We have two beautiful rivers in south Hampshire, the Test and the Itchen. Both chalk streams, in their upper reaches these are noted for their water quality. In fact, due to the chalk aquafer on the Itchen, which has excellent storage and filtration, we get our water supply from this river.
But here in Chandler’s Ford we know of another, less well-known river, the Monks Brook. ‘Fordians see it popping up here and there, through Hiltingbury Lakes, at the bottom of people’s gardens, under roads: sometimes pretty as in Flexford Reserve, sometimes business-like as it rushes down a manmade culvert under Hursley Road.
So what do we know of our local river? It is difficult to give a length as it is formed from seven streams that rise on the chalk west and north of our town. Its official source is at Bucket’s Corner (at the sharp bend on the road from Valley Park to North Baddesley, near the old church, take an even sharper bend towards Ampfield). After flowing though Chandler’s Ford and Eastleigh it joins the River Itchen at the medieval salmon pool at Swaythling.
It is first documented in 932 in a charter where King Athelstan granted the estate of North Stoneham to a man called Alfred, as the river formed the estate boundary. Earlier than this, however, it is thought that the river may have been used to prevent flooding at South Stoneham.
In the fourteenth century the monks of Hyde Abbey, Winchester, owned the North Stoneham estate and the river’s current name came from them, at least for the northern stretch of the brook. For the southern stretch we find that a tenth-century charter calls in the Swaethling Well. ‘Swaethling’ means ‘misty stream’ and so the area of Swaythling is named after our river.
After the river rises near Bucket’s Corner, the principal branch of the stream flows north-east until it reaches the railway line towards Romsey. From here it flows south-east following the railway, under Flexford Road (where it is joined by a tributary that has risen near Hursley), through Flexford Reserve and all the way alongside the cycle/footpath through Valley Park to the station, where a tributary from Valley Park joins it. Here it is channelled through a culvert to go under Hursley and Winchester Roads and on to rejoin the railway as it progresses to Eastleigh.
There are other tributaries that flow through Chandler’s Ford that may be familiar. One rises on the western reaches of Cranbury Park, flows through Hocombe Mead and Cuckoo Bushes, under Valley Road and then seems to go underground though Merrileas until it joins the main branch at the bottom of Park Road. Another course that flows down some front gardens of Park Road, ending up around Mead Road, also originates in Cranbury Park before flowing through Hiltingbury, including the grounds of St Martin in the Wood. (This is the same stream that had to be diverted when St Martin’s was built as its original course went right through the middle of the new church’s site.)
Another tributary originates at some ponds on the Cranbury estate then flows through Hiltingbury to become part of Hiltingbury Lakes. It continues down the lower end of Kingsway to come out again south of Brownhill Road, then down to the main stream near the station.
Once the main river leaves the railway near Oakmount Avenue, soon it is channelled to go under Leigh Road and the M3 and then is allowed to flow more naturally through the Fleming Park golf course where a tributary that comes from Templars Way joins it.
It passes under Chestnut Avenue and travels south adjacent to Stoneham Lane towards the airport. Here it is has to vanish again to pass under the M27 and the sliproads for J5 before finding the railway again (this time the Eastleigh to Southampton stretch).
It goes under the railway and the A27 before passing the back of South Stoneham church. Here it enters the grounds of Southampton University’s Wessex Lane halls where the river was once a feature of the gardens (landscaped by Capability Brown) of the eighteenth-century South Stoneham House, designed by Nicholas Hawksmoor. The river feeds a large salmon pool and flows in to the river Itchen at Woodmill.
The southern stretch of the river between Eastleigh and Southampton forms a green corridor and is home to roe deer, badgers, otters, voles, lizards, kingfishers, great crested newts, wasp spiders and slowworms as well as many wetland plants.
The St Martin in the Wood branch flows through our garden. Usually, it is dry at this time of the year but this year it has flowed throughout the summer. We have a small water rate reduction because some of our groundwater drains straight into it. We love sitting in our swing seat and listening to the burbling of water on sunny afternoons.
We are very fortunate to have the Monks Brook at the bottom of our garden. Love to see it quietly flowing.
Very interesting piece Christine. I was born in Station Lane and growing up we had a rope swing across the “river” as we called it. In truth we could walk across with wellies on. We built rafts and floated under the railway line out to Hursley Road and beyond sometimes if the raft stayed together. Remember the floods on Hursley Rd, happy days. I believe there used to be floods in Leigh Rd as well where it runs under the road.
Hi Christine and Roger …
I lived in Meadow Grove from 1937 until 1958, and the nearest accessible point to Monk’s Brook for me, was Ford Bridge in Leigh Road … I remember as a kid, I always referred to it as ‘Ford River’, and it was many years later I realised it was Monks Brook, hitherto only referring to the bit in Hursley Road at the bottom of Park Road, and the stretch across the fields behind Deans.
The highlight of those youthful days, when about 11, was to walk with Dave Morris (from Chalvington Road) through the river wearing wellie boots as far as we could without the water entering our wellies … I remember on one occasion we made it almost to Chestnut Avenue before the inevitable occurred … our respective mothers had no idea of course where we were or what we were doing, other than we were with each other, so the challenge now was for each of us to get home with wet feet undiscovered … those were the days !!!
Thank you Christine, I am ashamed to say the brook ran through our garden, 187 Hursley Road, we never knew its name!!! We lived there from 1956 to 1966.
One objective of my lockdown walks has been to follow many of the streamlets that form the topography of Chandler’s Ford. To many of us a slope is just a slope, but of course water erosion and weathering are the cause. So if anyone has seen a bald chap looking over walls and through hedges it may well have been me. Many of our residents (like Mike) are lucky enough to have a water course in their gardens, culverted or not, and I hope they make the most of it.
A most interesting blog about Monks Brook that brought back childhood memories for me.
I was born in 1939 in Hursley and as a child always wished that we had a river to play in and explore. I vividly recall a big adventure when a group of us aged about 9 or 10 years old in about 1950, decided to follow the course of a small stream that ran from a lake in Hursley Park, passed close to the village cricket club and then on though a group of fields know as the ‘Quarters’. We were now entering unknown area for us as the stream followed the Romsey road and passed below Hawstead Farm at Ratlake. Incidentally this was where my Grand Father, William Jones, was born being one of 14 children. Some of your older followers may remember him as the owner and driver of a coach that provided a daily service from Hursley to Southampton. My father, Harry Jones, joined and ran the business which was known as Hursley Coaches until it was sold in the 1970s.
The little stream was now gradually getting wider and deeper as it passed under Hook Road and then passed through marshy woodland until we eventually arrived at Baddesley Road near Flexford. We crossed the road and were very exciting as we had never been so close to a railway line before. The stream, now a brook, ran through the marshy land below Hiltonbury Farm where my future wife, Jennifer Vining, was living but it was many years until we eventually met. We were now a long way from Hursley and decided to turn back and follow the roads back home arriving very tired, muddy and excited about our adventure into lands unknown.
Jennie and I eventually met as we both ended up working in the County Surveyors Department in Winchester. I was an articled pupil being trained as a civil engineer and after a few years was entrusted with the design of a new bridge to carry Hursley Road over Monks Brook near the railway station as part of the flood relief programme . The bridge was constructed by HCC workmen working under my direction and I used the calculations and drawings as part of my submission to become a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers. I understand that the bridge is still standing and flooding has not reoccurred. Somewhere I have colour slides taken during the construction of the bridge which I must sort out and maybe publish on this page.
Jennie and I were married at St Boniface Church in 1962 and with my proudly won professional qualifications, we departed to the tiny desert settlement of Doha in Qatar to help it to become the impressive city it is today.
Can anyone help!
I have a photo titled , Monksbridge , South Stoneham .
It is a photograph of a lady with a wide brim summer hat and parasol crossing a wooden bridge over a stream , I’m assuming c1900 and the stream is the Monksbrook .
I’m hoping someone will know where the Monksbridge can be found.
Thankyou