Hawkesbury is one of the largest parishes in Gloucestershire, with a circumference of 31 miles.
It included the townships of Tresham, Hillesley, Upper and Lower Kilcot, Upton, and Little Badminton (highlighted in orange). Some of these became parishes in their own right.
The Church of St Mary the Virgin
The church of St Mary the Virgin is set well away from the village at the bottom of a steep hill.
The earliest documentary evidence of a church here was in a Charter of 972 and St Wulfstan, later Bishop of Worcester, was an early incumbent.
A list of burials in the churchyard are kept in the church and registers of baptism, marriages and burials exist in unbroken succession from 1603.
In the second photo of the interior, the Norman font can be seen. As in Elberton church, it was returned to the church having been discovered by a former vicar in a garden in Hawkesbury Upton ‘being used as an armchair by one of the village patriarchs’. It is 8 foot in circumference, and the effort taken to remove it up the hill to Upton must have been considerable!
The plaster on the walls was removed in the restoration of 1882.
The picture of the buttress of the church shows where perhaps someone had too much time on their hands in 1736!
Hawkesbury Manor House
This stood where the two walnut trees are, in a field opposite the church. Built in the 16th Century, it was abandoned soon after 1770, when Amelia, the wife of Sir Charles Jenkinson, died, soon after the birth of their son.
That son later became Lord Liverpool, our third longest-serving Prime Minister.
In the chancel of the church are many memorials to the family.
There is something irresistible about old guide books. In ‘Off the Beaten Track. The church and manor of Hawkesbury’, by Rev’d Devereux Mack BA (price 1 shilling), published in 1932, he writes
This was St Andrews church, in Hawkesbury Upton. Built in 1923, funded by Mrs Robinson, a local benefactor. She left money for a Chapel of Ease to be built next to the school, so that the elderly would not have to go down the hill to St Mary’s. The vicar of the time also disliked going down the hill on dark winter evenings.
In the 1970s, the Church had to decide which of the 2 churches should be retained – the remote, but beautiful, St Mary’s, or the more workaday, but accessible, St Andrews. They decided in favour of the former, and St Andrews is now 3 dwellings.
At the time of the Religious Census on 30th March 1851 the afternoon service took place at the school. All religious organisations were asked what services they had on that day, and how many people attended them.
The unexpectedly low figures were a seismic shock for the Anglican Church.
This is what we have for Hawkesbury Parish
Population – 2185
St Mary’s Church, Hawkesbury – seating for 280.
Attendance for the morning services 125.
‘No afternoon service because the vicar has to perform a service at Tresham chapel and at Hawkesbury National Schools [in Hawkesbury Upton].
Hawkesbury National School service [set up the year previously in consequence of a petition to the bishop from the vicar, church wardens etc]. 200 seats, 141 attendance.
4 independent chapels, one of which didn’t return attendance figures, with a total of 588 seats, and attendance of 189 (morning) and 184 (afternoon – though, of course, these could be the same people).
Tresham Chapel seated 80, and had an attendance of 25.
Hillesley had no church, as it was only consecrated later in the year. The Baptist chapel seated 450, with attendances of 180, 220 and 80 at 3 services.
There are no figures provided for Little Badminton.
So, for the population of over 2,000, only 1598 seats were available, and only 560 of those belonged to the Anglicans.
Non-Conformity in the Parish
The Bethesda Congregational Church was built in 1844, and is still used for worship today.
It was built of an inferior-quality stone, and later faced with concrete blocks, giving it the rather stark appearance that it has now.
The Primitive Methodists was built in 1860, but is now closed.
Records are held at Bristol Archives, ref. 41646, 41120, 44609.
There was a third chapel, marked as Baptist on early maps, but is now a house, and was possibly converted early in the 19th Century.
The was also a Wesleyan chapel on far side of Inglestone Common between 1836-1992. It is now a private residence. Bristol Archives holds the income and expenditure summary dated 1989. Ref 41120/3/7/1
Next to the Baptist Chapel is what was, for a short period in the late 1830s, the Poor House. It was built by Sir Matthew Hale in the 17th Century but the family later moved to Alderley. It was decided that it would be better to accommodate the Poor at Chipping Sodbury Workhouse, and the house became a private residence.
The Somerset Monument
The Somerset Monument was built in 1846 and stands high on the Cotswold Edge at the entrance to Hawkesbury Upton near the family’s ancestral home of Badminton. It commemorates General Lord Robert Edward Henry Somerset GCB (19 December 1776 – 1 September 1842) was the son of the 5th duke of Beaufort and elder brother of Lord Raglan.
Tresham
Tresham is a small settlement, lying along the rim of a valley which runs down to Kilcot.
It was recorded in the 1901 Census as having 96 inhabitants.
Tresham had a Chapel of Ease, saving the inhabitants the 5 mile walk to Hawkesbury. The one we see in the picture was built in 1855, and is still in use. It was believed that the previous building was burnt down.
There was also a Brethren Chapel.
The village has a useful website on its history, which it is well worth looking at.
Hillesley
Hillesley is now a separate parish from Hawkesbury. The Baptist chapel could seat 450.
The church, seen in the postcard (reproduced with the permission of Paul Best on Gloucestershire Social History facebook page), was built in 1851, replacing a ruined Chapel of Ease.
The Fleece is run as a community pub.
The Bodkin
The Bodkin (previously the Beaufort Arms), situated on the main Stroud to Bath road on the edge of the Badminton estate, was a 17th century coaching inn, which was extended in the Regency period. Jane Austen is said to have eaten and drunk at the inn as a child and later wrote about Petty France in her novel ‘Northanger Abbey’ as a dull two-hour rest stop on the road between Bath and the fictional abbey:
“There was nothing to be done but to eat without being hungry, and to loiter about without anything to see”
The earliest parts of Bodkin House have their origins in a 12th century priory which was destroyed by Henry VIII during the dissolution of the monasteries.
Little Badminton
Little Badminton, on the far side of the parish, is part of the Badminton Estate. The cottages are grouped around what would have once been the village green. In 1871, the population was 68. St Michaels church, hidden away in the trees, was originally a private chapel for the Duke of Beaufort, and dates back to the early 13th Century.
Sources
A monument to Hawkesbury : the way we were : voices from a village remembered.
By Sam Allen and others
This was published in 2010, with a later volume appearing in 2014.
Hawkesbury Chronicles – 972-1899AD. By Hawkesbury Local History Society.
The Manor of Hawkesbury and its Owners by Rev’d Henry Denny, 1920
Website
Records for Hawkesbury and Inglestone Common Methodist Chapels, part of the Frome Valley Circuit, are held at Bristol Archives, ref 41120. Bristol Archives also hold miscellaneous deeds for the parish.