123-639: Weybridge ( / ˈ w eɪ b r ɪ dʒ / ) is a town in the Elmbridge district in Surrey , England, around 17 mi (27 km) southwest of central London. The settlement is recorded as Waigebrugge and Weibrugge in the 7th century and the name derives from a crossing point of the River Wey , which flows into the River Thames to the north of the town centre. The earliest evidence of human activity
246-512: A modillioned eaves cornice and glazing-bar sash windows to the first floor. Halliford School in the centre of this area was the 18th–19th century home of Emma Hamilton , mistress of Admiral Nelson . The 21st century fully renovated hotel and restaurant (formerly the Ship ), Harrison's with river views is here beside the shorter Red Lion public house which in turn has a narrow, secluded south-facing public house picnic area overlooking
369-399: A 1960s building, as its headquarters, retaining Sandown House as additional offices. The new Civic Centre was built on land behind Sandown House, which has since been converted into flats, whilst Walton Town Hall has been demolished. In common with the nearby Surrey boroughs of Spelthorne and Epsom and Ewell , much of Elmbridge is a continuation of the built-up area of suburban London, and
492-507: A bridge, being a play on the district's name. 51°22′12″N 0°21′42″W / 51.3700°N 0.3618°W / 51.3700; -0.3618 Shepperton Shepperton is a village in the Spelthorne district, in north Surrey , England, around 15 mi (24 km) south west of central London. The settlement is on the north bank of the River Thames , between the towns of Chertsey and Sunbury-on-Thames . The village
615-864: A four-year term of office. Surrey County Council elections are held in the fourth year of the cycle when there are no borough council elections. The council is based at the Civic Centre, off the High Street in the centre in Esher, which was purpose-built for the council in 1991. When the council was created in 1974 it inherited offices at the Town Hall on New Zealand Avenue in Walton-on-Thames from Walton and Weybridge Urban District Council, and at Sandown House at 1 High Street from Esher Urban District Council. It initially used Walton Town Hall,
738-458: A later document shows that Chertsey Abbey had sold the advowson to Newark Priory by 1200. By 1262, the Priory had obtained a license that confirmed its rights to appoint a priest, to hold church property and to collect tithes from the local residents. In 1284 the village was held by Geoffrey de Lucy as a lesser tenant of Chertsey Abbey. Following the dissolution of the monasteries , Weybridge
861-507: A long boundary with the River Thames in its southernmost salient, which almost surrounds Spelthorne . Old Shepperton is almost surrounded by the extreme southern meander within this. Prehistoric glacial retreat north of this has made the north bank almost flat for a considerable distance and as such, elevation never exceeds 14 m above mean sea level (on the border of Laleham ). The river never exceeds 11.5 m, (beside Dumsey Meadow and under Chertsey Bridge ). The lowest elevation
984-506: A natural soil for pines, other evergreen trees as well as heather and gorse , described as naturally wet, very acid sandy and loamy soil which is just 1.9% of English soil and 0.2% of Welsh soil. Claremont Landscape Garden and Fan Court (now independent school) is on part of this elevated soil as is St George's Hill . Most undeveloped land in Elmbridge is Metropolitan Green Belt . The central band of forest/heath includes part of
1107-530: A new mill for extracting vegetable oil from seeds was built on the same site and the Whittet's Ait mill was also being used for the same purpose by the 1930s. In the 1970s, Whittet's Ait was the site of a solvent refinery. For much of the 20th century, Weybridge was a centre for the aerospace industry . The Lang Propeller Works was established on Whittet's Ait in 1913 and, in 1915, the Vickers company took over
1230-593: A place for "gentile retirement" and recorded eighteen upper-class families living in the area. The settlement was dominated by two estates: Portmore Park, to the north west of the centre, was the seat of the Colyear family, the Earls of Portmore ; Oatlands Park, to the east, had been built on the former deer park belonging to Oatlands Palace and was purchased by Prince Frederick, the Duke of York and Albany , in 1790. Towards
1353-419: A reception hall built in 1498. Its front cladding has mathematical tiles. Listed in the same high category of listed building is the parish church, St Nicholas' – its dedication is as with the ancient riverside churches of Thames Ditton and Chiswick . Also architecturally Grade II* is restored half timbered Winches Cottage on the west side of the lane which is 17th century. The village includes
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#17327723876041476-666: A result of the Local Government Act 1929 , the UDCs of Weybridge and Walton were combined in 1932. In 1951 the civil parish of Weybridge had a population of 8083. On 1 April 1974 the parish was abolished. The unified council was merged with the Esher UDC to form Elmbridge Borough Council in 1974. The name "Weybridge" suggests that there has been a bridge over the River Wey in the area since Anglo-Saxon times. During
1599-606: A series of promotions in the Surrey Herald to advertise the houses that he intended to build. Strict covenants were imposed on the development and the minimum size of each property was fixed as one acre (0.40 ha). Construction was interrupted by the First World War, but resumed shortly afterwards, continuing until the start of the Great Depression in the late 1920s. The first council housing in
1722-421: A value of £5 per annum. The other two entries list areas belonging to Chertsey Abbey , totalling a further 16 acres of meadow, land for four swine and ploughland for 1½ plough teams. None of the entries records a church or a mill in the settlement. There are only sporadic surviving references to Weybridge in the following centuries. A chapel is mentioned in a papal bull issued by Pope Alexander III in 1176 and
1845-679: A village or neighbourhood. Its post town is Shepperton. Its parish is Sunbury-on-Thames . In the south of the neighbourhood, on the Shepperton side of the motorway are a general waste transfer station, further fields and Sunbury Golf Course, which has 18 holes and is bisected by the Shepperton railway line. Charlton appears in Domesday Book as Cerdentone . It was held by Roger de Rames. Its domesday assets were: 5 hides ; 1½ ploughs (with potential for 3½), meadow for 4 ploughs , cattle pasture. It rendered £1 10s 0d. However this manor
1968-453: A wide range of restaurants, several cafés, with the railway terminus at the northern end. Shepperton railway station saw high ticketed entries and exits for a settlement of its size to 422,000 (6 April 2010 – 5 April 2011), being a terminus with main commercial destinations being in the City of London , Kingston upon Thames . commercial hubs of West London and South London accessed along
2091-604: Is Littleton . 51°24′40″N 0°26′38″W / 51.411°N 0.444°W / 51.411; -0.444 Charlton is a suburban hamlet and narrow area to the north, bounded to the west by the Queen Mary Reservoir in Littleton , bounded to the east and south by Thames water treatment works from that reservoir and by the M3 motorway . As a well-developed hamlet, bounded by farms, it also referred to as
2214-691: Is 9 m in flood meadows at the confluence of the Ash with the Thames. The Ash is the border with Littleton and Sunbury-on-Thames (mostly, to the northeast, with its technical hamlet , Upper Halliford ). Dumsey Meadow SSSI is the only piece of undeveloped, unfenced water meadow by the river remaining on the River Thames below Caversham , and is home to a variety of rare plants and insects. The Swan Sanctuary moved to an old gravel extraction site by Fordbridge Road in 2005 from its former base in Egham . On
2337-414: Is a short, since 1989 bypassed, winding lane from the High Street to Church Square, flanked by Shepperton Manor and the cricket ground, with some listed walls. Sir Nikolaus Pevsner described the view looking towards the south-east of the square with its now listed buildings and river opening as "one of the most perfect village pictures that the area has to offer". It offers two pub/restaurants two hotels,
2460-451: Is a village, with the second highest concentration of development in the post town. This neighbourhood is smaller than the adjoining village, separated by the M3 motorway and some adjoining meadows and fields. The second of the borough's Green Belt SSSIs , Sheep Walk Meadows, is a key feature of Shepperton Green, bounding it, to its south. A Saxon and medieval burial ground gives its name to
2583-475: Is close to the confluence of the River Wey and the River Thames , but the settlement also includes St George's Hill and Brooklands , to the south. The highest point in Weybridge is 78 m (256 ft) above ordnance datum , but the low-lying areas close to the rivers are only 10–20 m (33–66 ft) above sea level. Neighbouring settlements include Shepperton to the north, Walton-on-Thames to
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#17327723876042706-617: Is co-ordinated by Surrey County Council who also provide the statutory emergency fire and rescue service who have a station in Sunbury. St Peter's Hospital on the far side of Chertsey is a large NHS hospital administrated by Ashford and St Peter's Hospitals NHS Trust. It was opened under its existing name in 1947. The South East Coast Ambulance Service Foundation Trust provides emergency patient transport to and from this facility. Other forms of health care are provided for locally by several small clinics and surgeries. Waste management
2829-681: Is co-ordinated by the local authority via the Surrey Waste Disposal Authority and domestic waste collected by Spelthorne Borough Council . Locally produced inert waste for disposal is sent to landfill in Alfold and Shefford , and a proportion to energy from waste plants in Slough and Kent to lower landfill tax. Plans have been approved to permit gasification in Charlton in the north of the Shepperton post town as part of
2952-593: Is from 1548, when it appears as Brokeland . The name probably means "marshy land". St George's Hill appears to have acquired its current name in the early 17th century. It is recorded as Le Bery in 1337 and Oldebury in 1548. The previous name may derive from the Old English word burh , which might reference the Iron Age earthworks on the hill. Weybridge is in northwest Surrey , approximately 17 mi (27 km) southwest of central London. The town centre
3075-421: Is from a charter of 959, in which it appears as Scepertune . The name is thought to derive from the Old English scēp (sheep), hirde (herdsman) and tūn (enclosure, farm or settlement). The name is generally agreed to mean "shepherd's farm" or "shepherd's settlement". The earliest evidence of human activity in the local area is from the middle Neolithic . A henge , taking the form of a penannular ring ditch ,
3198-586: Is from the Bronze Age . During the Anglo-Saxon and medieval periods , Weybridge was held by Chertsey Abbey . In 2011 it had a population of 15,449. In the 1530s, Henry VIII constructed Oatlands Palace to the north of the town centre, which he intended to be the residence of his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves . He married Catherine Howard there in July 1540 and the palace remained a royal residence until
3321-459: Is given as Waigebrugge and Weibrugge . It appears in Domesday Book of 1086 as Webrige and Webruge and in subsequent surviving documents as Waibrigge and Wabrigge (12th century) and Wybrugge and Weybrugge (13th century). The name simply means "Bridge over the River Wey". Oatlands is first recorded in 1383 as Otelands , which may indicate that the area was used for the cultivation of oats . The earliest written record of Brooklands
3444-418: Is mentioned in a document of 959 AD and in the Domesday Book . In the 19th century, resident writers and poets included Rider Haggard , Thomas Love Peacock , George Meredith , and Percy Bysshe Shelley , who were attracted by the proximity of the River Thames . The river was painted at Walton Bridge in 1754 by Canaletto and in 1805 by Turner . Shepperton Lock and nearby Sunbury Lock were built in
3567-527: Is not twinned with any towns. However, between 1966 and 2009 Elmbridge was formally twinned with the Paris suburb of Rueil-Malmaison , Hauts de Seine , France . The council's arms were created upon the formation of the present day district, being formed out of symbols taken from the local towns and villages with the Latin motto meaning until the rivers cease . The arms include a depiction of an elm tree on
3690-503: Is very popular, with the Thames Path passing through the north of the borough and the 2012 Summer Olympics hosting both of the main road cycling events in the borough with most of the road section around Hampton Court and with the sections of the routes taken to and from Box Hill . The economy is diverse, with a strong local service sector, including numerous bars and restaurants, homes built and being built for city workers as
3813-468: The 2023 election the council has been run by a coalition of the Liberal Democrats and most of the residents' associations (RA), led by Liberal Democrat councillor Bruce McDonald. The first elections to the council were held in 1973, initially operating as a shadow authority alongside the outgoing authorities until the new arrangements came into effect on 1 April 1974. Political control of
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3936-743: The A3(M) from London bisects the borough. The main north-south road is the A244 for instance to London Heathrow Airport and starts in the borough at Walton Bridge leading to Esher and Oxshott then to Leatherhead . The east-west Leatherhead to Horsell, Woking road, the A245 leads by Cobham and Brooklands, Weybridge . As to rail, the South West Main Line cuts through the borough, with four stations from Esher to Weybridge , one of which several express services call at: Walton on Thames in
4059-604: The Ashley Park estate of the south of the town. The branch lines have services with four stations in the borough via Cobham & Stoke D'Abernon to Guildford ; and a branch to Thames Ditton and Hampton Court railway station in East Molesey , both within Transport for London's Zone 6. Bus services include TfL Oyster card services to East and West Molesey , Hinchley Wood , Claygate and Esher . Cycling
4182-554: The Civil War . The buildings were demolished in the early 1650s and a new mansion, Oatlands House, was constructed to the east of Weybridge later the same century. Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany owned the mansion in the 18th century. The town began to expand beyond its medieval footprint in the early 19th century, catalysed by the initial breakup of the Oatlands House estate, the enclosure of Weybridge Heath and
4305-475: The Elizabethan period , the bridge was a wooden structure, 240 ft (73 m) long and 5.25 ft (1.60 m) wide and was maintained by Elizabeth I in her capacity as lord of the manor. The structure was rebuilt in 1808 on 13 wooden arches. The present bridge dates from 1865 and is constructed from brick, iron and stone. A second bridge, downstream of the first, was completed in 1945 and now carries
4428-598: The Itala motor works at Brooklands. The circuit was also the base for several other aircraft manufacturers including Avro , Sopwith and Blériot . As of 2021, the European headquarters of Sony and the UK headquarters of Procter & Gamble are at Brooklands. At the start of the First World War, Weybridge became a training base for the 244 Motorised Transport Company, an army unit of mechanics and drivers operating as part of
4551-570: The Oxford-Burcot Commission . However, efforts to improve the stretch of the river through Weybridge did not start until the following century. In 1789, a flash lock was installed at Sunbury , but was replaced by a pound lock in 1812. Shepperton Lock opened the following year. The construction of the locks regulated the flow of the river and increased its depth, facilitating navigation and maintaining an adequate head of water to power mills . The River Thames through Weybridge
4674-720: The Wisley and Ockham Commons reserve within the national wildlife trust scheme: see Surrey Wildlife Trust , several pine heath based golf courses and in the north there are reservoirs , on the side of which there is sheep grazing. The Mole , passing the Grade I Church in Stoke D'Abernon , Cobham Mill at Grade II and Painshill Park and the Wey , passing Silvermere Golf Course and the Brooklands circuit, hotel and retail park, cut through
4797-520: The civil parish had a population of 6060. On 1 April 1974 the parish was abolished. In semi-fiction, George Eliot 's Scenes of Clerical Life telling the Sad Fortunes of The Rev. Amos Barton , gives a thinly veiled picture of Chilvers Coton 's church and village in the early 19th century in which she uses the name Shepperton. If anything real is to be gleaned for its use, it is perhaps a passing similarity. Shepperton Manor by John Mason Neale
4920-452: The station at Weybridge in May 1838. Initially the station had two platforms and was in a deep cutting between St George's Hill and Weybridge Heath. The typical journey time to London was around an hour and, by 1841, a mail train was stopping daily. A junction was created to the west of the station in 1848, when the line to Chertsey was constructed. Additional tracks on the main line through
5043-511: The "Residents' Associations Group", which forms the council's administration in coalition with the Liberal Democrats. The next election is due in 2026. Since the last boundary changes in 2016 the council has comprised 48 councillors representing 16 wards , with each ward electing three councillors. Elections are held three years out of every four, with a third of the council (one councillor for each ward) being elected each time for
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5166-490: The 1810s, to facilitate river navigation. Urbanisation began in the latter part of the 19th century, with the construction in 1864 of the Shepperton Branch Line , which was sponsored by William Schaw Lindsay , the owner of Shepperton Manor. Its population rose from 1,810 residents in the early 20th century to a little short of 10,000 in 2011. Lindsay had hoped to extend the railway via Chertsey to connect to
5289-591: The 1860s and in the 1870s a burial board was created to purchase land for new cemeteries. The Local Government Act 1888 transferred many administrative responsibilities to the newly formed Surrey County Council and was followed by an 1894 Act that created the Weybridge Urban District Council (UDC). Initially the council met at the National school , but moved to Aberdeen House at the junction of High Street and Baker Street in 1908. As
5412-498: The 1960s, one of very few private sector estate housing experiments of the 1960s with terraced, white panelled communal landscaped front gardens by Swiss architect Edward Schoolheifer; this American Radburn style was also used by Eric Lyons Span Developments in Ham Common, Richmond , London, Blackheath , London and New Ash Green , Kent. The conservation areas of Old Shepperton and Lower Halliford are localities, as
5535-696: The 19th Divisional Supply Column . The company served throughout the war in the Gallipoli and Balkans campaigns . There were two military hospitals in Oatlands. Barnham Lodge opened as a 35-bed hospital in 1915 and, by 1917, a small operating theatre was in use and the facility was being run by the British Red Cross . Oatlands Park Hotel was requisitioned in 1916 as a hospital for the New Zealand Expeditionary Force and
5658-419: The 19th century, there are originally expensive gravestones of the local minor gentry in the churchyard, two of which are dedicated to their naturalised black servants , Benjamin and Cotto Blake who both died in 1781. These bear the inscription "Davo aptio, Argo fidelior, ipso Sanchone facetior". During this long period since the conquest the wealth of the local rector and his bishop was great: William Grocyn
5781-594: The 20th century, Brooklands was an important location for the aerospace industry and aircraft developed and tested there included the Sopwith Camel , the Wellington bomber and the Hurricane fighter . Vickers established a factory at the circuit in 1915 and aircraft manufacturing continued at the site until 1988. The first written records of a settlement at Weybridge date from the 7th century, when its name
5904-515: The A317. Both the Thames and the Wey have been used for transport since ancient times. By the 14th century, there was a wharf at Weybridge used for shipment of timber and, in 1463, Thomas Warner was given permission to build a dock on his land, which became known as the "Crown Wharf". In 1537, materials for the construction of Oatlands Palace were transported to Weybridge by river. The River Wey Navigation
6027-607: The Anchor Hotel and the Warren Lodge Hotel. In this little square there is also the King's Head public house. The riverside manor, late 18th century, (its predecessor, as with the church here, predates the 12th century), features a room painted and rendered to look like a tent or draped damask . Also Grade II* listed is the c. 1500 timber framed Old Rectory refronted in the early 18th century, and including
6150-636: The Borough of Elmbridge was twinned with Rueil-Malmaison in northern France. Across the South East Region , 28% of homes were detached houses and 22.6% were apartments. Borough of Elmbridge Elmbridge is a local government district with borough status in Surrey , England. Its council is based in Esher , and other notable towns and villages include Cobham , Walton-on-Thames , Weybridge and Molesey . The borough lies just outside
6273-706: The Churchfields Recreation Ground. Serious bombing began in the local area in August 1940 and by December of that year 97 residents had died and 1300 houses had been damaged. A devastating air raid took place on the Vickers plant in September 1940, when 83 people were killed. A 500 lb (230 kg) bomb landed on the floor of the factory, but failed to explode. Five men of the Royal Canadian Engineers successfully removed
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#17327723876046396-488: The First World War and did not resume until 1920. The first two British Grands Prix took place at the circuit in 1926 and 1927 . The JCC 200 Mile race also took place at the circuit from 1921 to 1928, and again in 1938. In the early 1930s, Malcolm Campbell developed the Campbell-Railton Blue Bird , his final land speed record car, at Brooklands. Racing ceased for a second time at the outbreak of
6519-535: The Lower Halliford and Shepperton loop, rendering flooding far less common. The poet Thomas Love Peacock lived at Elm Bank House here from 1822 until his death in 1866. The field land and large houses on this estate were bought by Lyon Homes from landowner and developer Edward Scott in the 1950s. This estate of buildings on this street are in a conservation area for proving a successful modular development in geometric , white-painted modernism from in
6642-464: The Old Manor House (Halliford). From the 1760s—1860s a ropery was an industry here then from the 1860s—1870s brick clay was extracted. Halliford Manor, confusingly also called The Old Manor, dates to at least the 13th century and ownership became royal, being held by Elizabeth I and the wives of Charles I and Charles II . The Bishop of Winchester , Brian Duppa (1588–1662) owned
6765-473: The Old Manor. There is mention of Halliford in 962 and there was a settlement there by 1194. However the division into Upper and Lower Halliford does not appear until the late 13th century. Upper Halliford is a large hamlet in the parish of Sunbury, but Lower Halliford was almost certainly the main settlement of the manor. The creation of Desborough Cut diverted the main navigation of the Thames away from
6888-614: The Parliamentary side in the Civil War was dominated by "Grandees" i.e. wealthy nobles who often spent their time in comfort conducting fatuous debates in Parliament while the less well off risked their lives in the war to defeat an absolutist system. They were the subject of a long campaign of harassment by a local landowner and were eventually removed following a court case. The M25 motorway has several junctions nearby and
7011-420: The River Wey close to the Wey Bridge in 1912. At least fifty cinerary urns dating from the same period were found in the area in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Three of the urns were recovered from a barrow during building work on the Silvermere estate (south of St George's Hill) and were found to contain bones and charcoal. A copper-alloy bucket, now held by the British Museum , was discovered during
7134-437: The River Wey, had been established by Henry Howard, 6th Duke of Norfolk in the 1670s. It was purchased by the Locke King family in 1861, who sold the land for residential development in the final decades of the 19th century. St George's Hill was developed by W. G. Tarrant, who bought 936 acres (379 ha) of land from the Edgerton family in 1911. A year later he began the construction of the Tennis and Golf Clubs and published
7257-458: The Saxon Junior School who use it for playing fields and has Scheduled status. A farm combined with a significant amount of fishing and gravel lakes form the outskirts and within the clustered settlement an estate of the homes was built as non-serving personally barracks for the British Army . The population of Shepperton, according to the census of 1801, was 731. This number increased gradually to 858 forty years later, increasing further to
7380-422: The Second World War and new factories, warehouses and hangars were rapidly built, encroaching onto the racing circuit. The track was breached near Byfleet to improve access for deliveries to the site and a large workshop was cut into the concrete at the north end. Following the end of hostilities in 1945, the track was considered to be in such poor condition that a resumption of motor racing was ruled impossible. In
7503-414: The Second World War. Brooklands also played a key role in the development of the British aeronautical industry. In 1907, the aviation pioneer, A. V. Roe , performed the first flight by a British-built aeroplane at the circuit shortly after it opened in 1907. By 1912, several flying schools had been established at Brooklands and the Vickers company began manufacturing aircraft in 1915. The Sopwith Camel
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#17327723876047626-521: The Shepperton reaches (of the Thames Path ) as heading upstream from Hampton Court Palace another marked version takes Walton Bridge , the official version takes the Shepperton-Weybridge Ferry and another marked version crosses to the north bank at Chertsey Bridge . Upper Halliford has since the early 20th century been in Shepperton post town , and almost contiguous , but with its own station, residential roads, fair and shopping parade, even an Upper Halliford Village sign. Arguably in modern analysis it
7749-472: The South Western Main Line, however the village station remains a terminus. The rise in population and passing trade led to small businesses lining most of its high street by the end of the 20th century. Shepperton Film Studios is in the neighbouring village of Littleton , approximately 1 mi (2 km) to the north. The Swan Sanctuary and two SSSIs , one of which is managed by Surrey Wildlife Trust , are nearby. The first written record of Shepperton
7872-449: The Tudor period reduced the importance of manorial courts and the day-to-day administration of towns such as Weybridge became the responsibility of the vestry of the parish church. The Weybridge vestry oversaw the distribution of poor relief and the maintenance of local roads. In the 1840s, responsibility for poor relief was transferred to the Chertsey Board of Guardians of the Poor. Local drainage and highways boards were established in
7995-402: The Vickers aircraft factory made Weybridge an obvious target for enemy bombing during the Second World War. The defence of the town was coordinated by the 3rd Surrey Battalion of the Home Guard and five platoons of the C company were stationed at Brooklands. The local civil defence headquarters were established at the UDC offices in Aberdeen House and the council built a large air raid shelter at
8118-411: The Weybridge entries in the Domesday book, watermills appear to have played an important role in the economy of the area since at least the early modern period . The earliest record of a mill in the town is from 1693, when a paper mill was built at the confluence of the Wey and Thames. Ironstone was quarried from Weybridge Heath and St George's Hill, although the dates of these workings are uncertain. In
8241-416: The administrative boundary of Greater London , but is almost entirely within the M25 motorway which encircles London . Many of the borough's urban areas form part of the wider Greater London Built-up Area . The neighbouring districts are Mole Valley , Guildford , Woking , Runnymede , Spelthorne , Richmond upon Thames and Kingston upon Thames , the latter two being London boroughs . The district
8364-465: The annual amount rendered was £ 6. The Church Lane and Church Square area, leading to and next to the river predates by several centuries the High Street as the village nucleus . When the Thames Valley Railway built in 1864 the terminus of Shepperton railway station , 1 mile (1.6 km) north, for the 12 initial years a single train and track running to and from Strawberry Hill , the village slowly expanded into its northern fields. Its coming which
8487-426: The areas of Molesey , Long Ditton , Thames Ditton , Hinchley Wood , Esher , Cobham and Claygate lie within the social and commercial orbit of neighbouring Kingston upon Thames . Molesey, Cobham , the Dittons and Claygate were included in the Metropolitan Police District from 1840 until 2000. The northern third of the borough is flatter and fertile with free draining slightly acid loamy soil, similar to
8610-416: The bomb from the building before it exploded. Lieutenant John Patton was subsequently awarded the George Cross for his role in the incident. Later in the war, 19 V-1 flying bombs landed in the Weybridge and Walton area. The town is in the parliamentary constituency of Runnymede and Weybridge and has been represented at Westminster since May 2019 by Conservative Ben Spencer . Between 1997 and 2019,
8733-444: The borough from south to north reaching the River Thames which denotes the northern border, stretching from Weybridge to Thames Ditton apart from inclusion of inhabited islands such as Wheatley's Ait . The Wey and Mole have sources beyond gentle valleys which cut through the high North Downs to the south. The borough is home to some of the county's highest earners. It has been labelled Britain's Beverly Hills by sections of
8856-674: The constituency was represented by Philip Hammond , who was elevated to the House of Lords as Lord Hammond of Runnymede in 2020. Councillors are elected to Surrey County Council every four years. The majority of the town is in the "Weybridge" electoral division, but areas to the east of the centre are in the "Walton South and Oatlands" and "Hersham" electoral divisions. Weybridge is divided between three wards, each of which elect three councillors to Elmbridge Borough Council . The three wards are "Oatlands and Burwood Park", "Weybridge Riverside" and "Weybridge St George's Hill". Between 1966 and 2009,
8979-596: The construction of the Brooklands racetrack in 1907. It is thought to have originated in northern Italy in the late Bronze or early Iron Age and similar vessels have been found in Austria, Belgium and Germany. During the Iron Age, there was a fort on St George's Hill. It covered an area of around 14 acres (5.7 ha) and was protected by a rampart and ditch. Most traces of the fort were destroyed by housebuilding in
9102-417: The council since 1974 has been as follows: The role of mayor is largely ceremonial in Elmbridge. Political leadership is instead provided by the leader of the council . The leaders since 2010 have been: Following the 2024 election , the composition of the council was: The Thames Ditton and Weston Green RA, Esher RA, Molesey RA, Walton Society, and Weybridge and St George's Independents sit together as
9225-578: The county's Eco Park to take up to half of the county's residual waste. Shepperton's distribution network operator for electricity is UK Power Networks ; aside from renewables there are no power stations in the area. Thames Water manages Shepperton's drinking and waste water ; water supplies being sourced from the London sources including several reservoirs fed by the River Thames locally. There are water treatment works at Ashford , Hampton and sewage treatment works at Isleworth . Shepperton has
9348-482: The destruction of the 1904 station building. A manual telephone exchange opened in Weybridge in 1912 and was replaced in 1954 by an automated facility in Heath Road, which had sufficient capacity for 2500 lines. Although Weybridge was still only a small village in the early 18th century, a high proportion of the residents were members of the aristocracy. In 1724, the rector noted that it was increasingly becoming
9471-529: The earliest experiments in common ownership of land by ordinary people, in a marked contrast to the area's modern status as a wealthy private estate. In 1649 the " Diggers ", one of the radical groups set up in the aftermath of the English Civil War and the execution of Charles I seized common land in the area and lived by simple farming. As well as debates about religion and how the country should be run at this time these groups complained that even
9594-539: The east, Wisley to the south and Addlestone to the west. The rock strata on which Weybridge sits were deposited in the Cenozoic . The Bagshot Sands are the main outcrop to the south of the town and at Brooklands. From the centre of Weybridge northwards towards the Thames, the surface geology is dominated by river gravels. Overlying the Bagshot Sands at St George's Hill is a cap of Bracklesham Clay, which
9717-465: The end of the 18th century, Weybridge was beginning to expand beyond its medieval footprint. In 1800, Weybridge Heath , an area of common land to the south east of the village centre, was enclosed . The Act of Inclosure enabled the Duke of York to purchase almost the whole of St George's Hill and to add it to the Oatlands Estate. Four years later, Hanger Hill, one of the roads running across
9840-596: The end of the 19th century. Between 1891 and 1901 its population rose by 511 to 1,810. The population also rose substantially between 1931 and 1951, to 6,060 people. Data for 1801–1951 is available at Britain Through Time. The 2001 and 2011 Censuses give detailed information about the Town ward and Shepperton Green . The settlement had 9,753 residents, living in 4,301 households. Of those, 83.6% of residents described their health as 'good', for this overall figure, above
9963-733: The establishment of poor law unions and Sanitary Districts and was completed with the founding, in 1889, of the Middlesex County Council and Staines Rural District from 1896. In 1930 on the rural district's abolition, Shepperton became part of the Sunbury-on-Thames Urban District until its dissolution into a reduced and reconfigured county of Surrey in 1965. Three districts of the historic county thus did not become part of Greater London : Staines Urban District also joined Surrey and Potters Bar Urban District joined Hertfordshire . In 1951
10086-409: The first half of the 20th century. Remains of a roundhouse and archaeological evidence of iron workings were discovered in the triangle of land between the railway lines in 1981. There is not thought to have been a significant Roman presence in Weybridge, but 68 bronze coins of the late 3rd and early 4th centuries were found at Brooklands in 1907. Much of the hoard , which included nummi from
10209-427: The heath, was laid out and plots alongside it were sold for housebuilding . The Duke of York sold Oatlands Park in 1824, but the new owner, Edward Hughes Ball Hughes , was forced to lease the house and the surrounding 900 acres (360 ha) to Francis Egerton, 1st Earl of Ellesmere , three years later. The remainder of the Oatlands estate was sold in stages between 1828 and 1846. Housebuilding began almost as soon as
10332-480: The land was released, stimulated in part by the opening of Weybridge railway station in 1838. The majority of the houses in Oatlands village were completed by 1859. Oatlands Park House was sold to the developer W. G. Tarrant in 1909. The west side of Weybridge High Street was developed when the Portmore Park estate was broken up in 1880s. The estate, approximately covering the area between the High Street and
10455-431: The late Roman period. Evidence of late-Iron Age and Saxon settlements was found at Shepperton Green in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Shepperton is recorded in Domesday Book of 1086 as Scepertone . It had a population of 25 households and was held by Westminster Abbey ; (excluding any woodland, marsh and heath) it had eight hides , pasture for seven carucates and one weir (worth 6 s 8d per year). In total,
10578-528: The late 17th and early 18th centuries, iron was smelted at a mill on Whittet's Ait and there is reference to iron and steel manufacture taking place at two mills in Byfleet in 1760. The Whittet's Ait mill appears to have been used as a "Brass Wire Mill" in the 1760s and the machinery required for iron smelting had been fitted by 1769. A mill for grinding malt was built on the Wey upstream of Thames Lock in around 1819, but had fallen into disrepair by 1830. In 1842
10701-595: The late 1940s and 1950s, the manufacturers based at Brooklands started to transition towards the production of civilian airliners . Vickers began producing the VC series of aircraft with the VC1 Viking in 1945. The VC10 was launched in 1964, by which point the company had been nationalised as the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC). Increasingly BAC began to refocus manufacturing at Brooklands to
10824-633: The majority of locations have access to one of the Home Counties fastest commutes , trades including interior supplies, fitting, gardening, golf course/landscape management and a developed public/education sector. Of international renown are the employers Sony , Procter & Gamble , JTI (formerly Gallaher) and Toshiba Information Systems alongside the local corporate venues and day-out attractions of Sandown Park Racecourse and Mercedes-Benz World . As of 2012, Elmbridge residents had average weekly earnings of £1162. The Borough of Elmbridge
10947-498: The mayor with a large ceremony and some press, after Sunbury had held a similar competition. The board itself includes a grassland to represent the pastures and provides local information. Four infant/junior/primary schools, a senior comprehensive school and senior private school are in the village. See List of schools in Surrey Home Office policing in Shepperton is provided by Surrey Police . Public transport
11070-429: The most southerly moonrise . The ditch appeared to have been refilled and re-excavated in the late Neolithic. Two burials were discovered at the site - a torso, probably male, and an almost complete skeleton of a female. Radiocarbon dating showed that the woman had lived in the late 3rd millennium BCE and analysis of the isotope composition of her teeth suggested that she had grown up in an area where lead-zinc ore
11193-495: The neighbourhood of Lower Halliford, formerly a near but separate hamlet, which historian Susan Reynolds places at the eastern end of a reduced, river bend-consumed half of the early medieval village, east of the Old Shepperton Conservation Area due to erosion . This area is typified by a small number of detached classical three-storey 18th century riverside houses high on the riverside road on
11316-454: The opening of the railway station in 1838. The developer, W. G. Tarrant , was responsible for the construction of housing on St George's Hill in the first half of the 20th century. The world's first purpose-built racing circuit was constructed at Brooklands in 1907. The track hosted the first British Grand Prix in 1926 and was used by Malcolm Campbell to develop his final land speed record car, Campbell-Railton Blue Bird . Throughout
11439-500: The opposite bank are in downstream order are Chertsey Bridge and Chertsey Meads , the Hamm Court area of Addlestone , three islands, (the first two of which have multiple properties) ( Lock , Hamhaugh and D'Oyly Carte , one large man-made island, ( Desborough ), and the riverside parts of Walton on Thames , the upstream part of which is also open land, Cowey Sale Park. The towpath is the official route of three passing through
11562-545: The outside of the river bend; the bend being flanked by riverside meadows with small boat moorings , low rise chalet-style houses to the south west, the Las Palmas Estate , named after the land once being that of the Spanish Ambassador; further west by the wooded Shepperton Cricket Club and by the village Green, Bishop Duppas Park to the east, formerly Lower Halliford Common and in a small part owned by
11685-406: The press. Famous residents, past and present, include Sir Cliff Richard , Mick Jagger , George Harrison , John Lennon , Ringo Starr , Ronnie Wood , Andy Murray , Kate Winslet , John Terry , Gary Lineker , Mick Hucknall , Frank Lampard , Didier Drogba , Theo Paphitis , Chris Tarrant , Peter Crouch , Michael Aspel and Shilpa Shetty . St George's Hill is noted as the site of one of
11808-479: The production of aircraft parts, with final assembly elsewhere. Components of the British-built Concordes were manufactured at the site in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In 1977, BAC merged with Hawker-Siddeley to form British Aerospace and the combined entity began to run down the Brooklands site. Aerospace manufacturing finally ceased in Weybridge in 1988. Although no mill is mentioned in
11931-462: The regional average. Of these people 47.3% described their health as very good, below the regional average. 20.4% of 16- to 74-year-olds had no work qualifications, below the English average of 22.5%. In 2011 the area had only 114 people who were in the category "never worked/long-term unemployed". The average level of accommodation in the region composed of detached houses was 28%, the average that
12054-553: The reigns of Diocletian (284–305 CE), Maximian (286–305), Constantius I (305–306) and Galerius (305–311), was donated to the British Museum. There are three separate entries for Weybridge in Domesday Book. The first area of land described was held by Bishop Odo of Bayeux as tenant-in-chief and Herfrid of Throwley as lesser tenant . It included 16 acres (6.5 ha) of meadow and woodland for five swine with
12177-417: The relatively narrow, non-tidal river Thames. It is for this reason a bridge and ferry was recorded here from 1274 to 1410. The tern is applicable also to the mostly riverside homes and public park almost surrounded by the River Thames , south of the road from Kingston to Chertsey including next to Walton Bridge by Walton on Thames . The main park is Bishop Duppas Park and almost surrounds completely
12300-584: The residence of his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves , but the marriage was annulled after six months. The king married his fifth wife, Catherine Howard , at Oatlands, but rarely visited thereafter. Following Henry's death the palace remained a possession of the Crown until the Commonwealth , when the contents were sold and the buildings demolished. Only a side entrance gate and adjoining sections of walls, which date from c. 1545 , remain. Reforms during
12423-419: The route; this is supplemented by secondary school usage, with a substantial state school and private school. The Village Hall in the High Street has a large depiction of the economic life and of the history of the village. In October 2011, a group of children from St Nicholas C of E Primary School won a competition to create the history board, which was then edited by a graphic designer and officially opened by
12546-467: The south, as described in the Surrey article. In the next third, the first of the remarkable acid soil heaths in west Surrey begin to appear in places here , characterised by undulating heaths: these sandy and stony reliefs start in the east in the Esher Commons , covering the central swathe of the area including Oxshott Heath and Woods and areas of Weybridge and areas surrounding Wisley ,
12669-523: The station were added in 1885 and 1902. The lines through the station were electrified in 1907, although steam locomotives continued to haul long-distance express services through Weybridge until 1967. The goods yard was closed in 1964 and signal boxes in the local area were shut in March 1970, when control of the lines was transferred to Surbiton Panel Box. An arson attack in January 1987, resulted in
12792-602: The town was built by the Weybridge UDC between 1923 and 1927, when 160 houses were constructed on the Old Palace Gardens estate. Following the end of the Second World War, the Weybridge and Walton UDC built over 1000 houses in the two towns. Brooklands, the first purpose-built motor-racing circuit in the world, opened in 1907. Constructed on farmland to the south of Weybridge, the concrete track
12915-473: The village centre. Across the River Ash, Surrey , which is no more than a stream most of the year, adjoining, to its north is Littleton . Taken together with Littleton, three farms operate on the edges of this conjoined residential area, providing a buffer to the north and west. Shepperton's central SSSI is on the south side of the motorway Sheep Lake Walk and meadows , managed by Surrey Wildlife Trust . To
13038-458: The waterside meadows adjoining to the south and was also an important landowner in Croydon 's history, see Duppas Hill . Wealthy writers built or expanded homes here in the 19th century, primarily as summer residences, such as Rider Haggard , Thomas Love Peacock , George Meredith and Percy Bysshe Shelley . The Old Manor became yet another rebuilt Georgian house. The house which features
13161-521: The west are large lakes (one sifted and worked for gravel). This means that Shepperton Green with Littleton is buffered to all sides, except for its eastern side with its road bridge to Shepperton proper, classified as Shepperton Town ward and county council electoral division. This area is currently grouped with Laleham for all local elections. Shepperton has a traditional high street, shorter than that at nearby Ashford with two medium-size supermarkets, village hall, library, shops, optician, hairdressers,
13284-562: Was among several aircraft developed at Brooklands during the First World War. Aircraft manufacture continued during the 1920s and 1930s. Among those working at the Vickers factory was Barnes Wallis , who was involved in designing the Wellesley and the Wellington bombers . The Hawker Aircraft company opened a factory at Brooklands in 1935 and began building prototypes of the Hurricane fighter . Aircraft manufacture intensified during
13407-402: Was authorised by Act of Parliament in 1651. Twelve locks (including two flood locks) and 9 mi (14 km) of new cuts were constructed between the Thames and Guildford . Thames Lock was rebuilt in concrete in the 1930s, but like all the locks on the Wey, it was originally turf sided. The earliest locks on the upper Thames were built in the 17th century, following the establishment of
13530-523: Was awarded borough status from its creation, allowing the chair of the council to take the title of mayor . In the early 1990s the neighbouring London Borough of Kingston upon Thames sought to have eastern parts of Elmbridge, including Long Ditton , Thames Ditton , Hinchley Wood , Weston Green and the Moleseys transferred to it, making the case that these areas had particularly strong social and economic ties to Kingston and Greater London. The proposal
13653-544: Was considered by the Local Government Boundary Commission in 1992, but was not pursued. Elmbridge Borough Council provides district-level services. County-level services are provided by Surrey County Council . Claygate is a civil parish , which forms a third tier of local government for that part of the borough only; the rest of the borough is an unparished area . The council has been under no overall control since 2016. Since
13776-413: Was contemporaneously written in 1844 fifteen years after he had spent six years living in the village. Old parts of Shepperton are said to be haunted by the ghost of a headless monk. Battlecrease Hall (formerly home to Walter Hayes , Ford Motor Company executive and a founder of the company's Formula One programme) is alleged by its owners and certain visitors to have poltergeists . Leading to this
13899-551: Was created on 1 April 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972 , covering two former districts which were both abolished at the same time: The new district was named after the medieval Elmbridge hundred which had covered a similar area. The hundred appears in Domesday Book of 1086 as Amelebrige . The name thus derives from the River Amele or Emley, an old name for the River Mole , rather than elm trees. The district
14022-546: Was designed by Capel Lofft Holden and had a total length of 2.75 mi (4.43 km). The first races for motorcars took place in July 1907 and for motorcycles in February the following year. Both attracted a large number of entrants from across Europe and by 1911, the British Automobile Racing Club had established a programme of regular race meetings. Motor racing ceased for the duration of
14145-465: Was discovered in the late 1980s, close to the River Ash, to the north of Shepperton Green. The structure was around 23 m (75 ft) in diameter and is thought to have been constructed c. 3500 BCE . The main entrance to the henge was aligned with the position of the sun at sunrise on the summer solstice and lumps of red ochre had been placed inside the ditch to mark the position of
14268-576: Was found, possibly Derbyshire , the Mendips or the North Pennines . A reconstruction of the face of the woman from the skull was created at the University of Manchester in 2004. Finds from the Iron Age include an inhumation of a woman in her 40s, found on Chertsey Road, and iron swords, discovered at Shepperton Ranges. Pewter plates, from the latter site, are thought to date from
14391-464: Was further improved when the Desborough Cut was opened in 1935. The 100 ft wide (30 m) navigable channel bypasses a three-mile (5 km) meander and was primarily designed to increase the flood capacity of the river. Construction of the cut created the 45 ha (110-acre) Desborough Island, the entirety of which is in Weybridge. The London and Southampton Railway Company opened
14514-459: Was held by the Rede family for three years, before passing to the Crown in 1537. In June of the same year, Henry VIII began to construct Oatlands Palace by expanding an existing late-medieval manor house located to the north of the town centre. Some of the stone used in the construction of the foundations was taken from the demolition of Chertsey Abbey. Henry had intended that the palace would become
14637-407: Was in the parish of Sunbury and unlike the three adjoining manors, Shepperton, Halliford and Sunbury did not reach down to the river public meadowlands, used for grazing of animals. 51°23′53″N 0°27′32″W / 51.398°N 0.459°W / 51.398; -0.459 Shepperton Green is that part of the village which continues immediately west of the M3 motorway, north-west of
14760-470: Was largely due to contributions and permission of W. S. Lindsay the owner of Shepperton's manor. The River Thames was important for transport from the late 13th century and carried barley, wheat, peas and root vegetables to London's markets; later timber, building materials such as bricks, sand and lime, and gunpowder , see the Wey Navigation . While the village was wholly agricultural until
14883-589: Was primarily used to treat "medical & tuberculosis cases and limbless men". Ethel Locke King, the chair of the Chertsey branch of the Red Cross, was instrumental in establishing 15 hospitals in the local area during the First World War. She also organised a rest station for troops at Weybridge railway station. In January 1918, Locke King became a Dame Commander of the British Empire. The presence of
15006-529: Was rector 1504–1513 and was an Oxford classical academic who corresponded regularly with Erasmus and Lewis Atterbury (1707–31) expended much of the large parish revenues on having the large tower rebuilt. A large net income of rents and tithes of £499 per year was paid to the rectory belonging to S. H. Russell in 1848; this compares to £600 of poor relief, including for supporting its workhouse, paid out in 1829. A change to secular council-administered rather than church-administered public services followed
15129-470: Was used for brickmaking in the 19th century. Ironstone , containing 33-48% iron(III) oxide , is also found on the Hill, along with a capping of chert gravels, thought to have been deposited by a former course of the River Wey. The earliest evidence of human occupation in Weybridge is from the Bronze Age . A number of weapons, including socketed axe heads , a rapier , and a palstave , were retrieved from
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