COPTHORNE HUNDRED 



MICKLEHAM 



1725 it was let for IJ/. a year for the use of the poor. 

 In 1807 it was sold, and a new house of industry 

 built, which existed until the passing of the Poor Law 

 of 1834. 



In 1692 Edward Hudson left 3 a year to the 

 trustees of Skeet's Charity to provide beef for the poor 

 at Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide, and l to the 

 vicar and parish clerk for saying evening prayer on the 

 eve of those festivals. 



In 1777 Elizabeth Rolfe gave the interest of 400 

 to maintain a monument in the church and for 

 distribution among ten poor families. 



In 1786 William Denne left 250 for coals to 

 the poor. 



In 1797 John Lucas, the founder of the school, 



endowed a midwife with 100, and left 100 for 

 bread, the latter sum being diverted to the school in 

 1815. 



In 1812 Richard Toye left 1,200 for monthly 

 grants to six poor and aged persons. 



In 1842 Richard Emberton left 300, the interest 

 to be laid out in beautifying the church. 



In 1843 James Roberts left 89 los. for the benefit 

 of four poor widows with dependent families. 109 



Mr. John Sandes, after 1725, left a rent-charge of 

 5 or. for bread. 



In 1715 Dr. Shortrudge gave a benefaction to the 

 vicars of Letherhead, Great Bookham, Effingham, and 

 Shalford. 



The total of the charities amounts to 300 a year. 



MICKLEHAM 



Michelham and Micelham (xi cent.) ; Mikeleham 

 (xii cent.) ; Mikelham and Micheham (xiii cent.) ; 

 Mykeleham (xiv cent.). 



Mickleham is a small parish and village midway 

 between Dorking and Letherhead, and 21 miles 

 from London. It measures about 3 miles east and 

 west and 2 miles from north to south, and contains 

 2,825 acres. 



The village lies in the Mole valley, and the parish 

 comprises the valley and the downs rising on either 

 side of it, where the Mole makes its way in a deep 

 depression through the chalk downs. The soil in the 

 valley is river alluvium, calcareous rubble, sand, and 

 Wealden Clay washed down by the Mole, and on 

 either side is chalk, with some small patches of brick- 

 earth on the higher parts. The valley is peculiarly 

 picturesque (see Frontispiece of Vol. II). On the 

 west side the well-wooded slopes of Norbury Park 

 rise in places steeply from the stream, and at 

 its southern extremity on the east the side of Box 

 Hill is almost precipitous in places, particularly 

 'The Whites,' overlooking Burford, which con- 

 sists of loose chalk thickly overgrown with box 

 and yew. Elsewhere it sweeps upwards in smooth, 

 grassy slopes, studded with box, yew, and other dark- 

 foliaged trees and shrubs. Amid thick woods of box, 

 yew, and beech on the summit, overlooking Dorking, 

 is a fort and magazine recently constructed, and still 

 more recently abandoned. The well-known view 

 from the top extends southward over the Weald, which, 

 from that height, seems to drop away into a plain 

 bounded by the South Downs, while to the south- 

 west Redlands, and other hills near Dorking, covered 

 with wood, rise to the greater height of Leith Hill. 

 Ranmore Common and Norbury face the spectator 

 from the east across the valley. The top of Box Hill 

 is not more than 700 ft. above the sea, but the steep 

 descents to the east and south, and the absence of any 

 high ridge of sand immediately in front of it, give an 

 impression of greater elevation. Dr. Burton, who in 

 1752 wrote in Greek of his travels through Surrey 

 and Sussex, calls it, with pardonable exaggeration, the 

 brow of a mountain. 



On a spur of Box Hill, overlooking Juniper Hall, 



is a round tower, said to have been built by Mr. Thomas 

 Broadwood. 



It is in Mickleham chiefly that the River Mole 

 burrows in the way which has suggested the popular 

 etymology of its name. 1 From the foot of Box 

 Hill at Burford to Norbury Park there are 

 holes, called swallows, through which the water 

 sinks, making its way by subterranean clefts in the 

 chalk. Some of these swallows are in the bed of 

 the stream, others in bays in the banks of the 

 river, which' only come into operation in times of 

 flood. One of the largest of these latter is in Fredley 

 Meadows, some 200 yards up-stream from the railway 

 bridge, close to which, before the pathway from 

 Dorking to Mickleham was diverted, stood the wooden 

 ' Praybridge.' Near Thorncroft, in Letherhead, the 

 water rises again in the bed of the stream. In normal 

 summers the bed of the river for 3 or 4 miles is dry 

 ground and stagnant water. In the grounds of Bur- 

 ford House and Fredley are hollows some way from 

 the stream, in which the water rises when the river is 

 full. The peculiarity of the river, that its whole volume 

 normally ran underground for some miles, has been 

 exaggerated. The Mole is well known by the notice 

 of poets, Spenser and Drayton writing at length upon 

 it, and Milton and Pope mentioning it. Miss Drink- 

 water-Bethune of Thorncroft privately printed a 

 poem, 'The Mole or Emlyn Stream,' in 1839, with 

 sensible topographical and antiquarian notes, which 

 deserves to be better known. 



In Norbury Park is a famous grove of giant yews 

 of great age, known as the Druid's Walk, which no 

 doubt mark part of the track which, leaving the main 

 east and west road, called in modern times 'The 

 Pilgrim's Way,' near Bagden Farm, crossed the river 

 near the Priory, and thence led over Letherhead 

 Downs to Epsom and London. Norbury is also noted 

 for some giant beeches. 



On Box Hill, and north of it upon Mickleham 

 Downs, is a great deal of still open grass-land, though 

 plantations and inclosures upon the downs have cur- 

 tailed it greatly in recent years. 



The main road from Dorking to London traverses 

 the Mickleham valley. This was made a passable 



109 The above are recorded in the 

 church. 



1 Perhaps the oldest form of the name 



known is Emlyn Stream (Emele aqua) ; 

 Lansd. MS. 435, foL 1302, in a grant 

 of 1331. The name 'Mole' may come 



3OI 



from ' Molinae Aqua ' ; compare the 

 Welsh ' Melin.' 



