Waterlooville - History

History

Legend has it that it was named after the pub that stood at the centre of town, then known as Waitland End. The Heroes of Waterloo was so named because, on its opening day, in 1815, soldiers who had just disembarked at Portsmouth, returning from the Battle of Waterloo, decided to stop there and celebrate their victory. According to local legend, many of them settled there. The public house was renamed in their honour and the area around the pub became known as Waterlooville.

The original "Heroes" public house was at a crossroads near the main bus-stop. A new pub has taken the name and is located at the northern end of the shopping precinct. There are two other pubs in the town centre, The Wellington, at the southern end of town, and the Denmead Queen, which is adjacent to the Heroes and part of the JD Weatherspoon pub chain.

The local electrical shop, Eric Jackson's Ltd, has been open since 1928 and is the oldest retailer in the town. The business, now in its 3rd generation was started by Eric, then passed down the family to Michael and then to Peter Jackson.

The town centre was closed to traffic in 1981 when a bypass was constructed to take traffic away from the main shopping area. The bypass, initially anonymous, was named Maurepas Way sometime after the two towns were twinned in 1995. An underpass was constructed for pedestrians walking up along the Hambledon road. Between 1982–83 the old road was then fully converted to a pedestrian precinct. The precinct had a fountain and raised area at the northern end, near the Heroes pub, however regular vandalism of the fountain soon has resulted in its removal.

GEC Marconi built a site at Waterlooville for their Underwater Systems in the early 1980s, for the Stingray anti-submarine torpedo. A peace camp was set up near the construction site. After completion of the GEC building, a free music festival was held at Old Park Farm in Waterlooville called Torpedo Town. A second Torpedo Town festival was held in August 1987 at Bramdean Common near Winchester.

Near the town centre is the rebuilt St George's church. During the 1950s and 1960s the surrounding area saw extensive growth in housing, when large suburban public and private housing estates were constructed. This resulted in the original Victorian church failing to cope with the population growth. Plans for a new church were started and in 1970 the new church was built on the site of the old church. Parts of the old church were retained.

In July 2011 the town saw the consecration of its first Roman Catholic Church. For the preceding eighty years the growing Catholic community in the town had utilised at first one aisle of, and ultimately the entire of the chapel at St Michaels convent. However the decision of the sisters of Our Lady of Charity to sell the main convent site coupled with the inadequate capacity led to a new church being required. The new church which is dedicated to "The Sacred Heart and St Peter the Apostle" sits to the north of the town centre on London Road.

In August 2012 the northern part of the shopping centre underwent a £700,000 renovation, the raised area holding the former fountain was removed and new block paving installed. The renovation increased the area available to the weekly Friday market and improved pedestrian accessibility. In addition a "smoking-shelter" style band-stand was installed at pedestrian T-junction with The B*ulevard.