This summer, I visited England with my wife who travelled there to meet a client for her job as a consultant. This is the first time in almost 24 years I was able to travel with my wife on a business trip since my duties as Mr. Mom have diminished with the growth of my three children. With my wife having two days of breakfast-lunch-dinner meetings scheduled during the trip, I was left with two full days to explore the parts of England within driving distance of London. So I needed a plan and using this new fangled technology called a search engine (Google), I discovered a village on an ancient map of East Devonshire with the rare (but somehow familiar) name of Culliton (my surname.) Currently, the village is named Colyton and is located near the village of Colyford. It is close to where the River Coly flows into the English Channel.
Now I always considered Culliton an Irish name but Ireland, like the U.S. is kind of a melting pot. Many of the names in Ireland are the results of the various immigrant groups including Druids, Celts, Vikings, Normans, English, Spanish, and Scots. I have been told by Irish friends and acquaintances that the Cullitons are from County Kilkenny, Ireland. But because of the fact that the name Culliton and its variations have been identified as an Irish-Anglo-Norman names, there is a possibility that it is the result of the place-name Culliton/Colyton, Devonshire. And even though DNA testing through the Y – Chromosome can establish male ancestral origins (this can be done on the female side too), I thought the trip to Colyton, at might reveal my actual, if not my mythological homeland!
But then the nightmares returned. They started five years ago during a trip to England with my family. We rented a compact car and I started driving from Heathrow Airport toward Gloucestershire, a couple of hours west of London. Not only was the steering wheel on the right (as in wrong) side of the car, and not only did I have to shift with my left hand, and not only did every intersection contain a roundabout, but driving on the left side of the road was very disconcerting. And while I scared (scarred?) my family as I continuously sideswiped the brush on the left side of the car, I developed recurring nightmares about driving down the wrong side of the road and causing a catastrophic accident. These memorable dreams required me to change the destination of my adventure. I needed an adventure with public transportation.
So instead of searching for the ancestral home of the Cullitons, I would explore the ancestral home of the forefathers of my current home, Guilford, Connecticut. I decided to take my daypack and go for a hike in Surrey, England. This is the county south of Metropolitan London and the home of many of the original settlers of Guilford, Connecticut. I planned a trip where I could take the train from London to Ockley Station, Surrey and then hike through Ockley and end up in Guildford, (spelled Guilford on an old map) Surrey. This would be a two day hike with a sleepover somewhere in between the two locations. When I was done with the hike, I would be able to take a train back to London from Guildford. As many of you know, Ockley is the home of Reverend Henry Whitfield, the leader of the families who settled Guilford, Connecticut in 1639. The main city (or borough) closest to Ockley is Guildford, Surrey, our town’s namesake (although possibly indirectly.) By consulting online maps, I was able to guess that I could take a two day hike and arrive at Guildford on the second day before the sun set.
Ockley and Guildford were not too far apart really; maybe fifteen miles as the crow flies. But unable to fly like a crow, and unwilling to walk the entire distance on paved roads, and unable to find suitable berthing along the most efficient route, I developed a route that allowed me to take advantage of “public rights of ways,” mostly footpaths and bridleways through public and private land. This stretched my hike to about 25 miles, which is an appropriate distance for two days of hiking. With the help of the cartographers at Stafford’s in Covent Gardens, London, I was able to purchase a map that guided me on this hike.
Every culture and community has its origin story, and Guilford surely has its own story. In Steiner’s History of Menunkatuck, (1897), the story of the Reverend Henry Whitfield and his band of Puritans is told with details about where they came from and why they left England. King James, Oliver Cromwell, Archbishop Laude, Thomas Hooker, John Davenport, Lord Saye and Sele, Lord Brooke, and George Fenwick all seemed to have a hand directly or indirectly in why this Puritan group left England for the New World.
So I was excited to head to Ockley, where Henry Whitfield emigrated from. I took the morning train from London and arrived around 10 a.m. at Ockley Station. Taking out my trusty map, I followed a public path due east through barley fields to the village. Downtown Ockley is found along an ancient Roman road that is as straight as an arrow for many miles. After stopping for lunch at a local pub, I was directed to the old parish church on the north end of town. The church was St. Margaret’s and it is the church where Henry Whitfield was the rector before resigning to gather a company of fellow Puritans with him to travel to the New World to form a plantation. I was excited to find a plaque inside the 13th century church listing Reverend Henry Whitfield as the rector from 1619 to 1638 and another plaque commemorating his voyage to and founding of Guilford, Connecticut.
From there I hiked north through the manorial forests to the manor house called the Wotton House which is both an inn and conference center. I arrived there as the local nobility, the Lord Lieutenant of Surrey, had gathered her leadership in ceremonial military costumes. My L.L. Bean hiking clothes did not fit into the dress of the day, but all were polite.
The next day, I continued my hike through the North Downs Way public trails that followed former drover and pilgrimage routes. It was a great route that included World War II pillboxes, well managed forests, and heath. In England, keeping open pastures is part of the conservation efforts. They have even brought back an ancient breed of cattle that help them manage the native plant species through grazing.
I continued my hike west through forests, along bridal paths and foot trails. One particularly challenging section was the hike up to St. Martha’s Church which is located at the top of a very high hill. The most challenging part was the sandy path that made the hike similar to climbing up a very high sand dune. At the top, I found an ancient church, a very old graveyard, and a beautiful view of the Borough of Guildford.
The hike from to Guildford from the church was mostly downhill. But as I arrived along the riverbank of the Wey River, I realized that the Guildford in Surrey, England had little geographical resemblance to my American Guilford. This was a settlement along a navigable river surrounded by hills. Guilford, CT is a settlement along a broad plane with tidal rivers along salt marshes.
Some local historians or experts of rural England in the audience may have already surmised my mistake. Although Guilford, Connecticut is named after a Guildford, England, it is named after East Guldeford in Sussex, England, not Guildford, Surrey. This East Guldeford is a village along the English Channel named after Sir Richard Guildford, a Knight of the Garter and adviser to King Henry the VII who paid to have the salt marshes drained and diked in the 1480s. In this village there is a broad plain with salt marshes, closely resembling Guilford, Connecticut.
Although I did find Ockley and the mother church to the Puritans’ churches that settled Guilford, North Guilford, Madison, and North Madison, CT, I did not find the Guilford or Guildford, our town’s namesake.
What I did find from the hike was what the name Guilford or Guildford or Guldeford means. These names mean, according to legend, Golden Ford. At a shallow spot on the river where there was a natural crossing, the sand beneath the water was golden in color. It is an old Norman name related to the gilding on a book or the gilded age. I also found that Surrey and Sussex, the counties south of London are beautiful places where the hiking trails are lovely, the people are friendly, and the history is magnificent.
In the future, I would like to talk more about St. Margaret’s Church in Ockley and the group trying to preserve that church for next 700 years. Stay tuned.
