A brief village history
Housing Pre
1820
The oldest properties in the village are
without doubt along Church Street, with the oldest dating back to the 1300's.
The majority have now been demolished. Some records indicate that an ancient
Green Road ran along Church Street continuing to Thrapston and in doing
so also linking the "WillyWatt" Mill near Ringstead and Woodford
Mill together. The stone for many of these houses would have come from
the Common Stone Pit, later known as Stone Pit Common. It is now known as the
Woodford Shrubbery.
The warren field at the
east end of Church Street had a large house which was home to the St
John family. An entrance courtyard is still visible just on the right of
the entrance to the shrubbery, and the two large garden terraces are the
dominant features in the field. The house was located between the
"courtyard" and the gardens
Thatched cottages most probably dating
back to 1600s could be found in Church Green and also Club Lane (then
known as Hogs Lane (Hog derived from Hok meaning enclosure, but in late 1800s
became Pigs Lane). A group of three cottages at the bottom end of Club Lane were known
as Wells Yard and had their own stys. At the top of Bakers Lane was
another collection of cottages known as Jones Yard later becoming known as Spring
Gardens. Below Spring Gardens on the site of the present Scout Hut were
more cottages. (Bakehouse
Lane was named after the former Bakehouse (in existence as early as
1724) on the corner with Church Street)
Well after 1900 there were
many thatched cottages along this street at sites at the bottom of
Club Lane (site now cleared) and
opposite the top of the Moorings.
Bird's Yard was located at the bottom end of the High
Street (where Rose Cottage Nursing Home is now located), and Wells Yard
was on the east side of club lane at the bottom of the hill.
At this time nearly all of the properties
around the village green would have been thatched (some as late as the
1960's). There was also a terrace of thatched cottages in Addington Road.
Until the early 1800's the last house in the village on the way out to
Thrapston was known as the Nunnery. This is the house just north
of the village green with one of the windows blocked out due to the
window tax (introduced by William III in 1696),
The only thatched cottages
remaining in the village now are in Church Street.
Church Street only came
into being in the 20th century (as a name). Different sections being
known by different names, i.e. from east to west Warren Gate, Gravel
Walk, School Road, near the Church, Pecksparrow Lane (originally
Spixbarrow lane).
Housing 1820 -
1930
Many of the stone houses
north of Constable walk to the Mill Road Junction the houses on the
eastern side of the High Street are of stone and date from about 1820
to 1860. Houses on the western side are all of brick, some have date
stones and generally date from 1850 onwards. During this same period a mix of stone and brick built
properties were being constructed in Newtown to accommodate the many
people moving into the village to work in the quarries and furnaces.
Some once again carry date stones of 1860.
Eady's Row
was built in
approximately 1890 and comprises 10 brick and stone
cottages.
Sunnyside
was built just before 1900 and houses on
the eastern side of the High Street between Sunnyside and Constable Walk were built
just after 1900. Five of the properties in Sunnyside were equipped with
workshops and the remaining five had pig stys. Sunflower Cottage on the
corner of Sunnyside has a date stone of 1890, presently a hairdressers.
Whittlesea Terrace
was built in the early 1900's and Rose Terrace at roughly the same time.
Whittlesea Terrace, before houses had been built was known as Whittle
Lane and was the start of the present bridleway that runs to the north
of the shrubbery.
Housing 1930 -
date
Much of Mill Road, with the
exception of Mill Terrace westwards was constructed by the Oundle and Thrapston
Rural District Council, as too were Highfield and West Street. Whilst
many properties in Mill Road at the High Street end are pre 2nd World War,
the remainder of the local authority houses, Highfield and
West
Street were built as part of the rebuilding effort following that
conflict.
Houses had also been built in
1930 in the Leys (north side and more in the 1970's on the south side).
The Moorings comprising 12
"executive houses" were built in 1967/8 and was the first large scale
private development in the village. The Shrubberies and the
bungalows were built in the late 1960s. Alledge Drive was built in the
1970's and originally comprised 25 bungalows (3 facing Thrapston Road).
Alledge Drive was was later extended by East Northants Council to
include more local authority accommodation for senior citizens.
DeCapel Close was built in
the early 1980's and comprised five individual detached properties.
There have been numerous
examples of infill / individual properties throughout the village.
Latterly many of the older properties in Woodford especially around the Green
and in the High Street have been knocked "two into
one".
Since April 2006 a new
development off Mill Rd has been taking shape. This development called
The Paddocks comprises fifty properties of
differing types.
Industry
Many quarries
were opened in the area for the mining of iron ore and limestone causing the
population in the village to increase. When the Islip Ironworks
opened (whilst situated in the Islip Parish they were much closer to Woodford)
the number of people moving to Woodford increased greatly and it was at this
time that Newtown (1859 onwards) was built to accommodate the ironworkers who
worked both in the local quarries and also the works. 30 families moved to the
village from Wiltshire. A terrace of houses (known as Mill Terrace (adjacent to
the windmill)) was also built for workers at the western end of Mill Road (and
the 12 houses were occupied by 91 people in 1881). Almost a third of the village
male population were employed in the industry. The
furnaces opened on 20 April 1873 and finally closed on 16 October 1942.
The site is now occupied by the Islip Furnace Industrial Estate and a
car storage company.
The village was also home to two clothing
factories, Wallace and Linnell (Newtown) and the Ideal (Whittlesea
Terrace). Both factories closed in the 1970’s. A mail order company used
the Newtown factory for a short time in the early 1980s, but is presently being redeveloped into housing units.
In the late 1990s the factory in Whittlesea Terrace was demolished to make way for three
new houses.
Following the closure in 1974 of the Victorian
infant school near the village green, the school was re-employed as a
shoe factory. The shoe factory, part of the Griggs Group (of Doc Martins
fame), closed at Christmas 1999. The property is
now a private dwelling.
The largest employer in the village at present is a
construction company based in Thrapston Road.
Services
Water
to follow
Gas
Natural Gas was piped into the village in the 1960's
with some of the first houses to benefit being The Moorings and Alledge
Drive.
Electricity
to follow
Sewage
Originally many houses would have benefited from the
services of the night-soil collector prior to the sewage treatment works
being built in Church Street between the Moorings and the church. This
location proved insufficient and a treatment plant was built at the east
side of the warren field at the bottom corner. This was replaced by a series
of pumping stations around the village in 1983/4 which now pump the
effluent to the treatment works at Islip.
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