Please select the page you want from the fly-out from the History & genealogy button on the left.

There is much more information to come such as the 1901 Census.

Opposite the development is a house known as Connors. It is always wet where their drive meets BHL. Many attempts have been made to cure the problem but the reason why it is persistently wet is a result of a natural spring.

The pavement was added to the western end of BHL in the 1970s. Pictures will be posted here showing the lane before they were added.

The hurricane in 1987 resulted in many trees being blown down and blocking the road.

The house on the corner of BHL and Chichele Road used to be a chapel. There was a covenant which prohibited gambling on the premises when it was converted to a house.

Limpsfield Sawmill

The Limpsfield Sawmill was located roughly in the place where Limpsfield Village Hall now stands. The bungalow immediately to the north of the hall is called Old Sawmills, once the home of T. Dalton Purdey, architect. On the High Street roughly between the two you can still see two remaining gateposts of the sawmill. The original sawmill barn was removed and re-erected as The Barn Theatre but the sawmill was still operating after that time.

New Zealanders in Oxted

Many people remembers Ferguson's Radio, TV and electrical shop in Station Road West, now the Chinese restaurant. Fergie, the owner, was a New Zealander. He wa injured in the leg during WWII and nursed by a local Oxted girl (Marjorie?) whom he married. He was invalided out of the Services. They had three sons (one of whom was killed in WWII) and a daughter. Of the remaining sons, David ran the business with his father and Bob was in insurance in the city of London (and a member of Lloyds, the writer believes).

Barrow Green Court, Barrow Green Road

Barrow Green Court was formerly the home of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), philosopher and jurist. Now the home of Mr. Fayed.

L G Fry was an English Impressionist who lived in Limpsfield around 1900. He painted an oil entitled ‘Bracken cutters on Limpsfield Common’. It was a commoner’s right to cut bracken as winter bedding for animals.

If the subject interests you, why not start a new topic in Chatterbox?

Oxted Library

Before the current library, Health Centre and Council Offices were built (JT DesignBuild, Bristol) the library was housed in a single-storey wooden building. This building was originally the Crowhurst Village Hall. It had a main section, a reference room and a reading room, brown linoleum flooring and gas heaters!.

Genealogy

Many people are interested in their family history. Go to boards.ancestry.com

Looking for former St. Michael’s pupils?
Try www.oldschoolmates.co.uk

Surrey history
www.surreycc.gov.uk/surreyhistoryservice

Surrey Local History Committee
www.surreyarchaeology.org.uk/slhc/

East Surrey Family History Society
www.eastsurreyfhs.org.uk

Did you know or can you help?

There is a new page on Furzedown Auxiliary Hospital, Limpsfield. Help needed. Go there, click here

What do you know about Pearl Harbour? If you want to read an account of the Battle and see some of the most remarkable pictures ever taken, click here.

Buried at St. Peter’s Church Limpsfield are
Frederic Delius,
Sir Thomas Beecham,
Eileen Joyce. Click on St. Peter’s ‘yard

Bluehouse Lane (formerly Blue House Lane)

Where the maisonettes now stand at the Water Lane end of Bluehouse Lane was Skinners Farm. When George Eliot was writing ‘Mill on the Floss’ she used to stay at Skinners Farm. She also wrote Adam Bede while staying in Limpsfield.

The farm was unoccupied for a long time and was left open to the elements - and the public. It became dilapidated, was declared unsafe and the site was developed. The remnants of the farm walls still surround the development as a planning condition. They were about 7 feet high but unfortunately were reduced in height to their present one foot or so but there is still a wall! There was a raised barn adjacent to BHL which stood on stones in order to defy attack by rats.

Hamelin House, 116 Blue House Lane and the house attached used to be Monkswell Hotel and Guest House. During World War II many Canadian airmen were billeted there. In the box-room next to the loft, were pasted tear sheets of pin-ups taken from Picture Goer and Picture Show, two popular film magazines.

About twenty or more years ago, the Surrey Mirror printed a picture postcard of the house with the annotation.

In the 1950s and 1960s the house was owned by Sir Laurence and Lady Collier. Sir Laurence Collier KCMG (1890–1976) was the British ambassador to Norway between 1939 and 1950, including the period when Norway's government was in exile in London during the Second World War. He was the son of the artist John Collier and his first wife Marian Huxley, the daughter of Thomas Huxley. He was educated at Bedales School.

The garden extended all the way down to Granville Road until 1971 when it was sold and divided into two. The new owners built a house in Granville Road for Sir Laurence and Lady Collier. Next to this on the west side is a smaller detached house in which Mrs. Shakespeare lived with her daughter and son Robert. For a short time, Robert was an assistant professional at Tandridge Golf Club. The house was designed to be energy-efficient and it has no chimney! There is a similar house in Gresham Road.

Before WWII the house was known as Monkswell Hotel and Guest House. . The house was owned by Sir Lawrence and Lady Collier

Fairhaven 114 BHL was formerly known as Whymark. Most of the houses in the lane were built on what was originally Blue House Farm and the land was owned by the Titsey Estate.

Laleham BHL on the corner of Station Road East was for many years, a Convalescent Home.