Addlestone

Addlestone, including St George's College's grounds of Woburn Park and the remaining farms and water meadows designated Green Belt were the western strip of Chertsey Manor or Chertsey Beomond Manor (to distinguish it from others), possessed by Chertsey Abbey from the grant of land by Frithwald, subregulus of Surrey, at a date between the years 666 and 675 CE until the Dissolution of the Monasteries.[6]

Adam de Woburn lived at Woburn Park in 1260[8]

Only thirteen years after 1537 the Crown was content to lease the land rather than continue with a steward (office) so Sir William Fitz William (later his widow) held the whole Chertsey Beomond manor from 1550–1574; later[6] Sir Francis Bacon held it for the infant Charles I who granted it specifically for his Queen, Henrietta Maria (of France). During the Commonwealth of England, the government sold the manor to William Aspinall who sold 292 trees of Birch Wood there for the Navy; however taken back by the Crown at the Restoration of the monarchy and the first of many leases was granted; the first lease was to the first Lord Holles. For example, from 1779–1803 the Duke of Bridgwater held it and from an unknown date until 1827 the British Commander-in-Chief Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany, famed for the nursery rhyme and the Duke of York Column by St James's Palace and Carlton Terrace was tenant of the lands.[n 4]

In the 1740s, the famed gardener, Philip Southcote, chose to construct a two-storey house. Now a Grade II listed building,[9] it was also named Woburn Park, with an original ornamented farm (ferme ornée) on Woburn Hill with fields for cattle or crops, decorated with statues, grotto, vases, temples, archways and other features, much of which survives as part of St George's College. The subsequent owners of Woburn Park were:[n 5]

• 1783 Lord Petre
• 1816 Vice Admiral Charles Stirling, listed in deeds as Admiral Stirling but Vice-Admiral
• 1834 Lord and Lady King, later Lord (Earl of and Countess of) Lovelace
• 1862 Lord (2nd Earl of) Kilmorey

Chertsey poor law union's workhouse was in Addlestone and was built in 1836–8. Addlestone chapel was added in 1868. The Village Hall was built in 1887 by the Addlestone Village Hall Company. The Princess Mary Village Homes at Addlestone were established by the organisation and patronage of the Duchess of Teck (Princess Mary of Cambridge) in 1871: certified industrial schools for female children of prisoners, or children otherwise in a destitute or dangerous position. They were conducted on the separate homes system, and are supported by voluntary contributions, with a Treasury allowance for children committed under the Industrial Schools Act. Addlestone's schools were mostly founded in this period: St. Paul's Primary School, built 1841, enlarged 1851 and 1885, initially for girls and infants. Chertsey Urban District took over all roles of the parish and of the "Godley Hundred" under the Local Government Act 1894. A boys' school was added in 1901. New Ham School was built in 1874. St. Augustine's School (Church) for infants was built in 1882, and Chapel Park (a church-sponsored School) in 1896.[6]

A Baptist chapel was built in Addlestone in 1872, and a Wesleyan chapel in 1898. Another ecclesiastical district of Addlestone, though today separated now by the residential development of New Haw, called Woodham and closer to the major town of Woking was formed in 1902 on what were the boundaries of Chertsey parish and Horsell parish.[6]

By 1911 the ecclesiastical district and ward Addlestone could be considered to have outstripped the original centre of the parish, Chertsey, in importance. According to the Victoria County History published in that year:

This ward contains the largest number of people of the three wards [Chertsey, Addlestone, and Outer Ward] into which the Chertsey Urban District was divided, and the number of new houses shows the growing character of the neighbourhood.[6]

On Station Road, a large Blériot aircraft factory was built in 1917; its several hundred aeroplanes were taken by road to Brooklands for final assembly and test flying.[10] In the 1950s the site was taken over by Weymann to build buses and coaches who built the prototype of the AEC Routemaster bus ceasing trade in the mid-1960s.[10] Caddy's acquired part of the site to manufacture taxis followed in 1967 by Plessey which moved from Chessington.[10] In 1990, the site was used by Marconi.[10] These companies were important local employers.[10] By 2000 the site was derelict.[10] The site was redeveloped in the early 2010s as a business park: Aviator Park.[11]

The Bourne to the east of Addlestone forms part of the lower watercourse of the Windle Brook and Lightwater

Elevations range between 11 metres (36 ft) and 40 metres (130 ft). The maximum is on Row Hill recreation ground, Row Town, Addlestone; a ridge that continues to the northwest of Row Town where it is known as Ongar/Spinney Hill, where Great Grove Farm in its centre also reaches this height; the minimum is by the Thames and along the Woburn Park Stream which is the main distributary of The Bourne the main waterway of the village, a stream rising as the Windle Brook in Windlesham cutting a shallow ravine, flowing past the McLaren Technology Centre and Woodham then passing to the east of the village.[4]

Eminences of the Bagshot Sand stand out above the river most notably the western hills mentioned and Woburn Hill which is 25 metres (82 ft) AOD compared to St Ann's Hill, Chertsey's 61 metres (200 ft), however, is part of the landscape critical to Woburn Park and the private gardens of Woburn Hill.[4][6]

Major climate changes in Britain causing sea level changes in the last 2.58 million years, with mini Ice Ages, the ice sheets did not extend to Surrey but sand and gravel deposits swept towards the fledgling River Thames were spread in all lower parts. Gravel terraces at various heights on the valley sides are the remnants of successive floodplains, the highest terrace being the oldest and the lowest the youngest. The most prominent terraces mark the former levels of the Thames in north Surrey. Along tributary slopes, a deposit, head, forms the main sediment of latest age. Head comprises angular pieces of rock and soil derived locally from the extensive frost-shattering of rocks and the subsequent movement of this material down valley slopes.[12]

Soil is predominantly "loamy soil with naturally high groundwater".[13] Woburn Hill has "slowly permeable seasonally wet slightly acid but base-rich loamy and clayey soil". New Haw, the southern part of the Addlestone post town and historically a part has "freely draining slightly acid loamy soils"; so does Great Grove Farm.[13] West of the M25 as far as the centre of Ottershaw is a belt of "slightly acid loamy and clayey soils with impeded drainage" soil.[13]

Heading north from the town, towards the Addlestonemoor five-way, two-lane roundabout is a Grade II listed building at the renaming Brighton Road to Chertsey Road, the George Inn,[15] almost opposite which are another listed building split into two houses: nos 114–116 Chertsey Road, early 19th century, slate-roofed houses with sash windows.[16] This Inn is a Tudor Period building with 18th century and later alterations and has three gables facing the road.[15]

Woburn Hill is a large house built in 1815 spread over three storeys, that features a moulded cornice and fluted Greek Doric columns to its porch with an iron balustrade above it forming a balcony in front of a central window of the floor above.[6][17]

Row Hill forms a residential estate with shops of a butcher, baker and electrical appliance store that is contiguous with Addlestone to its west.[18] These shops are on Ongar Hill not Row Hill and hence the name Ongar Parade, also known locally as "Top shops" due to being at the top of Row Town.

Addlestone Moor has a public house, now closed 08/2013, now a Day Nursery, flood meadows, a sports pitch and a mobile home park.[4] It is also home to the Runnymede Rockets BMX Club. Its roundabout marks on the closer side of town has five exits and is used for motorway access from primarily Addlestone, Weybridge, Shepperton, Laleham and Chertsey.

A Rocket League esports team managed by local gamers.

Station Road joins into surrounding A-roads in all directions, including non-principal "Brighton Road" which has since become superseded by the motorway network and other north-south roads, the A319 that links in towards routes to Berkshire and the A320 road that is convenient for closer areas of Thames Valley corridor, and the A318 to Brooklands with its museum, luxury hotel and retail park and the A3 road Painshill interchange between Hersham and Cobham towards London.

Addlestone railway station opened in 1849 on the Chertsey Branch Line.[2] Train services are operated by South Western Railway. A journey time of 47 minutes to London Waterloo station is achievable with one change at Weybridge, however direct services via Staines upon Thames (with no changes) take up to 81 minutes.[24]

Addlestone has four principal bus services. An hourly service to Slough via Staines upon Thames and Windsor and in the other direction to the Brooklands retail park operates: bus 51:[25]
Another service with 2 buses per hour is the 461 which goes from Chertsey to Kingston upon Thames and bus 446 between Woking and Staines upon Thames.[26]

The Wey Navigation canal runs to the south east of the town. Coxes lock is the deepest unmanned lock on the Navigation with a fall of 8 feet 6 inches (2.59 m).