A History of Ashtead from the earliest times to the present day

Extracts with connections to the Dackombe family by John Terry (The Original Book edited by Alan A Jackson, with articles by the following W. J. Blair, I. G. Galbraith, A. J. Gillies, J. Hampton, M. Harbott, Shirley W. Healey, R. A. Lever, R. W. Moon, D. F. Renn, K. N. Smith) A book published by the Leatherhead & District Local History Society in 1977.

The following can only be a small part of this book which is over 200 pages long, but hopefully picks up some of the information about the Dackombes ownership of land. My interest also covers the Knightley and Wyke family mention in the first extract.

From page 57
The Last of Little Ashtead Manor
This is an appropriate moment to complete the known history of Little Ashtead Manor. Ownership passed from the Cole family to Peter Evans and then in 1671 to Robert Knightley (the indenture refers to the property somewhat loosely as the (the manor of Ashtead). From the Knightleys the estate went to the Wyke Family and then to the Dackombes. In 1713 it consisted of a farm (the White House, Ottways Lane) and messuage and second farm called Old Court House (between Agates Lane and Skinners Lane south of the present Gladstone Road). Aquila Dackombe is recorded as the owner of its 227 acres early in the 19th century (1802 and 1809) by which time all reference to it as a manor had ceased. About 1850 the land was sold to a Denmark Hill merchant, John Hackblock, and on his death a few years later, it was broken up for building development.

From page 149
White House Farm
Round the corner fromWest Farm in Ottways Lane was another farmhouse, latterly owned by Daniel Dackombe. It was recorded in 1796 and again in 1851 as having 225 acres, the farm then covering what later became West Farm and other field east of Agates Lane. In 1851 the farmhouse was described as newly erected and about this time the property passed to the Denmark Hill merchant John Hatchblock. The 1841 and 1851 census shows the house occupied by agricultural labourers, (the farmer lived in West Farm House). A Bengal Army officer's widow and daughter were in the farm house in 1861 while from 1890 until about 1930 the occupant was Samuel Andrews, bailiff to the Hackblock Estate and farm. This building is now a private residence named Dormera. East of Skinners Lane and north of Ottways Lane was a holding of pasture land owned by the Waterer family during the years 1690-1790; it is the same eight acres which were leased from Col. Howard by George King in 1839. It may be mentioned here that many local documents often fail to distinguish between a field being either leased or actually owned. . . .

From page 150
The Enclosure
Although it is known that the common fields of Ashtead were enclosed between 1802 and 1839, details are lacking from the court rolls. The Surrey Record Office has a map and an apportionment dated 20 July 1838 which shows that 460 acres were divided, allotted and enclosed and some 1,600 strip's (each 22ft by 33ft wide) lying in the common fields were taken inn. On 4 October 1838, the three main landownerss, Col Fulk Greville Howard, Daniel Dackombe, and the Rev William Legge met at the Leg of Mutton and Cauliflower with Joseph Syms, George King and William Pinnion, and agreed under the Enclosure Act of William IV 6 & 7 to enclose the remaining common and open lands of Ashtead. Three others of such proprietors and persons interested subsequently signified their consent and the agreement was confirmed by Tithe Commissioner George Smallpiece sitting at the King's Head, Epsom, on 17 October 1838. The reorganisation into larger and more manageable units is shown in the apportionment as follows (with a location column added):

Tithe Commutation
The Tithe Act of 1836 made such extensive changes throughout England that the undertaking has been referred to as the Victorian Domesday. Payment of tithes (one-tenth part of the crops due to the incumbent) had from that date to be made in cash instead of in kind. Commisioners were appointed, and they arranged for the drafting of large scale maps bearing field and plot and acreages as a basis for conversion into the separate cash equivalents. This was done by computation from the total sum of the previous tithe which was then divided into three equal parts for the three main cereals. In 1838 the tithe for Ashtead was £3553 12s 6d and the crop prices per bushel were: wheat 7s 0 1/4d, barley 3s 11 1/2d and oats 2s 9d. The respective amounts involved, which work ooout at 525.7, 932.4 and 1,342.1 bushels, are therefore seen to be notional calculations and not, as often claimed, the actual crop yields of the cereals.

The apportionment, recording the namess and acerages of the fields with their crops and occupiers' names, is a most voluminous document with more than 330 entries, some being plots of only 1/16th of an acre (ten perches). A representative selection of entries is listed below, the items in the situation column again are added, when required, for identification purposes.

Extracts from Ashtead tithe apportionement, 1839
(A=Arable, P=Pasture)

Out of a parish total of 2,516 acres, Col Howard's Holdings were 1,698 acres 2 roods and 33 perches and his tithe was £457 18s 0d out of a total £553. Dackombe's holdings were 211 acres 0 roods 33 perches with a tithe of £363 5s 0d.

The tithe commissioner was the same George Smallpiece who had confirmed the enclosure, a farmer from Compton, near Guildford. Meetings were held on 1 October 1838, 30 July 1840 (presentation at court baron) and on 1 October 1840 (final sealing).

It will be noticed that the same smallholder's names appear under both landowners as it was naturally more economical to have their various fields arranged in as compact a manner as possible. This on plotting these leases George King's fields lay in Ottways Lane and Lower Ashtead (219 acres) while the bulk of Agate's land extended north and south of the Rye and also south of the marl pit (total 384 acres).

It will be seen that there were only 600 acres left to be shared, of which no parishioner owned over 14 acres - the glebe had been reduced from nearly 18 acres in 1838 to 12 1/2 acres.

This historic tithe was completely revised in November 1887 and amended at various times between 1901 and 1926.

From page 162
Landowners and Farmers
Particulars have been given earlier of Col. Fulk Greville Howard (1773-1846), lord of the manor at the time of both the enclosure and tithe commutation,. With total holdings equal to over two thirds of the parish, he paid about 4/5ths of all the tithes.

The next largest landowner, Daniel Dackombe, who had a mere 210 acres in 1839, was an absentee landlord. He was a son of Aquila Dackombe and lived from 1778 to 1844, dying at Walworth. His father (1747-1819) was a Master of the Worshipful Company of Pewterers and his grandfather, also called Aquila, was born in 1720. Their land in Ashtead was in four locations: the Rye area; to the south of Barnett Wood Lane; the White House Farm In Ottways Lane; and around Addlestead Wood to the south. All this was sold in 1850 to John Hackblock, a tanner's son who became a wealthy resident of Hackney. He died within a few years and the old Dackombe estates were sold for building development. This was the first major fragmentation of Ashtead farm land and was to be followed by the manor sales of 1879, 1889 and the final one of 1924.

This section may, perhaps, best be ended with a final reference to the various farmers who, in good seasons and bad, ploughed our fields and scattered the good seed on the land, seeing that the right proportion of land went under pasture or plough. The names of Agate, Ballinghall, Bowman, Harriott, King, Maydell, Smith, Wale and Webb should be remembered along with the manorial stewards, John and Joseph Richardson and Robert Milne, on whose shoulders much responsibility rested.

And finally from page 219 of Appendix VI Parish Maps (part of 2nd paragraph to 4th paragraph)
.... Then just as this book was going to press, the 1802 copy was discovered in the custody of the executors of the late A. R. Cotton, lord of the manor until 1962, in their office at Ashtead.

Permission was kindly given for examination of this beautifully tinted map, on which the Park, Ashtead Woods, the pastures of Park Farm, Street Farm (with the 59 acres of Great Meadow), Woodfield Farm and West Farm, and the water meadows along the Rye are all shown in green. In buff are the arable fields in The Marsh (along the Rye north of the present Links Road). in Lower Ashtead and in an extensive area from the Leatherhead to the Epsom boundaries, including the 32 acres of the Thirty Acres Barn holding near Stane Street.

Left untinted are the non-manorial holdings such as the three separate blocks of the glebe, and the properties of the other landowners, notably Aquila Dackombe (shown as Acquila Dacombe), Joseph Syms and Thomas and Mrs Pinnion. All these are denoted by the initials of the owners, explained in a key, and the map also gives field numbers and field acreages. It is assumed that a complementary apportionment with details of all the landowners was prepared at the same time as the map, but this was not to be seen. The labour involved in draughting and tinting the many ribbon-like shotts or furlongs of the common fields must have been immense, but the completed work sets off the different types of field in a most pleasing way. Buildings are picked out in scarlet and the extent of such palaces as Dukes Hall, Merry Hall, Ashtead House and the various farmsteads is clearly shown.

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Last updated Wednesday, February 17, 2010 17:21