Help finding location of farm/house from last will dated 1811 - Berkshire

[TuiBird]

Hi, I'm trying to get some information from this will for John Ellaway in East Hendred in Berkshire regarding where he lived.  I've found details in the Berkshire Records Office on a plot of land allocated in the Enclosure process but this does not help me with where he lived.  I'm hopeless trying to read some of this.  I've deciphered a number of the monetary bequests but nothing sensible on the names of places.  Anyone with better eyesight or more practice out there?  Keen to get names of places and also anything on toll roads in the bequests.  These are the first two of five pages. Pages three and four have information on them but I can't upload them within the limits of the site.

[horselydown86]

...situate at East Hendred aforesaid which I hold
of the Lord of the Manor of East Hendred and
which I have duly surrendered to the use of my
will and all other my Copyhold Messuages or
Tenements and hereditaments in East Hendred
aforesaid Also I give and devise unto my
good ffriend John Allin of East Hendred aforesaid
Gentleman his heirs and assigns during the Minority
of John Shadwell the natural son of my said
Grand-daughter Mary Shadwell now aged about
eleven years all that my allotment or piece of
arable land situate in East Hendred aforesaid
containing about two acres now in the Occupation
of the said James Wiltshire...


...all that my Mortgage or Security on the
Tolls arising at the Gates Turnpikes or Tollhouses
on the Turnpike Road from Besselsleigh to Hungerford
and from Wantage to Marlborough for securing the
principal Sum of One hundred pounds...

[TuiBird]

Thanks for having a crack at this, the turnpike information is really useful.  There must be something on subsequent pages about other property I guess.

[solidrock]

The Besselsleigh to Hungerford Turnpike:
http://www.hungerfordvirtualmuseum.co.uk/index.php/36-themes/transport/823-turnpike-trusts

The road between Oxford and Salisbury was also important in the 17th century. The road north from Hungerford towards Oxford (now the A338) passed through Wantage, before joining the Swindon to Oxford road (now A420) near the village of Bessels Leigh before reaching the outskirts of Oxford.

This First Act to turnpike this route was passed in 11 Geo3 c97 - 1771, as the "Besselsleigh (or Besselsleigh to Hungerford) Turnpike Act". The Act expired in 1878. The interest bearing debt in 1824 was £4,000 and the income from tolls in the same year was £325. The length was 22 miles. There were four main gates in 1840, with one side gate or bar.

[solidrock]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Hendred

[TuiBird]

Thanks SolidRock.  I had no idea about toll roads before finding this inclusion in the will document.  I now know a little bit but can see a lot has been written about the subject.  Looks like John Ellaway had bid for and secured a lease on the revenue from a section of the toll road and that the term of the lease extended beyond his death.  His father came from East Hendred but before that his grandfather was in Letcombe Regis and great grandfather in Wantage, born around 1625.  I have not found any other informative documentation that might explain John's his involvement in toll roads.  He describes himself as a yeoman farmer.  My ancestral line moves to Beenham well before the death of John and from there gets sucked into the East End of London.  I'm guessing that a lot of people have the same experience I've had seeing many branches of the family gravitate from rural occupations into the industrial centres and then getting mangled by the impact of the long depression once there. 

A document I found that was useful to skim through on Toll Roads is here :

http://www.turnpikes.org.uk/Reading%20turnpike%20roads.htm