Netherfield Toll

[artifis]

I am trying to find the location of Netherfield Toll, presumably Toll House.

Henry Saunders aged 52 was living there in the 1901 census but I can't find it on any of the 1:2500 scale OS maps of the time. On the 1874 map there is a line across a side turning off the Netherfield Road with the letters T.P. alongside it, am I right in thinking the letters might mean Toll Point?

The turning is near the Post Office and is on a road that leads south to the Northtrade Road that runs into Battlen near to the Union Workhouse.  This road is quite straight in places, not the typical meandering roads of the area, and than makes me wonder if that was a toll road.

Looking at current maps it seems the junction has been altered and any building that was there has been demolished to make way for the revised junction so there's no current evidence of it former layout or buildings.

Any thoughts please?

[mckha489]

This book on google books has some distances from the toll to other landmarks

https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=cxvNImjh8T0C&pg=PA496&lpg=PA496&dq=netherfield+toll&source=bl&ots=gjfaoix8MZ&sig=ACfU3U3l4xlbe7vNCqPZKSNs81_SEovZtg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiy4pKii8vkAhUTQH0KHWMHCvsQ6AEwEnoECAUQAQ#v=onepage&q=netherfield%20toll&f=false

[mckha489]

There was a farm called Netherfield Toll Farm

http://www.sussex-opc.org/index.php?q=24996&t=property&k=24996

[artifis]

Thanks for those links. 

The problem seems to be that following the enumerator's census records in the 1901 census many of the places he's recorded are not on either the 1898 or 1909 1:2500 scale OS maps so it's impossible to follow his route plus I suspect that he dodged about somewhat if what I can follow is a guide.

I can't find Toll Farm and the Toll Wood indicated on the maps doesn't seem to tie in with any Toll point.

I guess I'll not be able to find where it was now. 

[stanmapstone]

On the 1874 map there is a line across a side turning off the Netherfield Road with the letters T.P. alongside it, am I right in thinking the letters might mean Toll Point?

TP   Telegraph Pole
TP   Turnpike
https://maps.nls.uk/os/abbrev/t.html

Stan

[artifis]

Telegraph Pole make sense as there is a Post Office nearby.

[arthurk]

The following page has a reference to "Limekiln Wood, near Netherfield Toll":

http://www.wcms.org.uk/cgi-bin/wcmsarchive.pl?archid=topley_sussex_nov2005

Limekiln Wood can be seen near the top of this map, NE of Netherfield:

https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=15&lat=50.9468&lon=0.4452&layers=6&b=1

There's also Netherfield Down, where the church is, and that might have been where the original village centre was. Toll Wood is also shown, SW of Netherfield Down.

I also found an article about turnpike trusts in East Sussex, which may or may not help:

http://scm.pastfinders.org/pdf/scm11_turnpike_trusts.pdf

[artifis]

Hi Arthurk

Thanks for those links, the last one allowed me to confirm my thinking on what was the Toll Road, the new one.  It ran from just to the west of the Battle Union buildings at Battle Lodge, northwards through Beechdown Wood, through Sprays Wood/High Wood and alongside Evebrook Wood to Netherfield.  From Netherfield westwards the original road was altered and upgraded to a Toll Road standard.

The map from the second confirmed what I'd found on another site but of better quality.  I must get to grips with the maps on the nls site though I must admit I've struggled when I've looked in the past - reading the instructions more carefully would help I guess! 

Toll Wood is next to Netherfield Place and doesn't appear to link to the Toll Road and the Limekild Woods is some way away, I guess the Toll Gate was a well known landmark to use to identify locations especially where Netherfield appears to have been a strung out community along a long road.  I agree that the centre of the village was probably near the church which as also where the driveway to Netherfield Place joined the road - I found references to Netherfield Place being the home of the local squire.

Thanks for everyone's help, I'm now happy I've located the Toll House where Henry lived, now to try and locate other dwellings in Netherfield Road where he and his father lived at other census dates.

[artifis]

I spoke too soon!

After further checking and following the approximate route the enumerator took in 1901, I'm certain that Netherfield Toll was not at the junction of the 1813 new toll road and the old Netherfield Road.  There is a building there in the 1874 1:2500 scale OS map with a bench mark indicated on it but in all subsequent editions of the map there is a blank area where the building was and no bench mark.  I suspect that the building that disappeared was the original Toll Gate house but that function had gone by post 1874.

The term 'Toll' seems to have been somewhat randomly in Netherfield over the years, i.e. Toll Wood not adjacent to the new toll road, and Netherfield Toll appears to have been in the area of the church, somewhere near the gatehouse to Netherfield Court which seems to have been called Woodlands on the OS maps - perhaps renamed but still referred to as Netherfield Place.

The sum result is I can't identify where Henry lived in 1901 which is a shame but not unexpected.

Thanks for everyone's help.