Slinfold

Geography

The village is almost 4 miles (6.4 km) west of Horsham, just off the A29 road.

The parish covers 4,186 acres (1,694 ha). The 2001 Census recorded a population of 1,647 people living in 627 households of whom 780 were economically active.

Slinfold is the source of the western River Adur, which flows to the English Channel at Shoreham-by-Sea

Manors

There has been a house at Dedisham, 1 mile (1.6 km) northeast of the village, since at least 1271, when Henry III granted the then occupier a licence to crenellate the manor house then on the site. The present house on the site appears to date from the 16th or 17th century. During the English Civil War the Parliamentarian commander Sir William Waller sacked a house on this site in 1643.

Slinfold Manor, 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south of the village, is a Georgian house built late in the 18th century.

Church and chapel

The Church of England parish church of Saint Peter was designed by the Gothic Revival architect Benjamin Ferrey in a late 13th-century style and built in 1861 on the site of the original medieval parish church.

Slinfold Chapel is linked with Horsham United Reformed Church.

Economic and social history

Slinfold railway station on the Cranleigh Line was opened in 1865 and closed in 1965. The trackbed of the line now forms part of the Downs Link Bridleway. The route of the former Roman road linking London and Chichester passes through the parish and a Roman posting station existed at Alfoldean. In 1848 it was recorded that Roman swords and brass ornaments had been found in the parish.

Slinfold has a village shop and Post Office, a primary school and pre-school, a recreation ground, a village hall and one public house, the Red Lyon. Where Slinfold Railway station used to be is now a Caravan Club site.

Bell legend

It is said that there is a boggy hollow near Slinfold which contains a sunken bell. Long ago some villagers, hoping to retrieve the bell, sought the advice of a witch. She told them that it could only be retrieved by 12 white oxen, at midnight. The oxen were used, but one villager broke the witch's instructions by speaking, and the bell sank back into the bog.