Woodburn and Bourne End
Woodburn and Bourne End
Bourne End is a village predominantly in the parish of Wooburn and Bourne End. It is close to the border of Berkshire, close to where the River Wye meets the River Thames.
Bourne End's original location is somewhat different from today's established village centre, a half a mile downstream on the River Thames. The name refers to the end of the river (bourne being an Old English term for 'river'), and it would be the mouth of the River Wye that this is derived from. The then hamlet appears on Morden's 1722 map of Buckinghamshire as "Born end". It was noted in the nineteenth century however, that the name had been corrupted to "Bone End", apparently through local mispronunciation, and thence on official maps and documents; in 1858, the vicar of Wooburn successfully reversed this, and the corrected name remains in use today.
Wooburn
Wooburn is a village in Buckinghamshire, England. It is located off the A4094 road between Wooburn Green and Bourne End in the very south of the county near the River Thames, about two miles south west of Beaconsfield and four miles east of Marlow. Wooburn is one of the two principal settlements within Wooburn and Bourne End, a civil parish in Wycombe district.
The village toponym is derived from the Old English for "walled stream". This refers to the River Wye, which has its source near West Wycombe and runs through the village to join the River Thames at Bourne End. In the Domesday Book of 1086 the village was recorded as Waborne though earlier, in 1075, it had been referred to as Waburna.
The Church of England parish church of Saint Paul is medieval but was extensively altered by the Gothic Revival architect William Butterfield in 1869. It has a flint nave and a tall tower. there are some half timbered houses facing the churchyard and nearby there is a flint school house.
The manor house of Wooburn was anciently a palace of the Bishops of Lincoln.
Local Area
Bourne End conveniently lies between the M4 and M40 motorways, and retains its railway station on the Maidenhead to Marlow branch line. Because of its close proximity to London, it has become a popular place for commuters to live. Located on the southern border of Buckinghamshire, it runs alongside the River Thames, with some publicly accessible frontage; the River Wye skirts across on the eastern side of the village, joining the Thames to the south. Considered by many to be a desirable place to live in South East England, it consequently suffers from high house prices.
All of the mills along the Wye Valley have now been shut down and demolished, Jacksons Mill in Furlong Road being the last (in Bourne End) in the late 1980s. These have been replaced by houses, offices or industrial estates, which has led to the continuation of the village as an employment centre.
Bourne End remains a distinct settlement, although the continued house-building over the past century means it is threatened by the evident ribbon development, through to High Wycombe. In 1997, when the Local Plan was in preparation, the Residents Associations of Bourne End and Wooburn successfully lobbied to stop Slate Meadow (the field which separates the two settlements) being designated for housing for the time being. Other undeveloped land around the village looks likely to remain so, as it has been specified as Green Belt, an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, a Site of Special Scientific Interest, or a combination of the three. In parts, Bourne End is surrounded by farmland. Somewhat further away, Cliveden and Hedsor overlook the village from higher ground to the south east.