Wheatley - Village Archive - Wheatley quarries visible in West Field

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Archive Notes:

Wheatley original quarries 'visible' in West Field.

The oldest quarry, named Chalgrove, quarried from the 13th century, can be seen from the 1945 Google Earth aerial photo (Photo 5) extract also superimposed on Arkell's geological map from the 1940s (first image below). Photo 5 also shows, at is northern end, Hill House, see record 1364, a listed building from late C18/early C19, with the quarry to the south. There are no trees (2024) immediately south of the house and a thin line of trees to the east. The main copse of trees are west and south-west of the house and there is a body of opinion that the quarry may have originally included this area (including perhaps the site of the house), subsequently filled in with trees allowed to develop. There is a depression in the ground shown in photos 1 & 2, east of Hill House which mark the further extent of this quarry, which is believed to have been deep and produced some of the best stone, used in Oxford colleges and other important developments of this period. Various images of Hill House are shown.

The quarry adjacent to the road and the wording 'Wheatley Quarries' is marked by the very large depression which houses an agricultural building. This depression is found approximately between 90 and 180 metres from the Park Hill access, and is shown in photos 3 & 4.

The small quarry, between these two on the Arkell map, is not obvious, but there are many smaller depessions suggesting that many stone sources were found and quarried and that these were not restricted to the sites on the Arkell map.