Maresfield

Maresfield
Sussex
Location
Grid reference:	TQ466240
Location:	0°59’49"N, -0°5’18"E
Data
Population:	3,656  (2011)
Post town:	Uckfield
Postcode:	TN22
Dialling code:	01825
Local Government
Council:	Wealden
Parliamentary constituency:	Wealden
Website:	maresfieldparish.org.uk

Maresfield is a village in Sussex, in the middle of the county, a mile and a half north of Uckfield; the nearby villages of Nutley and Fairwarp; and the smaller settlements of Duddleswell and Horney Common; and parts of Ashdown Forest all lie within Maresfield parish.

He village pub, in the centre of the village is the Chequers Inn, a house of the 17th century and which is a Grade II* listed building.

The village is on the southern edge of Ashdown Forest which was a deer hunting reserve from the time of King Edward II.

The parish church founded in about 1100.

History

The origin of name of the village is uncertain, but the first element may derive from the Old English word mere meaning 'pool'; the second element is certainly feld meaning 'open land'.

There was a Roman settlement, including a bloomery, and later a Norman village grew up around the church. In the 15th and 16th centuries

Maresfield is an old village (its church was founded in about 1100; the present nave and tower were built between 1375 and 1415). Fairwarp and Nutley developed as offshoots from it.

Iron has also played an important role in the history of the area, during the time when the Wealden iron industry was flourishing. Within two miles of Maresfield Church in the 16th century were five iron furnaces: Oldlands, Hendall, Old Forge, Lower Marshalls and Maresfield (powder mills). The Levett family owned and worked Oldlands, and it probably controlled Hendall as well, before it passed into the hands of Ralph Hogge, who formerly worked for the Levett family.

Among families long resident in the Maresfield area with historic ties to the old iron industry were the families of Levett, Pope and Chaloner, who had intermarried. William Levett of Buxted, a vicar who was a chief mover behind the iron industry in the Weald, had ties to the Maresfield area during his tenure as an ironmaster and supplier of armaments to Henry VIII. Eventually the vicar's former servant Ralph Hogge, who had become a major ironmaster after Levett's death, operated four furnaces and one or more forges within a couple of miles of Maresfield Church.

The village has expanded in the past twenty years, and three substantial housing developments have helped to increase the village population.

Manor

Until 1926,this was a largely agricultural village, up to 1914 effectively in the ownership and control of the family in Maresfield Park House, initially the Shelley family and then Count Alexander Münster of Hanover, Germany. The estate was confiscated in 1914 by the government after the start of First World War and the Park and estate houses were sold off in 1924 as reparation for war damage, the Park being broken up into housing plots. In the First World War, a large army camp was developed, and later on parts of the village, at Queen's Drive and the southern part of Parklands, were developed as married quarters for soldiers.

During the Second World War another large army camp was established to the west of the village, the land on which it was built now redeveloped for housing and the Ashdwon Business Park

Development

There has been considerable recent development. Since around 1990, substantial developments at the Cabin Café (now Mulberry Park), Park Farm (now The Paddock, Field End and Maple Close) and at Forest Park have increased the population of the village by about 1/3rd. New development of 80 dwellings is planned for Park Farm, which will further enlarge the village by about 1/6th.

About the village

Rock Wood within the parish is designated a Site of Special Scientific Interest. This woodland is of biological interest, with uncommon mosses and ferns growing alongside the stream which flows through the site.

Nutley

Main article: Nutley, Sussex

Nutley is a village on the main road (A22) north of Maresfield. It has its own church, dedicated to St James the Less, although the benefice is combined with Maresfield.

Fairwarp

Fairwarp is a small village directly north of Maresfield. The church is Christ Church.

Sport and leisure

• Cricket: Maresfield Cricket Club, established in 1756
• Football: Maresfield Village F.C.
• Gymnastics: Uckfield Gymnastics
• Tennis: Maresfield Tennis Club cricket club, bowls club,

Maresfield recreation ground is in the mist of the village. It was donated by the Hervey Charles Pechell in 1897 in commemoration of Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee, and a commemorative oak was planted by the Empress Frederick, the Queen's eldest daughter.

Maresfield also has its own fishing lake 'Underhill Fishing Lake' and is managed by Crowborough and District Anglers Association.

• Conservation: Maresfield Conservation Group

Pictures

("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Maresfield)

• 
  Maresfield Park, watercolour by Benjamin Dean Wyatt
• 
  Plan showing location of Maresfield Recreation Ground from deed of conveyance
• 
  Title of Deed of Conveyance which transferred the recreation ground to Maresfield Parish Council
• 
  Entrance to the recreation ground in 1897
• 
  Planting of the ceremonial oak in 1897
• 
  RAF 1947 aerial view of Maresfield army camp

Outside links

("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Maresfield)

References

• The Queen's Gunstonemaker: An Account of Ralph Hogge, Elizabethan Ironmaster & Gunfounder, Edmund Teesdale, Lindel Publishing Company, Seaford, Sussex, 1984