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Phone Box Repaired, Bins Emptied, Beware Potholes…and Your Snow Photos

Following the recent disruptive weather, a number of local services were affected.

However, all is back to normal after the sub-zero temperatures and snowfall of last week. The Friday bin collection was carried out two days later, on Sunday morning. The parish-council-owned grit bin at the top of Woodlands Road has been refilled. The Milk and More doorstep delivery did not happen on Saturday but is now operating to schedule.

And the phone box outside the village shop, which had developed a fault, has been repaired by BT engineers.

Potholes remain a problem and are likely to be more so after the freeze and thaw. Please contact Surrey County Council to report them, using the link on this website which can be found by clicking on the Home button on the top menu.

Finally, a lot of people were out-and-about in the village taking photographs of the snow. If you would like to share them on this website, please do so by using the Submit a Photograph button on the right side of the opening page and following the instructions. They will then be added by the web team to the Gallery section, where some snow photographs are already available to view.

 

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Hambledon Midsummer Festival – Jazz on The Green Tickets have Sold Out

Our license for this event limits us to 499 attendees and tickets have now sold out.

If you would still like to attend, you can join a waiting list for any returned tickets by registering at this link.

Thanks to all who have purchased tickets and have helped ensure this will be a great evening and a successful fund raiser for the nominated charities.

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Winter Weather – An Update on Bin Collection and Other Matters

Hambledon has shivered along with the rest of the country with temperatures plunging to -8C (please see latest photos under the Gallery menu)  but it was only in the last two days that snow caused a problem.

Although there were several relatively minor accidents in the lanes around the village, Hambledon remained open for business and credit goes to the village shop, which offered free deliveries to customers using volunteers in 4-wheel-drive vehicles if needed, and to the nursery school, which remained open all week when many other schools closed.

Stephanie Campbell, school secretary, said a great deal of effort went into keeping the steep entrance, car park and pathways clear of ice and snow. “We enjoyed fun snow play at the nursery school, warming up with hot chocolate when it got chilly outside.”

The Merry Harriers welcomed customers with a big log fire and hot food. The church, however, has had to cancel its Sunday services because snow remains on the steep Church Lane approach.

Hambledon Road, which was regularly gritted by Surrey County Council, is now clear of snow. Other lanes were gritted by local people and thanks go to them for keeping the village on the move. Most of the grit bins belong to SCC and it is responsible for refilling them. The parish council owns and maintains the bin at the top of Woodlands Road and this will be refilled over the weekend.

The Friday waste collection did not happen but please leave your bins out as Waverley Borough Council has advised they will be emptied over the next few days.

The payphone kiosk outside the village shop is currently out of order but the fault has been reported to BT which has said it has alerted its engineers and expects the repair to be carried out early in the coming week.

Hambledon Parish Council has a team of volunteers with 4-wheel drives, chain saws etc, ready to help out in the event of weather-related disruption and a link to them and other helpful numbers can be found on the opening page of this website. Please contact Stewart Payne, in the first instance, on 07831 393561. Arthur Frearson has joined the volunteer team and can be reached on 01428 683812 or 01252 722973. Please do not contact Tim Coleman or Nick Watson for the time being as both are unavailable.

If a grit bin near to you is in need of a refill please contact Stewart who will put in a request to Surrey County Council.

Our photographs show a snow covered Rock Hill, outside the nursery school; Church Lane and the listed red payphone outside the shop and post office.

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Power Outage at Beech Hill

UPDATE: 11:31AM Power has now been restored

Properties in the Beech Hill/Woodlands Road area are currently without power. Engineers are currently working on fixing a fault with the local transmitter. An update has been promised by the power company by 1pm.

In the meantime the Village Shop has hot soup and superfast broadband….

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Hambledon Cricket Club AGM & Nets

Hambledon Cricket Club AGM will be taking place next Tuesday night (20th Feb) at the Cricket Pavilion, starting at 8pm. All welcome!

Also pre-season nets will begin soon.

When: Weekly sessions starting on Tuesday 6th March 7:45pm – 8:45pm.

Where: Charterhouse Sport Club, Duke’s Drive, Godalming, GU7 2RS

Cost: £5 adults / £2.50 students etc.

6 sessions are booked on Tuesday evenings from 7:45pm – 8:45pm up until 10th April, so please come along whenever you can!

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The “Surrey Advertiser” ship’s badge mystery

Hambledon Surrey or Hambledon Hampshire?  Unfortunately, neither.  As is mentioned at the end of an article on page 33 of the “Surrey Advertiser”, 9 February, a warship named “HMS Hambledon” isn’t associated with either village:  it was allocated to HRDC – ie Hambledon Rural District Council – in 1942.

Nothing was known about this until the ship’s badge was delivered to Cdr. Tony Coates RN, Royal British Legion, Hambledon, Hampshire, in 2017 by a couple who were thought to have been from Hambledon, Surrey.  That was not in fact the case;  but it did lead Cdr. Coates to contact me, as our then-Parish Clerk, to see whether we knew anything about the ship and its history.  I had a sneaking feeling that we should have Hambledon Rural District Council in our sights;  and this has been proved by my subsequent researches in the HRDC archives which are held by the Surrey Hisrory Centre.   It’s a fascinating story, still in the making;  but a bit of preliminary background may help avoid any further confusion.

Hambledon Rural District Council comprised the villages that in 1974 were combined with Farnham and Godalming to form what is now Waverley Borough Council.  Its headquarters were in Guildford, in what are now the offices of Guildford Borough Council.

During WWII Warship Weeks were organised as part of National Savings campaigns to raise enough money to build ships.  Towns and villages focused on cruisers and destroyers and from 14-23 March 1942 the HRDC villages organised a Warship Week to raise the quarter of a million pounds that were needed to build (and permit you to adopt) a destroyer.  In the event 11 villages, including our Hambledon, plus Godalming and Farnham raised over £500,000 and became the adopted parents of “HMS Hambledon”, a Hunt Class destroyer, and her crew.  The District Council immediately commissioned (and paid for) a suitable badge and it’s pictured in the “Surrey Advertiser” article.  Presumably it stayed with the ship until she was broken up in 1957;  but what happened to it afterwards?   To try and find out, Cdr. Coates decided to contact local Surrey media.

There’ll be a fuller story in due course, drawing on the ship’s naval record, the HRDC minute books and any other verifiable information that may come to light as a result of other enquiries that have already been put in hand.  There’ll also be a bit of correcting to do to some of the information that currently appears on line!