Mill Hill

Mill Hill was until 1965 a district of the ancient civil parish and manor of Hendon. It became an independent ecclesiastical parish in 1836 measuring 3,570 acres (14 km²), centred on the church of St Pauls (see Buildings below). Farms and other small settlements in Mill Hill date to at least the 10th century. Until the 16th century the area was known variously as Lothersleage, Lothersley, and latterly Lotharlie. By the 14th century there was a route that ran from Hendon through Bittacy Hill up to Highwood Hill, still called The Ridgeway, and, as the writer Ralph Calder points out, the names of prominent local families found in the Black Book (1321) are familiar today as place names. These include Daws, Saunder, Page, and so on. Calder says the first reference to a mill in the area was in the 1350s, and he follows consistently the ownership of a mill from the 1630s until 1754. It may be that 'melnehel' (1374), considered by the Victoria County History, may refer to Holcome Hill, certainly the location of the later mill that Calder examined. The oldest documented use of the name Mill Hill (Myll Hylles), as a place name for the area is much later (1544). More....