Now here is a little town at the southern edge of the High Weald that doesn’t seem to blow its own trumpet.
Perhaps it should, as a warning, for the infant River Uck, a tributary of the Ouse that is bridged at the foot of the High Street and has often caused floods of some severity. Next to the bridge, is the striking and several times restored Bridge Cottage and aisled Medieval Hall House about which you can find more information in the 2021 volume of the Sussex Archaeological Collections. At the other end of the High Street is the Maidens Head Hotel which Fanny Burney (an English satirical novelist, diarist, and playwright) visited in 1799 but didn’t find much of enduring interest.
I recall some more interesting political battles here in the fifties and sixties. Also from that time, I recall driving out of Uckfield eastwards on a summer’s evening with the driver’s window open when a large tawny owl made a valiant effort to get in. It was only later that I learned that the road up to Framfield is called “Bird in the Eye Hill”.
To the north of the town was the historic house of Buckham Hill and some striking local rocks. To the south, as well as the Sussex National Golf course, is the garish, incomplete and unoccupied mansion of Mr Nicholas Hoogstraten. The rather circuitous railway from London used to go on to Lewes and Brighton. The only bit of that line now remaining is the very short Lavender Line at Isfield just south of Uckfield. Unlike the famed and well-preserved Bluebell Line which drew its name from the lineside vegetation, the Lavender Line drew its name from Mr Lavender who was the contractor responsible for the local line and who preserved this little section. And the line from London now stops at Uckfield.
There are still some fine old shops on the High Street, in particular, Carvils, the furnishers and tailors whose owner brothers used to turn out in two vintage Austin 12s as I used to turn out in a non-vintage Austin 10.
As one comes on to the High Street from West Street one is confronted by the Cinque Port Club – it seems a long way from the Cinque Ports (the Sussex ones are Rye, Hastings, and Seaford). At the southern edge of the town, the road forks by The Highlands Inn (which I recall being kept by Yorkshireman, Vince Snaith, formerly of Cuckfield) with the A21 going left for Eastbourne and the right-hand fork going to Lewes. The latter goes past Little Horsted Hall now a boutique hotel and Clayhill sometime resident of Prime Minister James Callaghan (and a rather secret club where I remember (once I had been recognised through a spyglass) spending some jolly early mornings).
Uckfield maintains sway as a market town although sadly with no market. The town was also once the center of the alleged Piltdown forger, Charles Dawson, and also boasts a little theatre and some industrious appearances in the local court. I recall a defendant to a charge of assault announcing his occupation as “throat slitter”- he worked at the nearby Buxted chicken farm.
Contributed by Peter Benner
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