Salfords ) is a village in the

borough A borough is an administrative division in various English language, English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History ...

Reigate and Banstead Reigate and Banstead is a local government district with borough status in Surrey, England. Its council is based in Reigate and the borough also includes the towns of Banstead, Horley and Redhill. Parts of the borough are within the Surrey ...

in Surrey, England. It lies approximately south of Redhill on the A23 London to

Brighton Brighton ( ) is a seaside resort in the city status in the United Kingdom, city of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, England, south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Age Britain, Bronze Age, R ...

road. The village is within the

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

of Salfords and Sidlow which covers a population of 3,069, and has a parish council.

Toponymy

The earliest written record of the village is from the assizes roll of 1279, in which a "Stephen de Salford" is mentioned as a resident. It appears in later documents as ''Salfordebrugg'' (1316), ''Saleford'' (1355) and ''Sallforde'' (1535). The first part is thought to derive from the

Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...

''sealh'', meaning

willow Willows, also called sallows and osiers, of the genus ''Salix'', comprise around 350 species (plus numerous hybrids) of typically deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist soils in cold and temperate regions. Most species are known ...

, and the name is generally agreed to mean "ford by the willow tree(s)".

Description

The village has its own 20th century church, Christ The King, primary school,

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

club, some shops, cafes, a social club, a tanning salon, a number of restaurants and a take away. Salfords Stream runs through the village and can cause flooding in the autumn and winter months. The southern boundary is marked by the Burstow stream. Both are minor River Mole tributaries, itself a tributary of the

River Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, s ...

. The only buildings old enough to be listed structures in the village are two adjoining houses on Brighton Road and The Mill House Hotel on the Salfords Stream. The village once boasted a wooden

watermill A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as mill (grinding), milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in ...

with two sluice gates next to the Mill House Hotel. It produced breakfast cereals in the early twentieth century. By the 1950s it was defunct and has since been dismantled and partly washed away. Salfords made the national news in January 2008 when a farmer named Robert Fidler built a personal home at Honeycrock Farm similar in style to a Tudor

castle A castle is a type of fortification, fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by Military order (monastic society), military orders. Scholars usually consider a ''castle'' to be the private ...

and disguised it with hay bales and

tarpaulin A tarpaulin ( , ) or tarp is a large sheet of strong, flexible, water-resistant or waterproof material, often cloth such as canvas or polyester coated with polyurethane, or made of plastics such as polyethylene. Tarpaulins often have reinf ...

for four years in an attempt to avoid planning permission from Reigate and Banstead Borough Council. Surrey Police opened a 24-cell custody suite at the IO centre on Salbrook Road in 2013, replacing an existing 12-cell facility at Reigate. The force had originally intended to build a 30-cell suite in Salfords, but reduced the scale of the development after the initial planning application was declined by the borough council.

History

Until the 1970s Salfords was part of Horley and with its own Victorian Chapel Church, owing its existence to the construction of the A23 road. A

Saxon The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like th ...

trackway ran from Earlswood to Horley midway between the London to Brighton railway and the modern main road. It then ran in front of the former Monotype Corporation site towards the Horley gasometer, passed the moated Thunderfield Castle (a 13th-century manor) on 'Harolds Lea' and reached the south coast near

. In the 1870s a state school was built on the fork between the London Road and Woodhatch Road on Petridge Common. The school consisted of four classrooms three were divided by sliding glass doors. The head teacher was located upstairs above the cloakrooms. In

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

two air raid shelters were built on opposite sides of the long tapering playground. In the mid-1950s the then "Salfords County Primary School" started to expand and relocated to Copsleigh Avenue. The

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...

was built in 1915 to enable workers access to the

Monotype Corporation Monotype Imaging Holdings Inc., founded as Lanston Monotype Machine Company in 1887 in Philadelphia by Tolbert Lanston, is an American (historically Anglo-American) company that specializes in digital typesetting and typeface design for use wit ...

factory. Today it is served by

Thameslink Thameslink is a mainline route on the British railway network, running from , , , , , and via central London to , , , Rainham, , , and . The network opened as a through service in 1988, with severe overcrowding by 1998, carrying more than ...

services between Bedford and Three Bridges with additional services in the peak hours between London Victoria and Gatwick Airport. On the main road Hall & Co, the dominant building materials supplier in the south east of England had their regional maintenance depot, used in WWII to repair war tanks.

Cricket club

Salfords Cricket Club is a village

club. The club runs two Saturday League sides in the Surrey Downs League and a Sunday friendly side. The club host a "Cricket Week" of mid-week games each July, and a tour every August. The club now play on a council-owned ground on Petridge Wood Common, off Woodhatch Road. Salfords Cricket Club was formed in 1921. The Club's first captain was Tom Enever, whose photograph can be seen in the pavilion today. The Council relocated the club to its present ground at Petridge Wood Common in 1960.

References

External links