Waterhall

Little remains of the 18th century farm

Reproduced with permission from the Encyclopaedia of Brighton by Tim Carder, 1990

The Waterhall estate of 737 acres was acquired by the corporation in April 1920, but only one house now remains from the late-eighteenth-century farm and hamlet in Waterhall Road. From the early 1950s until 1977 a large part of the valley was filled with 'clean' refuse and rubble, and several acres of playing fields have now been laid out on the large levelled area. {108,126,305}

Waterhall Mill is now more commonly known as Patcham Mill . A tower-mill built in 1884-5 for baker Joseph Harris, it was the last working windmill to be erected in Sussex and continued to grind corn until 1924; part of its machinery came from the old Preston Mill. It was sold for just £50 in 1928 and was converted into a house in 1936, but it was used by the Home Guard during the war before reverting to private use in 1950. The mill, which has a rendered tower forty feet tall, was completely modernised in 1975 with new sweeps, and is now a desirable residence and listed building. {44,250-253}

Waterhall Golf Club, which lies off Saddlescombe Road, was originally a private course laid out in 1922 {83} by a Mr Boddington who lived in the wooden clubhouse; it had nine holes in the valley with small greens and  narrow fairways to save labour. In 1934 the course was extended to eighteen holes, absorbing a nudist camp near the seventh green in the process. Two years later the corporation acquired most of the land as part of the West Blatchington estate, and the Waterhall course, which covers 131 acres and has a length of 5,615 yards, is now maintained as a municipal golf-course; the club itself is still private, however. {126,218,221}

Mill Road runs up the slopes of Coney Hill and Red Hill with a maximum gradient of 1:9. It was once just a narrow trackway, Mill Lane and Waterhall Road, (and retains the original narrow railway bridge) but the present fifty-foot-wide highway was formally opened by the Minister of Transport on 22 July 1932 at a cost of £37,000. The open spaces by Devil's Dyke Road and on the Westdene side of Mill Road were once part of West Blatchington parish, but were annexed by Brighton in April 1928. {115,124}

Since 1989 the whole Waterhall area has been radically affected by the construction of the Brighton bypass. On 2 April 1989 Brighton Pavilion M.P. Julian Amery formally cut the first turf in the WaterhallValley. The dual three-lane section from London Road to the Devil's Dyke Dyke Road is scheduled to be completed in 1991 and new playing fields have been laid out to compensate for those lost to the new road. Mill Road has been diverted, destroying much of the open space at the top of the hill, and will become a local road. Waterhall Road has also been diverted. {123}