PREFACE

This work is produced in the hope that it may interest some of the present and future residents of the Parish of Winterbourne.

I wish to express my sincere gratitude for all the help, which I have received in the Central Library of Bristol; in the Public Library of Gloucester, in which special use has been made of the "Hockaday Abstracts," and of Mr. Roland Austin's "Notes of the Family of Bradeston ;" in the Bristol Diocesan Registry, and in the Office of the Trustees of the Bristol Municipal Charities. I am also indebted to the Incumbents of the three Ecclesiastical Parishes; to my many friends who have allowed me to consult the deeds of their houses; to the late Mr. E. J. Davies, Secretary to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, Mr. C. Roy Hudleston, Mr. Wilfrid Leighton and Sir Lionel Goodenough Taylor, who have helped me in many directions; to Alderman Henry Matthews and Mr. H. G. Ludwell, who have supplied me with many items of information; and to the Rev. S. T. Collins, who has allowed me to reproduce the photograph of the brass in the Winterbourne Manor Chapel, and two others.

The County Histories of Atkyns, Fosbrooke, Rudder and Rudge have been consulted.

C. H. B. EI.LIOTT.

Frenchay.
1936.

ABBREVIATIONS

B.D.R.		Bristol Diocesan Registers.

Cal. pat. rolls.	Calendar of Patent Rolls.

Cal. of Inq.	Calendar of Inquisitions.

c.		About.

Esc.		Escheat.

I.P.M.-		Inquisition post mortem.

Lamb. Reg.	Lambeth Registers.

M.C.T.		Trustees of the Bristol Municipal Charities.

P.R.O.		Public Record Office.

Q.E.H.		Queen Elizabeth's Hospital, BristoI.

T.B. and G.A.S.	Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire
Archaeological Society.

W.D.R.		Worcester Diocesan Registers.

Winterbourne Gloucestershire by C.H.B. Elliott.

PART I. GENERAL HISTORY.

INTRODUCTION

WINTERBOURNE FROM THE EARLIEST DAYS.

THE earliest known inhabitants of the land were Iberians, of the stone and bronze ages; they were hunters, living in holes made in the ground, with coverings of brushwood, clothing themselves in the skins of bears, wolves and foxes, cultivating the soil to a small extent, and rearing a few domestic animals. They sometimes cremated their dead, and sometimes buried them under large round mounds, known as . "barrows"; it is supposed that the mound in the grounds of Hill Crest, Winterbourne Down, the highest point in the parish, may have been one of these. From the 7th century B.C. onwards there were successive invasions of Celtic tribes, from north-west Germany and the Netherlands, who with their superior weapons defeated the Iberians. In A.D. 43 the Romans, after a short previous visit, returned and conquered the country, which became part of the Roman Empire. They enlisted many of the Celts in their armies, and despatched much of the wheat raised by them for the use of their troops on the Continent. Shortly after A.D. 400 the Roman armies were recalled for the defence of other parts of the Empire, leaving this land a victim to the Anglo-Saxons, from Denmark, and Germany on both sides of the river Elbe, whose previous invasions the Romans had successfully resisted.

Bury Hill Camp.

The Camp on Bury Hill, about 7½ acres in extent, part of the Moorend Farm property which has lately been transferred to the parish of Winterbourne, was used as a place of defence by the Iberians.

The ramparts of earth, presumably built by the Celtic people, are well preserved on three sides, but that on the western side, where quarrying has taken place, has disappeared. The Romans formed a long line of forts, some constructed and others adapted, along the hills facing the Severn for defence against the Silures of South Wales. The Bury Hill Camp was adapted by them as a link between this line of forts and their camps on the Cotswolds. The "Proceedings of the Spelaeological Society of the University of Bristol," 1923, gave a very interesting account, by Mr. J. A. Davies and Mr. C. W. Phillips, of the investigations made by the Society (by permission of Mr. Rutter) on a portion of the camp. Various remains were discovered indicating its occupation by the Iberian and Celtic people. The most interesting discovery was that of a Roman army hut on the west side, where a length of 70 feet was uncovered. The width is 17 feet, and it was enclosed by a ditch 4 feet wide. There are remains of a foundation wall of 4 or 5 courses of Pennant stone, about 1 foot high, on which it is suggested that walls of timber or sods were raised, roofed with brushwood; it is supposed that this hut was for the housing of an outpost established during the campaign of A.D. 47. A smaller hut, similar to the larger one, was also discovered. Metals, some coins (undecipherable), and glass of the Roman period were found. There appears to be evidence of a longer stay here on the part of the Romans during the 3rd and 4th centuries.

Winterbourne was included in the Royal Forest of Kingswood, which was very large during the period of the later Saxon kings, and until 1228, when Henry III granted a charter of disafforestation, and most of it (including Winterbourne) was converted into common land, a comparatively small area being retained as a "Royal Chase." In the Saxon period the greater part of the land was divided into "Tithings," each tithing being probably regarded as sufficient for the maintenance of ten households, and ten tithings forming a "Hundred." The parish of Winterbourne is in the hundred of Langley and Swineshead, and comprises the tithings of Winterbourne and Hambrook, which are divided by the Bradley Brook.

Under the Conqueror.

The Feudal system which prevailed in France was introduced into Britain by William the Conqueror. Under this system the king was in theory owner of all the lands in the kingdom, which he apportioned among his Barons, as tenants-in-chief, with the exception of that which he retained in his own hands. G. M. Trevelyan, in his History o/ England (Book I, Chapter VII1) says that Domesday Book (1086) takes full cognizance of one organ of Saxon life--the Shire. Everything is grouped under the Shire or "County," for it is through the Shire that the king intends to act. But inside the Shire the unit under which all the information is re-arranged is the feudal holding of the tenant-in-chief, however widely scattered his lands may be in the County. And the lesser unit in Domesday Book is not the village regarded as a township, but the village regarded as a manor belonging to a lord, be he tenant-in-chief or vassal. He explains that the officers of the Shire or hundred made their demands not from the men of each township, but from the lord of each manor, who "answers for the manor" in the matter of taxation, recovering from his tenantry as best he may. In the eyes of the law the man who "answers for the manor" becomes more and more the owner of the manor and the old village organization slips ever more into the background.

The Civil Parish of Winterbourne.

The Civil Parish of Winterbourne extends c. three miles from north to south, and c. two miles, at its widest point, from east to west. The Survey map of 1827 gives its total acreage as 3,285. It is bounded on the north by Frampton Cotterell; the river Frome, which reaches Winterbourne just below Nightingale Bridge, divides it on the east from Frampton Cotterell, then from Westerleigh as far as to Damsons Bridge, then from Mangotsfield down to the Bristol boundary (except where its course runs round the foot of Bury Hill, which is now included in the parish of Winterbourne). The parish of Stoke Gifford borders it on the west.

The Bristol boundary reached the southern portion of the parish in 1897, a small stream from Goreham Hill, running under the main road, and thence into the Frome, forming the boundary. In 1935 the City boundary was extended so as to include the following portions of the parish of Winterbourne; the Begbrook and Frenchay park properties (and the houses on the opposite side of the main road), Newlands, Cliff Court, and Frenchay Mill. These remain in the ecclesiastical parish of Frenchay.