History Of Odiham Consolidated Charities & Odiham Education Charity.

The first almshouse on the site to the south of Odiham church was built by Julian Smith in 1620. It was not endowed with funds to pay a stipend to the occupants and was used by the Parish Overseers of the Poor as accommodation for poor people. It is today the Pest House. A few years later Sir Edward More built and endowed eight almshouses with income from Broad Oak Farm and other property in Odiham but these were unsatisfactory and his executors built the present range of Old Court with 10 dwellings. Stipends for food and fuel were paid to residents. The two additional almshouses were endowed later by John Mapleton in 1758 and Daniel Wyeth in 1774.

During the period from 1620 to 1900 a number of people left money to help the poor of Odiham. Many of these were for fixed sums which dwindled in value over the years but one was crucial for Odiham. In 1638 Sir Richard Gurney, at the request of his wife, an Odiham born woman, left eight acres of land in Hammersmith and Fulham to the Poor of Odiham. For two hundred years this yielded agricultural rents but by the 1850s the growth of London meant that it had become very valuable. First as a quarry for sand and gravel and then as a building site where the trustees allowed three roads of houses to be built for which they gained lump sums and annual ground rents. The charity became so wealthy that the Endowed Schools Commissioners convinced the Charity Commission that a lump sum of £3,000 and annual payments of £250 should be used as an endowment for Odiham Endowed School, now the site of Mayhill School. This started a link with what is now Robert May’s School ; Odiham Education Charity is now the foundation body for the school and nominates five trustees.

In 1949 Old Court still housed 9 residents, each almshouse had no electricity or gas, or sanitation and the only heating was by a coal range. Few people applied to live in them until they were improved. The trustees sold off ground leases in Hammersmith and with other grants and investments were able to refurbish Old Court and build over the rest of the site, first Gurney Court and then Benford Court so that today there are 26 almshouses plus a meeting room, called the Dorothy Owen Room. Since the advent of the Welfare State after 1947 the relief in need expenditure for the poor of Odiham, which at one time made up 50% of OCC expenditure, has much reduced but the Trustees still make small grants to retired residents at Christmas and supports the schools, other local organisations and individuals in need in the Parish of Odiham.