The Hartfield Village Historical Guide is the perfect place to learn about this historic village. The booklet takes you on a tour of the village from the old Railway Station to the Hartfield Oak at the opposite end via the Town Croft, the Parish Church of St Mary’s with Lych Gate Cottage, the Village Pump and many houses that are 500 or 600 years old that have gone through significant changes over the centuries. Researched and written by Mike Parcell and Norman Black and beautifully illustrated by Tony Goddard. Available at every History Group meeting or via the info email address under ‘contacts’. Great value!
Please note that due to time pressures the intended update to the Historical Guide has yet to be progressed. Some copies of the current version are still available.
Some updates are required since this version was drawn. This is a simple list of the updates with the relevant numbers.
1 – (Railway station.) ADD Playschool, Parish Office and Coal yard Housing
5 – (Old Crown Farm) ADD Health Centre, Housing development & Nick The Butcher
6 – (Town Croft) ADD Pavilion.
19 – (War Memorial) ADD Memorial Garden.
20 – (Haywaggon Inn) Now Haywaggon Development.etc
23 – (The Hartfield Oak) Add little more to the roads as the oak is between the two roads.
25 – (Oaklea) ADD buildings &/or change to Oaklea Court.
Between 26 & 27 ADD The Barn
30 – (Woods Stores) Change to Hartfield Village Stores
After 32 is Vine Cottage & then No.7 combined with No.8 & then two doors numbered 5 & 6 of what is one house.
33 – Vine House was extended in the same style (date?) & is called Vine House Cottage.
‘Hartfield Times’
In addition to the Historical Guide there are 8 issues of “Hartfield Times” with a huge collection of stories, reminiscences, descriptions and life as it was lived. Some of these stories have been included within the website previously but you now have the opportunity to read all eight as ‘flip books’. See below
(Issue No.8 is not shown in the photo below but does now exist in the full ‘flip book’ collection! The contents are ‘The Case of the Missing Holly Sticks, The Landing Strips at Hammerwood, Brackenhill Open Air Home School and The Bocking Family.)
There is limited availability of several of these publications in their original form, so please enquire via the contact page or at one of the history meetings if you would like to obtain one.
All 8 Issues of Hartfield Times are now presented as Flip Books along with 100 Years Ago in Hartfield.
100 years ago in Hartfield.(This is from about 1986 so now refers to 138 year ago!)
Voices of Old Hartfield
Finally, we also have a collection of audio recordings, the earliest made in the 1970’s, with reminiscences going back to the earliest years of the 20th Century. We played some of these at the social evening at the beginning of 2014 and 2015. Our social evening having become a more substantial event at the Village Hall ‘Voices of Old Hartfield’ will be reviewed but recordings will still be made, possibly with video in the future.
