Development of Eton Wick

Map of 1797
copied from The Story of a Village: Eton Wick 1217 - 1977

From its origins as a farming area of the Manor of Eton the earliest dwellings were built on the highest land north of the Great Eton Common. From the 14^th century to the 18^th century the six farmhouses continued that development. The 1797 map indicates houses on the southern side of Common Lane including the Three Horseshoes.

The first half of the 19^th century brought further house building including the Parsonage, Bell Farm Cottages, Harding Cottages and Prospect Place. Most of these were rented to working class tenants. As the century progressed more houses were built some on the gardens of the cottages facing the Great Common. These included Hope Cottages, Palmers Place and others. 

The largest development began in 1880’s on some of the land of Bell Farm where Boveney Newtown grew with Alma, Inkerman and Northfield roads, and Moores Lane. The development was beyond the western edge of the Parish of Eton which at that time was Bell Lane. As recorded in the 1881 census when there were there household it grew and grew. By 1911 there were 125 households, two more than Eton Wick.

 

Ordnance Survey Map 1899 courtesy of National Library of Scotland

By 1899 there were two distinct communities with the land south of Alma Road and west of the Eton Parish mostly undeveloped. A few houses were on the south side of the Eton Wick Road including the Shepherds Hut and Victoria Road was outlined. The 1925 map shows further development south of Alma Road.

 

Ordnance Survey Map 1925 courtesy of National Library of Scotland

Ordnance Survey Map 1932 courtesy of National Library of Scotland

The inter war years saw some development south of Alma Road including a few houses in  Tilstone Avenue and Close.

Map showing rights under the Commons Registration Act of 1965 
copied from The Story of a Village: Eton Wick 1217 - 1977

This map indicates that there were six registered Commoners under the 1965 Act. These included Crown Farm, Dairy Farm, Little Common Farm, Manor Farm and Saddocks Farm.

Ordnance Survey Map 1968 courtesy of National Library of Scotland

The 1968 map reveal the limits of the village development with Haywards Mead, Princes Close, Queens Road and Cornwall Close filling the remaining available land on the south side of the Eton Wick Road. The final major development in the village was on the wheatbutts in the 1970's.

 

Ordnance Survey Map 2023 courtesy of National Library of Scotland

The latest OS map of 2023 show how the village development has been restrained by the Lammas Land and Commons. The number of households was also limited by the single road that restricts potential for evacuation in the case of flooding. The experience of the Thames floods of 2014 showed that the Jubilee River did protect the village. There has been more house building allowed including particularly in Princes Close, Queens Road and Victoria Road.

Enclosure Map courtesy of the Berkshire Records Office.

Both Slough to the north and Windsor to the south have both grown as enclosure acts were passed for the Manor of Upton cum Chalvey, 1819 and the Manor of Windsor Forest, 1817. If the 1826 Bill to enclose the Manor of Eton cum Stockdale and Colenorton had not been rejected Eton Wick would probably have become part of Slough.

Photographic History of Eton Wick and Eton - Agriculture and Farm Houses - Farm Horses

Harry Cook ploughing with a team of horses c1920s.

Harry and brother Alf came to Eton Wick from Henley, where they had been farmers, in the early 1920s. Harry married villager Ethel Dace. They had one daughter Eileen. Ploughmen were very proud of the straight furrows they cut. Over the course of day, they walked many miles up and down the field, maintaining tight control of the plough handles and the horses. Harry worked for Saddocks Farm, among others. The picture below is of 'Porky' Banham tending his horses in front of the barns of Saddocks arm c1920s. 

Hay Making 

This photo is early 1930s, and is probably taken on South Field, with the trees and hedge of Eton Wick Road running from the left behind the horses. Cyril Tarrant is on the cart (arms folded); the others are believed to be, from the left: A Banham (Porky), Bert Baily and Arthur Tarrant on the rake. 

The horse gives way to the tractor

The horse gives way to the tractor. This picture was taken around 1930 on Manor Farm, and could well have been taken with the historic significance of the occasion in mind, as George Tarrant and his son Bob (in white shirt) stand by their new iron wheeled Fordson tractor, about to replace the horse in the background. 

The village blacksmith

The village blacksmith. This is believed to be blacksmith Arthur Gregory (left) with Charlie Benham, which would date the photo as early 1920s, as Jack Newell became the village blacksmith in the mid-1920s. The forge was located in Wheelwrights Piece, across the common brook opposite the Greyhound public house. It was a favourite place with the village children for spending a few hours watching the blacksmith at work. The lads helped with bellowing the fire and other odd jobs, while the girls could get steel hoops made for a penny. 

This article was first published in A Pictorial History of Eton Wick & Eton.

Photographic History of Eton Wick and Eton - Agriculture and Farm Houses - Steam Threshing

 

The top photograph on the opposite page shows a steam traction engine driving a threshing machine in front of Saddocks Farm Cottages in the 1930s. The main threshing contractors employed by Eton Wick farms were Wards of Egham and Poulters of Burnham. The contract staff often slept rough in the farm barns. Until the advent of combine harvesters, corn was cut and tied in sheaves by binders. 

To protect them from the wet until they could be collected, the sheaves were stacked in 'stooks'. Stooks comprised of eight or so sheaves stood on their butts, the rounded side to the weather. 

Reg. H Tarrant

Reg. H Tarrant of Crown Farm is engaged on this activity in the above picture, taken probably in the 1950s. The sheaves were then collected and built into ricks, often on the actual corn field, sometimes back in the farm, until the corn could be threshed and the straw baled.

Skilfully built and thatched ricks were a common site in South Field along the Eton Wick Road and on the farms. The photograph below shows Reg. J A Tarrant of Saddocks Farm as a toddler c1930 in Saddocks rick yard; probably these ricks were thatched by Reg's elder brother Cyril. (The two Reg's were first cousins, sons of George and Arthur, respectively). 

Reg. J.A. Tarrant

This article was first published in A Pictorial History of Eton Wick & Eton.

Saddocks Farm House

Saddocks Farm House and Garden circa 1906

At this time, James and Julia Tarrant lived here, followed by one of their sons, Arthur, and his family. This photograph is of the south elevation of the house. Arthur's sons Cyril and Reg (J A) can still recall the rose covered trellis archway along the garden path and the immaculate flower beds on the lawn beyond the hedge. At the height of their farming days, James and his sons ran Saddocks, Manor, Crown and Little Common farms. At the end of the 20th century, Crown Farm is still in the hands of Jamie Tarrant, son of Reg (H). 

This article was first published in A Pictorial History of Eton Wick & Eton.

Saddocks Farm

This photograph dates to around the 1930s, when it was farmed by Arthur Tarrant and his family. Robert 'Sadocke' farmed here in the 1500s. The farm house and its extensive garden is on the left. The farm house is mainly 19th century, but closer inspection of the bricks and other features of the west (left-hand) side of the house show this part to be very much older. The farm buildings are, from the left, stables, the cow (milking) shed, and a dutch barn. The much older barn beyond that was constructed of reclaimed timbers, possibly ex-ships, pitched shiplap boards on a low brick wall, and clay roof tiles. Much of the barn, and the roof tiles of Saddocks Farm Cottages (opposite the barn beyond the photo) was lost in the great gale of 1987. Since Elizabethan times, ownership of the property has passed several times between the Crown and Eton College. When the farm cottages were built, the farm was Crown Estate as depicted on the date tablet on the west cottage — 1868 with `VR' and a Crown above. There are a number of architecturally similar cottages scattered around the farm estates in Windsor Great Park. A circular thatched corn rick can be seen in the rick yard on the right. Up to the 1960s, Eton Wick Cricket Club played on the meadow beyond the farm house. For many visiting sides it was a novel and popular venue, despite the long grass of the outfield, interspersed with cow pats and rabbit holes. The farm was re-acquired by Eton College around 1940. 

This article was first published in A Pictorial History of Eton Wick & Eton.

The Mystery of the rise of the Lillywhites

Sometime between 1802 and 1807 John and Martha Lillywhite arrived in the Windsor/Eton Wick area.  On John’s marriage in Norwich in 1802 to Martha West (age about 30), John was a Gamekeeper in Linford, Norfolk.  On arrival in Windsor and Eton they quickly appear to have established themselves in both Windsor and Eton Wick. John appears in the 1811 Holdens’s Directories at the Swan Inn in Thames Street, Windsor and had also taken a tenancy of a farm in Eton Wick between the Tax assessments of 1813 and 1814.  By the 1841 Census (John having died in 1828) the Lillywhite’s were tenants of both Saddock’s (Martha) and Manor (her son George Snowden) Farms.  How was it that a “mere” gamekeeper had so quickly gained so much?  Is the middle name of their eldest son, George Snowden Lillywhite, baptised at St Andrew’s Clewer in 1809, a clue as the Snowden family feature in Windsor as councillors, with John Snowden elected as Mayor in 1812?

Fields farmed by Martha and George Lillywhite 

John Lillywhite was a Gamekeeper near Norwich when he married Martha West 1802.  Where John Lillywhite came from is unknown, there being no other Lillywhites at the time in Norfolk and how when and why he came to Eton is also unknown.  However, over the next 3 decades they became a prominent part of the local establishment. 

After 1814 John appears to have concentrated on farming  whilst Martha appears to have been the driving force at the Inn as Angus Macnaughton in "Windsor and Eton in Georgian Times" reports that "Across the road from Old Bank House stood one of Windsor's most famous inn, the Swan, of which only a small part survives today.  For thirty years, from 1810, Mrs Lillywhite presided, making it a notable RV for the many organizations which held their meetings and banquets there".  John had died in 1828, with his son taking over his father’s role, with Martha retiring from the Swan in 1840, but with her son George Snowden Lillywhite she seems to have continued farming, being shown in the 1841 Census as the farmer at Saddock’s Farm with her son the Farmer at Manor Farms.

George Snowden Lillywhite

The Lillywhite appear to have been fully integrated into the local society.  For example Windsor and Eton Express, on Sat 16 Nov 1833 reports that a number of "owners and occupiers of lands  through which it is proposed to make a railway or railways from  Bristol to London and Windsor to London do hereby convene a meeting to  be held at the Windmill Inn, Salt Hill in the county of  Buckinghamshire on Tuesday 19th November ...."  There were 19 signatories including G.S. Lillywhite.  The next year on Sat 29 Mar 1834 (Page 1, Column 2) it is further reported in the same paper that the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Salt Hill Society for Protection against Felons and Thieves there were listed as subscribers Martha Lillywhite of Eton and George S Lillywhite of Eton Wick.  This society was formed in 1783 to protect the property and persons of local farmers and gentry from "Robbers, Felons, Highwaymen and Footpads".  Entrance was One Guinea and there was an annual subscription of 5/-.

George Snowden Lillywhite was a member of the Chalvey Chapel and it is reported in the history by Dr Judith Hunter that "The Sunday School was closed (at Boveney) though services continued to be held in a barn, probably one belonging to Manor Farm; for at this dated the tenant farmer, George Lillywhite, was a member of the Chalvey Chapel.   There is also a tradition that the cottage next to the farmhouse was once used for worship, with 25 people attending the services on “Census Sunday" in 1851". 

By 1871 George had been elected Baliff of the Manor of Eton cum Stockdales and Colenorton.  In the same year, Dr Judith Hunters' history reports George Lillywhite being a member of a committee which purchased Bell Farm from William Goddard for a sewage farm.  George was married to a Goddard, and George's daughter married a William Goddard so this seems to have been a family affair!

George died age 68 in 1877 and is buried in Eton Church. No 536. His parents are buried in St John the Baptist, New Windsor.  But how and why John and Martha came to Eton remains a mystery as does the reason for their rapid acquisition of the tenancy of a pub and two farms.

This article has been written by Louis Lillywhite.

Further notes on the Lillywhite family in reply to the comment from Helen Burlinham.

A reply to Helen Burlingham's questions on the Lillywhite family 

1. George Snowden born 1890 (I have 1889) is as you say your grandfather; George Snowden born 1808 died in 1877 is your great (x3) grandfather.

2. Police Sgt Henry Lillywhite (1865 – 1927) Collar Number 132 was your Great Grandfather.  As a Policeman, he moved around (1887 in Upton cum Chalvey; 1888 Salt Hill; 1889 Eton; 1891 53 Berkhamstead Rd Police Station)

3. I cannot find any link to the cricketing Lillywhites, even though the obituary in the Parish Magazine of the daughter Lydia  of George Snowden Lillywhite born 1808 reported after her death in 1927 at 14 Clifton Cottages, Eton Wick:

“Miss Lydia Lillywhite passed away at the age of 91, and with her has gone the last representative of the Eton Wick of ancient days.  She was the daughter of George Snowden Lillywhite of Manor Farm, whose father kept the Swan Inn of Windsor, from which the Eton Coach started, of which Miss Lillywhite had a picture, with her grandfather's name on it.  Her mother was Lydia Goddard.  The Lillywhites were a branch of the Sussex family, so well known in cricket history.

Miss Lillywhite had suffered for some time from the infirmities of old age, and lived in great retirement. In earlier years she had been an excellent pianist and devotedly fond of music.  She was a staunch member of the Church. She was the last surviving subscriber to the building of the Eton Wick Church, just sixty years ago."

4. In spite of the reference to the Sussex family, I have not been able to find any evidence that there is in fact a link in spite of extensive searching.  It was, however, an “accepted truth” in the family and indeed started me off on the hobby of Genealogy!

Ancestor Tree

You (Helen)  – Joan Lillywhite – George Snowden Lillywhite (Born 1889 in Eton) – Police Sgt Henry Lillywhite (born 1865 in Eton Wick) – George Lillywhite (born 1837 in Eton Wick)  - George Snowden Lillywhite (born 1808 in Windsor) – John Lillywhite (born circa 1776, died 1828 in Eton Wick).

The additional information has been supplied by Louis Lillywhite.