Clanfield is a village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

in the south-east of the

East Hampshire East Hampshire is a local government district in Hampshire, England. Its council is based in the town of Petersfield, although the largest town is Alton. The district also contains the town of Bordon along with many villages and surroundin ...

district of

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Berkshire to the north, Surrey and West Sussex to the east, the Isle of Wight across the Solent to the south, ...

, England. It is situated north of Horndean, north of

Portsmouth Portsmouth ( ) is a port city status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Hampshire, England. Most of Portsmouth is located on Portsea Island, off the south coast of England in the Solent, making Portsmouth the only city in En ...

and south of

Petersfield Petersfield is a market town and civil parish in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is north of Portsmouth. The town has its own Petersfield railway station, railway station on the Portsmouth Direct line, the mainline rai ...

. It sits to the west of the main

A3 road The A3, known as the Portsmouth Road or London Road in sections, is a major road connecting the City of London and Portsmouth passing close to Kingston upon Thames, Guildford, Haslemere and Petersfield. For much of its length, it is classifie ...

, just north of where the A3(M) (Motorway) ends. The surrounding villages are Horndean, Catherington, Hinton Daubney, Chalton,

East Meon East Meon is a village and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is west of Petersfield. The village is located in the Meon Valley approximately north of Portsmouth and southwest o ...

, and Hambledon It has a semi-rural character, with 3 sides of the village being adjoined by fields including Queen Elizabeth Country Park. Clanfield is overlooked from the other side of the

by Windmill Hill and Chalton Windmill, which stands at 193 metres above sea level. Many references in Clanfield feature the

windmill A windmill is a machine operated by the force of wind acting on vanes or sails to mill grain (gristmills), pump water, generate electricity, or drive other machinery. Windmills were used throughout the high medieval and early modern period ...

, such as Windmill Garage. The population of Clanfield was 6,015 in 2021, a 30% increase from the 2011 census owing to property development and new homes. Clanfield is a popular area for walkers, with Queen Elizabeth Country Park being next to the village. The old village also has a restored

pond A pond is a small, still, land-based body of water formed by pooling inside a depression (geology), depression, either naturally or artificiality, artificially. A pond is smaller than a lake and there are no official criteria distinguishing ...

, a thatched village

well A well is an excavation or structure created on the earth by digging, driving, or drilling to access liquid resources, usually water. The oldest and most common kind of well is a water well, to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The ...

, the Clanfield memorial hall, and the

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

of St. James. Clanfield consists of two parts, "Old" Clanfield and "New" Clanfield. Old Clanfield has been around for roughly 250 years and New Clanfield about 60 years. There are two

schools A school is the educational institution (and, in the case of in-person learning, the building) designed to provide learning environments for the teaching of students, usually under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of ...

. Petersgate Infant in New Clanfield and Clanfield Junior School in Old Clanfield. Clanfield is twinned with Val d'Oison,

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

History

The name Clanfield is derived from the

Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...

and means "cleared field". Clanfield was historically a small

farming Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created ...

community centred about the church of St James, that dates from 1305 and was rebuilt in 1875 and contains two ancient

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with the fall of the West ...

bells. The community in 1929 recorded the

population Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...

as 129, by the late 1940s almost 500, and in 1998 over 4500, with almost 1700 households. The

South Downs National Park The South Downs National Park is England's newest national parks of England and Wales, national park, designated on 31 March 2010. The park, covering an area of in southern England, stretches for from Winchester in the west to Eastbourne in t ...

borders Clanfield on three sides (east, north and west) and includes a large part of the undeveloped part of the village to the north (the former Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty).

Politics

Clanfield has a parish council, two councillors for the Clanfield and Finchdean

ward Ward may refer to: Division or unit * Hospital ward, a hospital division, floor, or room set aside for a particular class or group of patients, for example the psychiatric ward * Prison ward, a division of a penal institution such as a pris ...

of East Hampshire District Council, and one councillor for the Petersfield Butser electoral division of

Hampshire County Council Hampshire County Council (HCC) is the upper-tier local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Hampshire in England. The council was created in 1889. The county council provides county-level services to eleven of the thirteen districts geo ...

. Clanfield is in the newly (2007) created Meon Valley

constituency An electoral (congressional, legislative, etc.) district, sometimes called a constituency, riding, or ward, is a geographical portion of a political unit, such as a country, state or province, city, or administrative region, created to provi ...

for

election An election is a formal group decision-making process whereby a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold Public administration, public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative d ...

s to the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of ...

. Prior to

Brexit Brexit (, a portmanteau of "Britain" and "Exit") was the Withdrawal from the European Union, withdrawal of the United Kingdom (UK) from the European Union (EU). Brexit officially took place at 23:00 GMT on 31 January 2020 (00:00 1 February ...

in 2020, it was in the

South East England South East England is one of the nine official regions of England, regions of England that are in the ITL 1 statistical regions of England, top level category for Statistics, statistical purposes. It consists of the nine counties of england, ...

constituency for elections to the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the two legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it ...

. Voting takes place in the Memorial Hall or Sports Centre. Since 2010 the Conservatives have won every election in the Meon Valley constituency.

Public transport

There are bus services to

Southsea Southsea is a seaside resort and a geographic area of Portsmouth, Portsea Island in the ceremonial county of Hampshire, England. Southsea is located 1.8 miles (2.8 km) to the south of Portsmouth's inner city-centre. Southsea began as a f ...

and

. There are railway stations at

and Rowlands Castle

Community and sport

There are three parks in Clanfield. All have swings and other child play items and Peel Park has a

skateboard A skateboard is a type of sports equipment used for skateboarding. It is usually made of a specially designed 7–8-ply maple plywood deck and has polyurethane wheels attached to the underside by a pair of skateboarding trucks. The skateboard ...

park. There is a park near the Sports centre in the new housing estate. South Lane Meadow has a

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

ground, and Peel Park has

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

pitches. Peel park has a building with changing rooms in. Clanfield has a football club called Clanfield F.C. The club contains teams for children, which are split into year groups. Clanfield's major community centres are Clanfield Memorial Hall, in South Lane, Clanfield Sports and Community Centre, Endal way, the St James Church Hall and Leader Hall (for the

Scouts Scouting or the Scout Movement is a youth social movement, movement which became popularly established in the first decade of the twentieth century. It follows the Scout method of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activi ...

), both Little Hyden Lane. The sports centre opened in 2019. There are three

public houses A pub (short for public house) is in several countries a drinking establishment licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term first appeared in England in the late 17th century, to differentiate private ho ...

and one wine bar. The rebuilt ''Rising Sun'' in the old village, the ''Hampshire Hog'' (previously ''Hogs Lodge'') on the outskirts of the parish near the A3 and the famous '' Bat and Ball Inn'', in Hyden Farm Lane, opposite the "Cradle of Cricket", Broadhalfpenny Down cricket ground. The boundary between Clanfield and Hambledon used to run through the ''Bat & Ball'' and the brass strip marking the old boundary still runs across the floor. Both the original ''Hogs Lodge'' (which was originally further behind the present one) and the ''Bat And Ball'' were occupied by members of the Murrant family. Originally a nineteenth-century building, in 1969 the ''Rising Sun'' achieved fame as the pub that was built in one day. There is a not-for-profit website funded by local business intended to benefit the community. Also in Clanfield is the Clanfield Observatory run by the Hampshire Astronomical Group, who have open days. The observatory is next to one of Portsmouth Water's reservoirs.

References

External links

Hampshire County CouncilEast Hampshire District CouncilBritish History OnlineHampshire County Council Web pages
{{authority control Villages in Hampshire Civil parishes in Hampshire