For hundreds of years, the area now known as Chandler's Ford was a stretch of countryside much akin to that of the New Forest. It contained the same variety of habitats: mixed woodland, heathland and wet meadow. A number of brooks and streams flowed through the area, to merge together and finally join with the River Itchen. Bronze Age man lived in the northern part, and no fewer than eleven tumuli were excavated by the Hampshire Field Club at the end of the last century, when urns containing the ashes of the cremated dead were taken for display at the Hartley Institute Museum in Southampton. Three fords existed on tracks which later became the major roads of the village; one on the main Winchester-Southampton road, one on Hursley Road, and one on Leigh Road. The village acquired part of its name from either the ford on the Winchester-Southampton road or that on the Hursley Road, but the origin of the 'Chandler's' part remains a mystery, the spelling having changed several times over the centuries, and no positive documentation has been found.

During the latter part of the 16th and the first few years of the 17th centuries, farms and farm workers' cottages were built, belonging to Hursley Park Estates and the Manor of North Stoneham. Hiltonbury Farm was probably the earliest of these, the original building appearing on a map of 1588. The building has an interesting history, being developed and added to over the years. The distinctive chimneys are a Victorian addition, and these and other features are repeated on a number of buildings that were owned by Hursley Park Estates at this time. In the 1890s, Hiltonbury Farm was sold to Cranbury Park Estates, and remained in their ownership until it ceased to be a working farm in the late 1970s. The farmhouse remains as a public house, in the centre of the North Miller's Dale housing development, built on what had previously been the farmland. The workers at Hiltonbury Farm were housed in thatched cottages at Ramalley and in Cuckoo Bushes Lane. Only one of these cottages now remains. At the top of Ramalley Lane, there was originally a group of seven or eight of these cottages, for which the tenants in 1740 paid five shillings per annum in rent. In 1638, Richard Major, a son of the Mayor of Southampton, acquired the Great Lodge of Hursley Park, and the accompanying Hursley Estates. In 1649, his daughter, Dorothy, married Richard Cromwell, third but eldest surviving son of Oliver Cromwell, and the young couple lived with Dorothy's father at Hursley. It is recorded that they attended the 'Merrie Feast', which was held annually at Ramalley, 'merries' being the small, sweet cherries which grew plentifully in the area, were harvested, and sold at this annual social event. The 'Merrie Feasts' were a feature of local country life for almost two hundred years. Ford Farm in Hursley Road was another early farm established in the Chandler's Ford area, as were Titlark, Velmore and Hut Farms on the main Southampton Road, and North End Farm in what is now Oakmount Road. These farms, with their accompanying cottages, belonged to the Manor of North Stoneham. By 1850, this small community, scattered across the whole area known as Chandler's Ford, amounted to a total population of something just under two hundred.

As the main Winchester-Southampton road passes through Chandler's Ford it follows a route which is very close to, and almost parallel with, the Roman road from Nursling to Winchester. Evidence of the Roman road has been found in recent times when excavations were taking place for new housing, for the Wessex Nuffield Hospital, and for the Pitmore and Thornden schools. The main road between the two major cities of Winchester and Southampton has always been a busy thoroughfare, from the time of foot travellers and stage-coaches to the present day. Stagecoaches from Southampton to London passed through regularly, and this led to the building of the first bridge over the ford in the late 18th century. In the early 19th century, two toll-gates were built, one marked by a house on the corner of what is now Leigh Road, and the other at Fryern Hill, opposite to the present site of the Halfway Inn. Behind the Fryern Hill tollhouse were stables at which the horses were changed, and a smithy. Throughout the 19th century, the village had been quite clearly divided between the three parishes of Otterbourne, Hursley and North Stoneham, but on 1 October 1897, Chandler's Ford's first Parish Council was formed. It became a separate parish in its own right, comprised of parts of North and South Stoneham, Ampfield, North Baddesley and Otterbourne, and this new parish was taken over by the Hursley Rural District Council. By 1900, the population of the village had grown to around a thousand. The last two decades of the 19th century saw the people of Chandler's Ford developing all the amenities necessary for life in a growing village.

The twenty years between the two World Wars saw the population of Chandler's Ford increase to over 3,000. In the 1920s, the land belonging to King's Court, Merdon House and Hut Farm were all sold for building development, as was some of the land in the Hiltingbury area. A major administrative change came about in 1932 when Chandler's Ford, and parts of Otterbourne, North Stoneham, Fair Oak and Stoke Park, were removed from the surrounding Rural Districts and joined to the Eastleigh and Bishopstoke Urban District.The western side of Hursley Road was the first sign of post-war development in the mid-1950s, and this was followed rapidly by housing across the whole of Hiltingbury, Scantabout, Peverells Wood and the Springhill and Oakmount areas. Individual meadows disappeared under houses, large houses were demolished and small 'closes' built, the Velmore area was developed and the land surrounding Hiltonbury Farm became the North and South Miller's Dale housing estates. More recently, the whole new 'village' of Valley Park has appeared on the western side of Monk's Brook. Each new housing complex has led to the building of accompanying shops, public houses and schools. Eight schools now cater for the primary phase of education, and they, in turn, feed into two comprehensive schools. As well as local shops for each phase of housing, the Central Precinct was built at the end of Hursley Road, followed in the mid-1960s by the Fryern Arcade and Safeway. A new 'mall' of shops was also built at Fryern Hill, leading to the new library, which celebrated its tenth anniversary in 1993.

What, then, has become of that stretch of countryside described at the beginning of this page? Much of it has disappeared under the constant building programme, but Eastleigh Borough Council, Hampshire Wildlife Trust and the Woodland Trust are responsible for the conservation and management of several acres of remaining woodland and wet meadow. These areas continue to provide not only a valuable habitat for the many species of wildlife for which they are a home, but also a constant source of challenge, interest and relaxation for the human inhabitants of Chandler's Ford, both newcomer and native.