Thorney Lane, running all the way from St Peter’s Church in Iver through Richings Park to Sutton, Horsemoor Green and Langley Marish and connecting with the road to Thorney Mill, has probably existed for more than a thousand years.
For much of that time its use was to connect the manor with its more remote farms and the rich parish land to the south, but it became more important when Richings Park became an estate in its own right. At times in the past, a section was also known as Richings Lane.
Perhaps not surprisingly some of the modern Richings Park roads have their origins in some of the old tracks to fields and homesteads, which were themselves influenced by ancient long gone features. The Sykes brothers tapped into this vein of history when naming the roads of the Estate.
The large area of Thorney Wood dictated the course of the roads with those to the west of Thorney and Colnbrook curving round the wood. Originally most travel was on foot on tracks that lead from Colnbrook to Iver passing along Dole Slade, then across the Ridgeway to Iver.
Changes to the roads in Richings Park were made by John Sullivan who bought the estate in 1786. A sketch map from the conveyance dated 1792 shows the original roads and the changes were made in 1795 resulting in the formation of the present Old Slade Lane as shown.
North Park was the northern boundary of the park ground of Richings Manor formed from the old track to Sutton and Parlunt during John Sullivan’s changes. More recently it was a track leading to Market Lane and Meadfield Road and Langley. This route was lost during the war as the Hawker airfield extended right through.
At that time the route from Richings Park to Langley was via North Park which only extended just beyond the drive up to Home Farm, along a dogleg through Home Wood (which extended between Home Farm and Sutton Lane) and out into Sutton Lane alongside the farmyard. Thence to the A4 and back to Langley.
In more recent times the A4 and A40 became major roads and source of increasing traffic and then came the motorways – the M4 in 1963 and M25 in 1986. In addition to the resulting pounding traffic, these roads have bounded and carved up our locality so that it not easy to image how free, open and peaceful it used to be.
The present street names were an attempt by the Sykes brothers to preserve what they felt to be some of the important historical connections: Bathurst Walk, Somerset way, Wellesley Avenue, The Poynings. The new straight stretch of road, cutting off St Leonard’s Walk (the original Thorney Lane) was briefly known as Hache Way. The early names of Syke Ings and Syke Cluan were Northumberland Avenue and The Earl’s Walk.
One early brochure mentions and has photographs of Fitz-Payne Avenue and Beauchamp Avenue. The new development of Northumberland Walk (off Syke Cluan) maintains this tradition.
Syke (sike) is the Anglo-Saxon word for a ditch or water course and still in use in Yorkshire; an Ings was a meadow next to a Syke (in Scotland a Cluan). Much of the land was originally meadow prior to the building of the estate. The first residents of Richings Park recalled a small stream in a ditch running along what was Syke Cluan before it was made up. The co-incidence with the name of the Sykes brothers was well taken.
Thorney House – a listed building of historic and architectural interest. It was probably once the Dower House of Richings and as such perhaps intended as the residence for the mother or son of the owner. In 1883 (and possibly earlier too) Col Charles Meeking and his family lived there while his widowed mother resided at Richings. At times Thorney House became the residence of senior estate workers. During the latter part of the Meeking years James Cox Macro Allen Wilson, who acted as Land Agent and Surveyor for the Richings Estate, resided at Thorney House with his wife Ethel Mary. He gave its address as Colnbrook. (Information from Census). The old Coach House and stables for Thorney house were at what is now Maytrees near St Leonard’s Church.
Thorney Mill – one of the three parish mills recorded in the Domesday book, the others being Iver and Huntsmoor.
Tower Arms – owned by the Tower family. In 1850 it was probably called the Hare and Hounds Beer House in Thorney. In 1851 and 1861 it was listed as the Fox and Hounds. It was known as the Tower Arms by 1874.
The Tower Cottages – on Thorney Lane South were built in 1868 in the rustic gothic style popular at the time. Ada Heath (who came from a Cowley family) lived in one of the cottages (No 12) in the 1930s and worked in the laundry on North Park.
North Star.
Thorney Villa.
Thorney Weir Cottage.
The original estate had 6 farms, four of which were sold to the Sykes brothers.
Sutton Farm occupied the land from Sutton Lane and Market Lane to the canal. Whilst part of the Tower estate its tenants included Whittington, Leader and Cutler. It was sold to the tenant Mr Robert (Bob) Purser (cousin of Frank and step brother of Clifford Reeves) by the Meeking Trust at the same time as the rest was sold to the Sykes. He ran it with his wife Ursula and son Richard.
It is not clear which is the 6th farm belonging to the estate – Parsonage Farm on the corner of Hollow Hill Lane and Langley Road or Brook Farm at the western end of Colnbrook are possibilities.
There was also Little Sutton Farm which was a parcel of land sold off by auction by the Receiver in 1929. It was also variously know as Sutton Court Farm and Sutton End Farm.
Larbourne Farm was on the east side of the Richings Estate, running across from Richings Way and The Poynings and Ridings to the Bigley Ditch, the border with Middlesex. The mellowed brick farm house is one of the oldest in the district with an imposing pear tree lined drive. In the past the farm has been known as Larborn, Larbourn, Labon and Laveren. It was once owned by the Tower family who let it to tenants. Among these were Binfield, Mercer, Trumper and Bagley.
It was sold by the Sykes to the tenant Mr White in 1931. Post war Mr White had considerably extended his orchards and under cropped them with salad stuff. Eventually he sold the land for gravel extraction to St Alban’s Sand and Gravel which became Halls Aggregates and the entire area was dug and to that to the west of the M25 up to The Poynings then eventually restored. It is now farmed by Halls.
The part to the east of the M25 was dug more deeply to reach the clay, both the permitted area and time period being exceeded. Retrospective permissions were granted, despite much local opposition. However, the County Council has secured an agreement from Halls and after more than 30 years the area finally passed into council ownership in 1990 and Thorney Park (opposite the North Star) was created as a natural woodland area round the lake which is 65 feet deep.
Old Slade Farm and house (including recollections of Duncan Staig). This was the oldest farm on the estate; the original farm house was called Dole Slade and was located near where the power pylon currently stands next to the M4. Lighting was provided by candles stuck into iron holders
hammered into the wooden roof beams. This was a fire risk and the house burnt down as did countless others at the time. The staddlestones for the farm storehouse were located and dug up by Duncan Staig. The second house was built in the curve of the stream near to where 39 Old Slade Lane now stands. It too burnt down. The third farmhouse was built in 1848/9 and was a listed building until it was demolished in 2004 for dubious safety reasons after the internal flooring had been removed.
Various outhouses were also demolished around this time. Old Slade Farm was at some time known as Plim’s Farm and Spriggs Farm. It was once owned by the Tower family who let it to tenants. The farmyard originally had stables for the heavy horses but when tractors took their place these were demolished and a barn built instead. The Silage Silo was built by Eric Sykes to an innovative design and farmers came from afar to view it as it was supposed to replace the clamp system. However it was never finished nor used for silage as it did not work properly.
Old Slade Farm was retained by the Sykes as a general agricultural holding, occupying the land from Old Slade Lane across to the Tower Arms.
As well as managing Home Farm, Eric Sykes oversaw the running of Old Slade Farm, where Mr Clifford Reeves (who had previously worked for the Meekings) became the tenant and valued manager for many years continuing after the sale to Boyers in 1938. Mr Reeves originally lived in a cottage along Old Slade Lane which was demolished to make way for the new development.
Clifford Reeves’s mother (a widow?) had married Mr Purser and had four sons, one of whom was Robert tenant of Sutton Farm. Duncan Staig (whose family lived in The Ridings) was Mr Reeves’ son-in law (married to Joan who was born in 1929) and successor up until its final closure in Sept 2000.
This farm, part of London’s market garden, before even Heathrow was dreamt of, prospered and produced vast quantities of vegetables (& cherries) for the Brentford Market. Transport was shared with Mr Frank Purser (Tan House Farm).
The original track from the farm led into Colnbrook – past Tan House. A gravel pit on the left of this track was dug out by the Sykes to supply building materials for the Richings Park development. A narrow gauge railway was built from the farm to the gravel pit to transport the gravel. Tipping wagons were pulled by a pony to the ballast holding facilities at the farm.
There was a big flood in 1947 and the water covered all the fields. No 75 Old Slade Lane was under 3 feet of water and the farmhouse flooded to 1 foot. The situation now is worse than before as the various culverts do not function properly and have been blocked. Hence the new house built in 2009/10 is on a 1 metre high bund.
When the M4 was built fossilised human bones were found in a pit about 15 feet deep on a corner of the old river which now runs underground.
Tan House Farm was sold to its tenant, Frank Purser by the Sykes in 1931.
Home Farm. This was the dairy farm and Coach House for Richings Manor, hence the clock on top of the stables. Mr JS Anthony was the manager for the Sykes brothers and latterly the receivers and bought and ran Richings Park Dairy. His daughter Bettie grew up here and married Mr Whitby Roberts, the Sykes’s lawyer. A Mrs Goodchild used to be the dairy lady for the herd. Her sister married Mr White who farmed Rabs Farm in West Drayton, which became Bob Smith’s farm and then a fire station, then a car sales and petrol garage and finally a petrol-only garage. Bob Smith’s father was killed by the bull. Bob’s brother Harold took the tenancy of Thorney Farm.
Thorney Farm. This was another ancient farm which lay to the east of Thorney Lane, where it is rumoured that Cromwell quartered some of his Troopers in 1642. It was also once part of the Tower estate and was let to a variety of tenants.
The name of many of the Tower farms often changed with the name of the tenants. Thorney Farm was known and shown on maps as Fountain’s farm as the Fountain family were long standing tenants. Another earlier tenant was Lovejoy. In 1932 it was named on maps as Thorney Farm and in the 1950s it was farmed by the Jolly family. Following the gravel extraction in the 1960s it was farmed by Harold Smith.
When gravel was to be extracted from Thorney Farm in the early 1960s to build the Staines Bypass, an aerial photograph of the site showed interesting crop marks and field systems. At Thorney Farm itself there were a number of very dark rings in the soil which on excavation turned out to be Celtic and later Roman, Romano-British and Saxon storage pits.
The most significant discovery was an intact dressed Sarsen stone found in the extracted gravel, with others broken up during the extraction process. These are the material from which Stonehenge is made and are not local deposits. Why these stones were here can only be guessed, but to the west of this, in the field know as One Hundred Acre Field adjacent to Thorney Lane South, the aerial photo showed a large enclosed area on the 25 metre contour in the shape of a key-hole and some 60 metres in diameter. The lower section opened out with trench markings intersecting the main body.
A circular hut around 25 metres in diameter and several smaller huts of 3 to 5 metres appeared to have been present surrounded by a deep ditch, possibly to keep farm animals in and unwelcome wild-life out. Storage pits for grain and root crops were also evident.
Part of the top section to the north east was damaged by the gravel extractions but the rest of the site remained intact following the interventions of archaeologists from the County Museum. In 1967 it was proposed to lay high voltage electricity cables along the boundaries of properties in Thorney Lane South near the Tower Arms. Initially permission was refused because of the importance of the site, but after considerable debate this was granted provided the trench was as close as possible to the boundaries of the properties and not more than 10 metres wide.
Time was not available to carry out a full archaeological investigation so permission was given for Mr Stanley from the County, along with a small group of local experienced enthusiasts, to carry out a controlled dig along the proposed route of the cables.
Because of the limited area available to the dig, only a small part of the site could be investigated, but one of the important discoveries was a deep in-filled ditch which corresponded to the aerial photo and from which a few Stone age implements were recovered, indicating that the land had been farmed for several thousands of years, possibly from around 2,000BC.
Small pieces of pottery from both the Bronze and Iron Ages were found in pits and sections and a Bronze Age ring was discovered at the centre of a damaged mound.
There may also have been later field systems, indicating that it was still being farmed up to the early Roman period. The indications are that the aerial photograph does show a Bronze/Iron Age farm settlement. The site is now protected by a preservation order as an ancient monument and any future development would require complete excavation and recording.
An ancient track led from Iver to Colnbrook. Part of it followed the natural drainage ditch which ran from opposite the lane to Thorney Farm diagonally across to Old Slade Farm. The ditch now runs behind the houses in The Poynings, round the farm and under the M4, mostly in a culvert. After prolonged discussions, the path was eventually diverted to run down The Poynings and from there across to join the new bridleway bordering the motorways.