Page:The Victoria History of the County of Surrey Volume 3.djvu/112

 A HISTORY OF SURREY

��ALBURY

��Eldeberie (xi cent.), Aldebur (xiii. cent.), Aide- bury (xiv cent.), Aldbury (sometimes in xviii cent.).

Albury is a parish 5 miles east of Guildford and 7 miles west of Dorking. The parish is bounded on the north by Merrow and West Clandon, on the west by St. Martha's and Wonersh, on the south by Cranleigh, on the east by Shere. A detached portion, the manor of Wildwood, used to lie in Alfold to the south, and detached portions of Cranleigh, Shere, and Wonersh lay in Albury. These were transferred to the parishes surrounding them respectively in 1882. The exist- ing parish contains 4,405 acres of land and 14 of water. It is 6 miles from north to south, and no- where more than 2 miles from east to west. It is of the typical form and soils of the parishes to the south of the chalk ridge. The northern boundary is on the crest of the chalk, the village is in the valley upon the sand south of the chalk hill, but close to it, and the parish extends across the sand on to the Atherfield clay and Wealden clay for a short distance, to the south. There is open common on the chalk. Southwards the ex- tensive heaths of Blackheath and Farley Heath are partly or wholly in the parish. The continuation of the high ridge of Greensand, of which Leith Hill, Holm- bury, and Ewhurst Hills are part, further eastward, reaches across the southern end of the parish, but falls away into the valley through which the Guild- ford and Horsham line runs, bending northward to form its eastern side. The views here across the Weald, and westward to Hascombe Hill and Hind- head beyond, are very beautiful. Below the escarp- ment of these hills part of Smithwood Common is in Albury. But it is to the north, on the chalk, at New- lands Corner, where the old road from Shere to Guild- ford runs up the down, and where Albury Downs reach 600 ft. above the sea, that the most famous view in the parish is to be seen. Its beauty consists not in extent merely, but in the broken foreground, east and west along the valley between the chalk and the sand. Some very ancient yew trees mark the line of the old road, commonly called Pilgrims' Way, along the slopes of the downs. The ancient bridle-way over St. Martha's Hill comes down into Albury through a deep lane. The modern road from Guildford to Dorking traverses the parish, and also the Redhill and Reading branch of the South Eastern Railway. Chilworth and Albury station is just outside the parish.

The Tillingbourne stream runs through the parish from east to west, working two mills. It is augmented by the water from the deep springs in the chalk which form the Shireburn Ponds, deep pools at the foot of the slope of the down surrounded by trees. The upper and more picturesque is usually called the Silent Pool. The springs which supply them are supposed to have connexion with those which break out on the other side of the chalk, due north, in Clandon Park. The operations of the Woking Water Company, who have tapped the chalk between them, have undoubtedly led to a diminution of the supply in the Shireburn Ponds.

Albury parish is somewhat rich in antiquities. At

��Newlands Corner is a large barrow, not marked on the Ordnance map, and neolithic flints are fairly numer- ous on and below the hills. The name HarrowshiH borne by part of the down may indicate an Anglo- Saxon holy place. But the most considerable antiquity of the parish is on Farley Heath, near the road from Albury to Cranleigh. The banks, with a very slight exterior ditch forming three sides of a quadrangular inclosure, are fairly well marked, especially to the. west. The east bank is not now visible. The in- closure is not exactly rectangular, but the north-west angle is slightly acute, the south-west slightly obtuse. The sides are 220 yds., and the interior space must consequently have been 10 acres. In the middle of this was a smaller quadrangular inclosure which Man- ning and Bray describe as of 22 yds. each way. This is now not to be traced, but stone foundations are visible where it was, and a great abundance of Roman tiles and some pottery are easily found in the whole inclosure. Many Roman coins were found by excava- tions conducted in 1 839 and 1 840 by the late Mr. Mar- tin Tupper, and it is said British coins also. 1 A gold coin of Verica found here is in private hands.

When Aubrey wrote he saw, or imagined, the ruins of a Roman temple on the spot, and the bases of the two pillars in the south arcade of old Albury Church are reputed to have been brought from this place. Further inclosing banks to the east are said to have formerly existed. Some of the coins found here by Mr. Tupper, and some found afterwards by Mr. Lovell, the schoolmaster of Albury, were sent to the British Museum. A systematic exploration, and a classification of remains, and pending this a cessation of the practice of taking road metal from the surface of the common, are much to be desired. The Roman road traced in Ewhurst parish would, if continued, have come close by here, and went on no doubt either to Newlands Corner or to the gap in the hills at Guildford. This is the Old Bury which gave its name to the parish.

The old village of Albury had grown up by the banks of the Tillingbourne, and partly within what is now Albury Park, around the village green, which adjoined the churchyard ; but Mr. Drummond, in 1842, finally removed it bodily half a mile to the westward, leaving the ancient church intact, and built a new parish church in the new village that grew up at what formerly had been known as the hamlet of Weston Street.

Albury Park also used to extend on to the chalk hill above Shireburn Lane, over what is now farming land. The road up the hill was called Old Park Pales Lane.' Early in the igth century a Maypole still stood at the corner where Blackheath Lane joins the west end of Weston Street.

Albury Park, the Surrey seat of the Duke of North- umberland, K.G., is famed both for the sylvan beauty of its park and for its gardens. The magnificent trees especially a noble avenue of old beeches, some huge walnut trees and clumps of hawthorns the irregular levels of velvety turf across which stretch long vistas,

��1 It is unknown exactly what coins were found by Mr. Tupper, but they are supposed

��to have extended from Domitian to Mag- nentius.

72

��'Manning and Bray, op. cit ii, iz6.

�� �