Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • P

VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 1

VCH Oxfordshire Texts in Progress

Goring

Economic History

Goring’s economy remained mostly agricultural until recent times, combining sheep-and- corn husbandry with some dairying. However, the village’s location beside an important river crossing on the Icknield Way made it a centre for crafts, trades, and hospitality from an early date, whilst the river itself was used for milling, fishing, waterborne trade, and latterly boatbuilding. The opening of a railway station in 1840 encouraged the village’s Victorian expansion into a local service centre, gaining a wide array of shops, inns, and other businesses which it retained in 2017. Outlying hamlets remained predominantly agricultural, although pottery, bricks, and tiles were made at Goring Heath, where extensive woods were managed for timber, fuel, and woodland crafts including chair-making.

A.W. Cocks’ grocery store in Goring High Street, c.1900. Photograph courtesy of Goring Gap Local History Society.

The Agricultural Landscape

Goring possessed a varied landscape of meadows and pastures fringing the Thames in the west, open fields on rising ground in the centre, and extensive woods, coppices, and heath punctuated with arable, pasture, and orchard closes on the Chiltern hills in the east. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 2

Assarting of woods for farmland is documented from the 12th century1 and is evidenced by medieval field-names such as ‘Niwelond’, ‘Stokkyngges’, and ‘Breache’,2 as well as the presence of numerous ‘shaws’ or strips of woodland left as field boundaries.3 Several of the river islands or eyots were used to grow osiers, reeds, and rushes.4 Inclosure was achieved both informally over time5 and under two private Acts of Parliament, the first of which in 1788 extinguished common rights on 850 a. of open fields, meadow, and pasture.6 The second inclosure in 1812 ended commoning on the 842-a. Goring heath,7 which by 1843 was ‘not barren and covered with furze, but a cultivated tract, enlivened with orchards, gardens, and cornfields’.8 However, a later writer observed: ‘the casual visitor, charmed with the scenery around, easily slides into theories of forest reclaimed, agriculture extended, and smiling villages dotting the landscape. But nature forbids; … the woodlands are the shelter of adjacent fields on a cold soil’.9 Certainly the ground there was generally stony with flints, reflected in field-names such as ‘Stony pece’ and ‘Cheseleyse’,10 and local chalk or lime had to be spread on the fields to maintain soil fertility.11 Nevertheless, over half the parish was under crop in 1848, when tithes were still owed on 2,606 a. of arable, 550 a. of woods, and 123 a. of meadow and pasture.12

Open Fields, Meadow, and Pasture

By the 13th century (and probably much earlier) Goring had North and South fields and Gatehampton East and West fields,13 some of which contained lynchets on the steeper slopes.14 By 1300 the North field had been subdivided into Great and Little North field,15 perhaps to facilitate the three-course rotation then being followed,16 and five open fields were named in a survey of Goring manor in 1674.17 Gatehampton’s fields remained open in

1 Eynsham Cart. I, pp. 110–11. 2 Goring Charters, I, nos 7, 155; OHC, E1/M1/CR/19; cf. PN Oxon. I, 55–6. 3 Bodl. MS C17:49(171); OHC, PAR115/16/H1/1–2; P. Preece, ‘Medieval Woods in the Oxfordshire Chilterns’, Oxoniensia 55 (1990), 57. 4 Berks. RO, D/A2/c150, f. 32; OHC, F XIV/21, ‘Rod Eyot’; ibid. DV/XII/27, ‘Withy Eyots’. 5 Below (early inclosures). 6 Inclo. Act, 27 Geo. III, c. 5; OHC, Goring inclo. award. 7 Inclo. Act, 49 Geo. III, c. 154; OHC, Goring heath inclo. award; ibid. PAR115/16/H1/1–2. 8 J.G. Robertson (ed.), The Environs of Reading, I (1843), 16. 9 E.A. Reade, Allnutts Charity: The Schools at Goring Heath (1877), 14. 10 TNA, E 315/406/1, ff. 39–40, the last meaning ‘gravelly leaze’; cf. PN Oxon. I, 55. 11 W. Barefield-Hutt, Hardwick (2010), 15; below (quarrying). 12 OHC, tithe award. A quarter of the parish was by then tithe-free: above, manors (tithes). 13 Goring Charters, I, nos 3, 9, 19, 23, 34. Goring’s North field was mentioned c.1180: J. Blair, ‘The Foundation of Goring Priory’, Oxoniensia 51 (1986), 194–6. 14 Goring Charters, I, nos 9, 27, 34; II, no. 254; HER, PRN 15348. 15 Goring Charters, I, nos 34, 53; II, no. 194. 16 Eynsham Cart. I, pp. 346–7. 17 Great and Little North, Red Cross, Summerhill, and Little: OHC, O15/4/M2/1. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 3

1681 but were probably inclosed informally soon after.18 Goring’s were inclosed in 1788, when a total of 832 a. lay in Great North (274 a.), Summerhill (270 a.), Spring (formerly Little North, 94 a.), Lockstile (66 a.), Sheepcot (45 a.), Red Cross (44 a.), and Little (39 a.) fields, all on the lower ground surrounding the village.19 Common meadows lay in a narrow band beside the Thames in both Goring (south of the village) and Gatehampton,20 where by the 13th century strips were allocated on an annual basis.21 Gatehampton’s common meadow, still held in lots in 1535, was perhaps inclosed together with its open fields c.1700,22 and Goring’s comprised only 17 a. at its inclosure in 1788, when it was known as Town mead.23 In 1279 Goring and Gatehampton manors possessed respectively 4 a. and 3 a. of meadow in demesne,24 and a survey of Goring manor in 1674 accounted for only 13 a. of meadow, all in common.25 The scarcity of the resource attracted high prices, Goring priory’s demesne meadow in 1535 being valued at 20d. an acre compared with 1–4d. for arable.26 From the Middle Ages both the open fields and common meadows were available for grazing at certain times of year,27 and both Goring and Gatehampton also had designated common pastures, the former (60 a. in 1279)28 including ‘Stapelmeresfeld’ in 129729 and perhaps also Summer hill, where in 1568 a farmer was ordered not to pasture his sheep until they had all been shorn.30 In 1681 a weaver left his wife a cow common in Gatehampton’s Town moor,31 and in 1758 pigs, cows, and horses were by custom released into Goring’s open fields a fortnight before sheep. Town mead was then opened annually to animals at Lammas (1 August).32 By inclosure in 1788 only a handful of small cow commons remained, mostly on the edges of open fields and known as ‘linchets’.33 By far the largest area of common pasture was Goring heath, an upland expanse in the east of the parish comprising trees, furze, and grass, the last primarily in greens such as Batchelor’s green at Collins End. Little heath was a detached part of the common lying a

18 OHC, MS Wills Oxon. 120/4/24. 19 Ibid. Goring inclo. award; ibid. P432/7/M1/1; cf. BL, Add. MS 78123 A. 20 OHC, PAR115/16/H1/1–2. 21 Goring Charters, I, nos 19, 20, 24, 61. 22 Valor Eccl. II, 205; above. 23 OHC, Goring inclo. award; ibid. P432/7/M1/1. 24 Rot. Hund. II, 778. 25 OHC, O15/4/M2/1. 26 Valor Eccl. II, 205–6; cf. TNA, E 315/406/1, ff. 39–40, where a price of 2s.–2s. 6d. an acre is mentioned. 27 Eynsham Cart. I, pp. 346–7; below (medieval farming). 28 Rot. Hund. II, 778. 29 Goring Charters, I, no. 44; II, no. 215. 30 OHC, E1/M2/CR/6. 31 Ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 120/4/24. Perhaps ‘Town piece’ in 1809: ibid. PAR115/16/H1/1–2. 32 Ibid. E1/M1/CR/25. 33 Ibid. Goring inclo. award; ibid. P432/7/M1/1; cf. ibid. Hen. I/iv/36. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 4

short distance west of Cray’s Pond.34 Lords and tenants of all manors in the parish anciently had common rights there, both for grazing animals (mainly cattle, sheep, and horses, but also geese) and collecting furze and fuel,35 as well as some from neighbouring Mapledurham36 and Whitchurch,37 whose lady in 1279 paid Goring’s lord 5s. a year for the right to pasture her beasts.38 An attempted inclosure of c.80 a. of heath in 1650 was resisted with the aid of Reading Corporation,39 and a Chancery case later in the century settled the heath’s division into three zones pertaining to Goring, Goring Priory, and Elvendon manors.40 Those remained until parliamentary inclosure in 1812, when the lady of Gatehampton’s claim to manorial rights there was rejected.41

The vicinity of Cray’s Pond as shown on the 1809 Goring Heath inclosure map (in OHC). Note the mixture of early inclosures and newly allotted parcels of former common heath.

34 Ibid. PAR115/16/H1/1–2; 35 TNA, WARD 2/8/27/3; Valor Eccl. II, 205; Cal. Pat. 1594–5, 82; OHC, E1/H/6–7. For geese, ibid. E1/M2/E/5. 36 OHC, E1/3/1D/8. 37 Ibid. E1/10/18D/1–2; E1/M1/CR/19. 38 Rot. Hund. II, 776. 39 Berks. RO, R/AZ3/4/45. For similar action by the Corporation in South Stoke, VCH Oxon. VII, 103. 40 OHC, E1/3/1D/7–11. 41 Inclo. Act, 49 Geo. III, c. 154; OHC, Goring heath inclo. award. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 5

Early Inclosures, Parks, and Warrens.

On the higher ground surrounding Goring heath arable was exclusively held in closes, most of which presumably originated as assarts. Several are documented from the 13th or 14th century, including ‘Emmecroft’ and Constable field near Cray’s Pond.42 In 1331 the lord of Elvendon granted his chaplain 25 a. of inclosed arable, and in 1390 Eastfields were three crofts joined together on Elvendon manor for which the tenant was allowed brushwood for fence repairs.43 Some pasture was also held in closes, including the lord of Elvendon’s ‘les Leyhes’ in 1415,44 but private meadows seem to have been rare during the Middle Ages, probably confined to the 3-a. ‘Swyncombemede’ (later Sunkham) beside the Thames near the South Stoke boundary which was given by Thomas Druval (fl. 1174) to Bec abbey and formed part of its Swyncombe manor.45 Piecemeal inclosure of common land is recorded from the early 16th century, when some arable was converted to pasture,46 and was advanced by the 1680s, when 55 a. called Goring Grove Grounds and 29 a. known as the Haydowns had been taken from Great North field.47 Most tenants on Elvendon manor in 1558 and Goring manor in 1674 had small closes or ‘pightles’ adjoining their houses and several also had orchards.48 Two medieval deer parks are known in the parish and the place-name Haw, recorded from the 13th century, may indicate an Anglo-Saxon game reserve among the Chiltern woods.49 Applehanger park, created between 1281 and 1294,50 covered c.75 a. south-east of Beech Farm.51 It was assigned to Thomas Brounz in 1359,52 but in 1422, when called ‘Elynore park’ (after either Eleanor Soundy or Eleanor Beech), it was merely a demesne wood on Elvendon manor, so presumably no longer used for hunting.53 The lord of Elvendon’s own park lay south of Elvendon Priory in the vicinity of Park Farm, where in 1356 John Loveday was granted a licence to impark 200 a. of woods and pasture.54 The park was recorded again in 1405 and 1415, when it was managed by a warrener. He was also

42 Goring Charters, I, p. lxi, nos 30, 99, 123; II, no. 337; P. Preece, ‘Constable field, Goring’, SOAG Bulletin 46 (1990), 23–4; above, landownership (other estates). 43 Goring Charters, II, nos 196, 263. For Eastfield(s), below (pottery). 44 OHC, E1/M1/CR/10. 45 Cal. Pat. 1408–13, 267; Goring Charters, II, no. 253; above, landownership (other estates). For its location, OHC, P432/7/M1/1; ibid. Hen. I/iv/70. 46 I.S. Leadam (ed.), Domesday of Inclosures 1517–1518 (1897), I, 332–3, 336–7, 352–3, 374–5. 47 OHC, Hen. I/ii/2; cf. BL, Add. MS 78123 A. 48 OHC, E1/M1/CR/19; ibid. O15/4/M2/1. For ‘pightles’, Bodl, MS Top. Oxon. d 485. 49 Derived from Old English haga: PN Oxon. I, 53; D. Hooke, ‘The Woodland Landscape of Early Medieval England’, in N. Higham and M. Ryan (eds), Place-Names, Language and the Anglo-Saxon Landscape (2011), 166–71. 50 Cal. Chart. 1257–1300, 255; Reg. Sutton, IV, 167; below, social hist. (Middle Ages). 51 Preece, ‘Medieval Woods’, 62–4. 52 ‘le Park de Appelhangre’: Goring Charters, I, no. 176. 53 OHC, E1/M1/CR/7; above, landownership (Applehanger). Its name survives as Elmorepark wood. 54 Goring Charters, I, no. 173; Cal. Pat. 1354–8, 577; Preece, ‘Medieval Woods’, 62–4. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 6

responsible for the lord’s rabbit warren, which was included in a demesne lease in 1405.55 In 1421 an Exlade Street tailor paid 6s. a year for the right to catch hares and pheasants there.56 Coney grove (called ‘the Cunygre’ in 1674) south of the village was evidently Goring manor’s rabbit warren57 and was perhaps managed in the late 13th century by Nicholas ‘le Warener’.58

Bank and ditch in Elmorepark wood, possibly marking the boundary of Applehanger’s medieval deer park.

Woods and Woodland Management

Woods attached to Goring manor in 1086 (described as five furlongs square) presumably lay in the centre and east of the parish, which remained well wooded in 2017.59 Beech and oak were historically the principal species grown for timber, but they were also coppiced along with hazel, ash, and occasionally hornbeam.60 From the Middle Ages some woods and coppices were inclosed by banks and ditches,61 and in 1377 two people were fined for trespassing in the lord of Goring’s woods.62 Elvendon manor employed a woodward by 140863 and in the 15th and 16th centuries tenants of both Elvendon and Goring Priory manors were routinely allowed ‘great timber’ for house repairs.64 By a custom first recorded

55 Goring Charters, II, no. 278; OHC, E1/M1/CR/10. 56 OHC, E1/M1/CR/11. 57 Ibid. O15/4/M2/1; ibid. Hen. I/ii/2; ibid. P432/7/M1/1. 58 Goring Charters, I, nos 16, 45. 59 Domesday, 432; cf. OS Map 1:25000, sheet 171 (2009 edn). 60 Goring Charters, II, no. 310; Preece, ‘Medieval Woods’, 59; P. Preece, ‘The Woodlands of the Allnutt Charity, Goring Heath’, SOAG Bulletin 65 (2011), 47–50. 61 Preece, ‘Medieval Woods’, 63–4; HER, PRN 9140, 9146; P. Preece, ‘Friarhampstead Wood, Goring’, SOAG Bulletin 49 (1993), 26–8. 62 OHC, E1/M1/CR/2. 63 Ibid. E1/M1/CR/6; cf. P. Preece, ‘The Passelewes’, SOAG Bulletin 51 (1996), 19–21. 64 OHC, E1/M1/CR/10, 17; E1/M2/CR/4, specifying timber for groundsills and crossbeams; E1/M2/CR/9, 12. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 7

c.1181 Goring priory’s nuns were permitted a cartload of wood every working day from the lord of Goring’s woods,65 a perquisite claimed by later lords of Goring Priory manor until at least 1654.66 In 1558 a dispute broke out over ‘Hawys grove’, a wood near Haw Farm, where for 60 years members of the Haw family had been felling timber for sale in Reading.67 By 1700 most woods in the parish belonged either to the Hardwick estate (with 490 a. of Goring woods in 1759)68 or to Goring manor, whose demesne farmer in 1669 was entitled to ten loads of billets and ten of bavins yearly from Chalk wood.69 In 1674 the manor’s demesne woods within the parish totalled 176 a. in five parcels and there was a further 60 a. at Lackmore in Checkendon.70 Those 236 a. passed in the 1720s to the Goring Heath almshouse charity, which employed a woodreeve and annually sold oak and beech timber as well as faggots, bavins, poles, billets, and bark, yielding £420 profit in 1727–8.71 Under the charity’s 1727 statutes each wood was cut once every seven years and each almsman as well as the chaplain and nurse received an annual fuel allowance of 50 oak or beech bavins, 50 furze faggots, and half a stack of stackwood.72 By 1826 its Goring woods totalled 273 a., some 70–80 a. of new woods and fir plantations having been established on allotments made under the Goring heath inclosure, and annual profits from wood sales averaged £499 over the period 1815–30.73 Whilst the charity still owned 267 a. of woods in the parish in 1910,74 only 137 a. remained in 1924,75 and 125 a. in 1955:76 its last woods were sold in 1988.77 In contrast, relatively little is known of woodland management on the Hardwick estate’s woods in Goring, although c.1900 under Sir Charles Rose much of its timber was processed at a sawmill just outside the parish at Collins End.78 In 1910 Sir Charles retained 507 a. of woods and plantations in hand at Goring Heath, which passed into various ownerships after the estate was broken up in 1912.79 In the 1950s a sawmill employing over 20 men in Great Chalk wood sent beech planks to High Wycombe (Bucks.) to be made into

65 Goring Charters, I, no. 1; TNA, E 315/406/1, f. 40. 66 TNA, C 2/Eliz/W5/54; OHC, E1/3/1D/1. 67 OHC, E1/8/1D/3. 68 Ibid. E1/1/1D/56–7. 69 Ibid. O15/2/4D/3. 70 Ibid. O15/4/M2/1. 71 Ibid. O15/1/F1/1–2; Preece, ‘Woodlands’; above, landownership (Goring). 72 App. to 1st Rep. Com. Char. 331–2. 73 Ibid. 326; OHC, P402/1/M/1. 74 OHC, DV/XII/27. 75 Ibid. RDC6/2/F4/4. 76 Char. Com. Scheme, 12 July 1955: copy in almshouse office. 77 Goiring Heath Charities mins,1965−2005: in almshouse office; P. Preece, ‘The History of the Allnutt Charity at Goring Heath’, Oxon. Local Hist. 9.3 (2012), 18. 78 Barefield-Hutt, Hardwick, 78–9; below, Whitchurch, econ. hist. 79 OHC, DV/XII/27; ibid. RDC6/2/F4/4; above, landownership. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 8

school desks.80 A sawmill built at Shirvells Hill in the 1950s closed c.200581 and another in Oaken wood was operated by a fencing company in 2017,82 when c.380 a. of woods continued to be managed commercially on the Elvendon Priory estate.83

Medieval Tenant and Demesne Farming

In 1086 Goring manor had 13 ploughteams on land for 10, implying pressure on resources. Three demesne ploughteams were worked by 7 servi, whilst 21 villani and 2 bordars shared the remaining 10, and there were 3 freemen (liberi homines). The manor’s annual value was £15 (including 20s. from a mill) compared with £10 in 1066. Both of Gatehampton’s estates had equal numbers of ploughteams and ploughlands (4 and 1½) and together they were worked by 16 tenants (8 villani, 4 bordars, and 4 servi), 2 servi working the two-ploughland demesne farm on Miles Crispin’s estate and Brien’s only tenants (4 villani and 2 bordars) sharing the half-ploughland not in demesne. Whilst Miles’s estate was worth £4 a year in both 1066 and 1086 (including 11s. from a mill), Brien’s had risen in value from £1 to £2. Meadow on the two estates covered 10 a. and 6 a. respectively.84 According to the Berkshire Domesday a hide of land at ‘Lonchelei’ in Reading hundred held from Miles Crispin by a certain Leofweard was valued with and counted as part of Miles’s Gatehampton estate.85 During the 12th century both Goring and Gatehampton’s lords made substantial gifts of farmland and other resources to various monasteries which became freeholders under those manors, although Goring priory’s estate achieved independent manorial status.86 In addition, Thomas Druval c.1175 restored Eynsham abbey’s common pasture rights in Goring,87 and his gifts or confirmations to Bec abbey and Goring priory included additional benefits, such as to Bec tithes of their pigs kept in Goring free of pannage, and to Goring pasture for 10 oxen in the lord’s close, grazing for a palfrey amongst those of Thomas’s men, and common pasture for 2 horses, 100 sheep, and pigs in the stubble fields free of pannage.88 A hide on Gatehampton manor was given to Goring priory before 1181 and Fulk Coudray’s confirmation charter additionally afforded the nuns grazing for a horse and cow in

80 GGA, Environment & Topography, letter 15 Sept. 2007; Goring and Streatley: A Portrait (Goring and Streatley Village Appraisal Group, 1992), 38. 81 SODC, P08/E0193 (accessed online). 82 www.rogersfencing.co.uk (accessed July 2017). 83 Sale Cat., Elvendon Priory (1996): copy in OHC, P409/13/D/1; local info. 84 Domesday, 432, 437. 85 Ibid. 152; H.C. Darby and E.M.J. Campbell (eds), The Domesday Geography of South-East England (1971), 242, 244. For Langley in Tilehurst as possibly ‘Lonchelei’, PN Berks. I, 194. 86 Above, landownership; below (milling; fishing; quarrying). 87 Eynsham Cart. I, p. 107; R.C. Van Caenegem (ed.), Eng. Lawsuits Wm I to Ric. I, Vol. II (Selden Soc. 107, 1991), 644–5. 88 M. Chibnall (ed.), Select Documents of the English Lands of the Abbey of Bec (Camden 3rd ser. 73, 1951), 13–14; Goring Charters, I, no. 1. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 9

his demesne pasture.89 Nonetheless Goring manor was still worth £15 a year and Gatehampton 10 marks (£5 13s. 4d.) in 1255,90 and Bec abbey’s estate yielded £4 18s. 2¼d. in 1288–9 including 7s. in rents.91 Goring priory’s grange at ‘Stapelhull’ (Stapnall’s) was worth £2 7s. annually in 1291.92 In 1279, when Goring priory and Applehanger manors (each comprising a hide held directly of the honor of Wallingford) had no tenants listed, Goring manor was dominated by its 23 free tenants with over 25 yardlands between them, of whom four were religious houses holding sizeable estates and one (Walter Waleys) held a hide-farm identifiable as the nascent Elvendon manor. The remainder held up to a yardland each paying cash rents and/or 1 lb of pepper. Only one customary yardlander worked on the two-ploughland demesne, paying 16s. annual rent and reaping 32 a. in autumn. Nine cottagers paid cash rents and provided one man to the lord for haymaking and another in autumn. Gatehampton manor had a more typical social structure of five customary and six free tenants, each holding a half-yardland with the exception of Goring priory’s freehold hide. Each customary tenant had from the lord at Michaelmas 4½ bushels of wheat, a ewe (or 8d.), a cheese worth 2d., a basin of salt, and a dish of flour. In return he or she owed labour on the one- ploughland demesne, including ploughing, harrowing, mowing, threshing, and carting, and gave to the lord (in addition to a cash rent) money at Christmas and a cock, 3 hens, and 10 sheep at Easter.93 By 1300 Goring’s open fields were worked on a three-course rotation, one field being sown with winter seed, another with spring seed, and the third left fallow.94 The principal crops grown were wheat, barley (some for malting), and oats,95 but a ‘rye croft’ was also mentioned from 1295.96 Sheep were folded in the fields to improve soil fertility97 the importance of which is indicated by the early prominence of the byname ‘Shepherd’.98 Tithes on cheeses were mentioned in the early 13th century, showing some dairying.99 Common pasture rights were jealously guarded, Eynsham abbey in both 1300 and 1345 successfully defending its rights regarding ‘Childeslonde’, in 1345 also gaining permission to erect a house there:100 in 1366 those rights were stated to be commons for 500 sheep over 500 a. in

89 Goring Charters, I, no. 1; Boarstall Cart. p. 64. 90 Rot. Hund. II, 42. 91 Chibnall (ed.), Select Docs, 127–8. 92 Tax. Eccl. 45. 93 Rot. Hund. II, 777–8; above, landownership. 94 Eynsham Cart. I, pp. 346–7. 95 Goring Charters, I, no. 37; II, nos 278, 310. 96 Ibid. I, nos 40, 80, 103, 155, 176. 97 Ibid. II, no. 278. 98 e.g. ibid. I, nos 2 (Bercarius), 35 (‘le Berker’), 101 (‘le Schyphurde’). 99 Gibbons (ed.), Liber Antiquus, 9. 100 Eynsham Cart. I, pp. 346–7; Goring Charters, II, no. 236; above, landownership (other estates); cf. VCH Oxon. VII, 99. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 10

the fields of Goring.101 In 1415 eight people paid to graze flocks of up to 160 sheep in Elvendon’s demesne pastures,102 and by 1477 some Elvendon tenants paid small amounts to the lord of South Stoke for the right to drive their sheep and cattle to commons in that manor, presumably at Woodcote.103 Elvendon emerged as an independent manor in the early 14th century, convening its own court baron by 1364.104 Leases for lives granted by members of the Loveday family survive from 1321 onwards and were mostly for cash rents and heriot, although some tenants also owed autumn service, commutable to 6d. by 1383.105 In 1370 and 1382 two tenants agreed to build new houses on existing tofts, one re-using timber from an old house:106 perhaps the previous houses had been allowed to fall down after the Black Death, the effects of which on the parish are otherwise unclear. Elvendon’s demesne farm, occupied by the Lovedays during the 14th century, was in 1405 let to Thomas Hetherand of South Stoke and three others for six years at 2 marks (£1 6s. 8d.) annual rent, the lease stipulating that 41½ a. should be sown with wheat, 5½ a. with pulses, 38½ a. with barley, 10 a. with oats, and 20 a. should be left fallow. All the arable lay in closes and was to be cross- ploughed and manured, both with carted dung and by folding sheep, for which the lessees received 300 sheep and 36 hurdles. In addition they were allowed a plough, 3 harrows, and 7 workhorses with various items of tack.107 A ten-year lease of the whole manor to Richard Wyot was issued in 1413, which he surrendered in 1421, and in 1425 John Sulham was the lessee.108 No information has been found regarding Goring and Gatehampton’s demesne farms, which were presumably similarly let throughout the 15th century by their absentee lords. By 1515 Thomas Martin was Goring priory’s principal tenant, holding its 100-a. Stapnall’s grange and another farm of 60 acres.109

Farms and Farming 1500–1800

During the final years of Goring priory the convent got into debt (estimated at £8–10 in 1530) and several of its buildings were allowed to fall into ruins, including a barn, a dovecot, and some tenant housing. The prioress, together with other landowners in the parish, was also accused of evicting tenants and converting arable into inclosed pasture.110 Nonetheless at

101 Eynsham Cart. II, p. 127. 102 OHC, E1/M1/CR/10. 103 Ibid. E1/M1/CR/29; cf. VCH Oxon. VII, 99. 104 Goring Charters, II, no. 255; below, local govt. 105 Goring Charters, II, nos 194–222, 253–64. 106 Ibid. II, no. 258; OHC, E1/M1/CR/4. 107 Goring Charters, I, pp. xlviii–liv; II, no. 278; OHC, E1/9/16D/1. 108 Goring Charters, II, nos 284–9. 109 Leadam (ed.), Domesday of Inclosures, I, 337, 374. 110 Visit. Dioc. Linc. II, 155–8; Leadam (ed.), Domesday of Inclosures, I, 332–3, 336–7, 352–3, 374–5. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 11

the Dissolution the priory had £60 5s. 5d. clear annual income, much of it derived from outside the parish, although £4 18s. 3d. came from the demesne and £4 0s. 4d. from customary rents of 14 tenants (11 in Goring and 3 in Gatehampton).111 In 1546 the gross annual rental of the Priory manor totalled £24 7s. 2d. from 4 freeholds, 16 copyholds, and 4 leaseholds, the last including £5 8s. 4d. from John Stonor for the demesne and £4 from Thomas Taylor for Stapnall’s grange.112 Taylor (d. 1559) later became the demesne farmer, leaving his lease (for 61 years from 1557 granted by Sir Thomas Pope in 1540) to his wife Edith and then his daughter Margaret, although by 1601 it had evidently passed to Margaret’s son John Whistler of Goring.113 A mixture of tenancies continued to be held under other manors. Gatehampton manor, which is poorly documented in the period, in 1552 had a demesne farmer (Alice Pury) and at least three customary tenants.114 Under the Whistlers the demesne or Gatehampton farm was probably owner-occupied for most of the time, although John Clarke may have worked it after John Whistler moved to Whitchurch in or after 1605: on Clarke’s death in 1628 his goods included 100 cheeses as well as livestock (£36) and 38½ qrs of stored grain (£30).115 The farm was apparently in hand again under Edward Whistler (d. 1652)116 and was later expanded to include virtually the whole manor following inclosure of its commons perhaps c.1700.117 Elvendon manor in 1558 included at least 10 freeholds and 6 copyholds, some of the freeholders still owing one ‘reaping day’ in autumn in addition to their annual rent. Richard Martin (d. 1577) was the demesne farmer there, whose son Thomas had the lease after him for £10 5s. 8d. annual rent.118 Following his death in 1599 Thomas’s inventory was worth £292, of which £182 was in livestock (including 360 sheep) and £68 in stored and sown crops.119 In 1670 the 222-a. demesne or Elvendon farm was let to Dyer Colston of Oxford for 42 years at £70 annual rent, provided he build a new stable with a hayloft and servant’s lodging. His undertenant John Hunt120 died later that year leaving goods worth £552, of which £196 was in grain and hay (including £52-worth in the Park barn) and £146 was in livestock (including 180 sheep). Cheeses, apples, and hops together worth £3 15s. were

111 Valor Eccl. II, 205–7; cf. TNA, E 315/406/1, ff. 39–40; ibid. SC 6/HENVIII/2924, mm. 6–9d. 112 OHC, E1/M2/E/1; A.H. Cooke, ‘A Rent Roll of the Suppressed Priory of Goring, 1546’, Berks. Archaeol. Jnl 35 (1931), 120–3. 113 TNA, C 2/Eliz/W5/54; OHC, MS Wills Oxon. 183.292. Jn was distinct from his namesake the lord of Gatehampton: cf. R.F. Whistler, ‘The Annals of an English Family’, Sussex Archaeol. Collns 35 (1887), pedigree facing p. 60. 114 TNA, WARD 2/9/28A/13. 115 OHC, MS Wills Oxon. 198.32; above, landownership (Gatehampton); below, social hist. (1500– 1800). 116 TNA, PROB 11/220/343, describing him as ‘of Gatehampton Farm’. 117 Above (agric. landscape); below (since 1800). 118 OHC, E1/M1/CR/19; E1/2/1D/3; ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 185.452. 119 Ibid. MSS Wills Oxon. 190.360; 299/1/6. 120 Ibid. E1/2/1D/23. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 12

stored in the cheese loft and seven stocks of bees with stools and hives were valued at £2 10s.121 Goring manor’s demesne was held by successive generations of the Clarke family, of whom Thomas (d. 1560) was in 1558 accused of preventing Elvendon’s tenants from pasturing their animals in Great North field.122 His son Henry (d. 1618) left the lease (regranted in 1591 for £8 3s. 5½d. annual rent) to his son Thomas,123 although in 1669 the lord Thomas Stonor let the demesne or Goring farm to his brother Henry for 100 years, selling it to him outright in 1675.124 The previous year, when the whole manor was surveyed, the farm had covered 282 a. including 150 a. in the open fields and 13 a. of common meadow and there was an outlying barn at Grove. Thirteen other tenants held an additional 178 a. between them, although all apart from Roger Lovejoy (92 a.) occupied a cottage with 15 a. or less.125 From 1715 Goring farm formed part of a larger estate with other properties, notably Place farm created from the Priory manor demesne sold in 1662.126 Coombe End farm was formerly a leasehold of the same manor enfranchised between 1585 and 1642, as was Stapnall’s or Grange farm, which by 1618 was a 200-a. freehold possibly owned and occupied by Robert Whistler.127 Other significant freeholds included the rectory, Haw, and Beech farms,128 the last worth £5 a year clear in 1596, when it comprised 45 a. in Goring’s open fields, 2½ a. of common meadow, and three closes at Applehanger.129 Farming remained predominantly sheep-and-corn-based with wheat, barley, and oats being the most frequently mentioned crops in testamentary records, although rye was also grown to a lesser extent along with peas and vetches.130 Barley was often malted, a number of farmers by the 17th century possessing malting equipment and malthouses.131 Some were also maltsters, including three generations of the Wheeler family, of whom Richard (d. 1686) owned malt worth £50 and wheat and barley worth £70.132 Lesser crops included hemp, hops, onions, garlic, lavender, and saffron, all titheable in 1535,133 and in 1560 two tenants were fined in the Priory manor court for encroaching on saffron gardens134 perhaps located in the former nuns’ or ‘Covent’ garden.135 Apples were also routinely recorded, along with

121 Ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 33/3/21. 122 Ibid. E1/M1/CR/19; ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 183.385. 123 TNA, PROB 11/131/163; ibid. C 5/44/1. 124 OHC, O15/2/4D/3; ibid. Hen. I/ii/2; above, landownership (Goring Farm). 125 OHC, O15/4/M2/1. For Grove, see below. 126 Above, par. intro. (settlement); landownership (Goring Farm; rectory). 127 OHC, E1/9/14D/1. 128 Above, landownership (other estates; Coombe End); cf. Bodl. MS Ch. Oxon. 2475; OHC, F VIII. 129 TNA, C 142/247/43; cf. OHC, E1/M1/CR/19. 130 e.g. OHC, MSS Wills Oxon. 179.256; 299/1/6; 175/2/9. 131 e.g. ibid. 169/3/25; 72/1/16; ibid. MS Archd. Oxon. b 40, f. 142 for the ‘Parsonage malthouse’. 132 Ibid. MSS Wills Oxon. 72/1/16; 156/3/47; TNA, PROB 4/11004. 133 Valor Eccl. II, 205. For hops, also OHC, MS Wills Oxon. 33/3/21. 134 OHC, E1/M2/CR/5. 135 Above, par. intro. (settlement). VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 13

bees and small numbers of poultry.136 In 1571 tithe eggs were collected between Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.137 Most farmers kept a range of livestock including sheep (primarily for folding), cattle, pigs, and horses:138 Thomas Havell (d. 1618) was fairly typical with 2 cows, 8 sheep, 4 lambs, and a pig.139 However, flocks of 100 or more sheep were not uncommon,140 some farmers also dealing in wool presumably for sale at market in nearby Henley or Reading: Henry Wilder (d. 1661) at his death had £18-worth in his wool loft.141 Others possessed cheese presses and butter churns, indicating the continued importance of dairying.142 As in previous centuries common grazing was strictly regulated in the various manor courts and pastoral rights protected. Fines were issued for improper grazing and stray animals impounded.143 Tenants of Goring Priory manor were forbidden from pasturing their livestock in Goring tithing unless accompanied by the common herdsman.144 Elvendon’s tenants in 1558 complained that they did not have the same rights as some from Whitchurch to graze their sheep on Goring heath, and also that South Stoke’s demesne farmer was obstructing their ancient entitlement to pannage with their pigs in Abbot’s wood at Woodcote.145 In the 18th century there were around ten large farms, the largest being Gatehampton (545 a.) worked for several decades as tenants by the Pearman family.146 In 1727, when the duchess of Marlborough owned Goring farm (276 a.), Place farm (192 a.), and four smallholdings let for lives,147 Goring farm’s tenant Francis Smith was fined £16 for not repairing Grove barn (rebuilt in 1705), sowing a greater quantity of oats than his lease allowed, and for not laying down enough ground to clover grass in line with the practice of ley farming (alternative cropping and pasture).148 Goring manor still had 17 tenants in 1728 paying either quit rents or rack rents totalling £70 2s. 4d. on holdings up to 94 a.,149 and Elvendon manor’s 17 tenancies (5 freehold, 9 leasehold, and 3 copyhold) in 1754 owed annual quitrents totalling £4 12s. as well as 12 capons and pullets.150 Both Elvendon and Priory manors then formed part of the Hardwick estate, the principal Goring farms of which

136 e.g. OHC, MSS Wills Oxon. 12/3/8; 33/3/21; 72/1/16; cf. Valor Eccl. II, 205 for tithes on apples, wax, honey, eggs, and geese. 137 Oxf. Ch. Ct Deposns 1570–4, p. 20. 138 e.g. OHC, MSS Wills Oxon. 136/3/21; 78/3/9; 175/2/9. 139 Ibid. 30/3/16. 140 e.g. ibid. 299/1/6; 88/2/4; 33/3/21; 78/3/9; 141/3/28. 141 Ibid. 88/2/4. 142 e.g. ibid. 299/1/6; 33/3/21; 28/1/33; 30/3/16. 143 TNA, SC 2/154/17; OHC, E1/M1/CR/15–25; E1/M2/CR/3–15. 144 OHC, E1/M2/CR/14. 145 Ibid. E1/M1/CR/19. 146 TNA, PROB 11/1059/356; OHC, QSD/L/132; above, par. intro. (built character). 147 BL, Add MS 78123 A; above, landownership (Goring Farm). 148 BL, Add MS 61468, ff. 109, 113–114. 149 OHC, O15/5/1L/9(1), p. 74. 150 Ibid. E1/M1/E/3. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 14

were Elvendon (276 a.), Beech (204 a.), and the combined Querns, Haw, and Holmes’s farm (199 a.), the last of which stretched into Whitchurch.151 Larger farms rented from other freeholders were Bottom, Coombe End, and Park, each of which owed more than £10 land tax in 1786, when John Nicholls’s Parsonage farm (£25) was in hand and he had recently purchased Goring and Place farms.152 Nicholls was the primary petitioner for the parliamentary inclosure of Goring’s common fields in 1788, when he was by far its greatest beneficiary, receiving 674 a. of the 850 a. allotted: the remaining 176 a. was split between 18 parties, none being awarded more than 45 acres.153 Shortly afterwards Nicholls divided much of his allocation between two new farms, Spring (225 a.) and Grove (215 a.), each with an outlying farmstead erected in the former open fields north of the village.154

Old Farm House (formerly Place Farm) and its associated 17th- century barn, which until recently was thatched.

Farms and Farming Since 1800

John Nicholls was again the principal beneficiary of the 1812 Goring heath inclosure, which extinguished tithes on 1,033 a. in the parish and redistributed 892 a. of commons and old inclosures, including 50 a. in Whitchurch: Nicholls received 356 a., Philip Lybbe Powys of Hardwick 213 a., and 49 landowners the remaining 323 a., including 20 a. as a fuel allotment for the poor.155 Two new farms were created as a result (Newhouse and Fox Cover), each

151 Ibid. E1/1/1D/57; ibid. Hen. I/iv/36; above, landownership. 152 OHC, QSD/L/132; above, landownership (Goring Farm). 153 Inclo. Act, 27 Geo. III, c. 5; OHC, Goring inclo. award; ibid. P432/7/M1/1; ibid. E1/H/1. 154 OHC, E1/H/6–7; ibid. PAR115/16/H1/1–2; cf. BL, Add MS 78123 A and B. 155 Inclo. Act, 49 Geo. III, c. 154; OHC, Goring heath inclo. award; ibid. PAR115/16/H1/1–2; ibid. E1/H/3. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 15

receiving 162 a. of Nicholls’s allocation.156 Although Nicholls broke up his estate soon after,157 farm sizes remained relatively stable towards the middle of the century, those leased from the Hardwick estate in 1840 including Elvendon (William Curtis, 225 a.), Querns and Haw (John Hewett, 154 a.), and Beech (John Smith, 103 a.).158 Other principal holdings were Coombe End and Stapnall’s (John Frewin, 288 a. together in 1848)159 and Spring and Grove (John Pittman, 460 a. together employing 32 labourers in 1851), Pittman combining farming with milling at Cleeve mill; although the largest remained Gatehampton (540 a. with 20 labourers in 1851) tenanted by William Stevens,160 who achieved prominence with his annual sales of prize-winning Oxfordshire Down sheep.161 Some 40 years earlier a Goring Heath sheep-dealer had been praised by the agriculturalist Arthur Young for fattening his flock on oilcake.162 During the second half of the 19th century Goring began to suffer the effects of agricultural depression. Two farmers, including Ambrose Jolly of Elvendon Farm, went bankrupt in 1881.163 As corn prices fell the proportion of arable dropped from 73 per cent in 1870 to 43 per cent in 1930. Wheat, barley, and oats remained the chief crops, followed by fodder crops, legumes, and (by 1930) a small acreage of sugar beet. The same period saw a steep decline in sheep numbers (from 3,083 to 62), partly reflecting the shift away from folding to the use of artificial manure (manufactured in the parish), and a corresponding increase in beef and dairy cattle, from 52 (36 in milk) to 243 (111 in milk). Pig and poultry farming remained popular throughout, although orcharding suffered164 as cherry trees planted at Goring Heath following inclosure were grubbed up for arable or pasture. Even so, c.1910 there were still some cottagers at Collins End who hawked their fruit and vegetables to passers-by or took their produce to market in Reading.165 Farm ownership changed significantly in the early 20th century, particularly following the break-up of the Hardwick and Coombe Park estates in 1912 and 1920 respectively.166 The 112-a. Goring (formerly Place) farm was also sold at auction in 1911,167 by 1913 forming the headquarters of a 723-a. holding combining Goring, Grove, Spring, and Beech farms run

156 The Times, 9 Aug. 1817; OHC, Hen. I/iv/68–9; cf. ibid. E1/9/6D/1; ibid. PAR115/16/H1/1–2. Another New House farm in Goring and South Stoke belonged to Woodcote manor in 1800: VCH Oxon. VII, 97; cf. Oxf. Jnl, 22 June 1805; OHC, SL199/D/36–7. 157 Above, landownership (Goring Farm; rectory). 158 Bodl, MS Top. Oxon. d 485. 159 OHC, tithe award and map. 160 TNA, HO 107/1691; below (milling). 161 Oxf. Jnl, 30 June 1855, 6 July 1861. 162 Young, Oxon. Agric. 308; cf. OHC, MS Oxf. Dioc. c 661, ff. 146–7. 163 London Gaz. 16 Dec. 1881, p. 6742. 164 TNA, MAF 68/255; MAF 68/3525. For artificial manure, below (trades). 165 Barefield-Hutt, Hardwick, 86, 94, 100. 166 cf. OHC, DV/XII/27; ibid. RDC6/2/F4/4; above, landownership. 167 Sale Cat., Goring Farm (1911): copy in GGA, Folder 6. Not to be confused with the earlier Goring farm. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 16

by the Fullbrook family. The largest individual farm remained Gatehampton (523 a.), worked by the Pearce brothers,168 tenants for over 50 years from c.1887. By 1907 they were also dairymen,169 renting an additional 76 a. at Battle farm,170 and in 1929 Gatehampton farm included two sets of agricultural buildings, one (the later Upper Gatehampton Farm) on higher ground to the east.171 In 1941, when Goring, Grove, Spring, and Beech farms were still worked together by the Lay brothers (615 a. employing 13 labourers with cereals, sheep, and beef and dairy cattle), the Pearces’ 541-a. Gatehampton farm (with 10 labourers) was also mixed with a 44-strong dairy herd. Of the remaining 18 holdings only two (Elvendon and Flint House) exceeded 100 a. and two were in the range 60–100 a., the rest including three small dairy operations and five poultry concerns. Over all the parish’s farmland was 66 per cent arable and 44 per cent grass, employing 45 labourers and supporting 277 cattle (117 in milk), 415 sheep, 63 pigs, and 2,275 poultry (1,120 on Goring Heath poultry farm).172 By 1960 grassland was back to 53 per cent and the number of milch cows had risen to 340.173 In 1965 two dairy farms (Spring and Battle) operated milk rounds in the local area and Gatehampton farm, noted for its Shorthorn cattle, also supplied milk for distribution. Grove and Park were both mixed farms, the latter with a herd of Belted Galloway cattle.174 A sharp decline in dairying in the 1970s and 80s (milch cows falling from 457 in 1970 to only 112 in 1988) coincided with an increase in arable farming (51 per cent of farmland in 1988), wheat and spring barley being the principal crops. Pigs and sheep were increasingly bred commercially, their numbers more than doubling. In line with wider trends agricultural employment in Goring and Goring Heath parishes fell from 54 individuals in 1970 to 38 in 1988.175 In the 1980s and 90s both arable and grass were intensively managed with a heavy reliance on chemical fertilisers and pesticides;176 however, the early 21st century saw a greater concern for wildlife and the restoration of some unimproved chalk grasslands.177 In 2017 a pick-your-own enterprise growing vegetables and soft fruit operated at Spring farm and a market garden at Goring Heath supplied organic fruit and vegetables to customers in Goring and beyond.178

168 OHC, RDC6/2/F4/1. 169 Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1887–1939 edns); above, par. intro. (settlement). 170 OHC, DV/XII/27. 171 Sale Cat., Basildon Park Estate (1929): copy in Berks. RO, D/EX1051/1; cf. Sale Cat., Gatehampton Fm (1945): copy in GGA, Box File 2. 172 TNA, MAF 32/913/129, including the whole parish: the Goring Heath file (ibid. MAF 32/913/286) is empty. 173 Ibid. MAF 68/4693, s.v. Goring, Goring Heath. 174 GGA, W.I. Album (1965). 175 TNA, MAF 68/5189; MAF 68/6123, s.v. Goring, Goring Heath. 176 Goring and Streatley: A Portrait, 40; www.bbc.co.uk/history/domesday (accessed Aug. 2017). 177 C. Smith, ‘Chalk Grassland Restoration at Coombe End Farm, Goring Heath’ (2012): copy at www.chilternsaonb.org (accessed Aug. 2017). 178 www.hildredspyo.co.uk; www.farmtotableproduce.co.uk (accessed Aug. 2017). VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 17

Trades, Crafts, Shops, and Inns

Occupational surnames of Goring tenants in 1279 included Chapman and Turner,179 and in 1296–7 nine brewers from Goring were fined in the hundred court.180 Around 1300 William Loveday granted John Smith (Faber) a house in Goring village on condition that he shoe all of William’s horses, mules, and donkeys with the grantor’s own iron, any surplus being returned.181 Around the same time Hugh ‘le Mareschal’ was presumably a farrier, and other early 14th-century inhabitants bore the surnames Collier (charcoal-maker), Cook, ‘Flexher’ (butcher), Mason, Skinner, Sutor (shoemaker), and Textor (weaver). A Goring blacksmith was mentioned in 1325,182 an Elvendon butcher in 1421,183 and a Goring Heath cooper in 1425.184 By the 1370s ‘tolcester’ (a fine for brewing) was charged at 1d. per gallon on Goring and Elvendon manors,185 and in 1433 Alice Hert paid 3d. for ale sold at her inn.186 In the 1530s John Stonyhouse was both a baker and a brewer:187 he was perhaps one of the village tradesmen whom nuns from Goring priory were then permitted to visit in couples in order to buy provisions.188 In the 17th and 18th centuries bakers, blacksmiths, bricklayers, butchers, carpenters, coopers, fellmongers, millwrights, shoemakers, tailors, weavers, and wheelwrights were all common,189 some of the weavers working in outlying hamlets, such as John Cripps of Gatehampton (d. 1681) and William Critchfield of Greenmoor Hill (d. 1692), who left two looms and tools worth £2, linen cloth worth £1 10s., and flock, hemp, and tow (cloth refuse) worth £1 4s.190 The bricklayers presumably used bricks made in the parish, whilst local hides were processed by fellmongers.191 The millwright John Toby (d. 1774) left his ‘screws, pump tools, and … other tools’ to his son-in-law, a Streatley millwright.192 None of the parish’s craftsmen was particularly wealthy, most having inventories valued £10–£30. More prosperous (£78) was the grocer Thomas Paty (d. 1677), whose shop sold fruit, spice,

179 Rot. Hund. II, 777. 180 Cornwall Accts, I, 126. 181 Goring Charters, I, no. 25. 182 Ibid. I, nos 56, 120; I and II, passim. 183 OHC, E1/M1/CR/11. 184 Cal. Pat. 1436–41, 212. 185 OHC, E1/M1/CR/2; E1/M2/CR/1–2. 186 hospicium suum: TNA, SC 2/212/7. 187 Ibid. SC 2/212/18. 188 Visit. Dioc. Linc. II, 156. 189 OHC, Goring and Gatehampton wills (searchable online). 190 Ibid. MSS Wills Oxon. 120/4/24; 121/1/16. 191 Ibid. 114/1/41; TNA, PROB 11/344/532; below (pottery). 192 TNA, PROB 11/1002/139; cf. OHC, E1/9/16D/43. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 18

sugar, soap, candles, salt, tobacco, pitch, and tar.193 Thomas Leach (d. 1762) was a tallow chandler.194 Malting was mostly practised on a small or moderate scale by farmers, although there were a few specialist maltsters, one of whom in 1796 was convicted of mixing excised and unexcised malt.195 William Burley (d. 1701) of Wallingford and later Cleeve was both a maltster and a bargemaster, holding leases of both Cleeve and Goring mills and operating Cleeve wharf by 1669,196 where malt, meal, and timber were the principal commodities loaded and unloaded.197 His successor John Jones (d. 1727) of Cleeve carried malt and meal on his barge downriver to London and coal on his return journey to Cleeve and Wallingford.198 Several parishioners were employed as boatmen and bargemen in the late 17th and 18th centuries,199 some of whom drowned,200 and later bargemasters living in Goring included John Ford (fl. 1730) and Richard Woodward (d. 1755).201 Waterborne trade flourished until the mid 19th century, when the river lost traffic to the railway.202 An inn or pub called the King’s Head was mentioned in 1718.203 Five premises licensed in 1753 had reduced to three by 1762, which in 1775 were called the Leather Bottle, Catherine Wheel, and Miller of Mansfield. The Leather Bottle at Cleeve (run successively by Ann Butler and Richard Atwell in the period 1753–1821)204 was also known as Spring House, having been erected to cater for visitors to an adjacent mineral well.205 The Catherine Wheel (run by the Butchers, Leaches, and Critchfields) belonged to the Goring manor estate until 1892206 and by 1826 included a forge, the Critchfields also being blacksmiths.207 At the Miller of Mansfield Thomas Hoare (1765–88) was succeeded as innkeeper by Richard Goddard (d. 1811).208 In both 1811 and 1831 one sixth of families were employed in crafts or trades. In the latter year 39 individuals were retailers and craftsmen, comprising 11 shoemakers, five bricklayers, four publicans or beer retailers, three blacksmiths, two bakers, carpenters, milkmen, and rope-makers, and one butcher, wheelwright, sawyer, carrier, potter, maltster,

193 OHC, MS Wills Oxon. 52/2/28. 194 TNA, PROB 11/877/382. 195 OHC, Cal. QS, IX, p. 151. 196 Ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 116/1/15; ibid. E1/2/1D/22; Berks. RO, D/A2/c150, ff. 29–32; below (milling). 197 OHC, O15/4/M1/1; ibid. Cal. QS, III, pp. 406, 408, 498, 502, 505; Oxf. Jnl Syn. 17 Dec. 1785. 198 TNA, C 11/1979/25; ibid. PROB 11/615/433. 199 OHC, E1/9/16D/28; ibid. Cal. QS, III, p. 404; ibid. MSS Wills Oxon. 114/2/51; 77/4/5; 158/3/33; TNA, PROB 11/736/457. 200 OHC, par. reg. transcript, burials, 1722, 1728, 1730. 201 Ibid. Cal. QS, IV, p. 508; ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 88/5/21. 202 Above, par. intro. (communics). 203 B.J. Enright, ‘Rawlinson’s Proposed History of Oxfordshire’, Oxoniensia 16 (1951), 66. 204 OHC, QSD/V 1–4. 205 Oxon. FS, p. 149; below, social hist. (1500–1800). 206 OHC, QSD/V 1–4; ibid. O15/1/F1/1, p. 255; O15/3/3D/1. 207 Ibid. P402/1/M/1; ibid. O15/5/4L/1(20); PO Dir. Oxon. (1847). 208 OHC, QSD/V 1–4; ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 261/1/20. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 19

shopkeeper, and tailor. Some 25 people (21 female) were in domestic service.209 Goring then had a ‘trifling sack manufactory’ – that of Francis Dafters, sacking and rope maker and beer retailer, who went bankrupt in 1836 – and the number of mostly poor women engaged in spinning at home had fallen sharply due to mechanization in the textile industry.210 A brewery in the village was started by John Curtis, who in 1838 also owned a malthouse, a harness maker’s shop, and a beerhouse (the later John Barleycorn). He sold the business c.1843 to William Pittman but retained a newly-opened inn by the station (the Railway inn or Queen’s Arms), which had its own brewery attached.211 The station itself had opened in 1840, bringing employment for a stationmaster, signalmen, railway policemen, porters, and platelayers.212 The railway may also have been a factor influencing Mark Taylor’s decision c.1841 to convert farm buildings at Cleeve into a bone mill and superphosphate works manufacturing artificial manure.213 From the 1860s until at least 1939 the business was continued by the firm of Weedon Brothers, also coal and coke merchants and (briefly) brickmakers, who maintained both coal and manure depots at several local railway stations including Goring.214

The Catherine Wheel (left) and Miller of Mansfield (right)

Aided by the railway, the late 19th century saw a significant expansion of non- agricultural employment in Goring village as it catered both for growing numbers of seasonal visitors and for a burgeoning resident population increasingly made up of affluent incomers,215 several of whom employed domestic servants, governesses, grooms, and

209 Census, 1801–31; OHC, par. reg. transcript, appendix. 210 LJ 63, 640–1; London Gaz. 30 Sept 1836, p. 1708. 211 Reading Mercury, 21 Apr. 1838; PO Dir. Oxon. (1847); Berks. Chron. 5 Feb. 1848; J. Hurst, ‘The Early History of the Queen’s Arms at Goring’, Goring & Streatley Local Hist. Soc. Jnl 16 (2014), 4–12. 212 TNA, HO 107/882/3; HO 107/1691; above, par. intro. (communics). 213 Reading Mercury, 30 Nov. 1861; Gardner's Dir. Oxon. (1852); OHC, L.C. I/1. 214 OHC, L.C. I/1; Berks. RO, D/EWD/B1/2; Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1883–1939 edns); P. Karau and M. Clark, ‘The G.W.R. at Goring’, Brit. Railway Jnl, Special 4 (1987), 107–10; below (pottery). 215 Above, par. intro. (settlement); below, social hist. (since 1800). VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 20

gardeners.216 The Sloane hotel opened by the station before 1869217 and in 1891, when the Miller of Mansfield was also a hotel, there were two lodging houses and various shops selling groceries, provisions, and drapery.218 A branch of the Metropolitan bank opened c.1899.219 Goring brewery by 1887 owned 37 licensed houses across south Oxfordshire and north Berkshire, of which the John Barleycorn, Sloane, Leather Bottle, and Stag and Hounds (at Cray’s Pond) were four.220 The business passed by marriage from the Pittman family to the Gundrys in 1897 and was sold to Brakspear’s of Henley in 1940, soon after which the brewery closed.221

Samuel Saunders’ boat works at Springfield in 1900 (left) and 2017 (right). First image courtesy of Goring Gap Local History Society.

Late 19th-century village craftsmen included the builder Thomas Higgs, who constructed many of Goring’s Victorian buildings, and various blacksmiths, wheelwrights, boot and shoemakers, and a harness maker. Boatbuilding was undertaken by Samuel Saunders, 222 who in the 1880s moved his business from Streatley to Goring, which from 1894 operated out of a custom-built workshop and showroom beside the toll bridge. In 1899 he relocated 2 km. upstream to works at Springfield, which were sold c.1910 to a Henley boatbuilding firm.223 The Goring premises were bought in 1899 by the boatbuilder George Ellis, who traded until 1908, when he also sold electricity generated at Goring mill.224 Gas

216 e.g. TNA, RG 11/1297; RG 12/988. 217 PO Dir. Oxon. (1869). 218 TNA, RG 12/988; Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1891). 219 Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1899). 220 Sale Cat., Pittman’s Brewery (1887): copy in OHC, P277/D3/1. 221 Sale Cat., Goring Brewery (1940): copy in GGA; TS notes on Goring Brewery (nd) in ibid.; Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1895–1939 edns). 222 PO Dir. Oxon. (1854–77 edns); Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1883–99 edns); above, par. intro. (built character). 223 VCH Oxon. II, 275; J. Hurst, ‘Sam Saunders, Boatbuilder: The Goring & Streatley Years’, Goring & Streatley Local Hist. Soc. Jnl 12 (2010), 6–14. 224 The Times, 6 June 1908; Sale Cat., Ellis’ Boatbuilding Business (1908): copy in GGA; below (milling). VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 21

and water were piped to villagers by the Goring and Streatley Gas & Water Co., which established both gasworks and waterworks at Cleeve in 1889–90:225 the gasworks closed in 1946.226 In contrast, the outlying hamlets retained their rural and mainly agricultural economies, Goring Heath’s woods giving employment to numerous woodmen, sawyers, carpenters, and chair turners throughout the 19th and into the 20th century.227 However, bricks continued to be made at Greenmoor Hill228 and a few craftsmen (including tailors, shoemakers, and a blacksmith in 1847) lived mainly at Cray’s Pond,229 where by 1891 there was also a grocer’s shop with a bakery and two pubs called the Stag and Hounds and White Lion. Two others were located at Shirvells Hill and Collins End (the Rifleman and King Charles Head) and the only other shop was at a crossroads near Querns Farm,230 where a bakery and general store (incorporating a post office by 1864) was established by 1841.231 The Rifleman closed c.1910232 and the Stag and Hounds in 1955.233 During the 1940s and 50s, when a grocer’s shop remained at Cray’s Pond, several local people were employed at RAF Woodcote.234 A bus depot at Greenmoor Hill operated from the 1930s until c.2006,235 shortly before the King Charles Head shut in 2008. The post office shop (latterly with a tea room) remained open until the 1990s and the White Lion until 2014.236

Former Goring Heath post office stores (left) and former King Charles Head pub at Collins End (right)

225 Goring and Streatley Gas & Water Act, 51 & 52 Vict., c. 127; H. Taunt, Goring, Streatley, and the Neighbourhood (1894), 10; Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1895). 226 Another Look at Goring and Streatley (Goring & Streatley Local Hist. Soc.,1999), 33. 227 cf. TNA, HO 107/882/3; RG 13/1141; PO Dir. Oxon. (1847–77 edns); Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1883– 1915 edns). 228 Below (pottery). 229 PO Dir. Oxon. (1847); TNA, HO 107/1691. 230 TNA, RG 12/988; OS Map 1:2500, Oxon. LVI.1 (1878 edn). For the King Charles Head, see below, Whitchurch. 231 TNA, HO 107/882/3; PO Dir. Oxon. (1847–77 edns). 232 London Gaz. 26 Nov. 1907, p. 8311; OHC, DV/XII/27; cf. OS Maps 1:2500, Oxon. LII.16 (1899 and 1913 edns). 233 www.closedpubs.co.uk (accessed Sept. 2017). 234 Local info.; www.mycetes.co.uk (accessed Sept. 2017); above, par. intro. (settlement). 235 L. James and J. Whitehead, Kemp’s & Chiltern Queens 1929−2002 (2017). 236 Local info. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 22

Goring village in the 20th century remained a service centre with an above-average number of shops (28 in 1965) mainly in High Street and Station Road, although some were located in Cleeve,237 where the Magpie pub was built c.1923 and traded until the 1980s.238 In 1939 there were seven grocers, five pubs or inns, three butchers, boot dealers, and cafés, two hotels, banks, newsagents, haulage contractors, drapers, dairies, confectioners, fruiterers, and coal merchants, and one hairdresser, watchmaker, plumber, builder, motor garage, baker, brewer, blacksmith, boatbuilder, tailor, chimney sweep, chemist, photographer, bicycle agent, and solicitor.239 In the 1940s and 50s traditional crafts including blacksmithing (the Catherine Wheel forge closed c.1945) increasingly gave way to new ones, such as servicing motor vehicles and electrical goods; however, a saddlery remained, which gained a royal warrant.240 In 1964 two cottages in High Street were demolished to make way for a small shopping arcade and the following year, when Goring’s shops employed c.110 people, a greater number of parishioners worked elsewhere, including Reading and London, RAF Benson, Cowley car works, and the atomic research laboratories at Harwell and Culham.241 By 1992, when a pen factory established in 1973 at the former brewery site had recently closed, only one fifth of Goring’s workers were employed in the village, two fifths commuting by train to Reading and London.242 Nevertheless, Goring retained a wide range of shops and services in 2017, including three estate agents, a solicitor, dentist, and vet, and both Indian and Chinese restaurants. The Miller of Mansfield then still offered accommodation, the Sloane hotel having shut in 1984. Following the closure of the Queen’s Arms in 2013 (converted into a convenience store in 2017), Goring’s remaining pubs were the Catherine Wheel, John Barleycorn, and Leather Bottle.243

Pottery, Tile, and Brick Manufacture

Pottery, tile, and brick manufacture at Goring Heath was made possible by plentiful supplies of clay, sand, and wood, the industries also being found in several Chiltern parishes.244 Pottery and tiles were perhaps being made by the 14th century, when parishioners were

237 GGA, W.I. Album (1965). 238 OHC, RDC6/2/F4/4; Sale Cat., Goring Brewery (1940): copy in GGA; info. (2017) from Janet Hurst. 239 Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1939). 240 Adverts in Goring Parish Mag.; Goring-on-Thames: Official Guide (1936–71 edns): Reading Mercury, 3 Feb. 1977. 241 GGA, W.I. Album (1965); Another Look, 41–5; cf. B. Stapleton, ‘1960s – Shops in Goring’, Goring & Streatley Local Hist. Soc. Jnl 9 (2007), 15–17. 242 Goring and Streatley: A Portrait, 3, 11, 28. 243 Goring & Streatley on Thames: Visitor’s Guide and Directory (2017); A Picture History of Goring and Streatley (Goring & Streatley Local Hist. Soc., 1986), 46; Hurst, ‘Queen’s Arms’. 244 Above, vol. intro.; VCH Oxon. VII, 104; XVIII, 289–91; P. Preece, ‘Some Local Kilns’, SOAG Bulletin 57 (2002), 40–2. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 23

surnamed ‘Crokkere’ and ‘le Tyhlere’,245 and Goring Heath’s later brickfield (at Shirvells Hill, bounded by Eastfield Lane) was seemingly in use for making tiles by the 1480s, when Thomas Luffyncote, lord of Elvendon, granted land at ‘Eastfields’ to John Martin of South Stoke for 31 years on condition that he supply 1,000 tiles a year for Woodcote chapel.246 Goring’s earliest recorded brickmaker was Richard Middleton in 1647, whose cottage (a leasehold of Goring manor) was in 1686 said to lie ‘near the kiln on the heath of Goring’.247 That kiln was known as the ‘brick kiln’ by 1662 and in 1674 it was leased from the lord of Goring by Thomas Hedges (d. 1701),248 whose family worked it until 1737,249 when William Hedges left it to his servant Elizabeth Davies, together with the right to dig sand and clay on the waste of Goring manor.250 By the 1780s the freehold had passed to P.L. Powys of Hardwick,251 from whom it was later purchased by the ‘kilnman’ John Cox (d. c.1808). His son William252 in 1810 had the right to dig clay, sand, and chalk from any part of Goring heath.253 ‘Cox’s kiln’ was shown on an 1826 map at the northern end of Eastfield Lane,254 but there was seemingly a break in production from c.1830 until the 1870s,255 when the kiln had been replaced by a new brickworks c.500 m. to the east at Greenmoor Hill: the adjacent wood was called Claypits owing to it having been dug for brick clay.256 From c.1890 it was run by the firm of Weedon Brothers, who advertised as brick and tile manufacturers, employing at least six parishioners in 1891.257 Production stopped shortly before the First World War258 and the ruined kiln was demolished c.1970.259 By 1786 the potter Robert Cubbage rented a ‘pot kiln’, which he owned in 1795. Dying in 1800, he was succeeded by his wife Ann.260 By 1805 the premises belonged to Edward Clifford, who combined his Goring trade as a potter with running a shoemaker’s shop in Reading.261 In 1826 ‘Clifford’s pottery’ stood adjacent to the brick kiln at the top of

245 Goring Charters, II, nos. 216, 255. 246 Ibid. nos. 310–11. 247 OHC, E1/9/7D/1, 7. 248 Ibid. Hen. I/i/1; ibid. O15/4/M2/1; ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 133/2/8. 249 For Mary Hedges, ibid. E1/9/3D/1: ibid. O15/5/1L/9(1), p. 74; TNA, PROB 3/25/88; P. Preece, ‘Eastfield, Goring, and the Brick and Tile Industry’, SOAG Bulletin 49 (1993), 28–31. 250 TNA, PROB 11/684/190. 251 OHC, Hen. I/iv/36; ibid. E1/9/7D/14. 252 Ibid. QSD/L/132; TNA, PROB 11/1475/278. 253 OHC, E1/H/6–7. 254 Ibid. P402/1/M/1. 255 cf. ibid. par. reg. transcript, appendix; TNA, HO 107/882/3; HO 107/1691; ibid. RG 9/742; RG 10/275. 256 OS Maps 1:2500, Oxon. LII.16 (1878 and 1899 edns). 257 cf. TNA, RG 11/1297; RG 12/988; Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1891 and 1895 edns). 258 cf. OHC, RDC6/2/F4/1; RDC6/2/F4/4; Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1907 and 1915 edns). 259 cf. OS Maps 1:2500, Oxon. SU6481 (1963 and 1976 edns). 260 London Metropolitan Archives, MS 11936/359/554646; OHC, QSD/L/132; ibid. par. reg. transcript, burials 1800, 1815; Goring Heath par. reg. transcript, baptism 1776. 261 OHC, MS Oxf. Dioc. d 568, f. 157; ibid. E1/H/6–7; ibid. Hen. I/iv/68–9. For Clifford as a Baptist teacher, below, relig. hist. (1660–1851). VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 24

Eastfield Lane,262 and he was perhaps the potter recorded in the 1831 census.263 Whilst production was maintained by three members of the Pratley family in 1841, it had ceased by 1851,264 although memory of the pottery was later preserved in the name Potkiln Cottages.265

Milling

The medieval parish contained several water mills, of which three (Cleeve, Streatley, and Goring) ground corn until the 19th century. Those that disappeared earlier include a fulling mill at Gatehampton, which the prioress of Goring quitclaimed to Fulk Coudray (d. 1251) together with a tenter-yard for drying and stretching cloth,266 and Gatehampton’s corn mill, which in 1086 (when on Miles Crispin’s estate) was worth 11s.267 and in 1279 belonged to Peter Coudray in demesne.268 Last mentioned in 1337,269 it stood by the river in or near Mill mead, just south of Gatehampton manor house, where there are traces of a leat.270

Streatley mill (left) and Goring mill (right). First image courtesy of Goring Gap Local History Society.

Cleeve mill was probably Goring manor’s mill worth 20s. in 1086.271 Around 1180, when part of Bec abbey’s estate, it had two waterwheels and in 1288–9 it rendered £2 4s.

262 Ibid. P402/1/M/1. 263 OHC, par. reg. transcript, appendix; above (trades). 264 TNA, HO 107/882/3; HO 107/1691. 265 OS Map, 1:2500, Oxon. LII.16 (1878 edn); M. Mellor, ‘Synthesis of Pottery in the Oxford Region’, Oxoniensia 59 (1994), 208. 266 Boarstall Cart. pp. 59–60. 267 Domesday, 437. 268 Rot. Hund. II, 778. 269 Goring Charters, II, no. 201. 270 OHC, PAR115/16/H1/1–2; J. Farr, ‘Gatehampton: An Oxfordshire Hamlet’ (2000), 14–15: TS in GGA; cf. Goring Charters, I, p. xxx, no. 96, ‘Mullemede’. 271 Domesday, 434. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 25

10¼d. to Bec’s priory of Ogbourne (Wilts.).272 John Sherfield rented it in 1433,273 and in 1437 William York became its tenant, paying 33s. 4d. annual rent.274 In 1566, when still a double mill, the earl of Derby let it to John Clarke of Ardington (Berks.) for 40 years at £4 a year with the right to take timber from Goring manor for repairs.275 William Roberts was its miller in the 1580s,276 and the mill descended with Goring manor until 1662,277 shortly after which Clement Kent became its owner and William Burley (also lessee of Goring mill) its tenant: by that time there were four waterwheels and an adjacent wharf.278 By the 1780s the mill belonged to Robert Baker, who also owned Goring and Streatley mills, although the Pittmans were its millers from 1788, purchasing the freehold soon after 1810.279 In 1851 the miller John Pittman also farmed 460 acres.280 Corn was last ground at Cleeve mill by Edward Bowyer, who left in 1887,281 after which it became a private residence.282 The mill building, a substantial timber-framed structure with brick infill and tiled roofs dating from the 17th century and later,283 was largely derelict by the 1970s, when the owners restored it, creating four self-contained dwellings. Three waterwheels remained in 1981, the largest of which (made of iron) dated from c.1820.284 Streatley mill, the greater part of which stood in Goring parish,285 was one of two mills on Streatley manor in 1086. Both later belonged to Goring priory, Streatley mill having been given before 1181 by William de Mandeville, earl of Essex and lord of Streatley.286 In 1535 both of the priory’s Streatley mills were let for £4 annual rent, and together they owed 6s. a year in tithes to the prior of Hurley (Berks.) as rector of Streatley.287 Two years later they were held from the Crown by William Stafford or Stratford for £5 annual rent,288 and in 1546 were bought by Giles and Gregory Iseham.289 Changing ownership a number of times,290 Streatley mill continued as a corn-grist mill until 1922, its millers including William

272 Chibnall (ed.), Select Docs, 13–14, 127; above, landownership (other estates). 273 TNA, SC 2/212/7; SC 6/1116/11, m. 3. 274 Cal. Fine 1430–7, 316–17; Cal. Close 1435–41, 494. 275 Berks. RO, D/ECw/T11. 276 F.S. Thacker, The Thames Highway (1968 edn), I, 51, 55; II, 206. 277 OHC, E1/3/1D/8. 278 Ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 116/1/15; TNA, PROB 11/463/46; Berks. RO, D/A2/c150, ff. 29–32. For Kent, above, landownership (Goring Farm). For Burley, above (trades). 279 OHC, QSD/L/132; TNA, PROB 11/1691/67; The Times, 15 May 1839. 280 TNA, HO 107/1691; above (since 1800). 281 Goring Parish Mag. (Jan. 1888); Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1883–91 edns). 282 Sale Cat., Cleeve Mill (1905): copy in GGA. 283 NHL, no. 1285845 (accessed Sept. 2017). 284 P. Burstall, ‘Setting Cleeve Mill Wheel in Motion Again’, Berks. and Bucks. Countryside 21.166 (1981), 21–2. 285 Above, par. intro. (bdies). 286 VCH Berks. III, 511; Goring Charters, I, no. 1. 287 Valor Eccl. II, 206; VCH Berks. III, 516. 288 TNA, SC 6/HENVIII/2924, m. 8d. A lease to Phil. Hoby in 1538 may not have become effective, since Stafford or Stratford was still tenant in 1546: L&P Hen. VIII, XIII (1), p. 587; XXI (2), p. 237. 289 L&P Hen. VIII, XXI (2), p. 237. 290 VCH Berks. III, 511; OHC, QSD/L/132; ibid. DV/XII/27. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 26

Bartholomew (1790 and 1800),291 John Strange (1867 and 1883),292 and Charles Hobbs (1887 and 1920).293 In 1922 it was taken over by the Goring & Streatley Electric Light and Power Co., which used its two waterwheels to generate electricity. The building (of brick and tile) burned down in 1926.294 Goring mill has not been found recorded before 1530, when, belonging to Goring priory, it was in disrepair, causing the prioress to buy in ground corn and malt for the convent.295 Around 1535 it was described as ‘a little watermill that serves the household’ and was then newly let for 6s. 8d. a year.296 After the Dissolution it descended with Goring Priory manor, initially being leased with the demesne,297 and in 1654 was let for 15 years to the miller Ralph Woodley, who at his death c.1661 held the mill (described as a double mill) and inhabited the millhouse containing three chambers, a hall, and a buttery.298 William Burley was lessee of both Goring and Cleeve mills at his death in 1701,299 and by 1786 the freehold belonged to Robert Baker. Millers included James Daston (d. 1790), Thomas Child (d. 1804),300 and James Dodd (d. 1891), the last for over 40 years until his death, employing five men in 1851.301 By 1894 the mill was used by the boatbuilder Samuel Saunders to generate electricity, which he increasingly sold to his neighbours primarily for lighting. The business was expanded by George Ellis, who sold it in 1908, by which time several buildings in the village and also Streatley were supplied.302 Electricity generation at the mill continued under the Goring & Streatley Electric Light and Power Co. until 1930,303 since when the 17th- century and later building constructed of brick and tile with traces of timber framing, has been variously a shop and a dwelling.304 The adjacent partly timber-framed miller’s house (Mill Cottage) became a separate private residence in the 1890s.305

291 OHC, QSD/L/132. 292 PO Dir. Berks. (1867); Kelly’s Dir. Berks. (1883). 293 Kelly’s Dir. Berks. (1887 and 1920 edns). 294 The Times, 7 Aug. 1926; cf. OHC, RDC6/2/F4/4. 295 Visit. Dioc. Linc. II, 156. 296 TNA, E 315/406/1, f. 40; cf. Valor Eccl. II, 206. 297 e.g. L&P Hen. VIII, XIII (2), p. 493, where ‘windmill’ should read ‘watermill’; TNA, C 2/Eliz/W5/54. 298 OHC, Gen. XIV/i/1; ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 88/2/3; TNA, C 7/231/12. 299 OHC, MS Wills Oxon. 116/1/15. 300 Ibid. QSD/L/132; TNA, PROB 11/1193/289; PROB 11/1407/273; J. Sims (ed.), The Thames Navigation Commission Minutes 1771–1790, I (Berks. Rec. Soc. 11, 2008), 225–6. 301 TNA, HO 107/1691; PO Dir. Oxon. (1847–77 edns); Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1883–91 edns); monument in churchyard. 302 Taunt, Goring, Streatley, and the Neighbourhood, 129; Goring Parish Mag. (Dec. 1894); Sale Cat., Ellis’s Boatbuilding Business (1908): copy in GGA; above (trades). 303 Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1911–28 edns); London Gaz. 14 Oct. 1930, p. 6269. 304 NHL, no. 1059550; Picture History, 34; GGA, W.I. Album (1965). 305 OHC, RDC6/3/Y1/26; TNA, RG 13/1141. VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 27

Fishing

Goring parish encompassed four medieval Thames fisheries, whilst another in Streatley called Runsford descended with Elvendon manor from 1352 until 1633, when it was sold to Richard Novice of South Stoke:306 in 1412 it was let for 30s. annual rent and a dish of fish or 2d. every Sunday.307 Goring’s four were each associated with a corn mill (Cleeve, Streatley, Goring, and Gatehampton), with which ownership passed,308 and each possessed a dam- like fishing weir or ‘lock’ constructed of wooden stakes extending from a river bank to a mid- stream island.309 Streatley and Cleeve weirs were documented c.1181, when the latter presumably provided the four sticks of eels given by Thomas Druval to Goring priory,310 whilst Gatehampton’s was in existence by 1251,311 and Goring’s by the 1530s, when it was worth 3s. 4d. annually.312 The first three and Runsford were named in a late 14th-century list of Thames ‘locks’ allegedly overflowing and causing floods in adjacent meadows.313 In the 1580s, when a similar list deemed them ‘unlawful annoyances which stop the course of the river’, Gatehampton’s was known as Hart’s lock, perhaps after a local family: disused by the 18th century, obstructive timbers from it were removed in 1804 and 1812, although some remained in 1910.314 Goring’s ‘locks’ were gradually abandoned in favour of other means of fishing, including the laying of wickerwork basket traps or ‘bucks’, recorded in the parish from the 1650s.315 In 1669 William Burley of Cleeve mill caught £20-worth of fish yearly in his bucks.316 In the 17th and 18th centuries members of the Baker family were fisherman,317 and John Taylor (d. 1740) left his all his tackle to his son John.318 In 1801 Hart’s lock fishery was purchased from the lady of Gatehampton by Robert Sherson, with whose Coombe End estate it later passed.319 A few men worked as fishermen in the 19th century,320 although by

306 Goring Charters, I, nos 132–46; OHC, E1/9/2D/5; E1/2/1D/18; VCH Berks. III, 514. 307 OHC, E1/M1/CR/8. For other leases, Goring Charters, II, no. 309; OHC, E1/M1/CR/19. 308 Above (milling); landownership. Gatehampton’s fishery descended with its manor until 1801: e.g. TNA, C 66/1432, m. 28; OHC, F XI/2; below. 309 C.T. Flower (ed.), Public Works in Medieval Law, II (Selden Soc. 40), p. 128; R. Peberdy, ‘Navigation on the River Thames between London and Oxford in the Later Middle Ages: A Reconsideration', Oxoniensia 61 (1996), 314–15. 310 Goring Charters, I, no. 1, where ‘Locstigle’ surely refers to the Cleeve weir: above, par. intro. (communics). 311 Boarstall Cart. nos 183, 202. 312 TNA, E 315/406/1, f. 40. 313 Flower (ed.), Public Works, II, pp. 125–9. 314 Thacker, Thames Highway, I, 51, 55; II, 214–15; PN Oxon. I, 52–3. 315 OHC, E1/3/1D/1; ibid. Gen. XIV/i/1; TNA, C 7/231/12; GGA, Monograph 15, 7–8. 316 Berks. RO, D/A2/c150, f. 32. 317 OHC, E1/9/16D/27; ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 9/1/21. 318 Ibid. MS Wills Oxon. 67/4/42. 319 Ibid. QSD/L/132; ibid. F VIII/49; F XIII/2; ibid. Wat. IX/1; above, landownership (Coombe End). 320 TNA, PROB 11/1963/213; ibid. RG 11/1297; Kelly’s Dir. Oxon. (1887–99 edns). VCH Oxfordshire • Texts in Progress • Goring (May 2018) • © VCH Oxfordshire • Economic • p. 28

1900 the river mostly attracted amateur anglers, its ‘excellent water affording plenty of sport’.321

Quarrying

Small-scale mineral extraction is recorded from c.1180, when Goring priory was granted use of a quarry in order to maintain its mill and build its church.322 Other quarries were recorded in the 13th and 14th centuries,323 when there was a sand pit in Goring’s South field.324 A quarry used before 1251 by Gatehampton’s lord to maintain his weir may be the former chalk quarry still visible in Hartslock wood.325 Two similar riverside chalk quarries located north and south of Cleeve mill were mapped in 1727326 and in 1788 provided chalk and earth for the maintenance of Cleeve mill, lock, and weir (north quarry) and Goring mill, lock, and weir (south quarry), the chalk being burned to make quicklime in a limekiln then standing at Cleeve wharf.327 By the 17th century clay and sand were being dug from pits at Shirvells Hill for pottery, tile, and brick production,328 and at inclosure in 1812 three small sand pits on Goring heath were allocated for highway repairs.329 Goring Heath was still peppered with chalk and gravel pits c.1900,330 some of which, when exhausted, were lined with clay and converted into ponds. Chalk was spread on the fields and flints were used in building work.331 Most of the pits were disused by the 1960s, when gravel was still dug from Gravelpit plantation near Haw Farm.332

321 S. Read (ed.), The Thames of Henry Taunt (1989), 87. 322 Blair, ‘Foundation of Goring Priory’. 323 ‘crundle’, ‘la crundele’, ‘le depecrondle’, ‘la quarere’: Goring Charters, I, nos. 9, 15, 99; II, no. 205. 324 ‘le strandputt’: ibid. I, no. 3. 325 Boarstall Cart. no. 202; HER, PRN 16779; T. Coombs, The Origins of Two Ancient Chalk Quarries at Gatehampton, Goring-on-Thames, Oxfordshire (SOAG Occasional paper 1, 1996). 326 BL, Add. MS 78123 A. 327 OHC, Goring inclo. award; ibid. P432/7/M1/1; cf. ibid. Hen. I/iv/55–6. 328 HER, PRN 9149; above (pottery). 329 OHC, Goring heath inclo. award; ibid. PAR115/16/H1/1–2. 330 OS Maps 1:10560, Oxon. LII, LIII, LV, LVI (1900 edn). 331 Barefield-Hutt, Hardwick, 14–15. 332 OS Maps 1:10560, SU 67 NE (1960 edn); SU 68 SW (1969 edn).