Flackwell Local Area History Group

This local history group for residents of Flackwell Heath, Loudwater and Wooburn, in Buckinghamshire, aims to promote an interest in our history and to foster a sense of community.

Repairing Old Thatch House, Sheepridge, from Malcolm LudlowRepairing Old Thatch House, Sheepridge, from Malcolm Ludlow Our objectives are:

  • To conduct research into aspects of the history and life in the communities of Flackwell Heath, Loudwater and Wooburn
  • To hold exhibitions on subjects of historical and topical interest
  • To conduct community projects on the history of Flackwell Heath, Loudwater, Wooburn and their environs and related subjects of local and community interest
  • To liaise with schools and other local interest groups to provide information on the history of Flackwell Heath, Loudwater, Wooburn and area
  • To support Flackwell Heath Community Library in preserving records and sources of information on the history of the locality
  • To organise talks, seminars and workshops on local history.
  • Spring Programme 2025

    All talks for 2025 will be at the Flackwell Heath Community Library.

    Welcome to our first round of talks for 2025. More talks will be avertised as soon as they are confirmed. We look forward to seeing you in 2025.

    Monday 20th January 2025 from 7.30pm
    John Hampden with Beth Rogers at Flackwell Heath Community Library

    Known as "The Great Patriot" and "The Father of the People", it is said, even by his enemies, that the whole nation mourned when John Hampden died. How did a modest Chilterns squire become such an important national figure, and a beacon of liberty for the American Founding Fathers and the Chartists? This talk explores the remarkable life of John Hampden, Parliamentarian and military commander. It includes his opposition to King Charles I's arbitrary taxes, culminating in the Ship Money Trial, and his escape from arrest for treason. The role of his Buckinghamshire Greencoats in the Battle of Brentford is explained, and the background to the Battle of Chalgrove, where he was mortally wounded.
    Dr Beth Rogers is Chair of The John Hampden Society. She has had a long career in the IT sector, consultancy and higher education. She was brought up in High Wycombe, where she developed a love of history, and a life-long interest in John Hampden.
    Concerning the painting, which is the only one that we know was produced in his lifetime, the acknowledgement is "Used with kind permission from the Earl of St Germans."

    This is a ticketed event. The tickets are available from the library on Tuesday 17 th December and are £5 (£3 to friends of FHCL). Please note the doors will open at 7:15pm, and that tickets will not be available on the night.

    Monday 3rd March 2025 from 7.30pm
    Retailers in High Wycombe with Jackie Kay at Flackwell Heath Community Library

    More information about this talk nearer the time.
    The tickets will be available from the library from Tuesday 28th January 2025

    Monday 28th April 2025 from 7.30pm
    Roman roads with Nigel Rothwell, Bucks Archaeological Society at Flackwell Heath Community Library

    More information about this talk nearer the time but it will include Roman roads in this locality.

    Standing with Giants group event
    Standing with Giants group event

    We try to arrange events for our researchers and the Standing with Giants workshop in 2024 was enjoyed by all. It was lovely to see some of our handiwork displayed on the Normandy beaches during the summer and later at Stowe.

    To listen to stories of local servicemen involved in both world wars, click here.

    Flackwell Local Area History Group Files
    If you are interested in our local history then don't forget that there are many books and folders in the lobby of the Community Library that may help you in your research. If you can't find what you are looking for then do ask.



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    Our Fact Finding Forum is no longer running as we feel that we have run out of topics 'within living memory' to discuss and research. Our twentieth century shops, chapels, churches, schools, pubs, farms and houses have all come under our gaze at the fact finding evenings and this research is now being added to the Flackwell Heath Timeline.

      Timeline of Flackwell Heath.


     This timeline has been prepared by members of the group. It lists the events which have shaped Flackwell Heath since 1800 and also sets them in the national and international context. We hope you enjoy reading it. Further information about any of the events listed on the Timeline would be welcomed and we invite your comments or corrections.

    Contact the group at info@localhistorygroup.org.uk 
    Note that folders on the farms, woods and houses which support our timeline investigations can be found in the local history section in Flackwell Heath Community Library.

    We now feel that we need to go further back in time to find out how these buildings, and local family names, came to be here in the first place. A new research group has thus been formed to investigate deeper into our past and if you would like to join us please click here to contact us.

    Schools Records
    The Local History Group have CDs of the Flackwell Heath (1876-1913) & Loudwater Schools records for sale at £5 each. Please contact Pat Trotter 01628 524332 if you wish to buy a copy.

    Book a Family History Research session
    Would you like to find out about where you come from? Would you like to know who your grandparents or great-grandparents were, and where they came from?

    If you would like to discover more about your family using the internet but are unsure how to start, then why not try a session of family history research. To arrange a research session please contact Gill Kyle on 01494 436314 or by email donkyle@btinternet.com. The sessions cost £2.00 for 50 minutes plus the cost of any photocopying.

    Appeal Corner
    We continue to gather information about our villages in the past. Copies of old photographs of local houses, schools, churches, chapels, pubs, farms and farmland are always welcomed. If you have old cine films of your road, house or family filmed in this area we would love to see them to enable us to compare then and now.
    Please feel free to contact Pat Trotter on 01628 524332 or email pattrotter@talktalk.net

    Greeting Cards
    Also available from the library are local area greeting cards. They are blank inside and cost £2.50 each.

    Facebook
    Flackwell Local Area History Group has its own page on Facebook where you can view and comment on old pictures and interesting information about our villages. If you are a Facebook user and would like to join the page there is a direct link at the top of this page or go to https://www.facebook.com/FlackwellLocalAreaHistoryGroup/ and 'like' the page.



    If you would like to share information in advance on the topics contained in any of our talks we would love to hear from you.
    click here to contact us.

    (For all enquiries please contact the Flackwell Heath Community Library, Chapel Road, Flackwell Heath)


    The group in action:
    Talks, exhibitions and displays at the Flackwell Heath Community Library



    Costumed cemetery tour for the centenary of WW1 at Little Marlow Cemetery



    Previous events

    2024
    Four For Thought with John Gurney
    Commonwealth War Graves Commission – Gardening the Globe with Kevin Fitzsimons
    Willie & Ettie Grenfell: The Souls of Taplow Court with Nigel Smales
    The 80th Anniversary of D-Day with John Gurney
    Cliveden: The American Millionaires with Cliveden speaker
    How Lucky We Were with Luca Webb
    The Commonwealth War Graves Commission with Ron Baker

    2023
    Prehistoric Buckinghamshire with Michael Farley
    Thames Valley Millionaires with Keith Parry
    Coaching Inns with Julian Hunt
    The Bishop of Lincoln and our local area with Michael Garrido
    The Home Front During WWII with John Gurney
    Beacons of the Past: Chilterns Iron Age Hillforts with Dr Wendy Morrison

    2022
    Under the Radar – does Flackwell Heath have wartime secrets? with Sally Scagell
    The Mills of the River Wye with John Gurney
    From Yesteryear to Here - the Jubilee edition - with Sally Scagell
    From Yesteryear to Here with Sally Scagell
    Lords of the Manor with Sarah Charlton and Mike Dewey
    Sticky Bombs and Stool Pigeons with John Gurney

    2021
    The Caringtons with Sarah Charlton
    Secrets of Bucks in WWII with John Gurney

    2020
    All further 2020 talks postponed due to the pandemic
    Sticky Bombs and Stool Pigeons with John Gurney

    2019
    Repeat of Cliveden: Passion, Pleasure and Politics Secrets of Bucks in WWII Group Visit to the Bunker at RAF Uxbridge
    Cliveden: Passion, Pleasure and Politics
    Steam on the Met and Chiltern Lines
    Dreaming of Home Part Two – the village the men left behind

    2018
    The Battle's Over – A Nation’s Tribute
    Dreaming of Home Part One – the village the men left behind
    Disraeli: The Unlikely Prime Minister
    Rations to Fashions - shopping in High Wycombe 1945-1970
    Steam on the Met and Chiltern Lines
    High Wycombe’s Contribution to Aviation
    Literary Luminaries of Buckinghamshire and their Secrets
    Lesser Known Grand Houses in Bucks

    2017
    Hospital Train 314
    Lost Pubs in Our Villages
    Woodturning by KraftinWood
    ‘Frackle’ – what happened: Who built what, where, when and why?
    Loudwater in the Great War
    Buckinghamshire Spies and Subversives
    Warfare takes to the Air
    A History of Local Railways
    A History of Wooburn Town and St Paul's Church

    2016
    Wycombe Man, Carving a Niche in the World
    Frackle People and Places - from olden times to the 1950s - twice
    Volunteers from Flackwell Local Area History Group acted as guides for WW1 Wycombe Cemetery pageant
    Volunteers from Flackwell Local Area History Group acted as models for A Dress to Die For at Wycombe Arts Festival
    Over a Hundred Years of Local Railway History
    History of Chairmaking in Wycombe
    The Villages in the Great War part 1 - Flackwell Heath

    2015
    History of Chairmaking in Wycombe
    Stained glass making at Burleighfield
    The Local Machine Riots of 1830/31 - Rioters families
    Early Schooling in Flackwell & Loudwater - twice
    Over a Hundred Years of Local Railway History - thrice and always a sell out!

    2014
    Women on the Home Front
    Glory Mill - Walk and Talk
    The History of paper-making talk
    Our World at War - Little Marlow Cemetery tour
    To Boldly Glow - History of glow worms in the area
    Assistance at Tell Them of Us, WW1 Cemetery Tour, High Wycombe
    Glory Mill - Walk and Talk
    Our Villages in the Great War
    Then and Now - Fennels Wood a changing story - twice

    2013
    Fund raising Quiz Night
    The history of Windsor Chairs
    A virtual tour of the surrounding area - SWOP
    Open evening - house histories and Glory Mill
    The Times of their Lives - Little Marlow Cemetery tour
    Lace Making presentation
    Walk for National Mills Weekend
    Silt Road - the Wye
    Farming in Flackwell Heath
    Our research on the Machine Riots

    2012
    The Machine Riots of 1830
    Open evening - sharing the past
    Jubilee Exhibition
    Community Library Opening - History Display


    To contact the group, please click here

    To find out more about our activities please use the links below:

    For a visual history of our villages go to Flackwell folk: www.galaxypix.com/Sally/Flackwellfolk/
    Loudwater lea: www.galaxypix.com/Sally/Loudwaterlea/

    Your memories of village life are always much appreciated and these will appear under the learn more buttons on our Flackwell folk and Loudwater lea websites:click here to contact us.

    For 'Then and Now' images of the area click here

    Here is a Timeline of Flackwell Heath.


    Our Research Projects

    Members of the Local History Group have wide ranging interests, from transport to houses, and places to people. To find out more about our research projects please click below:
    Our research projects



    Local War Memorials
    The Flackwell Local Area History Group has now completed its research into the WW1 soldiers who are named on the Flackwell Heath War Memorial. A folder of this research is available in Flackwell Heath Community Library. In 2016 five new WW1 names were added to the memorial thanks to this research.

    Our research into the Loudwater WW1 names is also complete and a folder of this research is also available in the Library. Information on both these war memorial projects can also be found on this website tinyurl.com/warmemorials but this is still a work in progress as more information becomes available.

    The WW1 names on the Wycombe Marsh war memorial have also been researched during 2017 by member Ruth Bowler and this was presented to the people of Wycombe Marsh in October 2017.

    Our World War Two research is now completed but we hope that anyone with additional memories of the WW2 men named on the memorial will contact us with any further information. Also, any stories of life in our villages during this time will be warmly welcomed.

    Do click here if you have anything to offer our research.



    The Group also took part in the 'Tell Them of Us - Wycombe and the Somme' cemetery pageant at Wycombe Cemetery in 2016. A website providing self guided WW1 trails of the war graves and memorials in Wycombe Cemetery can be found here: www.galaxypix.com/Sally/Losttheplot/Tellthemofus/index.html
    (Some of our local men are buried in Wycombe Cemetery.)



    The Group's research into what happened to the Swing Rioters of 1830 who were transported to Tasmania, and the stories of the families they left behind, has now been completed. The research is now available in the library.



    Remember to pick up a Walks Guide Sheet
    The Local History Group wish to encourage you to get out and discover some local views and the history under our feet. Jane Dunsterville has devised three circular walks in and around Flackwell Heath that are available from the Library. Pick up your Guide Sheet and discover an old trade route, the road that is named after a local merchant and the Old Wharf at Little Marlow.
    Walks are entitled:
    Fennels Wood
    Down on the Farm
    Golf links Loop



    Jane has also created a Mills Walk (which can be done in stages) and which takes you on a journey into the past and our papermaking heritage. Maps for this walk are available from the Library.



    For further information about any of our events and activities please call into the library, click here

    Site last updated 13th December 2024

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