Sandford-on-Thames

Coordinates: 51°42′47″N 1°13′55″W / 51.713°N 01.232°W / 51.713; -01.232
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Sandford-on-Thames
Shire county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townOxford
Postcode districtOX4
Dialling code01865
PoliceThames Valley
FireOxfordshire
AmbulanceSouth Central
UK Parliament
WebsiteSandford-on-Thames Village Magazine
List of places
UK
England
Oxfordshire
51°42′47″N 1°13′55″W / 51.713°N 01.232°W / 51.713; -01.232

Sandford-on-Thames, also referred to as simply Sandford, is a village and

Parish Council beside the River Thames in Oxfordshire just south of Oxford. The village is just west of the A4074 road between Oxford and Henley
.

Early history

In 1086 the

Thames between Iffley and Radley
. Six hundred years later the population of the village had barely doubled, and it was still under 200 people at the start of the 19th century. Today the population numbers more than 1,000 and the parish boundaries have undergone considerable revision.

Parish church of Saint Andrew

In the middle of the 12th century a small "field church" dedicated to

War Memorials at the Imperial War Museum.[2]

Knights Templar and Knights Hospitaller

The King's Arms
River Thames at Sandford Lock

In 1239 Sir Thomas de Sandford gave land to the

Henry VIII dissolved the order, and the land passed to Cardinal Sir Thomas Wolsey
.

River and lock

Main article: Sandford Lock

The river

Abingdon, once the county town of Berkshire. An ancient mounting block can still be seen on the western river bank just below the lock
, which travellers would have used to remount their horses having crossed the river on foot.

In his book Three Men in a Boat, Jerome K. Jerome described the pool under Sandford lasher as "a very good place to drown yourself in".[citation needed] The watercourse behind the lock-keeper's house (dated 1914) flows from the "big lasher" weir which creates strong currents and eddies. In spite of the danger, this was a favourite swimming place up to the mid-20th century. In 1921 the river here claimed the lives of three Christ Church students, including Michael Llewelyn Davies, the adopted son of J. M. Barrie, who was the inspiration for Peter Pan. An obelisk that has stood here since at least 1821 records the deaths of six Christ Church students who drowned here in three separate incidents between 1843 and 1921. Even into the 1950s the river at Sandford-on-Thames was still regarded as a place to come and relax. On Sundays people came from Oxford to swim at The Lido below the lock and to picnic. The King's Arms had extensive tea-lawns on which to spend lazy Sunday afternoons.

The first lock at Sandford was the navigation

21 Jas. 1. c. 32). The old lock has since been filled in but its position can still be seen (the position of the upper gates can be seen in the stonework above the present upper gates). A new lock on the present site was opened in 1836 which lasted until the most recent improvements when the present lock was built in 1972. Littlemore Brook joins the River Thames near Sandford-on-Thames.[3]

Farms

The

Thames river. After Dick Morris' death in 1966, his wife Freda continued on in partnership with her son Lloyd and together they ran the club until 1985 when the lease expired. After the long incarnation as Temple Farm Country Club the property burnt down in the 1990s and was restored as a hotel, originally part of the Four Pillars Hotels Group and from 2016 part of the De Vere Hotel group. The barn bar was said to be the final resting place of the Oxford Martyr George Napier, whose remains were taken from the Thames and laid to rest in the family chapel that later became the barn bar. The inscription 1614 was carved onto the gateway of the garden through which the torchlight procession carrying his remains was carried en route to burial.[citation needed
]

Rock Farm, formerly called Sandford Farm, was bought by a Mr. Benfield in 1897. He and his partner Mr Loxley were owners of a building firm and developed the clay on Rock Farm to supply their building works with bricks. Apart from the road name, the last remnants of Rock Farm are the original farmhouse, now called Manor House and originally called Sandford Farm, with its tied cottages running down the left side of Rock Farm Lane, another row of four to the right of Manor house and the old dovecote in Keene Close which was restored in the 1990s and stands in front of one of the houses in the recent Rock Farm development. The new barn style house in Rock Farm Lane stands on the floor plan of the original ancient barn which the developer of the site got permission to demolish. During the ground preparation for the new houses at Rock farm a large quantity of building stone was unearthed. some of which was dressed for windows and other architectural features. This may have been from

Roman pottery
shards and some firing slag was also found at the end of what is now Keene close. (Mr Gerald Keene was the last farmer to operate the farm at this site.)

Industry

Next to and downstream from the lock is a waterfront housing development, Sandford Mill. Built in the 1980s, this occupies the site of the former

millrace continues to flow under the footbridge that crosses from the King's Arms pub to the lock
.

At the beginning of the 20th century the

Oxford United
FC's Kassam Stadium which was completed in 2001.

Henley Road

The road through the centre of the village (now the

Second World War
.

The Second Wartime Boat Race, 1943

In 1943, the second wartime

Thames at Sandford. Like the first, it was unofficial and no Blues were awarded. However, public enthusiasm was high and the river banks were thronged with spectators, all of whom had to reach the course either by bicycle or on foot. Contemporary newspaper reports estimate the crowd at between seven and ten thousand. The Cambridge crew, unusually for the time, included a Dane at bow and a Turk at number four. The Oxford crew included four medical students. The race was rowed between the narrow banks of a 1.25 miles (2.01 km) downstream course with the start about 0.25 miles (400 m) below Sandford Lock and the finish at the Radley College Boathouse. Oxford won the toss and chose the Oxfordshire bank, with Cambridge rowing on the Berkshire side. Oxford set off at 40 strokes compared to Cambridge's 37, and were almost immediately in the lead and a length up in some thirty seconds. Despite being left at the start, Cambridge did not give up and responded well, with the judge's verdict at the finish recorded as a win for Oxford by just two-thirds of a length.[citation needed
]

Amenities

The village has two

Abingdon. A regular local bus service between Wallingford
and Oxford city centre serves the village.

Street names

Despite extensive local research by the

Parish Council and local residents, no suitable ancient field names could be found that could be adapted for the new roads created at Heyford Hill Lane in the late 1990s. Consequently, surnames of past local residents were proposed, and they were accepted by South Oxfordshire
District Council. The names adopted are:

People from Sandford-on-Thames

References

  1. ^ "Area: Sandford-on-Thames CP (Parish): Parish Headcounts". Neighbourhood Statistics. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 21 March 2010.
  2. ^ Imperial War Museum
  3. Geograph
    . Retrieved 4 March 2011.
  4. ^ Sherwood & Pevsner, 1974, page 689

Sources

External links

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Sandford-on-Thames.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sandford-on-Thames.
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