Acocks Green History Society
From medieval to Georgian
According to John Morris Jones, on whose writings this section is heavily dependent, the first open field’s southern border was the ridgeway path on the line of Broad Road, Flint Green Road, Rookwood Road, the alley from Alexander to Douglas Road, Dalston Road and. Wynford Road. The second field originally terminated on a line worn out over time as a path which became Yardley Road. Later this field was extended down towards the Westley Brook valley. So the first field of Tenchley was called Heyne (High) Field: in modern terms its bounds were Arden, Stockfield, Mansfield, and Wynford Roads. The second field lay to the east of the first one. The names in documents from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are not consistent (see below).
The northern field was known as Stockstile Field in 1642 (Discovering Yardley Group notes). By the end of the eighteenth century the name Tenchley had vanished, and the northern field was still known as Stock((s)tile) Field, while the second field had become known as Acocks Green Field. The southern part of Stockstile Field was called Crabtree Field, and the western part of Acocks Green Field had the name of Little Field. The hamlet at the pinfold was still there. Into this scene came the Warwick and Birmingham Canal, which cut through the Stockfield ridge in the 1790s before swinging south-westwards away from Deep More, a boggy area in the Westley Brook valley. At Yardley Road a 280-yard tunnel was made; there was no towpath.
References in documents:
Indenture 24 November 1624: all lands in Heynfielde in Greet (Birmingham City Archives)
Deed Poll 16 October 1626: five acres in a common field in Broomhall quarter in Yardley called Heynefeild: six selions of arable ground in a common field in Yardley called Stocktile field (Birmingham City Archives)
Deed Poll 19 September 1661: a dole of meadow in a common field called Hynefeild in a meadow called Broad meadow (Birmingham City Archives)Stockfield and Over Heynefield 1668 CR 299/441/1-9 (Warwickshire County Record Office)
Heynfeild and Stocke Field CR 299/442/1-10 1651/2-post 1678 (Warwickshire County Record Office)
Lands in Over Heynefield alias Stockstile field, in Nether Heynefield CR 299/452/1-8 1663-1678 (Warwickshire County Record Office)
Land in Neyther Heyn Field and in Over Heyn Field CR 299/490 1667 (Warwickshire County Record Office)
Indenture 18 January 1681: meadow in the common field called Henfeild and 2¾ acres of arable land in a field called Stockfield (Birmingham City Archives)
Land in Stockstile Field and in Over Heinfield CR 299/466 1698/9 (Warwickshire County Record Office)
Indenture 18 December 1725: 10 acres of land in a common field called Heynefield: land in Over Heynefield near the lane leading from Acocks Green towards Yardley church (Birmingham City Archives)
Indenture 1 July 1729: land in a common field in Greet commonly called Heynefield: land in Over Heynefield near the lane leading from Acocks Green towards Yardley church (Birmingham City Archives)
Indenture 24 December 1734: land in a common field called Heynefield into eight parts divided, one acre of land in a common field called Over Heynefield, all of which premises are now in the possession of the said Widow Dolphin (Birmingham City Archives)
The first known purpose-built place of worship in Acocks Green was built on Stockfield Road in 1827. See the Transport and housing page below for three photographs of this building, which was demolished in 2012.