A HISTORY OF HAMPSHIRE 



SELBORNE 



Salesbourne (xi cent.). Saleburne, Salebourne 

 (xiii cent, et seq.). 



The parish of Selborne, including the ecclesiastical 

 parish of Blackmoor, formed in 1 867, and the hamlet 

 of Oakhanger, lies on the extreme north-cast of the 

 county almost midway between the towns of Alton 

 and Petersfield. It covers about 7,9 1 5 acres, 7 of which 

 105 are land covered by water. 8 From west to east 

 the soils are of chalk, upper greensand, gault, and lower 

 greensand formation. The Selborne hops are grown 

 on the upper greensand and gault, chiefly in the west 

 and south-west of the parish, and also at Temple, on 

 the edge of the lower greensand, where the soil is a 

 wet, sandy loam ' remarkable for trees, but infamous for 

 roads.' These hop-fields and hop-kilns, or 'oast- 

 houses,' are characteristic features of the parish. Sel- 

 borne Hill, west of the village, is on the ' two incon- 

 gruous soils ' blue clay and sand, called locally ' black 

 malm,' which respectively mark gault and upper 

 greensand formation. Between the chalk and the clay 

 there is a layer of white stone very like chalk in ap- 

 pearance, but unlike it in properties, since it can endure 

 intense heat, and is therefore used for hearth-stones 



seem to 

 descent. 



SELBORNF, THE MAIN STRIET, LOOKING NORTH 



and the lining of lime kilns.* The northern and 

 eastern parts of the parish are wholly on soil of lower 

 greensand, and beyond Temple the new formation is 

 marked by a distinctly different vegetation a change 

 from hop-fields, beech trees and nut trees to furze, 

 pine trees and heather. Thence the unfertile red- 

 sand of the lower greensand continues on to Woolmer 

 Forest, mingling here and there with the blue shelly 

 clay which is also characteristic of this formation. 

 Altogether there are only 1,485^ acres of arable land 

 in the parish as compared with 2,o88 acres of 

 pasture land and 2,646^ acres of woodland. 10 



The village of Selborne is on the west of the 

 parish on high ground of an average of 400 ft. above 

 the sea level, although the greater height of the 

 Hanger and Noar Hill gives the impression that the 

 village is in a secluded dell. As the road from Alton 

 branches towards Selborne these two thickly wooded, 

 long, sloping hills stand up in the distance the one 

 behind the other. Approaching nearer the hills 



grow higher as the road makes a sharp 

 Then before any glimpse of the village can 

 be seen the road makes a sudden bend to the left, and 

 rising abruptly to the middle of the village be- 

 comes the main street. On the left is the ' Plestor,' 

 dating its name and existence back to 1271, when 

 Adam Gurdon granted it to the prior and convent 

 for a market-place. It is a green sloping oblong, one 

 end formed by the high road and the other by the 

 churchyard. In the centre stands a sycamore tree 

 encircled by an old wooden seat ; up in the left-hand 

 corner is the little wicket-gate leading into the church- 

 yard, and lower on the same side is the vicarage gate, 

 while along the right-hand side stands a row of deep- 

 roofed eighteenth-century cottages. At the end of 

 this row, facing the village street, is Plestor House, lately 

 repaired in the old style, and beyond it the quaint 

 butcher's shop with its row of gnarled lime trees. On 

 the other side of the street is The Wakes,' the once 

 unobtrusive house, now greatly modernized and ex- 

 tended by the present owner, Mr. Andrew Pears, J.P., 

 where Gilbert White wrote his Natural History of 

 Selborne, in the little room about 5 ft. square leading 

 out of his bedroom. The back 

 of the house opens on an exten- 

 sive lawn and well-wooded gar- 

 den sloping up to the park and 

 the Hanger, which, though teem- 

 ing with animal and bird life and 

 the drone of insects, has that 

 peculiar peacefulness that seems 

 to belong only to a beechwood. 

 This same peacefulness seems to 

 pervade the village street with 

 its quaint thatched and timbered 

 cottages nestling down at the foot 

 of the Hanger. But here and 

 there towards the upper or south 

 end of the street, where the road 

 rises and the Hanger becomes 

 lower, brick or tiled cottages, 

 and even suburban-like villas, 

 give a touch of unrestful modernity. Then on the 

 right-hand side stands a tiny Congregational chapel 

 built of the local white stone. Just below this a 

 turn to the right leads down to Well Head, where 

 a spring rises from under Noar Hill. This spring, 

 which has never been known to fail, was diverted 

 by public subscription in memory of Gilbert White, 

 in 1894, to form a water-supply for the village. 

 The overflow discharges from a conventional lion-head 

 fountain into an open trough, and then running 

 underground for a few yards reappears and runs north- 

 eastward through a narrow and extremely picturesque 

 valley, with wooded slopes on either side, towards 

 Oakhanger, where it becomes known as the Oak- 

 hanger stream. It then passes through the hamlet 

 of Oakhanger, skirting the eastern side of Shortheath 

 Common towards Kingsley. Another stream rises in 

 the north-west of the parish and runs north-west- 

 wards, only appearing occasionally until it reaches 

 Hartley Mauditt. 



7 Ord. Surv. 1897, 



8 Pop. Ret. 1900. 



Gilbert White, Nat. Hut. Selkornt. 



10 Statistic from the Board of Agricul- 

 ture (1905). 



