{"id":2121,"date":"2025-06-02T18:42:23","date_gmt":"2025-06-02T17:42:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/?p=2121"},"modified":"2025-06-02T18:46:21","modified_gmt":"2025-06-02T17:46:21","slug":"2121","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/2025\/06\/02\/2121\/","title":{"rendered":"The Inclosure of Curdridge Common, 1856."},"content":{"rendered":"

Ordnance Survey maps call the fields between Chapel Lane and the Reading Room Rec Curdridge Common. <\/em>I have never heard anyone use this name for these fields, but they are indeed part of what was Curdridge Common, which extended from Lockhams Road to the top of Station Hill, bounded, more or less, by the Bishops Waltham and Shedfield roads.<\/p>\n

Some years ago, Dennis Stokes of the Botley and Curdridge Local History Society and I were sorting through the contents of the Reading Rooms safe when we came upon a copy of the Curdridge Common Inclosure Map 1856. <\/strong> It was rolled up in a long metal map case and measured about 3 by 5 feet. Attached to the map were pages listing the plots the Common was divided into and to whom they were given, sold or otherwise allocated. We deposited it, along with much else, at the Hampshire Records Office in Winchester.<\/p>\n

Most villages had a common where locals could, for example, graze their family cow or their geese and collect fallen wood and furze for their fire. The common could make an important contribution to the livelihood of the poor. How important Curdridge Common was to anyone in 1856 \u2013 a relatively late date for inclosure \u2013 I don\u2019t know. (Inclosure<\/em>, by the way, is the legal term for the enclosure<\/em> of common or \u2018waste\u2019 land).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Recently, I re-visited the Records Office to take a proper look at the Map and its attachments. I looked first for my property, at the bottom of Outlands Lane, but it was beyond the bounds of the map. However, the plot where Camper House<\/em> now stands, about a third of way down the lane, was<\/em> on the map and was listed as being owned by William Camper<\/em> \u2013 who also built my house. He was one half of the famous yacht-building firm of Camper and Nicholson of Gosport.<\/p>\n

Here are some of my other findings :<\/p>\n

The Reading Rooms and Rec field<\/em> went to \u2018John Gatery\u2019 of South Stoneham. In other words, it did not become a public space in 1856, and indeed the Reading Room Charity was only formed in 1884 when the land was bought for \u00a3945 by Sir Henry Jenkins of Botley and the Burrells of Fairthorne Manor for the purpose of providing the Reading Room and the Rec.<\/p>\n

The Allotments\/Rec<\/em> field on the Bishops Waltham road went to the Churchwardens, who were responsible for the running and up-keep of the Parish Church. This would have been the Chapel of Ease, built in 1835. The present St Peter\u2019s was not built until 1887, when the Chapel was demolished.<\/p>\n

The Glebe field<\/em> \u2013 beside the Church car park \u2013 went to the Churchwardens and to the Overseers of the Poor to support the National School, that is, the primary school, built in 1839. The Overseers \u2013 often the same people as the Churchwardens \u2013 were traditionally responsible for organising poor relief as part of the Poor Law system.<\/p>\n

The triangle of land<\/em> now between the Plantation and the Bishops Waltham <\/em>road went to the Church Wardens for \u2018exercise and recreation.\u2019 This was the site of the original village cricket pitch – and the cottage beside the pond \u2013 Cricketer\u2019s Pond -was the original Cricketer\u2019s Pub.<\/p>\n

The triangle of land between the B3051 and the A334 on the Botley side of the allotments\/rec, plus the land on which Blenheim Cottage now sits at the top of Station Hill<\/em>, went to the \u2018Incumbent\u2019, that is, to the Vicar, as a means of raising income, probably through renting the land out.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Plot 28, which appears in the list of allocations but I couldn\u2019t find on the Map, went to the Bishop of Winchester as \u2018recompense for land lost\u2019.<\/p>\n

The Map also shows three ponds<\/em> in the village. One is Cricketer\u2019s Pond on the Bishops Waltham road, another is the pond now within the curtilage of Curdridge Grange \u2013 apparently known as Heart in Hand farm in 1856 \u2013 on Curdridge Lane. The third has vanished. It was located at \u2018Wangfield Green\u2019, <\/em>that is, opposite Lower Wangfield Farm, near Frogmill Track on Wangfield Lane.<\/p>\n

Kitcocks House, at the top of Kitnocks Hill, is named on the Map as Curdridge House, as it is on the OS map of 1868. Curdridge House is now the name of a fine old building on the Bishops Waltham road. I wonder if anyone knows how and why the name moved ?<\/p>\n

Interestingly, despite the enclosure, a History of the County of Hampshire <\/em>of 1908 reports that at that time ‘Curdridge Common’ consists of a few fields with patches of furze and heath, sloping up from the road opposite the church\u2019. These fields are now thoroughly cultivated, but I wonder if remnants of the Common may not still exist. The green-winged orchids in the Glebe Field (there are some in the Rec too when they\u2019re not mown), and the few furze\/gorse bushes on Reading Room Lane could be such remnants. A botanist friend from the Wildlife Trust noticed a tiny, dwarfed heather plant in among the grass as we sat on the mowed lawn at Beechcroft. He could hardly contain his excitement at the possibility that this was also a remnant from the Common.<\/p>\n

Does anyone else know of any possible remnants ?<\/p>\n

Kevan Bundell
\nwww.bundellbros.co.uk<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ordnance Survey maps call the fields between Chapel Lane and the Reading Room Rec Curdridge Common. I have never heard anyone use this name for these fields, but they are indeed part of what was Curdridge Common, which extended from Lockhams Road to the top of Station Hill, bounded, more or less, by the Bishops […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[82,126],"class_list":["post-2121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-curdridge-local-history","tag-curdridge","tag-local-history"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2121"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2121\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2126,"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2121\/revisions\/2126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bundellbros.co.uk\/kevansmiscellany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}