Thursday 8 June 2023

Cherry Orchards



Cherry Growing in Watford and surrounding areas


The growing of watercress in the local area, especially around Watford, is quite well documented, but perhaps not so cherry growing. A glance at old maps of Watford from an Anonymously Recorded History of Croxley Green - The Croxley Green History Project, it was noted in 1891 that ‘cherry growing has been a prominent, though diminishing industry in Croxley for some generations. The choosing of a “Cherry Sunday” as being a suitable time for a mass picking of the crop is a custom that has lapsed, but it was a great and happy attraction to local people and to others from farther afield’.


Going back to earlier records (1608), it was noted that in the 200 acres of coppices in Abbots Langley, numerous oaks dominated the woods, but well grown ash and beech trees were also to be seen. At Harwoods Farm, Watford, there were not many large trees - only 7 elms and 2 oaks. At Pinchfield in Rickmansworth there was a profusion of oak, ash and elm apparently in equal numbers. Yet not all trees were for timber. Cherry trees were a notable landmark near Penman's Green and this fruit was thereafter consistently associated with Sarratt, Chipperfield and Kings Langley.


Should you be able to go back to a similar time to get a glimpse of life in Watford during the reign of James I, you would find probably only 125 dwellings in and around the High Street. The population would have been no more than about 500 or 600 people. After crossing the 'great bridge' over the Colne and proceeding up the hill, you would soon pass the house and orchard of John Weedon, called the Saffron Garden. Once near the Vicarage, the houses would become closer together and there would be several inns to allay a thirst. But all around the town lay a pleasant scene of stables, barns, gardens, closes of pasture for horses and small orchards. Immediately beyond were the common arable fields and farms.


An interesting glimpse of the district in William Penn’s time is contained in the famous diary of John Evelyn. The entry for April 18th 1680 reads: “on the earnest invitation of the Earl of Essex I went with him to his house at Cashiobere in Hartfordshire”. The estate is described in detail, and he also comments – “The land about it is exceedingly addicted to wood, but the coldnesse of the place hinders the growth. Black cherry trees prosper even to considerable timber, some being 80 foote long”.



And from General View of the Agriculture of Hertfordshire, Drawn up for the Consideration of the Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement. Chapter IX Orchards. p 143 – 144:
“In the south-west corner of the county, and particularly in the parishes of Rickmersworth, Sarret, King’s Langley and Abbot’s Langley, Flaunden, Bovingdon, and partly in Watford and Aldenham, there are many orchards: apples and cherries are their principal produce. Every farm has an orchard; but the larger the farm, the smaller the orchard. Orchards are found chiefly in farms from 20 to 50 acres. The apples are most profitable; but cherries very beneficial to the poor, in the quantity of employment which they require in gathering the crop, for which the poor are paid from 4d to 8d per dozen pounds. In ten years after planting, cherry-trees begin to bear: each tree should have nine square perches of land (a perch being equal to 16.5 feet). A full-grown tree will produce 50 dozen pounds in a good year; and from 10 to 20 years, six dozen: prices vary from 10d to 3s a dozen. The caroon and small black are the favourite sorts. The Kentish will not thrive here at all. None of the apples are for cyder; they sell for 1s. 6d. to 8s. the basket, or bushel: a tree produces from two to 25 bushels. The orchards, whether of cherries or apples, should be under glass and fed with sheep; mowing the hay is so bad for the trees, that some orchards which were very productive while fed, have produced nothing after a few years of mowing. For ten years after planting, great care should be taken to keep the trees from the sheep, as their rubbing injures them. No orchards are worth above 4?£ per acre. They rarely exceed four or five acres, as I am informed.”


Stones Orchard


"In Hertfordshire at Croxley Green, Stone's Community Orchard is a 1.4 hectare relic of an orchard once nearly 4 times as large. Such orchards formed an important element of the local economy a century ago. Cherry Sundays were fairs held in July in many orcharding villages in south-west Hertfordshire and combined picking, sales and picking in local orchards including Stone's. Today, new saplings of the dark Carroon (Kerroon) and Hertfordshire Black cherries, as well as local apple varieties and plums, stand among the still flowering ancient giants which Walter Stone may have planted"
(From the Common Ground Book of Orchards, 2000)




Orchards, Trees & Orchard Produce - Hertfordshire information


Stones Cherry Orchard at Croxley Green, (Stone’s Community Orchard) named after Walter Stone, a former tenant farmer, is a 1.4-hectare remnant of an orchard once nearly four times as large owned by the District Council. It has tall cherry trees of Caroon cherries (or Kerroon) and Hertfordshire Black Cherries, and some apple trees including the Hertfordshire cooker Lane’s Prince Albert plus Bramleys, King of the Pippins, Laxton’s Superb and Worcester Pearmain. There are also pears, walnuts and Victoria and Kirkes Blue plums, once grown for Covent Garden market. It was well known within the village for its cherries, but apples, pears, plums and cobnuts were also grown. Such orchards formed an important element of the local economy a century ago. ‘Cherry Sundays’ were fairs held in July in many orcharding villages in south-west Hertfordshire and combined picking, sales and picnicking in local orchards including Stone’s. In the 1970s many of the orchards in the area were lost to housing but Stones was refused planning permission in 1983 and sold to the local authority for £1. It is now part of the village conservation area, managed by the Parish Council. Today, new saplings of the dark Carroon and Hertfordshire Black cherries, as well as local apple varieties and plums, stand among the still flowering ancient giants which Walter Stone may have planted. A survey in 1993/4 recorded sixteen grasses and 60 wildflower species including Black Medick, foxglove, ox-eye daisy, celandine and prickly sedge. There is full public access to the orchard, reached from the village green through a kissing gate. The fruit is available for local people to pick although much is left for wildlife. There are plans to reinstate Cherry Sunday on the green in time.






Cherry Pickers at Stones Orchard, Croxley Green c1915


Courtesy Croxley Green History Project https://www.croxleygreenhistory.co.uk/




Situated just off The Green and originally just over 12 acres, the orchard was part of Parrotts Farm and leased to George Stone who came from Sarratt in the late 1880's. When George passed away his nephew Walter Stone took over the tenancy. In addition to the orchard area there was a large meadow where dairy cattle were grazed. This would have contributed to the income for Walter and his family as he provided a daily supply of fresh milk for local villagers. The orchard had an extensive variety of fruit trees, and as the village expanded the orchard became very popular with local residents especially when the cherries were available during June and July. Families would make a special day of it to visit the orchard on so-called 'Cherry Sundays' Having bought a good portion of the plump ripe juicy cherries from the stall set up outside the orchard entrance the families would have a 'cherry picnic.' Maybe father would walk across The Green to the Coach and Horses or The Artichoke for some refreshment too! On this side of The Green the cherry orchards, some attached to the public houses, were known mainly for the cooking varieties.

During the 'cherry ripe time' it was the custom for an organised group/contractor of 'pickers' to bring their cherry ladders to local orchards to pick the fruit for owners or tenant farmers. The trees were very high and the men would climb into the tops of the trees to gather all the juicy fruit. These special ladders were wide at the bottom, and narrow at the top and were designed just for cherry picking, enabling the men to reach the treetops in safety (see above photograph).


'....... returning to my subject of Cherry Sundays I have been speaking to some friends who have lived by the green for most of their lives - Mrs. Grace Brown, and Mrs. Doris Woods granddaughter of Wally Stone who was the chief purveyor of Cherries on the green. He had splendid orchards and sold several varieties of cherries at Rose Cottage where the family lived. There were actually three Cherry Sundays, the second, third and fourth Sundays in July. There was no formal organisation but a great many people congregated on the Green outside the Orchards, the children in their Sunday Clothes. They sat around enjoying the cherries and chatting to their friends. The cherries cost only a few pence, the children paying one penny for a handful. The Coach and Horses sold cherries with their drinks'.


Kay Ragget - The Resident No 160, 1990 Croxley Green History Project


Unfortunately, the cherry orchards of bygone days are no longer with us, although many ornamental cherries have been planted in the Watford area and surrounding districts and old specimens can still be found in the local woods, although I doubt the '80 foote long black cherry timber' referred to by the diarist John Evelyn on the estate of the Earl of Essex.




Research - Lynda Bullock


References - The Croxley Green History Project - https://www.croxleygreenhistory.co.uk/
an invaluable source of local history


Common Ground Book of Orchards, 2000


General View of the Agriculture of Hertfordshire, Drawn up for the Consideration of the Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement. Chapter IX Orchards. p 143 – 144


The Diary of John Evelyn



Thursday 1 June 2023

The Gout Track



The Gout Track

A curious name for a road, one might think, especially a turnpike road.

Until authorisation by an Act of Parliament, responsibility for the repair of the roads lay with the parishes through which they ran, whether local roads or long-distance ones. The Overseer of the Highways, appointed by the Vestry, had the unenviable task of raising a rate to pay for repairs and finding the men to do the work. The Turnpike Acts made the users of the roads responsible for their upkeep, by the tolls which they had to pay at each gate they passed through. The tolls varied from 1/2d for an unladen horse up to 10d for a drove of livestock, with variable rates for carts, coaches and other wheeled vehicles, depending on the load and the width of wheels.

The Hatfield and Reading Turnpike was a turnpike road created in the 1760s to provide a route that connected the Great North Road (the modern A1) with the Holyhead Road (A5) and the Bath Road (A4). It had the advantage of making it possible for travellers to avoid congested London and was shorter in distance.

The Founding of the Road

It is said the the Marquis of Salisbury, who lived at Hatfield House, wanted a route to the Great West Road avoiding central London, for onward travel to the spa towns of Bath and Cheltenham where, as a sufferer of gout, he often took the waters. This would also spare him the discomfort and congestion of London's cobbled streets. With others, including the Earl of Essex, who suffered from a similar affliction and who lived at Cassiobury House close to Watford, he sponsored an Act of Parliament passed in 1757 for the building of a road from Hatfield to Reading. The Reading and Hatfield Turnpike Trust was set up by a further Act passed in 1768 to improve the route between the two towns.

It ran via St Albans, Watford, Rickmansworth, Amersham, High Wycombe and Marlow, with two alternative routes south and west from there, one to Knowl Hill (on the Great West Road between Maidenhead and Reading) and the other to Reading itself via Henley-on-Thames. In Watford the turnpike was known as Hagden Lane or colloquially as Ricky Road.

For many years this route was known as the Gout Track given its raison-d'etre.

In 1881 it was the last of the turnpikes to have its tolls removed, being on the last surviving Turnpike Trusts in the country.










Photograph By Ian Capper, CC BY-SA 2.0,

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=84960745




References: Wikipedia

Watford, A History - Mary Forsyth

Sue Ettridge




Monday 8 May 2023

Domenic's Cafe



Closure of Domenic's Cafe, Vicarage Roa
d


Photo courtesy of Stephen Danzig





A family run cafe has sadly closed at the end of January 2023 after 40 years in Vicarage Road.

Frank Blasi, who worked at the family-run business for 25 years, told the Watford Observer: “It’s a decision we’ve made as a family to explore other avenues.

Although the economic climate has been tough, it had no bearing on the decision, Frank added.

His dad Domenic, who opened the business in 1983, still chips in aged 80, while Frank’s sisters Luisa and Rita also work there too.

“It allows my parents now to just relax, especially my mum, because my mum (Nicky) works here as well. It’s purely from a family point of view.”

The decision to close sparked a wave of touching customer responses, which Frank described as “incredible and humbling”.

“Everyone’s got a little story and a memory which is nice,” he added. “For me it’s just going to work really, and I just didn’t realise how we’ve affected so many people over the years.

“But everyone’s saying ‘it’s the end of an era’, ‘don’t know what we’re going to do’, especially the Watford match day fans who come in as it’s been their place to go to.

“Some have even said to me that they enjoy coming to us more than going to the football!”

Many messages of sadness, but also good wishes were posted from customers.

Report courtesy of The Watford Observer

Photographs in the Gallery courtesy of Stephen Danzig





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