St George's Hill is a private

gated community A gated community (or walled community) is a form of residential community or housing estate containing strictly controlled entrances for pedestrians, bicycles, and automobiles, and often characterized by a closed perimeter of walls and fences ...

Weybridge Weybridge () is a town in the Borough of Elmbridge in Surrey, England, around southwest of central London. The settlement is recorded as ''Waigebrugge'' and ''Weibrugge'' in the 7th century and the name derives from a crossing point of the ...

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

, United Kingdom. The estate has golf and tennis clubs, as well as approximately 420 houses. Land ownership is divided between homes with gardens, belonging to home owners, and the estate roads and verges belonging to its residents' association. The hill first served as a home and leisure location to celebrities and successful entrepreneurs on its division into lots in the 1910s and 1920s when

Walter George Tarrant Walter George Tarrant (8 April 1875 – 18 March 1942) was a builder born in Brockhurst in the north of the port town of Gosport, Hampshire, England. He is best known as a Surrey master builder and developer of St Georges Hill and the Wentwor ...

built its first homes. In a survey, most roads in the estate showed an average house sale price of over £5,500,000, with many properties selling for in excess of £15m and a handful selling for between £20m & £30m, meaning it is one of the most expensive and exclusive places to live in the UK and worldwide. East Road, St George's Hill - geograph

History

In April 1649, common land on the hill was occupied by a movement known as the

Diggers The Diggers were a group of religious and political dissidents in England, associated with agrarian socialism. Gerrard Winstanley and William Everard, amongst many others, were known as True Levellers in 1649, in reference to their split from ...

, who began to farm there. The Diggers are often regarded as one of the world's first small-scale experiments in

socialism Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...

and/or

communism Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

. The Diggers left the hill following a court case five months later. The occupation has been commemorated by

The Land is Ours The Land is Ours is a British land rights campaign advocating access to the land, its resources, and the planning processes set up in 1995 by George Monbiot and others. History Their first campaign was the occupation of the disused Wisley Airfi ...

group, which briefly camped at the summit of the hill in 1995 and 1999.

Residences

Local builder

owned the land and created many of the houses on the estate. Each house is required by local laws to have at least of land, and houses are restricted to a maximum of 20 per cent of the plot. The Neo-Georgian

Hamstone House Hamstone House is a large detached house on the St George's Hill estate in the English county of Surrey. The house stands in 8 acres of grounds that are bordered by St George's Hill Golf Club. History The house was designed in 1938 by Ian Forb ...

(1938) and its entrance lodge and garages, Long Wall (1964-68; designed by Leslie Gooday for himself) and Crow Clump, The Corbies and Yaffle Hill (1913, originally built as a single house, 'Crow Clump') on St George's Hill are each listed Grade II on the

National Heritage List for England The National Heritage List for England (NHLE) is England's official database of protected heritage assets. It includes details of all English listed buildings, scheduled monuments, register of historic parks and gardens, protected shipwrecks, an ...

Geography

The hill is the lowest in

to be listed by the national database of hills of Britain and Ireland, which records claims for all

Munro A Munro () is defined as a mountain in Scotland with a height over , and which is on the Scottish Mountaineering Club (SMC) official list of Munros; there is no explicit topographical prominence requirement. The best known Munro is Ben Nevis ...

s and all other popularly used categories, ranking 36th and as a >50 tump. The easterly peak is the highest point of the three boroughs in the north-west corner of Surrey and has the highest summit to be strictly private, a higher semi-private Surrey summit being a shallower rise in rough woodland at Ribs Down, Windlesham. The summit is 255 feet (78 metres) above mean sea level (

Ordnance Datum In the British Isles, an ordnance datum or OD is a vertical datum used by an ordnance survey as the basis for deriving altitudes on maps. A spot height may be expressed as AOD for "above ordnance datum". Usually mean sea level (MSL) is used fo ...

) and the minimum descent (notch/ col) is 174 feet (53 metres).Database of British and Irish Hills
Retrieved 2015-03-06 This is to the south at a main road and school separating

Chatley Heath Chatley Heath is part of 336 hectare reserve including Wisley Common, Ockham and parts of Hatchford. It is an area with a mixed habitats including heathland, ancient woodland and conifer woodland. On the top of Chatley heath (formerly known as Bre ...

Wisley __NOTOC__ Wisley is a village and civil parish in Surrey, England between Cobham and Woking, in the Borough of Guildford. It is the home of the Royal Horticultural Society's Wisley Garden. The River Wey runs through the village and Ockham and ...

and

Painshill Park Painshill (also referred to as "Pains Hill" in some 19th-century texts), near Cobham, Surrey, England, is one of the finest remaining examples of an 18th-century English landscape park. It was designed and created between 1738 and 1773 by Charle ...

, Cobham. With its broad summit this minimum prominence results in views of Surrey varying from one observation point to another — the uppermost storey of houses or natural clearings viewed along the estate roads. The estate roads consists of tall, neat hedges, mature trees, tended grass verges and roads laid with tarmac as pictured. The nearest railway is the

South West Main Line The South West Main Line (SWML) is a 143-mile (230 km) major railway line between Waterloo station in central London and Weymouth on the south coast of England. A predominantly passenger line, it serves many commuter areas including south we ...

and nearest motorway is the

M25 motorway The M25 or London Orbital Motorway is a major road encircling most of Greater London. The motorway is one of the most important roads in the UK and one of the busiest. Margaret Thatcher opened the final section in 1986, making the M25 the lon ...

, both more than 165 feet (50 metres) below the summit and centred from its centre respectively.

Golf club

The golf club was designed in 1912 by

Harry Colt Henry Shapland "Harry" Colt (4 August 1869 – 21 November 1951) was a golf course architect born in Highgate, England. He worked predominantly with Charles Alison, John Morrison, and Alister MacKenzie, in 1928 forming Colt, Alison & Morrison ...

with the clubhouse being built in the early 1920s. The Red and Blue nines make up the main course at St George's Hill, with a third nine - the Green nine - upgraded in 1987 by

Donald Steel Donald Maclennan Arklay Steel (born 23 August 1937 in Hillingdon, Middlesex) is a former golfer and is a noted golf course designer, as well as being a writer and journalist. Educated at Fettes College and Christ's College, Cambridge, he has des ...

, assisted by

Jonathan Gaunt Jonathan Gaunt is a golf course architect, a member of the EIGCA and the director of Gaunt Golf Design. Gaunt or his company have designed over 30 golf courses since 1987, mostly in the UK. These include Ramside Hall Hotel and Golf Club in Dur ...

Tennis club

The tennis club has 15 artificial grass tennis courts (8 floodlit), 15 grass and 2 indoor tennis courts, 4 squash courts, gym, air-conditioned studio, 20m swimming pool, steam and sauna, bar and restaurants, creche and beauty spa.

Politics

The local political party is the St George's Hill Independents who are an independent political party.St George's Hill Independents
/ref>

Notable residents

John Lennon John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer, songwriter, musician and peace activist who achieved worldwide fame as founder, co-songwriter, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of ...

Beatles The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960, that comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are regarded as the most influential band of all time and were integral to the developme ...

singer/songwriter and guitarist *

Ringo Starr Sir Richard Starkey (born 7 July 1940), known professionally as Ringo Starr, is an English musician, singer, songwriter and actor who achieved international fame as the drummer for the Beatles. Starr occasionally sang lead vocals with the ...

- Beatles singer/songwriter and drummer *

Elton John Sir Elton Hercules John (born Reginald Kenneth Dwight; 25 March 1947) is a British singer, pianist and composer. Commonly nicknamed the "Rocket Man" after his 1972 hit single of the same name, John has led a commercially successful career a ...

- singer *

Alexander Perepilichny Alexander Yurevich Perepilichny (russian: Алекса́ндр Ю́рьевич Перепеличный; 15 July 1968 – 10 November 2012) was a Russian businessman and whistleblower who died, while jogging near London in 2012, after leaving Ru ...

- allegedly poisoned Russian businessman and whistleblower *

Mian Muhammad Mansha Mian Muhammad Mansha ( ur, میاں محمد منشاء) is a Pakistani business magnate and billionaire. He is the founder and CEO of the Lahore-based international conglomerate Nishat Group.

- ''Forbes'' listed and the richest man in Pakistan *

Shilpa Shetty Shilpa Shetty Kundra (born Ashwini Shetty; Née Shetty; 8 June 1975) is an Indian actress who works mainly in Hindi-language films. Shetty made her screen debut in the thriller ''Baazigar'' (1993) which garnered her nominations for two Filmfare ...

- Indian actress *

Theo Paphitis Theodoros "Theo" Paphitis ( el, Θεόδωρος Παφίτης; born 24 September 1959) is a Greek-Cypriot British retail magnate and entrepreneur. He is best known for his appearances on the BBC business programme ''Dragons' Den'' and as former ...

- entrepreneur and ''Dragons Den'' star *

Cliff Richard Sir Cliff Richard (born Harry Rodger Webb; 14 October 1940) is an Indian-born British musican, singer, producer, entrepreneur and philanthropist who holds both British and Barbadian citizenship. He has total sales of over 21.5 million s ...

- British singer * Tom Jones - singer *

David Crouch Sir David Lance Crouch (23 June 1919 – 18 February 1998) was a British Conservative politician. Crouch was educated at University College School, London and became a marketing consultant. He contested Leeds West in 1959, and served as Memb ...

- entrepreneur *

Nick Faldo Sir Nicholas Alexander Faldo, (born 18 July 1957) is an English retired professional golfer and television commentator. A top player of his era, renowned for his dedication to the game, he was ranked No. 1 on the Official World Golf Ranking for ...

- professional golfer *

Eric Sykes Eric Sykes (4 May 1923 – 4 July 2012) was an English radio, stage, television and film writer, comedian, actor, and director whose performing career spanned more than 50 years. He frequently wrote for and performed with many other leading com ...

- comedian *

John Terry John George Terry (born 7 December 1980) is an English professional football coach and former player who played as a centre-back. He was previously captain of Chelsea, the England national team and Aston Villa. He was most recently the assi ...

- professional footballer and coach *

Jenson Button Jenson Alexander Lyons Button (born 19 January 1980) is a British racing driver. He won the 2009 Formula One World Championship when he drove for the Brawn GP team. After his F1 career, he became champion of the 2018 season of the Super GT ...

- British racing driver * Englebert Humperdinck - singer *

Gordon Mills Gordon William Mills (15 May 1935 – 29 July 1986) was a successful London-based music industry manager and songwriter. He was born in Madras, British India and grew up in Trealaw in the Rhondda Valley, South Wales. During the 1960s and 1970s ...

- musician, songwriter and manager *

Dick Emery Richard Gilbert Emery (19 February 19152 January 1983) was an English comedian and actor. His broadcasting career began on radio in the 1950s, and his self-titled television series ran from 1963 to 1981. Life and career Richard Gilbert Emery was ...

- comedian * Bill Martin - Songwriter

Other private estates

There are other estates in Elmbridge: *

Burwood Park Burwood Park is an historic private estate located in Hersham, Surrey, England. Spanning six miles of road, Burwood Park is situated in a former deer park that belonged to Henry VIII. The 360 acre estate is known both for its extensive wildli ...

Ashley Park Ashley Park is a private residential neighbourhood at Walton-on-Thames in Surrey. Its central feature was a grandiose English country house, at times enjoying associated medieval manorial rights, which stood on the site, with alterations, betw ...

References

{{Use dmy dates, date=February 2019 Gated communities in the United Kingdom Golf clubs and courses in Surrey Housing estates in England Golf clubs and courses designed by Harry Colt Weybridge, Surrey