Chadlington Cheeky Circular (2.5 Miles)
During the 80's until the mid 90's Chadlington was my home!
We use to drink water out of the ‘fresh water’ spring outside in Mill End, or was that put our feet in it on a hot summers day (probably both)! Us girls spent hours sat on the funny stone thing by the sports field gossiping about stuff which we thought was so important.
The Brook never had big trees 35 odd years ago, there use to be a bridge over the waterfall, I don’t remember it ever being that muddy in winter.
I remember snowy days sledging down the hills, spending hours in the cold and coming home with freezing cold fingers. Then going home to sit infront of the gas camper stove, because the bad weather would have knocked out the power to the village.
I remember playing in the hay and this was back farmers were allowed to set the fields on fire.
The park was had one of the old slides with no safety precautions, enevitably I feel off the top once at least. And WOW if you could jump off the Bumper at full pelt you were a local hero!
So much has changed, there are no penny sweets sold by Mr Lydon (or half penny) from the post office counter, it’s long gone , and the telephone box where we use to ,never quite cut the phone card right, to get the ever allusive eternal credit to phone the boy of the moment.
Fifty pence use to buy an Apple Tango and a packet of salt and vinegar crisps from the club house and I am sure the peanuts revealed a topless page 3 girl as they were sold! £1.99 bought some cigarettes , which obviously ,a squirt of Exclamation and some chewing gum hide the smell from my parents (not) .
All of this I remember and reminisce so fondly........ simple times , happy times ! But I was too busy growing up and trying to be an adult - silliest mistake I ever made! Should have stayed forever young x
Some proper historical facts about 'Chad'
The name Chadlington is said the mean “The Hill” or “Tun” of Ceadda or Chad. A cluster of houses in Saxon times was called a ‘Tun’.
Chadlington is a village with a population of at least 825 people* in no less than 360 households* spread out along the south-facing slope of the Evenlode Valley in Oxfordshire. The nearest town is Chipping Norton, 3.5 miles to the north-east. The nearest railway station is at Charlbury, 3 miles to the south-east, from which many people commute to work in either Oxford and London.
The village is divided into five “Ends” which probably grew up around the original farmsteads and are still separated by open fields: East End which includes the Parish Church of St. Nicholas, the Manor House, the Manor Farm, and the School (technically in West End), West End (Lowlands Farm, Methodist Chapel and Shops), Brook End (Blaythorne Farm), Green End (Lower Court Farm), and Mill End (The fresh water spring ( Cough) and Upper Court Farm).
Chadlington is mentioned in the Domesday book in 1086 as Cedelintone, which became Chadleytone in 1268 and Chedelinton in 1307. It has been said that St. Chad, a native of Northumbria who died in 672 lived in the village.
To the north-west of the village is Knollbury, a neolithic enclosure believed to be defensive in nature. In a field in the hamlet of Dean to the east of Chadlington stands the Hawk Stone megalith, a fine example of a standing stone.
In 1517, Chadlington Hundred* included 27 parishes extending from Little Compton to Hook Norton and Enstone to Minster Lovell. In 1642, troops lined up in the village before the battle of Edge Hill in the Civil War.
Referrences of websites used to compile this information
https://chadlington.com
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chadlington