The story of our estate is closely bound up with next door Arle Court. Records suggest that the whole area (roughly from the A40 to Robert Burns Avenue) was farmland with a house called ‘Redgrove’ in the late 1700s. A larger mansion, ‘Grovefield’ was built in the 1820s. After various changes in ownership the estate was purchased by William Butt in 1847 – the name is perpetuated in nearby Butt’s Walk. In mid-Victorian times the old Grovefield House was replaced by the present Arle Court, a gothic pile containing richly carved woodwork. The house is now, as is well known, a wedding venue and host to various festivals. In 1904 the estate was purchased by a Yorkshireman, Herbert Unwin. Which brings to fairly modern times.
The Unwins sold up in 1936, selling much of the estate to Sir George Dowty, an aerospace tycoon, partly as a residence, mainly as a location for part of his manufacturing concern. Modern day ‘Redgrovians’ will be surprised (or frustrated?) to learn that the entire estate changed hands for £6,000. Arle Court became company offices; what became Redgrove Park was used in part as paddock for Lady Dowty’s stud of horses. Annual events were held there, still recalled by older people, as were the now silenced chimes from the Arle Court clock, once well known to estate residents. ‘Grace Gardens’, named after cricketer W.G.Grace once marked a large cricket field where county matches were played.
After the Dowty Group became part of Tube Investments Ltd in 1992 much of the estate was sold off and now houses, for example Redgrove Park, Asda, the Nuffield Hospital etc. Redgrove Park itself had more than one developer, but at the turn of the century the last of them, Arle Court Developments handed our estate over to a newly formed company, Redgrove Park Management Co Ltd (RPMC) owned, in turn, by its 78 property owners. In the latter part of the Arle Court regime there was a ‘Residents’ Committee’ from which originated the first Board of Directors of RPMC.
Brief historical note: ‘Hatherley’ is old English for ‘Hawthorn Field’.