| Cobham | |
High Street |
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Cobham
Cobham shown within Surrey |
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| Population | 10,918 [1] |
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| OS grid reference | TQ109600 |
| District | Elmbridge |
| Shire county | Surrey |
| Region | South East |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | Cobham |
| Postcode district | KT11 |
| Dialling code | 01932 |
| Police | Surrey |
| Fire | Surrey |
| Ambulance | South East Coast |
| EU Parliament | South East England |
| UK Parliament | Esher and Walton |
| List of places: UK • England • Surrey | |
Cobham is a town in the Borough of Elmbridge in Surrey, England, about 20 miles (32 km) south-west of central London and 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Leatherhead. Elmbridge has been acclaimed by the Daily Mail as the best place to live in the UK, and Cobham is a prosperous part of the London commuter belt. Cobham Fairmile ward has a population of 4,760[2] whilst neighbouring Cobham and Downside has a population of 6,158.[3] The area is also home to the training grounds of London-based Premier League club Chelsea and many of their players and staff live in the vicinity.
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Cobham is an ancient settlement whose origins can be traced back through Roman times to the Iron Age. Cobham lay within the Saxon administrative district of Elmbridge hundred.
Cobham appears in Domesday Book as Covenham and was held by Chertsey Abbey. Its domesday assets were: 12½ hides; 3 mills worth 13s 4d, 10 ploughs, 1-acre (4,000 m2) of meadow, woodland worth 40 hogs. It rendered altogether £14.[4] Coveham or Covenham is thought to mean a settlement in the curve of a river.
Historically, Cobham comprised two separate communities, Street Cobham and Church Cobham. The former lay on the road to London, and the building now known as the Cobham Exchange was once a coaching inn. The community of Church Cobham grew up around St. Andrew's Church, which dates from the 12th century. Although much altered and extended in the 19th century, the church preserves a Norman tower and is a Grade I listed building.[5][6]
The arrival of the railway in the 1880s led to the expansion of the original village, which became increasingly suburbanised during the 20th century. Until the 1960s, the entrance to the High Street from River Hill to the south was very narrow. A number of historic and picturesque buildings were demolished at that time, some of them to enable the road to be widened, some to be replaced by contemporary buildings more suitable for shops. Subsequently the High Street has developed into a busy local shopping centre. Although many small shops such as greengrocers, butchers and haberdashers have disappeared, there remains a wide variety of businesses in the High Street and neighbouring streets.
Cobham is not far from Brooklands, and there was a certain amount of associated aviation and motoring activity at Cobham during the last century. Leading motor engineer and car designer Reid Railton set up a manufacturing facility and built the well known Railton road cars at the Fairmile Works from 1933-40. An example of the Railton car is displayed locally at Brooklands Museum.
In World War II, after the Vickers-Armstrongs aircraft factory at Brooklands was badly bombed by the Luftwaffe on 4 September 1940, with heavy loss of life and many more injured, the Vickers Experimental Department was quickly dispersed to secret premises on the Silvermere and Foxwarren Park estates along Redhill Road. Engineer and inventor Barnes Wallis also carried out important trials catapulting models of his 'Upkeep' bouncing bomb across Silvermere Lake around 1942 and conducted spinning trials with larger prototypes at 'Depot W46' (the largest of the three dispersed sites). Vickers had numerous other war-time dispersed depots in the local area and those in Cobham included Corbie Wood and Riseholme (in Seven Hills Road), Conway Cottage and Norwood Farm.
Despite its proximity to both Brooklands and Wisley airfields (both active until the early 1970s), Cobham saw relatively few aircraft crashes. Most notable was a Lockheed P-38 Lightning fighter which flew low over Brooklands apparently in trouble and crashed at Cobham on 16th March 1944; the pilot survived but little else is known of this incident.
During World War II, another well-known aircraft company, Airspeed Ltd, apparently set up an almost forgotten design office at Fairmile Manor and is believed to have designed the Ambassador airliner there before moving back to Portsmouth in the late 1940s.
After the war, Vickers' Experimental Department continued to use two of the Redhill Road sites (now known as 'Foxwarren') and built new aircraft prototypes there such as the Viscount airliner and Valiant V-bomber, until it moved back to the main factory at Brooklands in the late 1950s.
In the seventies Cobham resident Mike Chambers built Huron Formula Fords and a Formula Atlantic car at the Silvermere works on the North side of the A3 and Geoff Uren prepared the BMW team saloon cars and Graham Hill's Jaegermeister sponsored Formula 2 car.
From 1972-2011, the Cobham Bus Museum occupied a war-time aircraft hangar (used mainly by Vickers-Armstrongs as a machine shop) next to Silvermere golf course in Redhill Road. The bus museum re-opened as the London bus museum at Brooklands Museum on 1 August 2011 and its former premises were demolished a few weeks earlier to be replaced by a new care home.
| Weybridge | Hersham | Esher | ||
| West Byfleet | Oxshott | |||
| Cobham | ||||
| Ripley | Great Bookham Little Bookham |
Leatherhead |
On the outskirts of Cobham is Stoke d'Abernon, whose name is taken from a family who settled there at time of the Norman conquest in 1066.
The local newspaper was the Cobham News & Mail until it closed and was incorporated into the Surrey Advertiser.[7] Cobham is also covered by the Elmbridge Guardian, the Surrey Herald and the Surrey Comet newspapers.
Chelsea F.C.'s training ground is nearby, close to Cobham and Stoke d'Abernon railway station, and Cobham's exclusive private estates are home to many of Chelsea's players.
At the heart of Cobham is the Church Cobham Conservation Area, which was designated in 1973 and includes fourteen statutory listed buildings. Amongst these are Pyports,[8] once the home of Vernon Lushington; the picturesque Church Stile House;[9] and two fine houses overlooking the River Mole: Ham Manor [10] and Cedar House,[11] the latter owned by the National Trust.
Across the river from the church, the estate of Cobham Park was the home of John Ligonier, 1st Earl Ligonier, who was made Commander-in-Chief of the army in 1757. The present house was completed in 1873 to a design by Edward Middleton Barry:[12] it has now been divided into apartments. At the other end of the town, beside the A3, Painshill Park is a fine 18th century landscape garden, restored from dereliction since 1980. Painshill House dates from the 18th century and has also been divided into apartments.[13]
Two other large houses on the outskirts of Cobham have been taken over by schools: Heywood is now the American Community School,[14] and Burwood House is now Notre Dame School.[15]
The River Mole provides a setting for Cobham's best-known landmark which is the red brick water mill, constructed in 1822 and once part of a much larger complex.[16] It stands on the site of earlier mills dating back to the Middle Ages. The mill was in use until 1928 when it became uneconomical to continue operating.
In 1953 the main part of the mill was demolished by Surrey County Council to alleviate traffic congestion on Mill Road. The remaining building was restored to full working order by the Cobham Mill Preservation Trust, and is now open to the public from 2pm to 5pm on the second Sunday of each month between April and October.
The primary school is called St Andrew's.[17] There is no state secondary school. The two main local prep schools are Parkside School and Feltonfleet School. There are three independent schools: Notre Dame; ACS (The American Community Schools) Cobham International and Reed's School.[18]
Painshill Park is nearby and Silvermere golf course is located in Redhill Road on the North side of the A3. Cobham has three football clubs: Cobham Football Club, Cobham United Football Club and Cobham Town FC (formed 2007). There is Cobham Rugby Football Club[19] and Cobham Village Club along with a branch of the Royal British Legion. Cobham Players[20] is the only group regularly presenting plays, musicals, pantomimes and other entertainments in Cobham.
Walton Firs Activity Centre lies just off the A3 in Cobham and covers 28 acres. It takes its name from Colonel Walton who dealt with the purchase of the site in 1939. It was used by a Royal Artillery Anti-Aircraft Battery during World War II and in peace time returned to use a Scout camp site. During the 1990s some 3,000 additional trees were planted and more recently an all-weather barn and an artificial, but realistic, caving complex have been added.
The Member of Parliament is Conservative Dominic Raab[21] in the Esher and Walton constituency. Dominic succeeded Ian Taylor who stood down for the 2010 General Election. In local government Cobham is part of Elmbridge Borough Council and Surrey County Council. Divided into two wards, Cobham Fairmile [22] and Cobham & Downside [22] for Elmbridge voting, there are five councillors, all Conservative. For Surrey County voting, Cobham is paired with Stoke d'Abernon.
Cobham, with its many old buildings, conservation areas and housing development pressures has a very active Heritage Trust,[23] re-formed in 2007, and a lower-profile Residents Association.[24] Unlike neighbouring areas in Elmbridge, Residents and amenity groups [25] do not contest local elections in Cobham, although occasionally independents have stood without success, most recently in a 2007 by-election. The only non-Conservative elected was a Liberal/Focus[26] councillor, Mike King in 1984 in the Fairmile ward, which includes some high density social and private housing beside the A3, as well as more upmarket private estates. Cobham and Downside ward includes the village centre, private estates off the A245 Stoke Road, semi-rural Downside and into Hatchford south of the M25.
For the 2009 Surrey County election, the local Conservatives have selected Elmbridge councillor and former Parliamentary candidate John V. C. Butcher[27] in preference to Dorothy Mitchell who has served the area since 1983. Another of the Cobham & Downside members on Elmbridge, Mike Bennison since 2005 also represents the next 3 stops up the line to London Oxshott Claygate and Hinchley Wood on Surrey County Council.
To the north and west of the town is the A3 trunk road, a major arterial route from London to Portsmouth. This road links to the M25 motorway at Junction 10, immediately to the south of Cobham.
Cobham & Stoke d'Abernon railway station, opened in 1885, is on the "New Guildford Line" from London Waterloo with journey times around 40 minutes.
Nowadays, Cobham Police Station is only used for minor issues; everything else is handled from Esher Police Station.
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