This is the second in our occasional posts exploring the stories behind local road names. Last week we introduced you to the Earl of Fingal and his estate map and Appleby family, commemorated in Fingal Crescent and Appleby Walk. This week we’re focusing on just one road name, Floyer Grove, off Beke Avenue behind the Health Centre in Shinfield.
Left: The former Floyer’s Barn on Hyde End Road, all that remains of Floyers Farm – now undergoing further redevelopment
Peter Floyer and his family lived and farmed in Spencers Wood in the early part of the eighteenth century. On Fingal’s Estate Map of 1756, Floyers Land is marked as an area on Hyde End Road between the Basingstoke Road and Grovelands Road. All that remains now is the barn, an unremarkable building that’s easily missed, which until recently was known as Floyers Barn. Colonel Peter Floyer had served under the Duke of Marlborough in the French wars, known as the War of the Spanish Succession 1701-1714, and on his retirement had settled in Shinfield. Father and son, also named Peter, were original trustees of the Infant School on School Green, established in 1707. On the north wall of St. Mary’s Parish Church there is a tablet to Mary Floyer, his wife, dated 1726.
In an extract from the farms of Shinfield, Floyers Farm is described as being 45 acres 3 rods 28 perches (approximately 18.3 hectares) in size. In 1765 the “Annual Register” records “In the garden of Peter Floyer of Shinfield there are some rasberry trees in perfect leaf and so well stocked with ripe fruit that they have been gathering from them every day this month past. They are likewise in the same garden very fine full-blown jassmines, pinks, honeysuckles and a very fine carnation near blowing.”
Less is known about the later history of the farm. In 1862 it was a small, unnamed farm between Ryeish Green and Spencers Wood owned by Rev. George Hulme. In 1871 we know the farm was occupied by Mr John Thorpe and on 13 May 1879 it was sold in auction by Charles Simmons on behalf of Rev. Bernard Richard Body, a member of the Body family which lived in Shinfield for many years and owned several properties in the area.