Edward Alfred Doughty was born in Hambledon on 1st May 1922, the younger son of Edward and Sarah Doughty of The Stores in the High Street, the village shop run by the family. He grew up in the centre of village life alongside his older brother Leonard, both belonging to a generation whose adulthood was shaped entirely by the Second World War.
Leonard George Doughty was born in Hambledon on 6th September 1913, the elder son of Edward and Sarah Doughty of The Stores in the High Street, the village shop run by the family. He grew up at the centre of village life and by 1939 was working as a grocery salesman while also serving locally in the Royal Observer Corps alongside his father, helping to track and identify aircraft during the early years of the war.
Percy Charles Guymer was born on 25th December 1899 at Stony Stratford in Buckinghamshire and spent his early years in the Wolverton and Fenny Stratford area where his father worked in general business. During the First World War he enlisted in the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry. Like many young soldiers of the later war years he was subsequently transferred to the Labour Corps, undertaking the essential but demanding work of road building, transport and supply duties that kept the army operating behind the front lines. His service placed him among the generation whose military experience came not only from combat but from the vast logistical effort required to sustain modern warfare.
Maurice Jack Kirby was born in Hambledon on 23rd August 1920, the son of John William and Annie Kate Kirby. The family lived in the High Street and later in a cottage beside The Vine in West Street, and he grew up in a working agricultural household where his father was employed as an engine driver on local farms. By 1939 Maurice himself was working as a heavy labourer in coal delivery, typical of the manual trades carried out by many young men of the village.
Ronald Salter lived in Hambledon at 4 Church Lane and was the son of Marion Hoare (née Salter). He was well known locally and remembered as a close friend of the Clay family, part of the small village community where families and friendships often overlapped across generations.
James Henry Bailey was born in 1901 at Hadlow in Kent. As a boy he entered the army in 1917 as a boy soldier and remained in regular service for over a decade, leaving the colours in 1928. Military life therefore formed the foundation of his adult years, and even after returning to civilian life he remained part of the reserve.
In the Great Survey commissioned by William the Conqueror, Hambledon (recorded as Ambledune) is revealed as a productive and valuable community transitioning from Saxon to Norman hands. Formerly held by Alwin under Edward the Confessor, the land was granted to the Norman aristocrat William de Perci. The survey meticulously details the assets that formed the backbone of the medieval village
In 1726, a devastating fire tore through the heart of Hambledon, fundamentally reshaping the village’s architecture. The blaze was particularly destructive on the east side of the High Street, where the majority of the houses were either damaged or entirely leveled. The fire also spread into East Street, leaving a significant portion of the community homeless and impoverished.
In 1749, St Peter and St Paul’s Church in Hambledon undertook a significant restoration of its soundscape. The existing five bells, which had suffered years of unreliable performance, were dismounted and transported to Robert Catlin’s renowned foundry in Holborn, London. There, they were recast into a modern peal of six bells.
Although a form of cricket had been played on the windswept plateau of Broadhalfpenny Down in Hambledon since at least 1753, the village secured its place in sporting immortality between 23rd and 25th June 1772. This three-day, two-innings match is recognized as the first-ever recorded first-class game of cricket, contested between a Hambledon XI (as local tradition stoutly maintains) or a Hampshire XI (the designation preferred by Wisden) and an England XI.
