TANGLEY, HATHERDEN & WILDHERN
PEOPLE OF THE PARISH TELL THEIR STORY
INTERVIEWED AND EDITED BY ELEO CARSON
This is a portrait of the Hampshire parish of Tangley through the last hundred and twenty years. Based on archives, letters, diaries and interviews with nearly two hundred people, past and present, this rich oral history portrays the lives of those who have lived here since 1880.
The book gives a brief history of the earlier development of the villages but its main focus begins with the acquisition of the two large estates in 1880 when the Hatherden and Wildhern land was bought by Alfred Butterworth and the Tangley estate was bought by Henry Merceron. The vast majority of local people worked on the land and a detailed account of life at the time emerges from their stories. Men and women played their part in both world wars and the book contains interviews with adults and children who lived in the parish at the time.
Life here has changed in the years following the second world war - at last the three villages had electricity and running water; the first council houses were built and gave some the opportunity for better accommodation; few people owned a car but bus companies ensured they could visit the neighboring villages and towns. Slowly patterns of land ownership and farming changed with maechanisation far fewer were needed to work the land, men and women left for the towns and the whole way of life altered.
The book is generously illustrated with photographs. These cover all aspects of life in the three villages over the years - May Day, horses logging in the woods in 1909, life on the farms with horse and later tractor, the choir outing, the thatched cottages of Wildhern, the Home Guard, the pubs, fancy dress at the village fête, village gatherings, people past and present, all adding to the enjoyment of the book.
"It is most moving...Tangley, Hatherden and Wildhern is one of the most valuable parish histories I have read, and one which will increase in fascination as time passes. It is a model of what has become a popular form of documentation"
Ronald Blythe, author of Akenfield
Eleo Carson has lived in Tangley for over twenty years. She has worked for many years as an editor at a London publishing house.
