de Clere (d1250)
and Philippa de Fay. It was Maud’s part
of the Bramley Manor to the east that included amongst others the lands in
Wonersh. They passed through her
daughter Alice who married Richard Breus, and then their descendants to Thomas
Cockesey (Grenville). On his death Bramley was passed to the Earl of Surrey, and
through his son Thomas Duke of Norfolk
reverted to the King Henry VIII 1545.
The title was then sold to Richard Carill in 1559.
Great Tangley was a parcel of the
Manor of Bramley and until the 20th century Wonersh and Tangley were
separate settlements. It is sometimes
difficult to establish if documents refer to Bramley or
Tangley , but in 1107 Henry I gave the Manor to his daughter Juliana, as a
wedding portion, however it soon reverted to the Crown. It is known that in 1196, the Manors were in
the possession of John, Count of Mortain, as Prince John was then known. The tradition of the countryside is that the
old house at Great Tangley was supposedly used by King John as the
starting point of the chase in the Forest of Anderida (which in
those days covered much of southern England
between the North and South Downs, where deer
and wild boar abounded); Tangley was apparently known as “King John’s hunting
lodge”. Richard of Tangley proved his
title to the land in 1238 and by 1315 it was tenanted by Sir Robert Fitz Pain. It then passed to the Burley family and
descended finally to John Burley and his wife Sybil. The Manor is mentioned in old documents dated
1524 as a Court of Justice held in Bramlie.
The title of Lord of Tangley
Manor was sold by 1559? to Richard
Carrill. On the death of his great
grandson John Carill in 1656 his “moiety” was divided between his daughters (SHC Ref 892/6/ ): Lettice Ramsden (East Bramley), Margaret Ludlow (West Bramley,
including Little Tangley)) and Elizabeth Fermor (the other third). John’s
widow, Hester remarried to Sir Francis Duncomb and they continued to reside at
Tangley (SHC
G123/2/1) until his
death : Great Tangley (East Bramley) was
sold in 1673 by Lettice to Leonard
and John Child (Childe), both freeman of Guildford (noted by Aubrey circa
1690 that Leonard Child of Guildford held court at Tangley). It passed to
Charles Child(d1754) (son of
John) and then to his sister’s son Charles Searle. Great Tangley was sold in
1759 to Fletcher Norton. Elizabeth sold her portion to Richard Gwynn;
rather dubiously he assumed a role of Lord of the Manor and this too eventually
passed down to Fletcher Norton. The 2nd
Lord Grantley in 1805 purchased the other half of the original Bramley Manor
from Lord Onslow and for the first time since 1241 there was a single Lord of
the Manor of Bramley.
All this division and reuniting caused some
confusion, which even the surveyors and legal profession eventually admitted
was beyond fathom. The 5th
Lord Grantley sold his Surrey properties in
1884.
Little Tangley
is the reputed Manor House of Chinthurst (Chilthurst) together with
Loseley. It was a Dower house in 1452
for Tomasine, widow of William Sidney, and passed through various hands to the
Sparkes family in 1791.
Losterford House
was also called a Manor House in 16th century when in 1547 John
Scarlet held it as the Manor of Shalford Bradestan.
Rowleys is
another reputed Manor House, bought in 1508 by Robert Harding, which then
descended to the Onslow family. In 1806
the Earl sold it to Richard Sparkes.
John Aubrey noted circa 1690 that Edward Nicholas of West
Horsley held court at Shamley Green.
Halldish
(Aveldershe) was a farm in Shamley Green owned by Bartholomew Haveldersh and
wife Joan; they are buried in Wonersh churchyard. In 1626 it passed to George Duncombe (SHC Collection 1322), remaining with the family until
1841.
In the 14th century there
was the beginnings of a cloth industry in this area which goes back to the
settlement of Flemish weavers and dyers during Edward III’s reign. The neighborhood attracted the trade, for
sheep could be farmed on the Downs, water
power for the fulling mills could be had from the River Wey; the best fullers
earth in the country could be had from Nutfield, and the fullers teazle and
woad for dyeing also grew in the district.
Several of the cottages in “The Street” were the homes of weavers. The “Old House” and “Medd House” were
originally three or four cottages.
“Weavers” still retains the old weavers beam in the living room. The material produced was a rough blue
woolen cloth, known as Kersey. The tradesmen formed a Guild with a Guild
House in the parish on Lords Hill
Road known as Yealdhouse (a middle English form of
Guild). It is possible that the North
Chapel in Wonersh church was originally a Guild Chapel.
This once thriving cottage industry, probably involving
most of the village, was languishing before the end of Elizabeth’s reign (1600
ish), and by the end of 1630 there was serious unemployment in the area
(including Guildford, Godalming and
Farnham). The demise of the industry
was due to the competition with the Company
of Merchant Adventurers and the London Drapers
Company, who eventually succeeded in getting the cloth trade under their
control.
Many people drank Ale, a light fermentation of
hops which was less risky than drinking contaminated water. Wonersh had at least three “ale houses”: one
in Barnett Lane,
one in what is now Tankards, and the “Fighting Cock” which at some time in the
18th C became known as the Grantley Arms.
The historic Pilgrim’s
Way between Canterbury and Winchester
passes along the North Downs, through Shalford
and St Marthas, both parishes having close associations with Wonersh. John Bunyon (1628-1688) spent some time in
Shalford before writing “A Pilgrim’s Progress, and it is reputed that Shalford
meadows are the “Slough of Despond”, Albury Vale is the “Vale of Humiliation”,
and the Fair held at Shalford (Beckets Fair) was Vanity Fair. Interesting facts for future “trivia”
questions!!
The Napoleonic War brought concerns for
shipping in the Channel and plans to create an overland connection between London
and Portsmouth
resulted in 1813 with the Act of Parliament for the construction of the Wey and Arun Canal. It finally opened in 1816 and was an
important transport route to the south coast, prospering until the construction
of the railways, including in 1865 the Guildford to Horsham
railway. There was a station for
Wonersh & Bramley. The canal closed
in 1871. The railway closed under the
Beeching axe in 1965 and the track bed is now part of the Downs
Link Cycle Route.
There is an interesting pamphlet held by the
Wonersh History Society (and at the Surrey History Centre) setting out the
history of parochial schooling “Wonersh and Shamley Green
Schools 1683-1977”. The National School
(mixed and Infants) was erected at Norley Common (roughly in the centre of the
parish) in 1840 and enlarged in 1884 for 300 children. This is now Wonersh and Shamley
Green Infants School. Lawnsmead Infants
School was opened in 1890 and closed in 1924.
Blackheath village traces its’
roots back to 1833, before which there is no record of a rate paying
inhabitant, when the census of that year records just 12 occupants. It
consisted of only a few cottages, including those occupied by workers from Chilworth
gunpowder factory. In 1864 the Illustrated London News
recorded the visit of Queen Victoria
on Easter Monday to witness a Volunteer Review, an exercise conducted by
volunteer reservists; during the proceedings the Revd W Earle (vicar of ??) was
accidentally shot and died. It was
shortly after the Volunteer Review in 1867 that the pub was built, called The
Volunteer Arms and later renamed The Villagers.
Cricket was first played at Blackheath in 1878. At the end of the nineteenth century several
houses were remodelled, enlarged or newly built to the designs of Charles
Harrison Townsend, an architect associated with the Arts and Crafts
movement. St Martin’s church was built in 1893, the
village hall 1897 and the cemetery chapel in 1900.
These are independent
websites so please be discerning in how you use the information.
Useful websites for history:-
British History Online
Parishes: St
Martha's or Chilworth | British History Online
Victoria County
History: Surrey
University of
Portsmouth Census 1800-2004
1837online.com - The
place to start tracing your family history
Britannia: British History
British History
Spartacus Educational - Home Page
British History for tourism, education and
research
BBC - History
Surrey History
Service - Archives Database - Search
List of Listed Houses in Wonersh
www.wonershchurch.com