waterways

Haywards Heath history

Articles published in:

2026

  • The 19th century building had a very different beginning to the one we see today. Find out more about the 1859 Brighton Lunatic Asylum here.

  • Click here to go back to the first days of the telephone in Haywards Heath and explore the history of communication in the town when the only service provider was the General Post Office.

2025

  • Charles Tucker for sharing this amazing image of South Road in Haywards Heath, thought to be taken around 1940s. See all here.

  • From the spring-fed pond on the southern corner of the Ardingly Road / Hanlye Lane mini roundabout, a small stream runs downhill behind the houses in Horsefield Green, one of many tributaries that feed the River Ouse. Click here to read all about it.

A river runs through it (Haywards Heath)

By Steve Turner

I was recently asked by a resident of Horsefield Green in Cuckfield about the water that runs behind their house. I gave them a potted explanation but I thought I would look into it further.

From the spring-fed pond on the southern corner of the Ardingly Road / Hanlye Lane mini roundabout, a small stream runs downhill behind the houses in Horsefield Green, one of many tributaries that feed the River Ouse.

Scrase Stream ‘proper’ starts its life from another spring-fed pond opposite the public footpath on the bend in Ardingly Road; in its infancy it runs, barely worthy of note, beside the footpath heading towards the Baptist Church. Turning slightly west, it connects with the Horsefield tributary in the fields behind Glebe Road.

Continuing west, the stream travels through the fields at Hatchgate Farm, Paiges Wood and into Penland Wood, where it picks up pace and water from springs at Gravelye Farm, Penland Farm and Harlands Farm; of course the latter two are now being squeezed by housing.

In 2022, the stream was forced into culverts between the private hospital in Burrell Road, Haywards Heath, and the road aptly called Bridgers Mill. Nowadays there is nothing to be seen of the mill or its ponds and Balcombe Road runs across land where the ponds had been.

Balcombe Road 1949 - notice the different route of the road, going through the railway tunnel. The mills were demolished in 1968 and Balcombe Road realigned to remove the very dangerous bend under the bridge.

In its day, Bridgers Mill was powered by water held in place behind embankments and supplied by water from Scrase Stream (see Cuckfield Connections: ).

The mills were demolished in 1968 and, with the ponds filled in, the road was realigned to remove the very dangerous right hand bend under the railway bridge.

Scrase Stream now runs through a culvert under the railway embankment and continues behind the houses in College Road. Years ago, there were more ponds on what is now Mill Green Road industrial estate.

Swinging south, behind Summerhill Close, it passes under the bottom of Oathall Road through Scrase Bridge, which gave its name to the secondary school before it was renamed to Oathall.

Picking up more input from springs and the stream from Black Hill in Lindfield, it wends its way through the Scrase Valley Nature Reserve, between the houses of Penn Crescent and Wilmington Way in Haywards Heath and Pelham Road and Meadow Lane in Lindfield, before going under the bridge in Lewes Road beside Lindfield Enterprise Park.

Heading out into open country, our little Scrase Stream, which started life back in Ardingly Road, Cuckfield, is on its way to make its own Cuckfield Connection.

Now on the flood plain of the Ouse, passing East Mascalls, more streams and rivulets are swelling our Scrase Stream as it now runs parallel to the River Ouse and Cockhaise Brook, before they all finally join in to one, just east of the Sloop pub: our Scrase Stream is now the River Ouse.

So, if you want to play Pooh Sticks and you’re prepared to be patient, throw your stick in at Cuckfield and saunter down to Newhaven to see it wash out into the English Channel!