Ochrepit Hill

By Kate Pratt

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On the large scale Ordnance Survey map (1:2500, 1976) the hill above Vale Crescent is marked as Ochrepit Hill. This rang a bell with David Walker who remembers as a child using the phrase “going up the Okky” for that particular bit of hill, but without knowing why.

The inference is that part of the excavations of the chalk pit was actually for ochre, which is a mixture of iron oxides produced by the oxidation of the ore. It is located in pockets both in the ore and the rock, and comes in a range of colours from browns and reds to yellow and deep purple. Perhaps there were links with the Iron Foundry which used to be operative in the village – possibly iron ore was mined locally, though this seems unlikely in this area.