Odsey

This page is a general introduction to Odsey and there are other, more specific pages     Railway   Railway Inn   Odsey Mill   Odsey School   Odsey War Memorial and dwellings are listed under Station Road, Odsey within Private Dwellings

Today Odsey denominates a hamlet in the south of Steeple Morden parish, although historically Odsey was a location along the Icknield Way, on which was centred a manorial estate centred on Guilden Morden and spilling over into Steeple Morden and Ashwell. From the 12th Century, the estate was a Grange of Warden Abbey in Bedfordshire. A grange was an extensive farm detached from the home property of the owners. Later the estate was owned by London merchants and Robert Chester of Cokenhatch, who sold to the Duke of Devonshire in 1722. The Duke used it as pleasure grounds and a racing box, facilitating participation in the famous Odsey Races held on the heath opposite  Houses standing today, Odsey House and Odsey Grange, date from the Devonshire era. Odsey Park is early or mid-nineteenth century and was erected by the Fordham family.

The name Odsey is believed to be derived from Odda’s hollow or pit. Odda being a person and the hollow being a feature of the nearby Icknield Way. It is also suggested that the nearby gravel and chalk pits may have some connection with the origin of the name, although it seems unlikely that they were significant features at the time the name was evolving.

Odsey also gave its name to the Hundred of Odsey, a local government grouping of sixteen parishes in north Hertfordshire, including Ashwell.

The modern hamlet has grown since the arrival of the railway in 1850 and the opening of Ashwell Station (later Ashwell & Morden) the same year. Previously, there had been only a small farmstead, part of the Cheyney Manor estate and from 1846 a steam powered corn mill, erected by the Herbert Fordham of Odsey Park.