About and contact
An independent, unpaid history of South Oxhey. How it was made, who it owes, and how to send a correction, a memory or an old photograph.
What this is
The Story of South Oxhey tells the history of the London County Council estate at South Oxhey and the land it was built on: the Oxhey Place estate and its farms, woods and chapel, the golf course that came before the houses, the building of the estate from 1946, life on it, and its renewal. It is written for people who live here, grew up here or simply want to know how the place came to be.
How it was made
Everything here comes from records anyone can check: old Ordnance Survey maps, council papers and planning records, newspapers, directories, the local history book Poor But Proud, the community site Our Oxhey, Wikipedia and other reference sites, and the memories residents have already shared in public. Every fact carries a small number that links to its source on the Sources page. Where the sources disagree, we say so rather than pick one quietly.
Ordinary residents are never named in the story itself, and no private house numbers are given. Where a memory helps tell the story, we write "a resident remembers" instead. The Sources page lists some published pieces with their writers' names, as they first appeared.
Who is behind it
This is an independent, unpaid local history project. It is not connected with Three Rivers District Council, the Three Rivers Museum Trust, Our Oxhey or any other organisation, and it sells nothing and carries no advertising.
It owes a great deal to the people who did the hard work first: David Reidy and the contributors to Poor But Proud, John Swain for his plans of the golf course, Neil Hamilton for his research and photographs, the many people who have written for Our Oxhey, the National Library of Scotland for its old maps, and the photographers of Geograph and Wikimedia Commons whose pictures are credited under each one.
Get in touch
If you spot a mistake, remember something about the estate, or have old photographs, programmes, school pictures or letters from South Oxhey, we would love to hear from you. Email [email protected].
If you send a photograph, please say roughly when and where it was taken, and whether you took it yourself. We will only use it with your permission and will credit it however you like, or not name you at all if you prefer.
Using this site
You are welcome to quote from these pages for your own research or a local group, with a link back. Each picture's credit and licence are shown with it and on the Pictures page. Many are out of copyright, and many others are under Creative Commons licences that let you reuse them on the licence's terms, including crediting the photographer as shown. For anything else, please ask the person or body credited.
The site sets no cookies. It uses Cloudflare Web Analytics to count visits, which does not track you across other sites or identify you.
What's new
- 18 September 2026: The Story of South Oxhey is online. The whole history is now public: Oxhey Place and its farms, woods and chapel, the golf course, the building of the estate, life on it and its renewal, with a map through time, 110 street pages, seven walks and a timeline.
- 18 September 2026: Schools, churches, shops, getting about, and clubs. Life on the Estate now has five pages of its own, drawing on hundreds of residents' memories and articles gathered by Our Oxhey.
- 18 September 2026: Seven self-guided walks. Walks with maps, GPS routes and printable A4 leaflets, from the streets of 1947 to 1953 to the farms and lost houses the estate replaced.
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