Stocken Farm with William Saunders

click William Saunders & Bethia Janes for more about William and Bethia

... continued from Stocken Farm with John Forrest

William Saunders owned Stocken Farm from 1911 until his death in 1934.

1877 circa, William Saunders purchased two plots of land from Josephine Irving, mortgagee of the land of John Cheshire. Land which had once been part of Princes Risborough Common.

One was at the bottom on the north-west side of a track, made to access this plot (later known as 'Hillcrest Field'). The other was straight ahead at the end of the track, a large field later known as ‘Hillocks’.   The track years later became ‘Goodacres Lane’.

Note. At that time the only house on the Goodacres Lane track, right at the entrance to it, was The Bakehouse, built by Henry Janes. Interestingly, about the time he purchased the above fields William married Henry's daughter Bethia.

1911 Purchase of Stocken Farm. He was still also farming Pound Farm at Saunderton Lea when he bought  Stocken Farm in Lacey Green for £3,400.

It had 167 acres, 1 rood ,24 poles of land including the farmhouse and two cottages called Graham Cottages built on the main road by the previous owner John Forrest of Grymsdyke in 1885. (click John & Evelyn Forrest for more about their lives.)

Researcher's Note. It was a sign of the difficult farming times that John Forrest had paid £8,250 for it in 1877, added two houses and then sold losing £4850, 33 years later. There had been terrible weather starting in 1870  right through the first world war.

Land Added. William Saunders already owned the two fields in Lacey Green, which he had bought about 1877, from Josephine Irving. William had a barn built in Hillcrest Field. From 1911 these fields became part of Stocken Farm.   In 1934 the smaller one was sold off to George Hawes. of Woodbyne Farm.