EARLY YEARS... There is a club myth that the course began – and was played for many years as a nine-holer. The evidence in the minutes suggests, however, that all eighteen holes were envisaged in the initial plan although only nine may have been in pay in the very earliest days. In November 1921, Colt was reported as still "planning the tees and bunkers for the first seven holes". But the slow progress did not deter play taking place because it is recorded that no fewer  than six trophies were played for over eighteen holes the same year – the Glyn-Jones Shield (first President of CHGC), the Manning, Stair, Claridge and Founders' Cups, as well as the G. Goblets. And early in 1922, the committee decreed that "lifting and placing on the fourteenth and sixteenth holes is no longer necessary".

120 ACRES... The skill that marks the Crews Hill design as exceptional is the cunning manner in which Colt laid out an eighteen-hole course on so compact a site of 120 acres. Although there are five short holes, all of them require the most careful shot placing to achieve results. Indeed, during pro-am events, one of the best spectator points is only a few yards from the clubhouse. From there, the professional can be watched at close quarters as they tackle the brook-protected tenth, when the pin is only yards from the out-of-bounds on the road.
Many of the fairways feature a special brand of gentle torture – a corrugated, rippling effect, rather like petrified waves on a still green sea... thought to be the result of medieval agricultural practice of strip cultivation. Possibly held up by the fact there are so many market gardens and nurseries in the local area.

Crews Hill is a course with a character of its own, each hole a separate challenge. Colt made full use of he gently undulating slopes and nowadays the many trees, from the oldest oaks to the newest silver birches provide a fitting settig for his grand design. And from the holes along the central ridge, the eye is easily tempted from the ball to the panoramic scenery on either side.
Today's trees have largely replaced much of the gorse that constituted a major hazard in the early days. A brochure from the 1950's describe the first hol, for instance, then a par 5, was said to have "a sea of gorse so close to the line into the green from the dog-leg as almost to mask the left side". There was a thick gorse at the back of the forth and gorse "guarded the left of the 6th fairway". The fourteenth green, lying in a bottleneck, had "bunkers and gorse to trap the erratic shot", and the tee-shot from the sixteenth was described as "a drive uphill through a wide avenue of gorse". The eighteenth tee was "in the heart of a sea of gorse".
No doubt in an attempt to protect it from the ravages of frustrated golfers, the scorecard at that time carried a local rule stating that "a ball lying in gorse... must be lifted and dropped behind, under penalty of one stroke, or declared unplayable.

Colt was a hard taskmaster and when he commented adversely on some work carried out not long before the course was complete in 1922, the committee ordered immediate steps to be taken to put it right. The only reference to payment is one minute saying that "a fee of £50 be paid to Colt for his services".
It was in June 1922 that the committee was able to record that "the whole course was now open and paying excellently," all 6100 yards of it. (Some extra land was acquired by lease in 1924 on the right of the thirteenth and near the fifth green to give a little more latitude to wayward shots, but did not add to the overall length of the course.)
Completion was duly reported to the eminent golf writer, Bernard Darwin, who was the Southern representative of the St. Andrews Rules of Golf Committee, and whose advice was sought on the question of setting the "bogey", as par was then known. The recommendation was 76. The bogey or par was re-assessed at 72 in 1933. Today it is 70 – the result of a re-measurement in 1976, with the course at 6230 yards.
Colt's back had not long been turned before the members' ideas for chopping and changing began to make minor alteration to the layout. In 1929, two of the longest holes on the course, the fourth and the sixteenth were shortened by moving the tees forward. The fourth has since been moved back close to its original position, although further away from the public footpath.