Common Hill and Beenham Lane

 

 

 

In 1802 a plan was produced to extend the road from Parker's Corner back to the Bath Road in one direction and in the other from the Beenham Lane junction at the top of the hill down the other side to connect with the road to Bradfield at the Bourne bridge. This was Richard Benyon's first attempt to close up the old road to Bradfield that ran under the Long Gallery at Englefield House. An extract from the plan (left) shows the projected new road from the Beenham Lane at Hill Close to the Bourne bridge. Alongside the Bourne and running part-way up the hill on this side lay the Englefield common woods so this side of the hill was known as Common Hill, the name adopted for the whole road on both sides of the hill. The plan shows the new road running between Great Denty Land and Little Denty Land (Daintylands today) and joining the old Bradfield Road from Englefield House. A single house is shown near the Bourne and the junction of the new Common Hill and the old Bradfield Road, as it had been in 1762.

 

The sketch plan produced by Richard Benyon shortly afterwards shows a large number of houses around this junction as well as the two pairs beside the new road and these must be some of the new ones built in the first two decades of the 19th century to replace those demolished in the old village.   It is probably at this time that the brick kiln was built and a road into the brickyard constructed from Common Hill. This road and the brickyard (141) are shown on the map from 1844 (below), as they were in 1829.

 

In 1844 two pairs of new cottages alongside the road on this side of the hill (143, 144) were home to Henry Horn, James Northaway, John Smith and John Turton and there was also one opposite (147), which was a single dwelling with David Aubery as occupier. More houses a little further down the hill just beyond the track into the wood (146) were inhabited in 1844 by Joseph Lovegrove and George Turton and opposite, down a turning off the old Bradfield Road (145), was another large house, probably the same one seen in 1802, which the tithe survey says is occupied by William Trinder and James Woodley but the estate survey adds George Mildenhall and Giles Warner as well.

 

Along the Beenham Lane in 1844 Goff's Farm (151), was tenanted by Stephen Hart but the two houses there are lived in by Edward Allen and Thomas Allen with their families. The two cottages further along the Beenham Lane were, in 1844, home to gamekeeper Thomas Farley and underkeeper William Cox. On 24 April 1888 Richard Benyon wrote to his Agent saying he wanted to "pull down Goff's", though it is clear from the letter that he was happy to wait until the best time for the existing tenants. This finally came in 1892 when the new Wimbleton's Cottages were built and Edward Lamperd, a brickmaker at the nearby brickyard, and his family were moved there from Goff's Farm. At the same time the third keeper, George Wood, living in the cottages further along the lane left the estate, his successor, Neville, being housed at Parker's Corner. Both the farm and the cottages were then finally pulled down and a new pair of cottages, Mayridge Hill Cottages, built further along Beenham Lane at the top of Mayridge Hill.

 

By 1871 all the buildings on the north side of Common Hill had gone except for the two pairs of cottages halfway down and the new Bradfield Lodges built at the end of the gated coach road that Richard Benyon made through the old park after closing the Bradfield Road. The other two pairs of cottages were removed in the 1880s.