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Chilton has been in existence since before the Domesday survey and its present
church since a few years after that time. Over the centuries many changes have
taken place.
The duck pond on the upper green is gone. Instead there is the drainage pond for
the noisome A34. But the Aylesburys have been replaced by wild mallard which
home in at night to rest safely in the middle of the fenced-about water, and
wait each morning for the kindly lady who saves her crusts for them.
Church Farm, the pride and success of old Jo Church back in the 1800s, is now an
estate of desirable residences. Likewise, Lime Tree Farm no longer feels the
warm breath of calves on a frosty morn, but the rattle of ‘Clean-Your-Own-Seeds’
machinery setting out on its perambulations. The old, red-brick barns of Manor
Farm, once the first welcome to the village, have long since given place to
chalet-type houses.
By the side of the Bargeway, there used to be famous orchid nurseries which
despatched their patiently-cultivated treasures as far off as Japan. The nursery
site, too, is a new housing estate, commemorating its famous origins only in its
name. The National Garden Centre’s headquarters is over by the A34.
There were once two racehorse training establishments. Wide-eyed yearlings still
ballet-dance down Main Street on the long rein learning about life; and the
elegant three year olds lift the heart with their beauty as they pace on air up
South Row from the Lower Road stables. Children’s ponies whinny greetings over
the fence of every available few yards of pasture — including what was once the
pig-farm, Place Farm, which even had pigs recorded in the Domesday Book.
From time beyond memory the unofficial emblem of Chilton has been the rook,
perhaps stemming from the ring of ‘immemorial’ elms round the churchyard, which
are now, alas, no more. But Chilton’s rooks are faithful and there stands now on
Harwell airfield’s old bomb-dump a grove of sycamores with one of the largest
colonies of rooks in South Oxfordshire. And they, and all wildlife, have fair
fling on the beautiful country park which was, until 1990, the prefabricated
estate, for workers at AERE.
The tiny Methodist chapel in South Row (surely one of the smallest in the
country with a capacity of 25) would have been crowded out 50 or so years ago,
when the 12th century parish church had fallen into disrepute under an unpopular
rector. Now the chapel languishes almost invisible in a losing battle against
the elements and a large holly tree.
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