Hogleys Farm

For the purposes of this site, we have included just 5 buildings in the “Hogleys Farm Area”. These are:

Hogleys Farm itself
Hogleys House
The Bungalow, Hogleys (no longer exists as a separate house)
Sandyburn
Heath Farm House

We do appreciate that Sandyburn is a little detached from the rest of Hogleys, and is closer to some of the houses on White Lane. But it does have close links to Hogleys, as are explained further down this page. These 5 buildings are shown on the Hogleys/Whites Farm map below (with thanks to Ordnance Survey).

Today there are only 4 separate houses at Hogleys (as we think that The Bungalow is now part of Hogleys Farm). When looking from the common at the 3 houses on the west side of Chapel Lane (ie excluding Sandyburn), it would be natural to assume that the middle house of the 3, Hogleys Farm, is the oldest. With its wooden beams, it certainly looks (and indeed is) much older than the other 2. And it is, after all, called Hogleys Farm, which suggests it is where the farmers and their families originally lived. However it was originally not a dwelling, but a farm outbuilding (ie a barn). It was converted to a house much later (in the 1950’s).

The original Hogleys farmhouse actually lay close to (just west of) the site of today’s Hogleys House, the northernmost of the 3 houses. We can see this on the 1875, 1915 and current OS maps below. On the 1915 map (middle image), the farm is much closer to the paths emerging from the right hand side of the image than on the left-hand (1875) map. We will see further down the page that these changes were made by a John Mason in 1900. Moving to today’s map (on the right), one can see that the outlines of the buildings have changed little from 1915.

All this is a little confusing, so to try to make things clearer, we have shown below a date table of the houses at Hogleys below.

Early history to 1897

As with White’s and Bullswater Farms, Hogleys was originally owned by the Lord of The Manor of Pirbright, but held copyhold by a tenant farmer [Copyhold is a little like leasehold. A copyholder, however, in addition to paying yearly rent, had to supply labour at harvest time and also pay a heriot in animals or cash and fine when the property was sold or passed to the copyholder’s heirs.]

The farm started as a fairly small property comprising only around 5 fields in a strip of land known as “Hungry Hill” next to an area of heathland. Nothing much changed over the next 300 years – the size remained as around just 6 acres. The area of heathland remains as heathland to this day.

Hogleys does not seem to be mentioned in any documents from the 1500’s. The earliest mention of Hogleys was the sale of “Hogleys Hill” by Henry White of Nuthurst to a John Russell in 1647. Nuthurst was what is today White’s Farm, and Henry White was the copyholder (and farmer) of White’s Farm at the time.

John Russell appears in the 1664 Hearth Tax listing as occupying a house with 5 hearths (the average in Pirbright was around 3, so Hogleys Farmhouse was a sizeable building at the time). There were several John Russells in the area at that time, and we are not sure which particular John Russell this was. We will refer to him as John Russell I, and assume he was the John Russell born in Pirbright in 1642. [Although he could have been the son of an earlier John Russell born in Pirbright in 1618. As we said, too many John Russells...]

John Russell’s son (John II) inherited the property on the death of his father in 1690, and then in 1740, on John II’s death, the property was inherited by a nephew of John II, John Huntingford. This John Huntingford was the maltster at Rickford Malthouse, who had also acquired the 3 fields known as Speeches from the owner of Heath Mill. The 1765 Window Tax return shows Mr Huntingford as occupying property having 11 lights (ie windows), whereas most other properties had only 7 lights. Perhaps he occupied other property in Pirbright (as well as Rickford Malthouse, which was in Worplesdon).

On John Huntingford’s death in 1769, the property passed to John’s daughter, Ann Honor (b 1736), who had married James Honor (1721-1789, who we will refer to as James I). James Honor I was the father of James Honer II (1760-1837) who bought Heath Mill c1802, where his story is told in more detail.

Ann was still Copyholder of the property at the turn of the 19th century, but on her death in 1803, Hogleys passed to her son, James Honer II. The Court Roll of that year notes that Hogleys now included “half an acre taken from the common. Proclamation made, but no-one came”. [We guess that this half-acre refers to plot 169 on the 1805 Pirbright map (shown below, left) as it appears to be the right sort of size, and borders the common.]

The 1807 survey of Pirbright (of which the relevant part of the map is shown above) shows “Hungry Hill” as being 6 acres in size. It was owned by James Honer II, and occupied by someone called Watts. This Mr Watts was almost certainly James Watts, who also rented 5 fields called Hoads (now part of Mount Lodge in Malthouse Lane) about half a mile to the south-east. James Watts was the son-in-law of James Honer, and was probably using these fields (5 acres arable, 1 acre meadow) to grow crops to supply grain to Heath Mill, but this is guesswork on our part. James Watts’s story is told in the section dealing with Whites Farm.

After the death of James Honer II in 1837, the copyhold of Hogleys was purchased c1839 from the executors of James Honer by Samuel Greenfield (who also owned Grove Farm and Bakersgate, where Samuel’s story is told). This marked the end of nearly 200 years of continuous Russell/Huntingford/Honor family ownership of Hogleys.

We have shown below right the Tithe Map of 1841, showing Hogleys, White’s and Bullswater Farms, shaded purple, blue and yellow respectively. [We should point out that the map was orientated several degrees anti-clockwise of the true orientation by the people who prepared it.]. It is obvious that Hogleys was by far the smallest of the 3 farms, at 7 acres. Bullswater was 27 acres, and White’s 41 acres. Each farm bordered the other 2 farms, and the 3 properties met at a single point (which remains today as a meeting point of 3 fields, albeit somewhat overgrown).

The map shows only 1 dwelling and a few outbuildings at Hogleys, and at the time of the 1841 Tithe Map, George and Louisa Grover were the tenants there. George was born in Worplesdon in 1792, and married Louisa Stevens (born Merrow c 1798) in Merrow in 1823. They had no children. George died in 1844 aged only 52, and was buried at St Mary’s, Worplesdon. Louisa moved to Jacob’s Well and became a laundress. She died at the Guildford Union Workhouse in 1864 and was buried at St Michael’s Pirbright.

The 1851 census does not show anyone at Hogleys.

On Samuel’s death in 1854, Hogleys is described as a dwelling, barn buildings and about 6 acres. Samuel’s will is extremely verbose and tricky to read. A good example perhaps of the result of lawyers in those times being paid by the length of the document?

After Samuel’s death, Samuel’s daughter, Elizabeth Greenfield (born 1833) inherited Hogleys (and Grove Farm) from Samuel. 2 years later in 1856 she married an Alfred Blunden, who had been born in 1829, the son of a Police Superintendent. Alfred was a haberdasher by trade and lived in Richmond.

Alfred and Elizabeth moved to Richmond and leased Hogleys to a variety of tenants over the next 40 years. The Court Rolls of the Manor of Pirbright state that the copyhold of Hogleys remained with the executors of Samuel’s will (2 gentlemen named George Holt and John Parsons Kaye) until the 1890’s. These gentlemen were probably trustees, and in reality we think that it was effectively owned (copyhold) by Elizabeth and Alfred.

But it looks as though not everything turned out so well for Alfred and Elizabeth. By 1891, they were living in a pharmaceutical dispensary in Brighton, where Alfred was the house porter, and Elizabeth the housekeeper. Within 2 years they had both died.

We will now look at the tenants who ran Hogleys Farm from the 1860’s. Many of the tenancies were short-term, so we will restrict ourselves to dealing with those families who were living at Hogleys in the census years.

In 1861 Stephen and Jane Chuter farmed Hogleys. Stephen was born in Aldershot in 1793, the son of a labourer. In 1813 he married a Jane Cawood (also born in 1793) in Farnham. Stephen’s mother’s maiden name was also Jane Cawood. Now a man marrying a lady with the same Christian name and surname as his mother is a first in our experience, and must have been slightly disconcerting for him. Obviously they were not the same Jane Cawood. But just to add to the story, both the Jane Cawoods married a man called Stephen Chuter (albeit 21 years apart). The 2 Stephen Chuters were obviously father and son, but we cannot trace if or how the 2 Jane Cawoods were related to each other. But they both originated from the Farnham/Aldershot area, and Cawood is an unusual name, so we would assume that they were.

Back now to the real world. Stephen had been a potter in the nearby area called East End (which is today the group of houses at the end of Chapel Lane, beyond the Providence Chapel – unfortunately outside the scope of this website at present). The pottery itself was where South Cottage and Melrose are today. Stephen and Jane had 10 children. By 1861 Stephen was aged 68, which is quite old to be starting a venture to farm 7 acres in size, even today, let alone 160 years ago. We would hope that a few of his 10 children would have lent a hand with the farming duties. Stephen died a few years later, in 1869, and was buried (for some reason) in the Chapel of St John the Baptist in Woking.

After Stephen’s death, Jane stayed at Hogleys and in 1871 was living there with 2 of her children (Stephen and James, both unmarried) and a 74 year-old widower named Richard Pantling, who had lived next-door to the Chuters in 1851. Jane Chuter died in 1875, and was buried with her husband in the Chapel of St John the Baptist in Woking. Richard Pantling died in 1878 and was buried in Pirbright Churchyard, next to his wife, Jane, who had died in 1844. A photo of the Pantlings’ gravestone is shown left.

In 1881 it looks as though Hogleys had been divided into 2 parts, with 2 families living there:

John and Lucy Trash (yes, really) with their 5 children and 2 agricultural labourer lodgers, and
Daniel and Elizabeth Fry with their 4 children and 1 grandchild.

John Trash was a 58 year-old agricultural labourer from Hawley, near Frimley. His wife, Lucy (or Louisa), was born Louisa Kerridge in Odiham and was 20 years his junior. They married in 1863, lived in Wanborough in 1871, and by 1891 they had left Pirbright and were living in Normandy.

Daniel Fry was born in Farncombe in 1829, the son of a carpenter. Daniel had followed his father’s footsteps and also became a carpenter. He married Eliza Stevens at Pirbright in 1852, but within 7 months, Eliza had sadly died, aged just 19. Daniel remarried Elizabeth Simmonds in 1854 and they had 10 children. They moved around Pirbright a lot – in successive censuses they lived at Upper Green; near Rails Field; Hogleys; The Green, and finally Gibbs Acre. Elizabeth died in 1914 and Daniel in 1918.

In 1891, again 2 different families were living at Hogleys:

William and Elizabeth Stevens and their 4 children, and
George and Amy Wright.

William Stevens was a road labourer, who had been born in Pirbright in 1858. Elizabeth had been born in Putney in 1863. By 1901 William and Elizabeth had moved to Stafford Lake (just a little way north of Sheet’s Heath). We think that the Stevenses then moved to West Heath, and that William died in 1942, and Elizabeth in 1939 or 1949.

George Wright was a hawker aged 45 who had been born in Middlesex. His wife, Amy, was aged 40 and had been born in Cambridge. We cannot trace anything more about them and suspect that they were at Hogleys for a short time only before moving on.

In the 1880’s the Manor of Pirbright had started to enfranchise its copyhold properties (ie convert the copyhold to freehold and sell the property as freehold). When in 1892, Elizabeth Blunden, the de facto copyhold owner died, the Manor may have decided to use the opportunity to enfranchise Hogleys, and by 1897 Hogleys had indeed been enfranchised. The new owners in 1897 were John and Flora Mason. They were John Morey Mason, who owned Pullens Farm (which was situated where the Pirbright Institute is today) who had married schoolteacher Flora Hagar Greenfield, granddaughter of Samuel Greenfield in 1892. It rather looks as though Flora may have inherited the copyhold of Hogleys after the death of Elizabeth Blunden, her aunt in 1892, but we don’t know for sure.

Until enfranchisement in 1897, William Stevens and his family continued to live in one part of the house. The other part was occupied by a Richard Stevens, possibly a brother?

Post – 1897

This seems an appropriate point at which to cease the early history of Hogleys, and look at the 5 dwellings individually.

There was only one dwelling at Hogleys (split into 2 parts) at this time. As a reminder, this original Hogleys Farm has morphed into today’s Hogley House, so we will begin with that house. We will then move southward to consider Hogleys Farm, The Bungalow, and finally Sandyburn and Heath Farm House.

Hogley House (previously Hogleys Farm or just Hogleys)

In 1900 John and Flora Mason submitted plans to rebuild the original Hogleys Farm as 2 adjoining cottages (see pictures below). These plans were approved and Hogleys continued to be rented out to tenants. But they did change tenants (perhaps they raised the rent?) and by 1896 William and Charlotte Chandler and their 3 children were living at Hogleys Farm (which for several years after was often simply referred to as “Hogleys”).

William had been born in Ash in 1850, the son of Jesse Chandler, a market gardener, and Emma (whose maiden name had been the delightful Emma Hogsflesh – sometimes pronounced “Huflé” apparently!). Emma was only 19 when she married – maybe in a hurry to ditch her surname? In 1882 William married Charlotte Lipscombe. Charlotte had been born in Worplesdon, also in 1850, and was the daughter of William and Mary Lipscombe, who farmed 2 acres at “Backside Common”. This doesn’t sound too flattering either, but it was actually near Wood Street. In 1901, William and Charlotte were living at Hogleys with their son and 2 daughters.

In 1904 John Morey Mason died, and Hogleys was put up for auction. We don’t know who purchased it, or whether it remained unsold and remained with Flora.

But the sale might have been the reason that the Chandlers moved to Normandy in 1905, into a house called “Pirbright Glen”, where William worked as a market gardener. The Normandy Historians have written a great history of this house at https://normandyhistorians.co.uk/aandp8.html Charlotte died in 1926, living on the Village Green at Worplesdon. William died at All Saints Hospital on the Finchley Road, London in 1929.

The next occupant of Hogleys from 1905 was Harry Grist, son of James and Sarah Grist, who were farming Bakersgate at the time. Harry had been born in Hampshire in 1870, and in 1900 joined up with the Hampshire Imperial Yeomanry to fight in South Africa. He only lasted 5 months in South Africa before requesting to come back to Britain. In 1901 he was a poultry farmer, living at The Bungalow, Fox Corner (which we think was part of Heatherside)

By 1905, at the age of 37 and still single, perhaps he was casting around for something to do. In April 1907 he was appointed Parish Overseer, but that obviously didn’t meet his ambitions. In September 1907 he sold his collection of horses (see ad right), and in December the same year he sailed to Canada, moved to the west coast, married a Mabel Gray the next year, and stayed in British Columbia for the rest of his life (which lasted until 1959).

We think that the farm was then bought by Charles and Rose Varndell in 1909. Charles had been born in 1876, the son of a carpenter. He grew up in Vauxhall Bridge Road and became an architect. In 1901 he married Gertrude Rose Perduce (known as Rose), who was born in Devon in 1871. They lived in Battersea and had 2 daughters.

We don’t know for certain the reason why Charles decided to buy Hogleys. It seems a rather odd decision for a young architect used to the hustle and bustle of central London. Charles’s occupation in 1921 tells us the likely answer: In the census of that year Charles gave his occupation as Architect, working for HM Woods & Forests Dept at Whitehall (Administration of the Crown Estate).

Perhaps he was involved in designing the new Testing Station for the Board of Agriculture, which was announced in 1912. Judging by a later newspaper advert (in 1911) the Varndells were also farming pigs (putting the hog back into Hogleys perhaps?).

The year after they bought Hogleys there was a large fire on the common near to the farm, which would have been very alarming to the Varndell family. A newspaper article about the fire is shown left.

But the Varndells did not seem to take to the countryside and sold Hogleys in 1912. Or maybe, once they realised how unpopular the Testing Station was with the local community, they decided to flee the area. Whatever, by 1913 they were living in Surbiton.

We think that the new owners were Martha and Andrew Hamilton together with Rose and Lucy Jellicoe. They were certainly living at Hogleys, but they could have been tenants, rather than owners. They decided to change the name of Hogleys to “Heath Farm”, which was certainly an accurate description of its location, but not as distinctive (being near Heath Cottage, Heath Mill, Heath Mill House, Heatherside, etc) as Hogleys.

Martha Hamilton was born Martha Jellicoe in London in 1842, the daughter of a Hampshire merchant. She had married Edward Hamilton, born 1839 in Donegal, who was the Secretary of the Londonderry Port & Harbour Commissioners. Andrew was born in Londonderry in 1881, the youngest of 9 children.

Edward had died in Londonderry 1899, and the family was still living there in 1901, Andrew being an apprentice chartered accountant. The family was fairly well off, but they decided to move to England, and by 1911 Andrew and Martha were living at Edenbridge, Kent. Andrew had qualified as a chartered accountant, but was unemployed. They were living with 2 of Martha’s sisters, Rose and Lucy Jellicoe, who were both younger than Martha (having been born in 1847 and 1851 respectively) and were both unmarried. It may have been Martha’s wish to be with her sisters that had driven her decision to return to England after Edward’s death.

Andrew joined the army in December 1915, giving his occupation as Poultry Farmer, and his address as “Heath Poultry Farm”. This suggests that he had forsaken the dizzy heights of accountancy a few years earlier to concentrate on more rural matters. He was a Private in the London Scottish Corps and served in France. He was given 2 weeks leave back in England in November 1917, but, 12 days after returning to France, he was killed in action at the Battle of Cambrai, during a particularly heavy enemy bombardment and attack.

We think that Martha died in late 1917 in the Guildford area (though her death is not recorded in the Pirbright parish register). The Jellicoe aunts moved to Southampton immediately after WW1, but Rose Jellicoe died in 1919. In 1921 Lucy was living with 2 of her elderly cousins (one aged 99, the other 90, and all unmarried) in Southampton. Lucy died in 1927, leaving £13,000 (worth £1.2 million today).

We can’t find a record of the occupants of Heath Farm immediately after WW1, but we know from the advert below left that they were poultry farmers (and that the name of the farm had reverted to Hogleys). Then in 1920 Edgar and Winifred Stephens moved into Hogleys. He was presumably not a poultry fan, as one of his first acts was to sell the poultry equipment (see ad below right). 4 years later he was selling pigs.

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The farm had been purchased by Winifred’s parents, Arthur and Fanny Neeves, although we don’t know if they purchased it in 1912, or c1920 – we suspect the latter.

We’ll first look at the owners, Arthur and Louisa Fanny Neeves. Arthur (born 1865 in Bloomsbury) was the son of a “Philosophical Instrument Maker”. Apparently this strange description meant that he made scientific instruments such as microscopes and telescopes. Louisa was born 1 month after Arthur in Clerkenwell, the daughter of the “Assistant Returning Officer at Holborn Union” (whose name was Horatio Nelson Anderson).

Arthur and Louisa married in 1876 and soon had 4 daughters. They lived in Beckenham, with Arthur working as a clerk at the Board of Trade. By 1911 they were living at Great Shelford in Cambridgeshire, with their youngest daughter, Winifred and her new husband, Edgar Stephens. Arthur had changed his job to working at the Patent Office.

By 1921 the Neeves family were at Hogleys, and in 1922 Arthur submitted a plan for a new house nearby, where Roughways now is. The plan was approved, the house was duly built, named Bellevue, and within a few months, Arthur and Louisa had moved into it. This house is covered in more detail under “Roughways” in the Whites Farm section.

Arthur and Louisa stayed at Bellevue until 1927, at which point they left the area (at the same time as Edgar and Winifred). In 1939 they were living at Shoreham-by-Sea. Arthur died in Weston-super-Mare in 1942, and Louisa died there 4 years later.

Now, to Edgar and Winifred Stephens. Winifred was the youngest daughter of Arthur and Louisa Neeves, born in Beckenham in 1883. She married Edgar Stephens in 1905 at Beckenham. Edgar had been born in Dalston in 1880. His father was a railway clerk from Somerset.

Edgar and Winifred left Hogleys at the same time as her parents did (ie 1927). They moved to The Owl House at Lamberhurst, Kent. This is a 16th century house with (today) 16 acres of land, whose gardens were until a few years ago, open to the public. Until 2005 The Owl House was owned by the wife of Julian Sands, the actor who died in 2023 while walking in California. However Edgar died in 1929, aged only 49. Winifred returned to her parents, and in 1939 was living next door to them at Shoreham-by-Sea. She gave her occupation as “Partner in Building Contractor Business, acting as chauffeuse”. She was living with a Frank Beach, a Building Contractor (who was presumably her business partner).

The new owner of Hogleys in 1927 was Muriel Josephine Woodger. Muriel was born in Shepherd’s Bush in 1890, the daughter of Joseph Woodger, a veterinary surgeon and Florence (nee Finch). Joseph had been married once before, but his first wife died aged only 41. As a result Muriel grew up in Chiswick with a half-sister who was 22 years older than her, which must have been a bit odd.

Joseph died in 1919, and we can guess that he died a wealthy man. As well as his Chiswick house (and maybe some other property), he left £16,000, which would be worth around £700,000 today. In 1921 Muriel was living in the family house in Chiswick alone, with no occupation. Her elder half-sister was living with 1 servant a few miles away on Duke’s Avenue (today under the end of the M4 near the Hogarth roundabout).

Muriel bought Hogleys in 1927 and moved into the house with Olive Baly. Olive (aged 51 and thus 14 years older than Muriel) was a music teacher. We don’t know what the relationship was between Muriel and Olive, but they lived together for nearly 40 years, and Olive ended up as Muriel’s executor when she died in 1965. Maybe Muriel needed a lot of piano tuition.

Muriel and Olive are on the Electoral Registers as living together in the family house in Chiswick since 1921, and it seems that they kept that house until 1939.

Muriel installed a phone as soon as she moved into Heath Farm in 1927. The phone was in her name (not Olive’s). We think that Muriel was a lady of some energy and commercial acumen, as she immediately proceeded to launch several building projects, most of which were implemented:

In 1928 she submitted a plan for a bungalow, which was not approved.
2 weeks later she resubmitted the plans, duly altered. This time they were approved, but we don’t think were ever actioned. An extract from the plans is shown below (left).
In 1930 she applied for permission to extend Bellevue (now Roughways). Her plans were approved, and as far as we know the extension was built.
In 1936 she applied for permission to build a house called Heath Edge (today called Sandyburn) a little further north on the east side of the path leading to Chapel Lane. An extract of part of the plan (oriented 90 degrees anti-clockwise for some reason) is shown below (centre). Heath Edge was actually built on land that was previously heathland and not part of Hogleys Farm. Presumably it had been acquired as part of the enfranchisement process in 1897.
In 1937 she applied for permission to build a garage on the site of the 1928 application which had never been actioned. The result of this plan can be seen today as a garage/outbuilding next to Hogleys House, but in the plot belonging to Hogley’s Farm. We have shown below right a (rather concise) letter from Muriel to the local council accompanying the application.

Hog - 1936 Building plan - Sandyburn.jpg

With all this activity, Muriel was clearly taking advantage of upturn in the British economy following the decision in the early 1930’s to leave the gold standard (as explained in the Economic/Social History here). There was a sharp increase in UK housebuilding at this time, and Muriel jumped on the bandwagon, building Heath Edge (today Sandyburn) in 1936.

Muriel and Olive moved into Heath Edge in 1936, and we have continued their story in the Sandyburn section (below). Muriel did continue to own Hogleys, and carried out yet another major rebuilding program to create today’s Hogleys Farm in the early 1950’s, which we have documented in the Hogleys Farm section below.

After Muriel and Olive moved to Heath Edge, their first tenants in Hogleys from c1937 were Douglas and Eleanora Walshe and their youngest daughter, Veryan. Douglas was born in 1880 in Lambeth, the son of a schoolmaster from Manchester. He married Phyllis Johnson in 1904. Phyllis was a writer, born in 1886, the daughter of a stockbroker.

By 1911 Douglas (who was a journalist) and Phyllis were living at Littlefield House, Worplesdon (on the A323 Aldershot Road at Clasford) with their young daughter. As they had 3 servants living with them, it sounds as though life would have been rather pleasant. But Phyllis’s parents, brother and sister were also living in the same house, so maybe not so pleasant after all.

By 1914 the family had moved to Send, produced 2 more children, and Douglas had become a writer. Douglas published his first book in 1920: “With the Serbs in Macedonia”, which doesn’t sound a particularly cheerful read, although second-hand copies can still be obtained today online.

By 1921 the family were living in Cheam, where Douglas decided to aim for a more lowbrow market with his writing. His first novel – “A Wonderful Wooing” – was published in 1924. [Editor’s note: As someone who grew up in Cheam, I’m astonished that he found sufficient base material there to write such a book.]. A picture of the book is shown below. At the time of writing it was on sale online for a very reasonable price, but we just managed to restrain ourselves from buying it.

In all Douglas published 36 books, some written under the pseudonym William Ashley (which tended to have racier titles, eg “His way with women”, “A young wife’s secret”). But most of his books seemed to focus on the same general area (eg “Siren in Satin”, “Find the lady!”). He also wrote the occasional play.

Phyllis died in 1929, aged only 43, although this didn’t seem to stop Douglas’s creative output, as he published no fewer than 9 novels during 1929-31. In 1933 he married Eleonora Vawdrey (born in Plymouth in 1884), who was living just around the corner from Douglas in Cheam.

Douglas and Eleonora moved to Caterham, and then moved into Hogleys in 1938. Perhaps he thought that living near to his Worplesdon roots would reinvigorate his writing. If so he was mistaken. His creative juices must have run dry, as only one of his books was published in 1938, followed by his last book in 1941.

In 1946 the Walshes moved out of Hogleys and moved to Egham. Douglas died there in 1952.

From c1950, Lt Col Rodney and Marjorie Morris were the next tenants of Hogleys.

Then, in 1953, Muriel embarked on one of her biggest building projects (at the age of 63) - to convert the old barn to the south of the house into a new house for the Morris’s. This coincided with another nationwide housing boom (refer Economic/Social History here). She was given permission to do this, and the result is the house now known as Hogleys Farm (which is covered in a separate section below). Most of the Hogleys land was also transferred, leaving Hogley House with around 2 acres.

The Morris’s moved out of Hogleys, and bought the newly-converted Hogleys Farm c1955. Their story is continued in the Hogleys Farm section below.

Hugh and Beatrice Shelbourne purchased Hogleys in 1955 from Muriel. Hugh Stanton Shelbourne was born in 1890 in Hornsey, the son of a lighterman living first in Hornsey, and then in Kingston. [In case the reader doesn’t know what a lighterman did (the author confesses that he didn’t know), he/she carried goods from a ship to the shore or to another ship.] Hugh’s father doubled up as a builder, which needs no explanation. Hugh’s mother (nee Beatrice Irene Sheridan Colman) was born in 1895, the daughter of a “Life Insurance official (Chief Inspector)”, working for the Life Association of Scotland in Bishopsgate.

Hugh joined the Royal Flying Corps in 1917 and the RAF (as a cadet) in 1918. After WW1, he trained as a stockbroker and became a member of The Stock Exchange in 1923. He and Beatrice were married in 1926 in Marylebone. In 1939 Hugh and Beatrice were living in a detached house on the A319 between Chobham and Bagshot, with 3 servants. They then moved to Guildford Road at Ottershaw.

The Shelbournes stayed at Hogleys until 1971, when they moved to Friar’s Rise, near The Hockering in Woking. Hugh and Beatrice died within a month of each other later the same year.

The next owners of Hogleys were Peter and Carol Fane-Gladwin. They immediately renamed the house “Hogleys House”, and thus it has remained ever since.

Peter was born in 1914, the son of Ralph and Isabella Fane-Gladwin. Ralph, a Lieutenant in the Scots Guards, died just 9 months later at Ypres, aged only 29. His 1914 entry in the UK Roll of Honour is shown below.

This must have been dreadful for his wife, Isabella, and her 2 young sons. Not surprisingly she remarried after the war and had a third son. Peter followed his father into the Scots Guards, reaching the rank of Lt Colonel. He was reported as wounded while fighting in the Middle East in 1940. He was awarded an MBE in 1951, and then an OBE in 1954, having served in (what was then called) Malaya. A picture of Peter in his service days is shown below.

Peter remained in the army, and we have shown below a 1961 cutting mentioning him (with thanks to the Daily Mirror).

He married a Carol Wigan (born c1946) in 1968 and they had a son. The family lived in Hogley House until c1994. They moved to Knaphill, where Peter died in 1999. We think that the current owners bought the house c1994.

Hogleys Farm

We must start with a caveat: As we described above, today’s Hogleys Farm is not the original Hogleys Farm. Instead it was constructed from the old barns of the original Hogleys Farm c1953. The original Hogley’s Farm was situated a few yards west of where Hogleys House is today, but was demolished c1900.

As described in the section above, the house now known as Hogley’s Farm was formed c1953 as a conversion by Muriel Woodger of the old barns which had been part of the original Hogleys Farm. The barns appear on the 1807 Pirbright survey, but we do not know how much earlier they were constructed. The house is certainly a fine-looking building today. A little over 50% of the Hogleys land (3 acres or so) was also transferred to the new house.

Lt Col Rodney and Marjorie Morris had been living at Hogleys House (refer above) between 1951 and 1953, and we assume that they bought the newly converted barn from Muriel c1954. They immediately named it Hogleys Farm (even though it had never been a farm, just a barn on a farm).

Rodney was born in London in 1916, the son of Cyril Morris, an officer in the London Fire Brigade. He trained as a Mechanical Engineer and spent 3 years at the Dennis Bros factory in Guildford between 1934 and 1937, which included working on the fire engines produced there. We’re sure his dad would have approved of that. At the time Rodney was living at Joseph’s Road, Guildford. He then joined the army, becoming a 2nd Lieutenant in May 1939 and a Lieutenant in September that year.

If he was looking for an eventful career, then his timing was spot on – WW2 was about to commence. But in June 1939 he married Jean Marjorie Gardiner (known as “Marjorie”). Marjorie had been born in 1917, the daughter of a Chartered Accountant. At the time of her marriage, Marjorie was living in Wimbledon, working as a “Secretary to Arithmaticion”, whatever that means. A photo of them at their wedding is shown left.

In 1944-45 Rodney was attached to the Guards Armoured Division in France. He survived the war, and by 1945 he was a major in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers. He and Marjorie had 2 children. Their son’s wedding was reported in The Tatler in 1966, with the bride being one of the “Brides of the week”. A photo of the happy couple is shown right(with thanks to The Tatler).

The Morrises lived at Hogleys Farm until Marjorie’s death in 1991. Rodney died in Marseille in 1995.

The next owners from c1993 were Philip & Christine Finnigan. They sold the farm in 1998 (we’re not sure to whom), and it was sold again in 2006 to the current owners.

The Bungalow, Hogleys

This building is a bit of a mystery. It first appears in the records in 1938, but had disappeared by the early 1960’s. We can only think that it is the building next to what is now Hogleys Farm, and that it was converted to a dwelling in the 1930’s. We can’t find any building plans for this conversion. It may later have become part of Hogleys Farm in the 1960’s or 1970’s. But we are not sure about this. At any rate, it seems that Muriel Woodger rented the property out to tenants, rather than selling it.

The first occupants in 1946 were Reginald and Queenie Fielder.

Reginald was born in Southampton in 1899, the son of a market gardener. He and Queenie (nee Foster) were married at Guildford in 1920. Queenie had been born in Pirbright in 1899 and had attended Pirbright School.

In 1921 they (and their 3 month old son) were living with Queenie’s family at No 7, Pirbright Terrace. Reginald was a baker/confectioner, although a few months earlier, on his son’s baptism register, he had recorded that he was a French polisher. So, he was a man of many talents. Queenie’s father, Charles Foster, was a carter, working as a government contractor at Vale Farm Road in Woking.

They soon moved away from Pirbright, and in 1939 they were living in Southampton, with Reginald being a Foreman at a bakery. We don’t know why the Fielders moved back to Pirbright after WW2, but they lived at The Bungalow for only a few years until 1952. We are not sure where they ended up after that. Reginald died in 1972, and Queenie in 1974.

During 1955-56 an Aline Strickland was registered as living at The Bungalow. We think that this was probably Aileen Strickland, who was born in Portsmouth in 1901, the daughter of a dockyard storehouseman. In 1939 she was working as a shop assistant in her brother’s shop (a woodworker or case-maker) in Portsmouth Dockyard. Below is a photo of Aileen at her sister, Amy’s wedding in 1923.

Aileen never married and died in 1966 in Petersfield.

The next occupants of The Bungalow from 1956 were Samson and Caroline Dendy. Samson James Dendy was born near Horsham in 1888, the son of Samson Wallace Dendy, who was a foreman on a farm. [In case you are wondering, yes, Samson Wallace Dendy’s father was also called Samson. Maybe they were a strong family.] Caroline (nee Lewis) was born in 1890 in Hascombe. They married in Hambledon, near Godalming, in 1911.

They moved around a bit, living in Send, Binscombe and Godalming, and from c1950 to 1955 at “North Bar” in Brookwood Cemetery, where Samson had worked until his retirement in 1955.

Samson only enjoyed 3 years of retirement at The Bungalow, as he died in 1958. Caroline stayed there for another year or 2, and then moved to Enfield, where she died in 1986, aged 96.

We cannot trace whether Samson was related to Frederick Dendy, who had lived at Nos 2 and 5, Pirbright Cottages between 1915 and 1930. They were both born in Itchingfield, near Horsham, albeit 18 years apart. Dendy is an unusual surname, and so it is likely that Samson and Frederick were related in some way, but if so, it must have been a few generations back. Frederick’s wife, Barbara was still living at No 2 until her death in 1956.

We think that, after Caroline Dendy left The Bungalow around 1960, it became part of Hogleys Farm, owned by Rodney and Marjorie Morris (refer section above).

Sandyburn (previously Heath Edge)

Sandyburn (originally named Heath Edge) was built in 1936 by Muriel Woodger, who lived at Hogley House (refer section above). An extract of part of the plan (oriented 90 degrees anti-clockwise for some reason) is shown below. Heath Edge was built on land that was previously heathland and not part of the old Hogleys Farm. Presumably it had been acquired when Hogleys Farm was enfranchised in 1897. The current Sandyburn seems to have acquired a little more land on what seems to be the north-east side on the plan (but in reality is on the south-east side).

The original name of the house was Heath Edge, which describes the location of the house pretty well, we think. Muriel and her companion, Olive Baly decided to move out of Hogley House and into Heath Edge as soon as the building work was completed. During WW2 Olive set up a “Spitfire Fund”, which is explained in the 1942 press cutting right.

Muriel embarked on another major building project in 1953 (to convert the old barn into today’s Hogleys Farm), which we have described in the “Hogley House” section above. Muriel and Olive celebrated the success of the project by sailing to South Africa in 1954, when Muriel was aged 64 and Olive 78. Neither owned up to having any occupation (although we would offer property developers as a suggestion).

This trip must have been something of a “final fling”, as they left Pirbright the following year (1955) and moved to Boscombe, in Bournemouth. The Bournemouth phone directory entry was now in Olive’s name, not Muriel’s, for some reason. Muriel died in Boscombe in 1965, with an estate of £12,500 (worth £200,000 today), presumably plus some property. She named Olive as her executor – not surprisingly as they had lived together on their own for over 40 years. Olive died there in 1973, aged 98.

Strangely we can’t find any evidence of any Heath Edge occupants between 1955 and 1964. We can only conclude that Heath Edge stood empty during this time.

In 1964 William and Gertrude Slorick bought Heath Edge. They had previously lived in Weybridge in a house called Sandyburn, and so they immediately changed the name of their new house from Heath Edge to Sandyburn – the name it bears today. Slorick is a very unusual surname – there aren’t many Sloricks around. We suspect it may have a German or central European origin, but this is just a guess.

William Slorick was born in 1908 in Durham, the son of Lancelot Slorick, a shipyard riveter. Gertrude (nee Ditchburn) was born in South Shields in 1913, the daughter of a tool-maker. They married in 1936 in South Shields. William was a draughtsman, while Gertrude was a shorthand typist. By 1939 they had moved southwards to Shipley in Yorkshire, and straight after WW2 they moved even further south to Weybridge. They had 2 children: Pamela (born 1950), who died in 1994, and a son, Michael, who became a partner in law firm Mackerell Turner Garrett in Woking as well as chairman of Shalford Football Club.

A newspaper picture of Michael in 1997 is shown left. Gertrude was secretary of the Pirbright Womens Institute. In 1970 her driving gained her an unwanted appearance in the local newspaper (see cutting right).

In the early 1980’s the Sloricks sold Sandyburn. William died in 1996 and Gertrude in 2000 (both living in Surrey).

c1984 the current owners purchased Sandyburn. They have made several planning applications since, including for a new house just to the north of Sandyburn (which was refused).

Heath Farm House

We think that Heath Farm House was built in the mid-1960’s. It was built on land that had previously been heathland, and was therefore completely unsuitable for growing garden plants. It is therefore surprising to see a flourishing garden containing strong healthy plants and an impressive lawn. We suspect that this required several years of hard, green-fingered work. Now that the common has recently been cleared, the house can enjoy impressive views across to the far side of the common.

The current owners moved in when the house was built and have remained there ever since.

A History of Fox Corner, Pirbright

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