Church Crookham is a large suburban village and civil parish contiguous with the town of Fleet, in northeast Hampshire, England, located southwest of London. Formerly a separate village and now generally considered as a southern suburb of Fleet, the area comprises one of the 18 wards of the Hart District, in addition to parts of two others. The southwest of the village incorporates the Zebon Copse housing development constructed in the late 1980s.
History
Crookham dates back at least as far as the Domesday Book, though Church Crookham and Crookham Village did not become distinct entities until the founding of the Christ Church in 1840. It is this church for which Church Crookham is named. The region had few inhabitants at this time, with the 1831 edition of Samuel Lewis's "Topographical Dictionary of England" claiming Crookham had 623 inhabitants and not even mentioning the much smaller Fleet.
Church Crookham lies on GHQ Line – the most important of a number of fortified stop lines constructed as a part of British anti-invasion preparations of World War II – and was at one of the most heavily fortified sections of that line.
Church Crookham has been used as a filming location for several films. These include the 2002 James Bond movieDie Another Day, which used woodland and flat ground in between Church Crookham and Aldershot to represent the demilitarised zone between North and South Korea. Church Crookham was also one of several English towns and villages that served as filming locations for the 2006 movie Children of Men.
Tobacco
Church Crookham was the location for the only commercially successful tobacco plantation in Britain, which produced among other brands "Blue Pryor" cigarettes and pipe tobacco. Production finished in 1938 and the plantation site is now occupied by Redfields Garden Centre, but Redfields House is part of the buildings that now encompass St Nicholas' School. Redfields was also the centre for the British Pioneer Tobacco Growers Association after the Second World War. Tobacco was grown there, cured and a commercial brand 'Trowards Rayon D'or' was produced alongside the main purpose of supplying plants to members, curing and shredding their final product before returning to the appropriate members. Among members of the staff were Charles Baggs, general manager throughout their existence, and Admiral Sir Clement Moody. A BBC film was made during the 1950s entitled Tobacco Road which featured the Redfields site and their site in nearby Crondall. The Association closed after the death of Mr Troward, although Charles Baggs did continue to supply plants and cure the members' product for a further period after his death. The works at Redfields employed some twenty to thirty local staff, which demonstrated its importance at that time in history.
