Haywards Heath IV


2019 marks the 50th anniversary of the demolition of Haywards Heath mill in 1969. Jenner & Higgs mill stood in a succession of mills tracing back at least to 1638. The site now offices is on the left as you go under the railway bridge from College Road heading for Sainsbury’s. It’s linked to the stream now diverted which powered it. The water wheels gave way to steam, gas and then electric power after 1915. Picture Charles Tucker.


There’s a great profile of heroes of Haywards Heath by Hanna Prince in September 2019’s Sussex Living magazine available free at points across the town. I was fascinated to read about the vapour baths Dr Lockhart Robertson used at the asylum to treat depression in the 1860s. In those days the physical restraint of sufferers of mental illness was giving way to a more enlightened therapeutic approach. Do pick up your free paper!

Drilling Haywards Heath railway tunnel in 1841 so impacted the contractor he built a house on top of it. This blue plaque above Folly Hill tunnel reminds us of Clevelands, the first house in modern-day Haywards Heath built by Joseph Flesher (1806-1859). September’s Sussex Living available free at points across the town has an article by Hanna Prince about Flesher and others who helped shape our town. Before Flesher Haywards Heath consisted of a few cottages and farmhouses scattered around a wide area. With the railway’s arrival need for housing was generated. Joseph Flesher, buried in Cuckfield Churchyard, built several houses besides his own making him de facto one of the town’s founders. More pictures at https://lifeinhaywardsheath.blogspot.com/

The Revd Robert Wyatt first Vicar of St Wilfrid, Haywards Heath is featured in a profile of heroes of Haywards Heath gathered by Hanna Prince in September’s Sussex Living magazine available free at points across the town. The Church was built with support from Anne and Frances Dealtry of Bolnore mansion who had paid for the construction of the town’s first school adjacent to it. Wyatt was wealthy and generous enough to never draw his stipend despite having six daughters! Fr Robert’s grave is prominent just off the path through St Wilfrid’s Churchyard. He was succeeded as Vicar by his son Thomas which meant the Wyatt’s provided over 70 years of leadership in the formative days of our town. More pictures at https://lifeinhaywardsheath.blogspot.com/

Ever noticed the number of curly gutter brackets on houses in Haywards Heath? They’re the trademark of distinguished architect Harold Turner (1885-1961) born in Ardingly who in 1930 set up his practice in Haywards Heath. In September’s Sussex Living, available free at points across the town, Hanna Prince details Turner’s Arts and Crafts twist on the traditional Sussex farmhouse which has left its mark on our buildings. Harold’s most notable project was designing Franklands Village in the mid 1930s which provided inexpensive housing for young couples. Prince notes how this contrasted with previous provision of detached, spacious properties for the wealthy. More at https://lifeinhaywardsheath.blogspot.com/


Haywards Heath has never been short of barbers. It’s a trade that’s guaranteed even if DIY head scalping is now the rage among some. Who can remember Allen’s on South Road and the sort of conversations gentlemen had with their barbers in the 1960s? There’d be less directions given by customers in those days who went more happily with ‘short back and sides’! The decor looks suited to fast turnover. Picture Charles Tucker.


Haywards Heath May Day processions grew out of the 1904 call for ‘all Social Democratic Party organisations and trade unions of all countries to demonstrate energetically on the First of May for the legal establishment of the 8-hour day, for the class demands of the proletariat, and for universal peace’. Over a century later the welfare of workers remains an issue among us as many find it difficult to afford housing in our town. Picture Charles Tucker.

One of 
Haywards Heath’s long lost pubs the Liverpool Arms or Hotel was demolished in 1997 to make way for the car park which preceded Waitrose. Its name is associated with the Irish railway workers from Liverpool. There was another upmarket pub, Station Inn also named at one time Goldings, on the opposite side of the railway.  The cattle market guaranteed trade at three railway pubs until it closed in 1989 when only the Burrell Arms survived.


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Haywards Heath II

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As the M25 skirts the North Downs south of London and the A27 skirts the South Downs and Brighton the A272 traverses the ancient home of Haywards Heath, the High Weald of Mid-Sussex. Heather Warnes 2009 history observes that ‘it was common in this part of Mid Sussex for early estates to be laid out across a ridge top, the north-facing slopes often being reserved to the lord for wood and timber’. The heath was open land facing south benefitting both from the sun and drainage of water from the rock underlay of the High Weald down to the southern claylands. The River Ouse north of the Weald provides a second natural boundary for our heath. Haywards Heath is a town with population 33,845 (2011 census) that grew up to the north and east of the ancient ‘Hayworth’ estate after the arrival of the railway in 1841. Its name derives from ‘Hayworth’ south of Muster Green on the A272 formerly a prehistoric ridgeway track. In her ‘Assessment of the early history of Hayworth and Trubwick in...
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Haywards Heath VI (pubs)

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Asylum Arms (demolished) The Asylum Arms, Haywards Heath appeared in 1857 among 20 temporary buildings erected to serve the 200 workers building the so-called Sussex Lunatic Asylum. The Arms run by James Ashdown offered ‘very neat and commodious liquor’ according to the Brighton Examiner of 2 June 1857. The pub was situated on the Asylum Road (now Colwell Road) junction with Sussex Road (now Wivelsfield Road). Demolished before 1874 Asylum Arms’ coming and going is reminder of how the elongated shape of Haywards Heath derives from the construction of the County Hospital to its south with its large population, staff, pastoral and commercial significance. Austens Hotel (demolished) Building a railway and a town was thirsty work. A number of pubs and hotels came in their wake starting with the Liverpool Arms for workers on one side of the railway facing the Station Inn across the rails used by employers. This 1908 picture shows Austens Hotel on Clair Road, now demolished, wh...
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Haywards Heath VIII (walks)

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  Abbots Leigh house (1892) built by an aide of Queen Victoria recalls a village near Bristol and a hymn tune composed there in 1942 by villager Cyril Taylor for ‘Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken‘ to replace use of the German national anthem. It is a hidden treasure of Haywards Heath with a facade visible only from the footpath which circles the estate. That footpath descends from Lewes Road to the right of North Colwell Barn opposite the path up from Lyoth Lane via Cobbetts Mead. The woodland path past the Barn opens into a large well mown meadow. Follow the path down through the fields as it curves round Abbots Leigh revealed in all its splendour to viewers on the path in the bottom field. After enjoying the view enter the wood and continue through to enter Slugwash Lane opposite Cottage of Content. Turn left to walk up Slugwash Lane to Lewes Road. Turn left again to walk along the verge before crossing the road into Snowdrop Lane then left back down to Lyoth Lane. At the botto...
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