Celebrating 100 Years of our Parsonage Mill Home!➡

100 Years at Parsonage Mill

We're celebrating 100 years of Attlee's Country Store at Parsonage Mill by taking a look through the archives!

Attlee's has been based in Dorking since 1788, originally in the high street, until 100 years ago in June 1921 when Edmund Attlee was given the chance to purchase the Parsonage Mill site from The Denbies Estate for a sum of £1250.

(Photos from Derek Stidder)

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The original Attlee's Store just minutes away from Parsonage Mill on Dorking High Street was then surplus to requirements and sold.

(Photos from Sainsbury's Archives, Attlee's Archives)

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Change came in 1973 with no new generation of the Attlee family to take over, William Lillico & Son (who were already established in Kent) purchased the business. Decades of change and modernisation came about following the effects of the 2 World Wars and The Great Depression.

(Photos from Lillico's Archives, Attlee's Archives)

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The next big change in Attlee's history came about in 2020 in the midst of a global pandemic with the slight relocation and renovation of the shop within the Parsonage Mill Site.