Chorleywood



Charleywood Common
The Common consists of about 200 acres and is an important wildlife site.  It has grass and heath land with ponds and woodland. Cattle grazed here until the Great War, and now do again,  and wildlife and heath land has increased since.. There are squirrels, rabbits, foxes, hedgehogs, voles, mice and muntjac.   It is managed by the Parish Council. There is a horse track and horses are not allowed other than on it.
Chorleywood Golf Club.  This has a a nine-hole course on the Common.  T he club was founded in 1890 and it is the oldest club in Hertfordshire. At the start club members included Londoners who arrived here on the newly completed Metropolitan Line. The original course had 2 holes across the railway so in 1922 the course was reduced to 9 holes, with help from course architect James Braid. Play was not permitted on Sundays until 1926. In the Great War, the Common was used for practice by the Bombing School and later 150 live grenades were cleared from the fairway.

Common Road
Chorleywood Memorial Hall. This was built by donations and subscriptions to commemorate the fallen of the Great War. It opened in 1922 built by the local firm, Darvell, who donated a memorial board inside. It is based on the plans for the village hall at Bovingdon. It is run by the Village Halls Trust Committee. Adjacent is the Royal British Legion Hall, funded by donations and built in 1936.
Chorleywood Club. The golf club house. In the Second World War  the clubhouse was used as an emergency first aid post by the ARP and bombs fell on the course. A new Clubhouse was opened in 1990.
Rose and Crown. The pub is described in 1861 as formerly called ‘The Hammer’. It is thought to date from the 17th although the current building dates from the 1890s. It is not shown on old maps although 'Berkley Arms' is marked.
Chorleywood Kennels.  Now The Masters House, Kennels Cottage and The Kennels. These are at situated at the base of a steep bank at the side of the Common. The Kennels is an L-shaped building now housing. There is a large iron gate survives in front. They were the kennels for the Berkely Hunt.
Darvells Yard. This was a local builders firm, the site described as a Steam ]oinery Works in 1916. It is now housing.

Lower Road
Chorleywood Health Centre

 Old Common Road
Chorleywood Arts Centre.. This is in what was a Wesleyan Methodist Chapel which was built in 1893 replacing an earlier meeting-place. Nothing remains of the original interior or its fixtures and fittings. It closed in 1969 and sold in 1970 and all reference to its past were removed, including the inscriptions on the foundation stones
Berkely Arms. This is now Berkely House although a brewers sign survived, illegible, below the side gable. At the rear, there is a mid 17th century timber-frame range with exposed queen struts.  It was named for the hounds of the Berkley Hunt which used to exercise on the Common.

Shire Lane
St.John Fisher church. Hill Cottage was originally a private house with a a large ground-floor studio once used as a rehearsal room by Sir Henry Wood. It was extended in the early 20th, C F A Voysey. The Assumptionist Fathers came to Rickmansworth in 1903. Chorleywood Catholics then had to walk there and so later services were held in members’ homes. Plots of land were bought, found unsuitable for a church, and sold. Eventually they bought Hill Cottage and it was dedicated in 1955.

Station Approach
The area at the junction with Shire Lane was once called Currants Bottom
Chorleywood Hotel. Turned into flats. Was renamed the Sportsman and was a Toby Hotel.
Chorleywood Station. Opened in 1889 the station now lies between Chalfont and Latimer and Rickmansworth on both Chiltern Railways and on the Metropolitan Line. It  originally opened  when the Metropolitan Railway extended to Chesham from Rickmansworth  In 1915 the name was changed to ‘Chorley Wood and Chenies’ and in  1934 changed to ‘Chorley Wood’, and in changed to ‘Chorleywood’. It was originally served by steam hauled Metropolitan line trains which ran from Aylesbury changing to an electric locomotive at Rickmansworth. electrification north of Rickmansworth was completed in 1960 and steam withdrawn the following year. Electric substations were built to serve the newly electrified line. Metropolitan line trains are formed of London Underground stock but the Chiltern Railway trains are diesel multiple units.

Sources
Chorleywood Parish Council. Web site
Day. London’s Underground
London Transport. Country Walks
St. John Fisher. Web site
Three Rivers Council. Web site

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