Whitehawk

Whitehawk is a suburb in the east of Brighton, England, south of Bevendean and north of Brighton Marina. The area is a large, modern housing estate built in a downland dry valley historically known as Whitehawk Bottom. The estate was originally developed by the local council between 1933 and 1937 and included nearly 1,200 residences. Subsequently, the Swanborough flats were built in 1967, and in the 1970s and 1980s much of the estate was rebuilt by altering the road layouts and increasing the number of houses. Whitehawk is part of the East Brighton ward of Brighton and Hove City Council. Before being developed, Whitehawk was chalk downland. At the top of Whitehawk Hill, Whitehawk Camp was a Neolithic causewayed camp of the Windmill Hill culture inhabited around 5500 years ago. It is now a scheduled ancient monument and is one of three causewayed camps known to have existed in the South Downs. The name Whitehawk is believed to be a corruption of "Vied Ac", the Saxon for "holy oak", named after a wooden pole which stood on the hill. Horse racing started on Whitehawk Down in the late 18th century next to the causewayed camp and connected to the White Hawk Fair. Brighton Race Course is still on the site, which became known as Race Hill. By 1870, the neighbouring Sheepcote Valley was being used as a rifle range to train volunteer soldiers. By 1916 it had begun to be used as a refuse tip. A site at Sheepcote close to the edge of the Whitehawk housing is still used as a Council waste centre for domestic users. Whitehawk Road, as it then was, came to demarcate the eastern parish boundary of Brighton. In 1818 gas works were built at Black Rock, between Whitehawk and the sea. By virtue of being built there, the works avoided paying taxes in Brighton. By the beginning of the 1920s, the Whitehawk area consisted mainly of pig farms, smallholdings and allotments. This would all change between 1920 and 1931 when Brighton Corporation, in common with local government authorities all over the country, began a program of slum clearances.