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Cuckfield Connections
A personal journey of discovery
Jun 152 min read
C15th: Tailoring trade - a model for 21st century
Edmund Flower, founder of Cuckfield Grammar School, was a master tailor who will have served an apprenticeship to learn his craft. He was...
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Jun 123 min read
c1470: Apprenticeship in tailoring
This article explains how tailors would learn their craft and progress through the trade and, on successful completion, become ‘freemen’....
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May 262 min read
1989: GCSE student uncovers 'Cottage glove industry' in Cuckfield
Mid Sussex Times January 27 1989 They made gloves fit for a Queen Cuckfield once had a thriving glove-making industry, and Queen Mary...
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May 75 min read
c15th: Merchant Taylors, who were (are) they?
Edmund Flower, the founder of Cuckfield Grammar School, was a member of - and for two years Master of - the Merchant Taylors' Company,...
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Mar 24, 20231 min read
1927: Dough weigh me
A fine of £1 and 1s. costs was inflicted on Cuckfield baker named Charles Cain, at named at the Haywards Heath Petty Sessions on Monday,...
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Feb 22, 20231 min read
1881: Shop local
Sir, Your correspondent 'Improvement' need not wonder much why the upper classes are so reluctant to deal with the Cuckfield...
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Jan 11, 20232 min read
1865: Death of Cuckfield's oldest tradesman
Sussex Advertiser - Tuesday 15 August 1865 CUCKFIELD. Death of the Oldest Tradesman.—The oldest established tradesman in this place...
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Aug 15, 20221 min read
1916: NFU questions employing women
Cuckfield Mr JC Macfarlane, of Cuckfield, chairman of the Haywards Heath branch of the National Farmers Union, when the question of...
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May 27, 20226 min read
Nine brickmaking sites in Cuckfield
If you asked a local resident 'what industrial production would you associate with Cuckfield' the most likely products that would be...
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Apr 29, 20222 min read
1724: A year to move a single tree 20 miles
The state of all the Wealden roads, until the macadamising process arrived later in the 19th century, was a constant source of adverse...
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Apr 25, 20221 min read
1870: Desperate farmers mend the roads
As late as the 1870's an observer reported 'roads being mended with the plough, the mire being turned up on the side to dry whilst a new...
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Mar 3, 20221 min read
1868: Cutting edge frozen egg experiment
In order to stock the lakes of New Zealand, several boxes containing the ova of the ‘omble chevalier.' a species of chart, have been...
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Feb 12, 20221 min read
1908: First road surfacing kills fish and threatens cattle
Cuckfield Urban Council is in trouble with Sussex farmers because it has tarred the roads to abolish the dirt nuisance. The farmers say...
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Jan 27, 20221 min read
1902: Well, well, no water, no pay.
A remarkable success In water finding has just taken place at Cuckfield by Mr H Chesterman, expert water finder, engineer, and surveyor,...
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Dec 26, 20212 min read
1905: Christmas party for the Workhouse Inmates
The Workhouse Inmates had a fine time of it on Boxing Day, thanks to the liberality of the Guardians and friends and also to the labours...
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Dec 1, 202114 min read
High Street Timeline
This Timeline is the first known attempt to collate the key dates and events relating to the coaching period and development of Cuckfield...
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Nov 22, 20214 min read
1850: Haunted brewer's home
This fascinating information was supplied by Mrs Joan A Freeman* formerly of Hove in June 1981 to Peter Holtham of the Sussex...
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Oct 5, 20211 min read
1917: Better late than never
Mr Beeching, grocer, of the High-street, had a lady call in his shop the other morning, and she said she had an account she wanted to pay...
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Sep 5, 20218 min read
1950s-70s: Jack Norris Snr - with skills admired by pro musicians
The Cuckoo Oh the cuckoo she is a merry bird she sings as she flies And she brings us good tidings and she tells us no lies And she sucks...
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Aug 19, 20213 min read
C16th/17th: We'll tan your hide
Perhaps a lesser known fact about Cuckfield is that it was one of the principal tannery centres in Sussex in the 16th and 17th centuries....
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