Chailey

Chailey is a village and civil parish in the Lewes District of East Sussex, England. It is located 7 miles north of Lewes, on the A272 road from Winchester to Canterbury. The Prime Meridian passes just to the east of Chailey. The parish consists of the settlements: South Chailey (which also incorporates South Common), South Street, Chailey (also known as Chailey Green) and North Chailey (which incorporates the North Common). The parish church is dedicated to St. Peter and is recorded as having been built in 1256. Recently a special service was held to commemorate its 750 years. At one time Chailey had more churches than pubs. The churches being St Peter's, St Martin's (within Chailey Heritage), Chailey Free Church, St John's (now housing in South Common), and St Mary's (now housing in North Common), and the pubs being the King's Head, Five Bells, Horns Lodge and the Swan House. In addition it is believed another chapel was sited near the Bluebell railway. Chailey is reputed to be the inspiration for the 1969 children's television series Chigley by Gordon Murray, (along with nearby Plumpton as Trumpton and Wivelsfield Green as Camberwick Green).

Chailey is a village and civil parish in the Lewes District of East Sussex, England. It is located 7 miles north of Lewes, on the A272 road from Winchester to Canterbury. The Prime Meridian passes just to the east of Chailey. The parish consists of the settlements: South Chailey (which also incorporates South Common), South Street, Chailey (also known as Chailey Green) and North Chailey (which incorporates the North Common). The parish church is dedicated to St. Peter and is recorded as having been built in 1256. Recently a special service was held to commemorate its 750 years. At one time Chailey had more churches than pubs. The churches being St Peter's, St Martin's (within Chailey Heritage), Chailey Free Church, St John's (now housing in South Common), and St Mary's (now housing in North Common), and the pubs being the King's Head, Five Bells, Horns Lodge and the Swan House. In addition it is believed another chapel was sited near the Bluebell railway. Chailey is reputed to be the inspiration for the 1969 children's television series Chigley by Gordon Murray, (along with nearby Plumpton as Trumpton and Wivelsfield Green as Camberwick Green). ==Notable buildings and areas== The parish of Chailey is large. It is so special because it is one of the remaining areas of the Sussex Weald with heathland Commons. Chailey Common is a Site of Special Scientific Interest that is located within the parish. It also has many areas with ancient woodland. To the north are the parishes of Haywards Heath and Fletching, to its east are Newick and Barcombe. To its south it borders the parishes of Hamsey, St John Without and East Chiltington and to its west, Wivelsfield. ===The Church of St. Peter=== The parish has a 13th-century church dedicated to St. Peter at Chailey Green ( ). The large graveyard has two fine old Yews that are over three span girth. The little archaic grassland is unimproved and a Site of Nature Conservation Interest (SCNI), but the parts nearest the church are mown too often and the southern extension are in poor condition. It is worth recording that at least one part of the SNCI ( ), a relict wet meadow, just north west of The Hooke has been destroyed only recently (2017). ===The Heritage Mill=== The Heritage Mill is situated on the Red House Common. It is also known as Beard's Mill. It stands beside a yew tree said to mark the centre of Sussex. Records show that mills have stood here since at least 1590. The mill museum is open to visitors regularly. There used to be a mill on the South Common in South Chailey, opposite where Chailey School is situated, but it has worn away over time. ===Chailey Brickworks=== Chailey Brickworks, now the Ibstock brickworks, ( ), is one of the oldest factories in Europe, and has been in continuous production for over 300 years. There is deep pit ( ) that is now a blue lake with gorse around its rim. The pit is made from bluish grey Upper Wealden Clay mudstones, with a bold pink stratum. Fossils have been found there, including the early flowering plant, Bevhalstia. There are also trace fossils which are likely to have been made by crustaceans, bands of fossil wood, insect and fish fossils. In Spring nightingales can be heard singing here. ===Second World War D Day airfield=== Second World War D Day airfield was on the west side of the parish by Townings farm. The RAF cleared the ground in 1942 for the Chailey Advanced Landing Ground. It was largely manned by Polish exile Spitfire squadrons, which supported the Normandy D Day landings in June 1944. ===Farmland=== The two largest estates in Chailey are the Hooke Estate which covers around a 1000 acres and the Hurst Barns Estate, South Chailey, which covers around 500 acres. The Hooke Estate is between South Chailey and Chailey Common and they include a cluster of working farms in this landscape. There are many fine old oak, beech and hornbeam veterans in the area and there are a few significant clusters of farm fields that have been preserved from the effects of traditional farming by their difficult terrain, or by sympathetic land managers, and which are very different to the 'improved' green dairy pastures we are used to seeing. At Sedgebrook Farm, south west of Chailey Common, seven fields remain unimproved and are managed for nature. The farm's fields are the centre of a series of wet woods, damp meadows and carr that extend east to Godleys Green ( ). In late spring the cotton grass and marsh cinquefoil covers many square metres of quaking bog amongst the carr. In Spring the perfume of water mint is widespread and you can find angelica, marsh pennywort, purple moor grass tussocks, sharp-flowered rush, black sedge and bog stitchwort. In late May, a southern meadow has swarms of meadow/marsh plume thistle with soft shaving brush carmine flowers on white-woolly stems, and there's ladys smock, spotted orchids, creeping willow and rare spring sedge. The higher and drier meadow in July, is yellow with bird's-foot trefoil. There are bush crickets, cone-headed heads, large marsh and meadow grasshoppers and 'bloodsucker' soldier beetles. The rushy meadows have water horsetail, sneezewort and clumps of narrow buckler fern in the shadier places. Towning's Farm ( ) has "an old fashioned air" with fine vernacular farm buildings and a good farm shop and some attractive pigs, poultry and sheep. Several of the fields on Towning's Farm have only been lightly 'improved'. As a result, some archaic vegetation still exists. For example, the pasture along the west side of Bineham Wood has tiny patches of Tormentil and other old herbs (2018). The woodland rides are the last redoubt for these old grassland species, but straw laid for the Pheasants in several of these woods can only harm that relict vegetation. Bower Farm too ( ), to the south, has a dairy herd and some old buildings, like Towning's Farm, including an outhouse with herringbone ironstone walls. Southam Farmhouse is a Tudor, timber framed, but modernised is to the west of the relatively new Southam Wood. The area was once part of the heathy South Common until its enclosure in 1841. Although new, just inside the wood, where the footpaths fork east of the farmhouse, is an ancient hornbeam dubbed The Octopus ( ), its many tendril-like branches writhing and wrapping around each other. At the north end of the wood, east of the footpath is a veteran beech with '1945 Audrey and Bill' carved on the bole next to two hearts pierced with an arrow. There are a number of notable working farms in the area but there are also a number of wealthy owners who have gained or inherited wealth from non-farming means who utilise the farms. Many of them have bought a farm as a private nature reserve, as at the lovely archaic meadows of Vixengrove Farm, Chailey. These landowners display varying degrees of empathy to public usage, from hostility to open-hearted delight. This seems to be so at the lovely archaic meadows of Vixengrove Farm, Chailey. Described in its listed building citation as "probably the most interesting house in Chailey parish" the 400 year old Wapsbourne Farmhouse ( ) is a traditional L-shaped, timber framed, three storey building, with diamond shaped leaded panes in its casement windows, and big brick chimney stacks. The name means 'bourne path' (werpel) and perhaps referred to the partly lost track from Wapsbourne Gate and Farm westwards to the defunct Hunt's Gate crossroads, still marked by a huge veteran oak pollard, ( ), hidden in the hedge where the footpath turns off from Butterbox Lane. ===Woodlands=== The varied ground of the Chailey parish results in different woodlands. The vale of the Bevern Stream is at the bottom of Chailey parish and has a number of pleasing little woods. Many of them are Bluebell woods under over-stood hornbeam coppice, with young oaks. While the fertile greensand areas are open and unwooded, on the Wealden Clay. Between Chailey Common and South Chailey there are the many medium-sized woods of the Hooke Estate and its neighbours. Going north towards the Lambourn Gill (Longford Stream), the acidic Hastings Beds, with their sands, hard sandrocks and clays, begin. As the ground rises towards Chailey North Common, the Wealden Clay gives way to Tunbridge Wells Sand and the woods subtly change, becoming drier and more acidic. They give a subtly different character to its woods. Many, such as Frick wood, are quite heathy and abundant with birch, ling heather and gorse. ==Governance== Chailey is governed at the local level by Chailey Parish Council which consists of eleven councillors meeting twice monthly. The parish council is responsible for local amenities such as the provision of litter bins, bus shelters and allotments. They also provide a voice into the district council meetings. The May 2007 election was uncontested due to only eight candidates standing. Three more councillors were later co-opted to the council. The next level of government is Lewes District Council. The District council supplies services such as refuse collection, planning consent, leisure amenities and council tax collection. Chailey is covered by the Chailey and Wivelsfield ward which returns two seats. In the May 2007 election, two councillors from the local Conservative party were elected. This ward is called Chailey and Wivelsfield and had a population of 5,068 at the 2011 Census. Chailey lies within the Chailey ward for the next tier of government, East Sussex County Council. The ward also includes Ditchling, East Chiltington, Newick, Plumpton, St John Without, Streat, Westmeston and Wivelsfield. The County Council provides services such as roads and transport, social services, libraries and trading standards. The June 2009 election resulted in a win for the Conservative Meg Stroude, in 2013 and 2017 the Conservative Jim Sheppard and in 2021 the Conservative Matthew Milligan. The UK Parliament constituency for Chailey is East Grinstead and Uckfield. Created prior to the 2024 General Election, it is represented by Mims Davies, a Conservative. Prior to Brexit in 2020, the village was part of the South East England constituency in the European Parliament. ==Schools== There are three schools in the village: Chailey St Peters Primary School, which is the primary school in South Chailey; Chailey School, which is the secondary school in South Chailey; and Chailey Heritage School, which is a special needs school on Chailey Common. ==References== ==External links==

Text derived from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1301029545 under CC BY-SA 4.0; modifications have been made.