BISHOP'S SUTTON HUNDRED 



HEADLEY 



HEADLEY 



Hallege (xi cent.), Hertelegh (xiii cent.), Hedle 

 and Hetlegh (xiv cent.), Hedley (xv cent.), Hethelie 

 (xvi cent.), Hedleigh (xvii cent.), Heathley (xviii 

 cent.). 



Headley is a large parish near the borders of Surrey 

 and Sussex containing 6,871 acres of land and 

 52 acres of land covered with water, of which 

 1,5 1 1 J acres are arable, 1, 1 1"]\ permanent grass, and 

 852 woods and plantations. 1 The village lies about 

 4^ miles north of Liphook Station on the London and 

 South- Western Railway, and is reached from it by 

 narrow winding lanes. It extends north-west of 

 Bramshott to the Surrey border, its high ground 

 commanding a wide and picturesque view of the ro- 

 mantic scenery of the three counties, having Hind- 

 head and its neighbours the Devil's Punch Bowl and 

 the Devil's Jumps prominently outlined to the 

 east. The village lies round a heath, for, as the 

 name implies, Headley was in origin a settlement 

 in a clearing. To the south-east of the village 

 is Hilland, the residence of Mr. W. J. Phillips, J.P. 

 The schools, with a recreation-ground adjoining, 

 are on the heath itself. To the west of the heath 

 is the rectory and the church of All Saints with 

 its massive ivy-covered tower, and near by is the 

 Holly Bush Inn, mentioned by Cobbett in his 

 Rural Ridts. The old pound still exists, and a 

 chestnut tree marks the spot where the stocks 

 once stood, though they themselves have disap- 

 peared. The road on the east of the heath makes 

 a sharp descent past Arford House and Curtis's 

 Hill, thence it turns by the Wheatsheaf Inn to 

 the east, and climbs up steadily to Grayshott. 

 The country through which it passes is most 

 beautiful dense pine-woods alternating with the 

 wild stretches of heather which cover Headley 

 Common, but there are signs that it will soon 

 become as popular for a residential neighbour- 

 hood as Hindhead or Haslemere. Many roads 

 are already marked out and many villas already 

 built. Grayshott is a district which is fast be- 

 coming populous, owing to the growing apprecia- 

 tion in which the charming scenery of Wagner's 

 Wells is held. 



Thirty years ago there was only one primitive 

 grocer's shop in the hamlet, then it became a receiv- 

 ing place for letters, and now the village has a whole 

 street of shops and a fully equipped post and telegraph 

 office. The late Lord Tennyson lived here for a 

 short time, but finding the spot not sufficiently 

 secluded removed to the house which he had built 

 on the top of Blackdown. Grayshott Hall, near the 

 village, is the residence of Mr. A. Ingham Whitaker. 

 Other hamlets in the parish are Lindford with its 

 inn, the ' Royal Exchange,' Hearn, Deadwater, Holly- 

 water, Stanford, the property of Major-General W. 

 Brownlow, C.B., of Eveley House, Wishanger, with 

 its fish-pond in the north of the parish near Frensham 

 Great Pond, Sleaford, and Barford. As most of these 

 names imply, Headley is very well watered, this dis- 

 trict being rich in shotts or natural springs, concerning 

 which the late Mr. Shore wrote as follows : ' This is 



a county of springs, the most interesting of which are 

 in the beautiful glen-scenery of Wagner's Wells at an 

 elevation of from 400 to 500 ft. above the sea. The 

 Wagner's Wells stream flows from Grayshott to Lud- 

 shott through a series of beautiful ponds at different 

 elevations until it joins the Wey near Bramshott flour- 

 mill. This southern Wey then flows past Bram- 

 shott paper-mill to Lindford, where it receives the 

 streams from Woolmer Forest. One of these 

 streams flows, except in dry seasons, from Wool- 

 mer Pond, and the other with which it unites 

 has several branches, one of which flows from a pond 

 on Weaver's Down, another from Forest Mere Pond 

 and through Roody Pond, another from Wheatsheaf 

 Pond and Bohunt Pond, and another from Fowley 

 Pond. These streams unite and form the Holly- 



HEADLEY MILL 



water at an elevation of about 245 ft. above the 

 sea. . . Headley is one of the least known of our 

 Hampshire villages, but is one of the most interest- 

 ing. It has a character of its own, plenty of sand 

 on a clay or loamy outcrop, and in one part of it, 

 the part called Arford, plenty of water and springs at 

 an elevation of about 255 ft.' * 



In a perambulation of the parish taken in the reign 

 of Edward VI five mills are mentioned : one built on 

 Frensham Pond and held by Richard Drake for a rent 

 of 1 3/. 4</., another lying between the highway called 

 ' Grevat Lane ' on the west and a river bank and a 

 meadow called 'Kyttsmede' on the east, a fulling- 

 mill and a water-course held by Thomas Fygg, a mill 

 held by Richard Gyll, and a messuage and fulling-mill 

 abutting on Lacyes Marsh. 3 At the present day there 



1 Statistics from Board of Agriculture 

 (1905). 



a P. and Proc. of the Hants Field Club, 

 ii (i), sz. 



SI 



Eccl. Com. Ct. R. bdle. 136, No. i. 



