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Milton Common
Milton Common maps
Historic maps of Milton Common and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Milton Common maps
Milton Common photos
We have no photos of Milton Common, although we do have photos of these nearby places:
Great Haseley| Little Haseley| Little Milton| Thame| Cuddesdon| Long Crendon| Wheatley| Stadhampton| Forest Hill| Garsington| Chiselhampton| Oakley| Haddenham| Watlington| Dorchester-On-Thames
Milton Common area books
Displaying 1 of 7 books about Milton Common and the local area. View all books for this area
You can read extracts and browse photos from these books.
Memories of Milton Common
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Oxfordshire memories
Great Haseley
I was five when I moved to Great Haseley from Newington, near Stadhampton, with my mother, father and brother. The year was 1957 and Horse Close Cottages was a new housing estate - we were thrilled to have a bathroom and an inside toilet, a Rayburn for cooking and to keep us warm. My maternal grandfather Caleb Tyler and his parents before him lived in a two up, two down cottage next door to the Bishops opposite a pond, water was from a pump at the bottom of the Lane. My mother Kathleen Tyler, her brother Geoffrey and my father Lionel Ring from Stadhampton both attended the village school up to the age of fourteen. I attended the village school from 1957 to 1963 where Mr Hunt was headmaster, with other teachers whose names I cannot remember, we were taught a fairly wide range of subjects. Over the years I remember using the village hall for PE lessons, Christmas parties, jumble sales, cheese and wine and bingo evenings, having... Read more
John Bull
I worked for John Bull at his butcher's shop in Wheatley, we lived at Home Farm until his bungalow was built in the summer of 1963. Does anyone recall the period?
No 4 Waterperry
My memories of Waterperry are all happy ones, my granmother Mrs Sparkes lived at no 4, the house was built in 1921, and my mother lived there as well, so some of the memories are from what she told me and some are from myself. As for what my mother told me, she as a child did not have it all easy in the school summer holidays, she once told me that she used to dread the school holidays as she had to go stone picking in the fields along with the other children, which literally means picking up all the large stones up for the farmer, I think they got paid for it but I don't know how much. But one thing they did like was going blackberrying, there was a book written that said Edy Sprakes (my grandmother)could pick quicker than anyone, then they would take them home and wait until a man came to the village to buy them, apparently they were used for dye. She also... Read more
The Stables
As a young arrogant doctor with an imposing E-Type Jaguar, I was privileged to live at the stables with assorted collegues. One a gynaecologist, now in Cape Town, one a London based psychiatrist of vivid eccentricity and one more, whose face I forget. The gamekeeper and his wife lived next door. He was an amusing and amused observer of his young city neighbours. He introduced me to one of the owls he had nursed back to health. Barney would come when called at night and sit on the windowsill and eat apples. I was fortunate to ride with him (the game keeper, not the owl) on occasion, on a magnificent hunter. We had breakfast feasts on the lawn and dinner near a big log fires. In the mornings I frequently had to hoosh out the cows, who had pushed opwn the gate and were chomping on the lawn, that in an early morning mist. One Christmas, my South African friend brought the church to life with a Christmas service. We had parties and... Read more
Famliy
In the last two months (year 2006) I found out that I had a Great Uncle that lived in Cuddesdon in the 1881 census. This was a surprise to me as I lived in Cuddesdon in Parkside Cuddesdon for 5 years under my ex married name(1995 to 2001) and never new I had famliy there beforehand. This was David King who married a Ann Gunn, who was born in Cuddesdon, her father John Gunn was also born in Cuddesdon. (I am not related to the Gunns, only by marriage.)
Playing in The Daisy Field
I grew up in Cuddesdon and spent many happy hours playing in the surrounding fields. My family moved up to Parkside (No. 15) from The Park houses in '56 when I was 2. I don't remember living there although a trip with mates down Redman's Lane, turn right and pass the crab-apple tree, then on towards the river was a regular summer jaunt. The water from the spring was so refreshing - much more pleasant than the Corona bottle of tap water someone had brought along.
We would play in Cuddesdon Brook (straight down the hill on Redman's Lane) although that was seen as 'foreign' due to it being on land owned by a Wheatley farmer (Mr Greaves) rather than the familiar Palmers. The sloping meadow at the top of Parkside by (now) Sunset Lodge was the Daisy Field, named for reasons obvious in the summer. In the winter of 1963 when the snow and ice was ferocious I well remember sledging on Mum's baking tray to the bottom of... Read more
Oh to be A Bishop's Daughter
In 1971 my father The Right Reverend Kenneth John Woollcombe became the youngest Bishop Of Oxford at the age of 47 and we came to live at Bishop's House, Cuddesdon, opposite the Theological College, next to Bishop's Wood.
On March 3rd of this year ( 2008) he died after a long illness at the age of 84.
The Times wrote in his obituary "Scholarly clergyman who rose to be a capable, effective and popular Bishop Of Oxford". I quote "He also had an enormous gift for friendship. He gave support and often spiritual direction to many throughout his life."
Whilst we lived at Cuddesdon, life was not so easy for us, the young family. Me and my two sisters were teenagers and had been used to living in the centre of Edinburgh. My elder sister, Meg, went to boarding school in The Lake District but Fran and I attended what was then Holton Park Grammar school in Wheatley (it is now known as Wheatley Park School). It was quite... Read more
