A Palaeolithic Succession at Farnham, Surrey

Extract

The area which Mr. Reginald Smith asked me to watch since 1922 is that of the upper reaches of the River Wey from Alton to Farnham, a ten mile stretch of the valley of the Wey which in the 18th century was described by Arthur Young as “the finest ten miles in England.”

To-day the Wey follows a zig-zag course some 50 ft. below the Railway Terrace on the South, and the opposite terrace on the North, on which the village of Bentley (Hants.) is built. Above this lowest terrace of the Wey, deeply covered with a pale stratified gravel of the river drift, is another terrace about 100 ft. above this river, also much gravelled with stratified river drift heavily iron stained. Then still ascending we come to the top of the Alice Holt spur known as the Alice Holt—Bourne plateau on which there are three levels, all much gravelled, but with contorted drift as opposed to the river drift of the terraces on the Northern slope.

This Alice Holt spur is the northern of three spurs that run from Alice Holt to the Waverley Valley: here the river makes a right angle with the Alton–Farnham Valley as it turns south immediately east of Farnham town. The area watched measures in all some 20 square miles.