The Ockley Hamlet grew to service the needs of Ockley Farm, the hub of the Ockley Estate since the 17th Century, although it is likely there was a farmhouse on the site for at least a hundred years before that.

Medieval Period

The Ockley Estate in much its current guise originates in the Rape of Lewes in the 13th Century. It is considered likely that at this time there may have been a house on the site of the existing Ockley Manor.

Post Medieval Period

John Wood’s death in 1559 bequests to his son ‘his chief house named the manor of Occalye in Kemer and the lands there belonging’.

17th Century

We know that the four main farmstead buildings - the main house, the dovecote, the barn and the granary were all built in a similar era, and from stylistic dating of brickwork and other features, this was at the latest during the 1600s.

The main house was probably never a manorial seat, the land being owned by people with considerably grander houses, but initially tenanted as part of the farm.

18th & 19th Century

These are the centuries of development of the farm, the farmstead buildings and ultimately the associated cottages up and down the lane, that form the Hamlet of Ockley.

James Wood took ownership of the farm and the house in 1718 and transformed the house in to a higher status residence , financed we assume by the proceeds of the farm.

As we enter the high farming years (1750 - 1880) we can trace the addition of farm buildings through the maps of the time.

John Wood’s estate map of 1808-1813 shows the main house, dovecote and barn as a group with the cowshed, malthouse and granary to the North. By the 1845 tithe map this group has been added to by a cottage to the southeast of the main house (the Garden Cottage), on the site now occupied by Millway Cottage, and two cottages to the north (7-8 Ockley Manor Farm Cottages).

By 1881 the growth of the farm required more farm hands on site necessitating further building. A cottage had been built opposite the malthouse / courtyard group on the other side of Ockley Lane (6, Ockley Cottages, replaced by the later Barn Cottage). The original cottage was built in the same ‘estate’ style’ as the other buildings, comprising flint with bands of brickwork, visible on the aerial photo at the foot of the page.

Three further cottages were added by 1897 (nos. 3, 4, 5 Ockley Cottages), and by now the farm was split away from Ockley Manor, although there remained inter-tenancy of land and the residents of the cottages worked across both Ockley Manor Farm and Ockley Manor itself, with many families having family members working on the farm, with others as servants in the Manor.

The farm had also seen the addition of two further large barns through the 1800s, one to form the eastern-most barn, a cart-shed, the other to enclose the courtyard group close to Ockley Lane.

20th Century

The early years of the 20th Century saw the two further cottages being added Northwards in Ockley Lane to the farm (1 & 2 Ockley Cottages) plus a new farm house overlooking the farm land, at Ockley House and Woodside. Two further houses were built for the owners of the Manor House southwards in Ockley Lane near the S bend. Arable farming became mechanised, although much of the land remained grazing land, with cattle and sheep being reared. The field shapes remained very much similar to the old field shapes of the 18th and 19th century, although inevitably with a number of fields joined together as the use of mechanisation grew.

Some of the cottages were sold off in to private ownership towards the end of the century, providing a statement for the decline of the number of people engaged in agriculture.

21st Century

The courtyard group of barns were developed for residential use in the early 2000s, forming Malthouse Barn, Ockley Manor Farm Barn and The Granary, becoming privately owned. The Barn at Ockley Manor was also converted for residential use.

More cottages and two of the farm barns were sold in 2015, including 7-8 Ockley Manor Farm Cottages and the cowshed and cart-shed, which had been used for farming purposes until that time. The two cottages and the two barns have been acquired by the current owners of Ockley Manor, in order for them to be restored and returned to functional use as part of the Ockley estate - coming full circle.

The Ockley Estate in the second half of the 20th Century