Very rough first copy !!!
WILLIAM HODSON, the JAM FACTORY and the new RAILWAY
In our last newsletter, we told the story of William Hodson and North Tadworth Farm, and his very own Jam Factory. The farmhouse was at the end of Chetwode Road, where Broad Walk stands today, and the factory was sited on Long Walk. Much of the Preston Estate and the de Burgh site were the fields for his fruit and veg.
For William, business was blooming. By 1892 he was wealthy enough to put his two older boys through Epsom College. Fred, his oldest, left the College and joined the jam-making business. While John studied medicine at Guy’s Hospital and went into general practice in Nottingham.
1893 must have been a good [POTATOES DIRECT FROM THE FARM.—LZE- year for potatoes, judging by of good Potatoes will be sent to any address in or neat the adverts that Willian London, carriage paid. for 5s, ‘bag charged 2d.!, Cash oa 6
placed in The Standard. livery.—Orders to W. HUDSON, Tadworth Farm. Epsom. i
In the same year, an Act of Parliament was passed to control access to the commons and heath-lands of Banstead. When William was appointed as one of the Conservators, he found himself rubbing shoulders with local dignitaries, such as Francis Baring, who built the country mansion in Banstead Wood, and Lord Chief Justice Sir Charles Russell of Tadworth Court.
William was a religious man. In 1895 he built a Mission Hall on land in the High Street called Town Field or Pound Field, which he bought with other local businessmen. The Mission Hall was later registered as the Baptist Free Church and the current building is known as Christchurch.
Meanwhile, when Frederick Colman of mustard fame bought the Nork Estate, William got a new landlord.
Fortunately, they shared a passion for farming and so, while William got on with his business, Colman built up a prime herd of red-polled cattle on the grasslands of Nork.
At the same time, moves were afoot to construct a new railway. A spur line was proposed from Drift Bridge to
Walton-on-the Hill, passing through Tattenham Corner and Tadworth Village.
Frederick Colman was not happy. The line would run right across his new estate. He reacted by selling off a narrow strip of land to Epsom Grandstand Association, on which they constructed a ‘straight mile’ racecourse. It started at the lower end of Merland Rise (celebrated today by Straight Mile Place) and finished in front of the Grandstand. The new racecourse cut right across the proposed line of the railway. When the rail sponsors proposed to tunnel under the ‘straight mile’, Frederick countered with a barrage of objections; e.g. demanding that an additional siding be built at Tattenham Corner for the sole use of the jam factory. The Drift Bridge spur line proposal was dropped.
In 1900, Frederick Colman died and control of Nork Park passed to his widow, Lady Helen Colman. Her older son, Gordon (pictured standing), set about turning the estate into a game park which would prove disastrous for William’s fruit trees. William’s quarrel with the Colman’s would lead to his downfall.
When Gordon Colman turned 21, he joined the board of the family’s mustard business and was put in charge of sales and advertising. With Gordon’s passion for hunting he hired a gamekeeper for Nork, skilled in the propagation of wildlife and protecting it against poachers, J Om
Very soon, William’s farm and orchards were overrun by rabbits which destroyed his crops and damaged his fruit trees. As if that wasn’t enough, he also lost an important customer, when the wholesale business of Ransome Wallace of Copt Hill (who had invested in the jam making business) was declared insolvent. William’s good fortune was fast running out.
Needing to control the pests, William consulted the terms of his farm lease and found it stated that, as tenant, he could kill the rabbits, if his landlord failed to do so on his behalf. He raised this with the Colman’s who did nothing, so William decided to take matters into his own hands, Over the next few days he killed no less than 500 rabbits.
When Gordon Colman discovered the slaughter, he issued a demand for compensation and William Hodson had to pay £25 for the dead rabbits, £277 for pheasants, and a further £400 in legal bills,
William was a ruined man. Unable to pay his workers, he had to close the Jam Factory and dismiss the workforce. Unable to pay the rent, William and his family were forcibly thrown off the land they had farmed and improved for the last thirty years. One can only imagine the effect this had on poor William.
He was forced to sell his share in the Mission Hall.
To make ends meet, William
William ended his days living alone in Ashcroft, Tadworth. He died in 1912, aged 62. I have been unable to locate his burial place. Elizabeth Hodson survived her husband until 1922, living in a cottage in Epsom Lane. She died aged 70 and was buried in Kingswood Cemetery.