| Henry Leake, a Methodist minister,
responded to the early 19th-century campaign to provide allotments for labouring
families (see Hammond, J.L. and B., The Village Labourer, for the allotment
movement.) The Victoria County History says Leake let out 40 quarter-acre
plots. Leake's ground on an 1837 map is shown as two plots, one of 8 and
one of 2 acres. However the map was made by the Oxford and Great Western
Union Railway who were planning to build a line straight across his larger
plot, and he is listed as assenting to the scheme. (See Leigh J., Iffley,
Brunel and the Great Western Railway. ILHS Publication No 1). The plots
were part of the old open field called Iffley Meadow, north of the village;
maybe he thought compensation would provide better plots elsewhere. Modern
allotments have all gone under building, except this stretch on the slopes
of Rose Hill. This was old glebe land bought by the council for allotment
use. It has since had to be defended with vigour against the Council's own
development plans. |
