BOURTON-ON-THE-WATER
The parish of Bourton-on-the-Water is midway
between Stow-on-the-Wold and Northleach; its
large village centre, well known as an attraction to
holiday-makers, lies a short distance from the Foss
Way, with its main street running beside the broad
green that flanks the River Windrush. The parish is
2,470 a. in extent, (fn. 1) and wedge-shaped: the northwest boundary follows the Foss Way, the eastern
boundary the Slaughter brook, the River Dikler, and
the River Windrush; the southern boundary runs up
a watercourse and over Bourton Hill to Broadwater
Bottom. (fn. 2) Except for the part of the southern boundary
that separates Bourton from Clapton, these are the
boundaries defined in pre-Conquest charters, which
relate to Bourton and Clapton together. (fn. 3)
The north-eastern half of the parish—along the
south-west side of the Windrush and in the triangle
formed by the Windrush, the Dikler, and the Foss
Way—lies in the vale between 400 and 450 ft., and
is flat and contains much rich meadow-land; most of
this area was inclosed in the early 17th century, (fn. 4) and
in places ridge and furrow survive where arable land
was converted then to permanent grass-land. To
the south the land rises steeply from the Windrush
valley to over 700 ft., and then falls away more
gently towards Broadwater Bottom. In the extreme
south-west a little scrub-covered rough pasture
survives, but nearly all the land was divided under
an inclosure Act of 1773 (fn. 5) into fields separated
sometimes by dry-stone walls but more often by
hedges. There is almost no woodland in the parish.
For the upper part of its course through Bourton
the River Windrush is slightly higher than the land
on its right, and its comparative straightness also
indicates that it does not follow its original line.
The likely reason for the diversion was the use of the
water to drive mills, of which there were three by the
12th century. (fn. 6) The river appears to have followed
its man-made course by 1620 at the latest. (fn. 7) It was
reputed a fine trout-stream as long ago as 1779. (fn. 8) In
1620 there was said to be a park belonging to the
lord of the manor, (fn. 9) but how big it was or how long
it survived is not known.
The south-western part of the parish is on the
Inferior Oolite, which has been extensively quarried
at the edge nearest the village, below which the
Cotswold Sand, Upper Lias, and Middle Lias
appear as narrow belts on the steep hillside overlooking the Windrush valley. Below 450 ft. most of
the parish is on the Lower Lias, but along the rivers
are relatively wide alluvial deposits and between the
rivers are patches of river gravels, (fn. 10) of which those
on the eastern side of the parish were being commercially exploited in 1962.
The presence of gravel is largely responsible for
the early use of Bourton for human occupation, and
for the continuity of settlement for which the parish
is remarkable. The earliest evidence of human
activity there comes from the northern end, in the
Slaughter Bridge gravel-spread, where Neolithic
pottery was found in a series of fire-pits or cookingholes. (fn. 11) This gravel-spread was still in use in the
transitional period from Neolithic to Bronze Age,
as is attested by the burial of a woman in a shallow
grave accompanied by a beaker, (fn. 12) and by other sherds
of the same period near-by. The ceremonial burial
with eight socketed bronze axes is of a later date in
the Bronze Age, (fn. 13) and the round barrow at Bourton
Hill Farm represents the more usual burial of this
period. (fn. 14) Shallow pits with a red clayey earth filling
containing flint scrapers, and flakes found below the
rampart-of the Early Iron Age camp, indicate that
the largest gravel-spread, (fn. 15) stretching over a mile
east and south-west from where the Foss Way
crosses the Windrush, was in occupation during the
same period.
The Early Iron Age camp, known by its Saxon
name of Salmonsbury Camp, (fn. 16) was built at the
highest part of the vale on the largest gravel-spread.
It is four-sided, defended by double ramparts and
ditches, and is unusual both for its large size (56 a.)
and for being in the vale overlooked by hills on all
sides. The likelihood is that it was a market town
rather than a fort for refuge in time of danger. In
1880 140 currency bars were found on the northeastern rampart. (fn. 17) The main entrance to the camp
faced the natural approach from higher ground on
the west. A much smaller entrance lay in the centre
of the north-eastern side, whence a trackway leading
north-eastwards can be seen on air photographs.
The Belgae occupied at least part of Salmonsbury
Camp, and along with coins and other pottery of
theirs was found the unique black fluted jar later
deposited in Cheltenham Museum. Belgic occupation was short-lived, and Claudian pottery from
soon after the Roman conquest of a.d. 43 (fn. 18) is found
at Salmonsbury. A dense occupation continued in
the camp and spread outside it.
The Foss Way by-passes the camp by half a mile,
and near the crossing of the Windrush at Bourton
Bridge there grew up another settlement, dominated
by the mansio or posting-house built beside the road,
the ruins of which lie mostly under the railway
embankment. Trade was drawn to the new settlement, and in time an area stretching from the bridge
to the camp was covered with Romano-British
buildings. Many coins and much Roman pottery
have been recovered from Lansdown at the western
end of Bourton village, the coin evidence alone
showing an occupation throughout the Roman
period. (fn. 19) Further expansion also took place along the
south side of the camp, while ribbon development
beside the Foss Way ran up Whiteshoots Hill. In
the former area native hut sites have been found with
abundant Roman pottery and other objects, (fn. 20) while
a graveyard of the same period lies in front of
Burghfields.
An outlying settlement, also of this period, lay on
the Santhill gravel-spread, the narrow stretch of land
between the confluence of the Windrush and the
Dikler at the south-east corner of the parish. The
remains of a small Roman house accompanied by
the layout of a field system and native-type huts were
uncovered during gravel-digging c. 1960.
There are no signs of any sudden end of Roman
occupation at Bourton-on-the-Water, but the Foss
Way appears to have been disused in the 6th or 7th
century when the Roman road was used as a pagan
Saxon graveyard. Eight burials were found in graves
dug into the gravel bedding of the road half a mile
south-west of Slaughter Bridge. (fn. 21) By the 9th century
the road was again in use, for a coin of Egbert
(802–39), dropped by the ford at Slaughter Bridge,
was recovered. (fn. 22) There was also Saxon occupation
on the Slaughter Bridge gravel-spread, where a
Saxon weavers' hut was found in 1931, (fn. 23) In Salmonsbury Camp other Saxon objects and burials have
been uncovered.
Bourton-on-the-Water in 1962
KEY TO MAP OF BOURTON-ON-THE-WATER
1. Parish church
2. Old Rectory
3. Rectory
4. Church Room, former
National school
5. Manor-house
6. Lower Mill
7. Big Bridge
8. Narrow Bridge
9. Payne's Bridge
10. The Green
11. Victoria Hall
12. Old Baptist Manse
13. Baptist church
14. The Manor
15. Sherborne Terrace
16. Harrington House
17. Grey Gables
18. Chardwar House
19. Christadelphian chapel
20. Police station
21. Post office
22. Bank
23. New Inn
24. Eastfields, formerly the cottage hospital
25. The Red House, formerly
the cottage hospital
26. Cottage Hospital
27. Salmonsbury Cottages
28. Camp House
29. Graveyard, with site of old
Baptist chapel
30. Burghfields
31. Railway station
32. Railway Inn
33. Secondary school
34. Primary school
35. Former Zion chapel and
British school
36. Mill House, formerly Upper
or Bourton Mill
By the 11th century the church was established on
its site at the north-west end of the post-medieval
village; (fn. 24) this, and the discovery of pottery of the
Norman period near the centre of the village, (fn. 25)
indicate that by the 12th century the village had at
least begun to assume its orientation along the course
of the Windrush. It is possible that the building
of houses there was connected with the diversion
of the course of the river, mentioned above, and that
previously the village street had run between the
church and Salmonsbury Camp. Several 'cot-acres'
mentioned in 1620 as lying in the field north of the
village (fn. 26) may derive from the cotlands of the 12th
century, (fn. 27) which were presumably associated with
dwellings. The villager surnamed Burimon in 1327 (fn. 28)
may have been so called because he lived near the
camp, rather than in the main village, and indeed the
name of the village itself might be taken to indicate a
closer geographical relationship (fn. 29) between the village
and the camp. Camp House and Burghfields, both
built before the parliamentary inclosure of 1774, may
be on sites that have been continuously occupied
since before the village was built beside the river, but
it is also possible that they owe their location to the
inclosure of most of the Bury field in 1620. (fn. 30) That
inclosure could account for the disappearance of any
positive trace of a village street between the church
and the camp, though the apparently ancient track
from the camp to Rissington Bridge remained in
use.
By the late 17th century the village stretched along
the north-east side of the Windrush from the church
to the road leading towards the camp (later called
Station Road), and on the south-west side formed
a rough square round Sherborne Street and Threadneedle Street (later called Victoria Street). (fn. 31) The
main bridge over the stream was Big Bridge, by the
mill, then called the Broad Bridge, (fn. 32) and there was
presumably another bridge a little way downstream.
There, roughly at the middle of the High Street,
was the focal point of the village, where the street
crossed a wide green, on which were the village
stocks. (fn. 33)
At that time the green is unlikely to have extended
nearly so far along the river, either towards the
manor-house, church, and rectory at the north-west
end of the village or south-eastwards, where what
later became green was a copse or shrubbery until
the early 19th century. (fn. 34) By 1773 the two parts of
the village were connected by four bridges: (fn. 35) the one
opposite the green (Narrow Bridge) had been built
in 1756, and the one further downstream (Payne's
Bridge) was rebuilt in 1776. (fn. 36) All the bridges, including the later ones, have three arches, are slightly
humped, and have very low parapets. By the end of
the century Bourton was clearly regarded as a village
of attractive appearance, (fn. 37) though it was said that
the prospect was much too regular to be very picturesque. (fn. 38) The stocks were removed from the green
c. 1860; this may have been part of an attempt to
improve the appearance of the centre of the village,
which had been described in 1856 as 'genteel and
pretty.' (fn. 39) George Frederick Moore in 1911 built the
road-bridge that leads from High Street to Victoria
Street, which for a time replaced Big Bridge as the
main crossing, (fn. 40) and he was to a great extent responsible for planting new trees and reducing the
grass to order. Opposite the village war memorial he
had a field-gun placed; it was set in concrete to
prevent a repetition of its being dragged into the
river by a party of unsympathetic villagers, but after
Moore's death in 1927 it was removed by general
consent. (fn. 41) By gift in 1924 and by his will Moore set
up a trust fund yielding £36 a year for the maintenance of the green. (fn. 42) Since Moore's time the main
change in the appearance of the green has been the
alteration of many of the house-fronts for commercial
purposes. In 1961 a ditch running along the green
was filled. (fn. 43)
The growth of Bourton in size and prosperity from
the mid-17th century was perhaps stimulated by
agricultural changes in the parish, (fn. 44) and is reflected
in the size and architectural richness of the houses.
In the 17th and 18th centuries the south-west side
of the village probably provided most of the new
building sites, both for cottages and larger houses,
and that part of the village increased both in area
and density; the High Street also was extended
slightly at each end. In the early 19th century the
north-westward extension of the High Street was
carried much further, creating the area known as
Lansdown, in which building continued steadily
into the mid-20th century. In the late 19th century
an important development was the beginning of a
completely new road (later Moore Road) from the
middle of the village towards the railway station,
where a small settlement had grown. (fn. 45) In the 1930's
a group of houses called Salmonsbury Cottages was
built by the rural district council north-west of the
village, and another estate was later built beside the
station by the council. After the Second World War
many houses were built, by the council and by
private developers, along the road leading south-east
from the village towards Rissington Bridge. These
houses engulfed the small hamlet of Nethercote,
which existed in some form in the 12th century, (fn. 46)
contained a large house and more than one family
in the early 14th century, (fn. 47) and had one large house,
two small ones, and an inn in 1773. (fn. 48) In 1962 further
houses were being built beyond Nethercote, and also
on the south-west side of the village. The isolated
houses in the parish, with the exception of Camp
House and Burghfields (mentioned above) were all
built after the parliamentary inclosure of 1774. In
the late 18th century and early 19th nine outlying
farm-houses were built, some with adjoining cottages.
Other houses built remote from the village before
the 20th century included Whiteshoots and the
'Coach and Horses', both on the Foss Way, and
some houses near the station. (fn. 49)
The population of Bourton evidently increased
during the 14th century: whereas in 1327 both the
number of taxpayers and the amount of tax assessed
for Bourton were near the average for the hundred, (fn. 50)
in 1381 only Stow-on-the-Wold and Sherborne
surpassed Bourton's figure of 118 poll-tax payers. (fn. 51)
In the mid-16th century, however, the number of
communicants was lower (fn. 52) than the number of polltax payers in 1381, and the population remained
static until the mid-17th century, when the number
of households rose from c. 40 (fn. 53) to 70. (fn. 54) In the 18th
century the population rose from an estimated 350 (fn. 55)
to 615 three years before inclosure (fn. 56) and c. 700 in
the early 19th century. (fn. 57) By 1851, despite emigration
to America in the thirties, (fn. 58) the total had risen to
1,040 and then remained steady until 1931, when it
was 1,100. Between 1931 and 1951, with the building
of new houses, the population increased by over
half (fn. 59) and it continued to rise thereafter.
The growth of Bourton is attributable in part to
its good communications with its neighbours, which
have given it easy access without making it a market
centre. One reason why it did not have a market in
the Middle Ages was that it belonged to Evesham
Abbey, (fn. 60) which owned a market at Stow-on-theWold: (fn. 61) Stow was better served by roads and was
more nearly central in the abbey's group of estates
in the area. Nevertheless, as suggested above, (fn. 62)
prehistoric settlement in Bourton may be associated
with an Iron Age trackway, the continuation of which
is perhaps marked by the road leading west from the
village towards Andoversford and Gloucester, and
the Romano-British settlement was connected with
the crossing of the Windrush by the Foss Way. There
was a bridge there in the Roman period, (fn. 63) a ford in
the 8th century, (fn. 64) and by 1483 a stone bridge. (fn. 65) Up
to the early 16th century, however, the recognized
route from Bourton to Northleach was not by the
Foss Way but through Farmington. (fn. 66) Bourton Bridge,
which had previously been wide enough for one
team at a time, was rebuilt as a county bridge
c. 1805; (fn. 67) it was again widened and rebuilt in 1960.
The Foss Way was a turnpike from 1755 to 1877. (fn. 68)
The road leading south-east out of the village had
evidently been built up above the level of the surrounding marshy land by 1539, when it had given
its name to Causeway mead. (fn. 69) By 1536 this road was
carried over the River Dikler by Rissington Bridge; (fn. 70)
in 1955 (fn. 71) a new bridge was built alongside the narrow
18th-century bridge, which survived in 1962, and
the line of the approach road from Bourton was
altered. From 1862 to 1962 Bourton was served by
a railway, with a station only half a mile away, an
unusual advantage for a Cotswold village. Until
1881, when the railway line was extended to Cheltenham, Bourton station was the terminus of a branch
line from Kingham (Oxon.). (fn. 72)
The buildings of Bourton-on-the-Water are of the
17th century and later, except for part of the church
and two or three houses which incorporate 16thcentury work. Presumably there were few stone
houses before the 17th century: a lease of Nethercote
manor in 1532 mentions timber but no stone for the
repair of the buildings. (fn. 73) The manor-house was
rebuilt in stone apparently in the 16th century; when
the rectory was rebuilt c. 1580 (fn. 74) it may have been of
stone, but it was rebuilt 40 years later (fn. 75) and no part
of the 16th-century building can be identified; two
smaller houses, the smithy cottage and the cottage
adjoining Vine House, originated as stone buildings
in the late 16th century. By the early 17th century
timber was not plentiful in the parish, (fn. 76) and this may
have encouraged building in stone. Stone-pits were
mentioned in 1584, (fn. 77) and by 1692 the quarries in the
parish were extensive. (fn. 78) Presumably these quarries
had provided all the stone used up to the late 17th
century, but it is questionable whether they also
provided the freestone that is such a feature of the
larger 18th-century houses in the village. In the
early 19th century the quarries were larger (fn. 79) than
the remains of them visible a hundred years later,
and it is possible that the supply of freestone was
exhausted. Until the mid-19th century nearly all the
houses were built of stone, with Cotswold stone
roofs: the roofs of Welsh slate, clay tiles, or other
materials on a few of the older buildings are mostly
later changes. Even after the mid-19th century,
builders usually imitated as closely as they could
the traditional building materials: nearly all the
houses built after c. 1930 are of stone or reconstituted stone.
The 17th-century houses in the village show a
profusion of the characteristic features of Cotswold
architecture: projecting gables, string-courses, windows with stone mullions and dripmoulds, and
stone hoodmoulds over the doors, features that were
strikingly represented in the 17th-century parsonage
house, which boasted 140 separate lights (having
mullioned and transomed windows). (fn. 80) This architectural richness and the comparatively large number
of substantial 17th-century houses may be seen as
an indication of the prosperity of the village at the
period, but this view should not overlook the fact
that many of the smaller houses were embellished,
and nearly all the larger ones were given their greater
size, often by skilfully imitative additions, in or after
the late 19th century, when the village was exerting
its charms as a picturesque rural retreat. The addition to Sherborne Terrace, the original part of which
bears the date 1650, is inscribed 1914, when the rest
of the terrace was largely rebuilt, and the additions
to Chardwar House are easy enough to detect; it is
not easy to see that Dial House, dated 1698, and
Grey Gables were given a considerable part of
their apparently 17th-century fabric during the 20th
century. (fn. 81)
Even the larger houses were built of rubble in the
17th century; in the 18th most of the larger houses
were built of ashlar and used several imported
features. Harrington House, described below, is the
most notable example. Among the houses with hipped
roofs is the Mill House of the Upper Mill; and the
New Inn (which has a sundial dated 1712), Hartley
House, and Windrush House have half-hipped gables
masked by truncated parapets, apparently a local
feature. The Old Manse, the size of which indicates
the prosperity of the Baptist community, is, however,
of rubble and has mullioned instead of sash windows
on the elevation away from the street; it was built
in 1748. (fn. 82) The Old Rectory, though built c. 1820,
belongs with the 18th-century houses of the village;
the larger houses of later date, and the farm-houses
of c. 1800, though they often have sash windows
with architraves, hark back to an earlier tradition.
The manor-house (to be distinguished from the
18th-century house that was called the Manor from
c. 1900) (fn. 83) may be on the site where a residence for
the abbots of Evesham was built c. 1200. (fn. 84) John
Lane, who farmed the manor from 1514, (fn. 85) and his
son William lived in a house known in the 16th
century as the bridge end house; (fn. 86) this was evidently
the manor-house, which was the last house in the
village at the end towards Bourton Bridge. In the
mid-19th century the manor-house was largely
demolished, and only a small part of the south front,
apparently built in the late 16th century, remained
standing. What was left was used as a dispensary
until 1890 when Dawber rebuilt the house for Dr.
F. R. S. Corser. In 1919 the house was again rebuilt,
supposedly in the style of the 16th-century house. (fn. 87)
In the garden a large round pigeon-house survived in
1962.
Nethercote Manor stands on a site half a mile
south-east of the village centre where apparently
there was a house in 1532, (fn. 88) and perhaps where the
hall of Nethercote stood in the early 14th century. (fn. 89)
Thomas Collett built a new house there in 1689, (fn. 90)
shortly after buying the manor. This house has been
altered less in the 19th and 20th centuries than any
of the other larger 17th-century houses in Bourton,
although there is an addition on the south-east side
dated 1949. The house is of rubble, and the windows
have stone mullions and dripmoulds. The northwest front, of three stories with three gables carrying
ball finials, has two doorways, of which the southern
one has a low arch with imposts and keystone. The
range of farm-buildings east of the house are also
of the late 17th century.
Harrington House, the most imposing of the
houses in the village, was built c. 1740, incorporating
as its northern wing a 17th-century house which had
been rebuilt c. 1700 by Anthony Collett (d. 1719),
whose niece and eventual heir Elizabeth married
William Moore (d. 1768), a lawyer. Moore built the
house, of yellowish ashlar, in a regional Palladian
style. The house is of two stories, with the cornice
and pediment carried by pilasters. The Cotswold
stone roof is surmounted by a domed gazebo and
surrounded by a balustraded parapet with vase finials.
The windows, with segmental heads, have moulded
architraves and keystones, and the doorway has
rusticated Ionic pilasters supporting a cornice and
pediment. The gate-posts in front of the house are
of vermiculated stone with ball finials. The interior,
with unusually elaborate rococo plaster-work, is of
c. 1740, and the contemporary staircase is lit by a
Venetian window in the centre of the garden front.
In 1776 William Moore's second wife, another
Elizabeth, married Sir James Harrington, Bt. (d.
1782), after whom the house is called, and after her
death the house passed to an illegitimate son of
William Moore. Early in the 19th century it was
bought by a Mr. Hall, and by c. 1860 was owned by
a Mr. Mills who used part of the house as a brewery.
Alfred Hadley, who continued to use it in the same
way, bought it c. 1870, and his family lived there
until 1922 when it was bought by J. A. Fort, who
added a southern wing in the same year. (fn. 91) From
1947 the house was used as a Holiday Fellowship
hotel. (fn. 92)
A house on the site occupied by Burghfields, a
short way out of the village, was bought in 1703 by
John Jordan. (fn. 93) Another John Jordan (known as
Squire Jordan) rebuilt the house in the late 18th century. (fn. 94) It is of rubble with a hipped Cotswold stone
roof with a modillion eaves cornice; it has two stories
with sash windows with keystones, and dormered
attics.
An ale-house was recorded in Bourton in the
mid-16th century, when the Rector of Wick
Rissington was accused of spending all his time
there. (fn. 95) Victuallers were recorded in 1639 (fn. 96) and
1755, (fn. 97) although in the late 17th century it was said
that Bourton had no ale-house. (fn. 98) The New Inn is
likely to have been built as an inn in the early 18th
century, and by 1773 there was also the Fox Inn at
Nethercote, in the angle formed by the lane and the
main road. (fn. 99) By 1824 the 'Coach and Horses'
existed on the Foss Way, north of the village, (fn. 100) and
in 1856 there were four inns in the parish: the New
Inn, the 'Coach and Horses', the 'Woodman', and
the 'Wellington'. By 1864 the 'Woodman' had been
replaced by the Railway Inn. The Lansdown Inn
(later rebuilt and renamed the 'Mouse Trap') was
built c. 1890, and with the addition of the 'Bell' the
number of inns was six in 1939. (fn. 101)
The Bourton-on-the-Water Village Hospital (later
usually called the Moore Cottage Hospital) was
opened, the third of its kind in the country, in 1861,
largely through the efforts of John Moore, a local
surgeon. The yearly number of in-patients was
c. 30, of out-patients c. 170. The original building
(later the house known as Eastfields) was rented, (fn. 102) and
in 1879 the hospital was moved to a new building
(later the Red House) on a site given by W. S.
Stenson. (fn. 103) In 1928 the hospital was moved to another
building, provided by George Frederick Moore. (fn. 104)
Under the National Health Act of 1946 the hospital,
which had formerly been maintained largely by
voluntary contributions, passed under the management of the Banbury and District Hospital Management Committee. (fn. 105)
The Victoria Hall was built by subscription in
1897 to commemorate the queen's jubilee, and was
intended to provide a reading room and space
for meetings and entertainments. In 1924 George
Frederick Moore gave the trustees a cottage, the
sale of which provided an endowment fund of over
£1,000 for the hall. (fn. 106) By the fifties the hall was being
used as a working men's club, (fn. 107) and in 1962 it became
the home also of the local Y.M.C.A., (fn. 108) which had
formerly had rooms in Lansdown. In Lansdown
also was a British Legion Branch, and near the
church was the Bourton Vale Community Centre,
opened during the Second World War. (fn. 109) The village
had a long tradition of local clubs. In 1803 there were
two friendly societies, and in the next ten years
membership of friendly societies rose from 247 to
nearly 400. (fn. 110) New friendly societies were registered
in 1828, (fn. 111) 1837, and 1838, (fn. 112) and a club day, for
various societies, with a dinner at the New Inn, continued to be held until c. 1930. (fn. 113) Club Day, the first
Friday in June, survived in 1962 as a pleasure fair
in the village street. Another pleasure fair was held
on the first Friday in May. The Bourton Vale
Cricket Club, founded in 1883, is the oldest of the
village sports clubs, which include football, hockey,
and tennis clubs. (fn. 114) The sports ground on the
Rissington road was enlarged c. 1952; one contribution towards the cost of the new ground came
from the proceeds of the sale of the town quarry,
allotted under the inclosure Act of 1773 and by then
worked out. (fn. 115)
The village was supplied with water by a large
number of wells (some 200 in 1930, but only ten of
them more than seven feet deep) (fn. 116) until 1936 when
main water was brought by the North Cotswold
R.D.C. A sewerage system had been built early in
the 20th century. (fn. 117) In 1869 the village streets were
lit by oil-lamps, the expense being met in part out
of the proceeds from penny readings and concerts.
In 1882 a gas company was formed: plant was
installed near Clapton Row, and the gas used for the
street lamps. By 1916 the streets were lit by electric
light, the power being supplied by the Bourton-onthe-Water Electric Light and Power Co. which was
founded in 1912, (fn. 118) was empowered to supply the area
of the parish only, (fn. 119) and by 1942 had been merged
with the Wessex Electricity Co. (fn. 120)
The village figured briefly in England's political
history in 1644 when Charles I and the Prince of
Wales lodged one night there on the retreat from
Oxford. (fn. 121) In 1667 Dr. Richard Gardiner, Canon of
Christ Church, Oxford, and a noted preacher, gave
an estate at Bourton which he had bought in 1662 to
his college for the support of two servitors; the
college retained the estate until the early 20th
century. (fn. 122) John Collett Ryland (1723–92), the divine,
was born at Bourton and sent to school by Benjamin
Beddome, (fn. 123) the Baptist minister. (fn. 124) Edwin Ransford
(1805–76), the actor, was born at Bourton and buried
there. (fn. 125)
It is not, however, for its historical associations
that Bourton-on-the-Water is widely known. The
easy course of the River Windrush under arched
stone bridges and beside grassy banks set around with
the old stone houses of the village has long given
Bourton a distinction among its neighbours, and
certainly by the later 19th century retired people of
the professional classes were being drawn to settle
in the village. (fn. 126) Bourton, with its railway station,
was affected as much as anywhere by the growing
appreciation of the Cotswolds, and the increased use
of motor transport after the First World War brought
a considerable holiday traffic to the village, with a
resultant growth in the numbers of guest-houses and
tea-shops. (fn. 127) After the Second World War there was
a change both in the scale of the local tourist industry
and in the type of attraction offered to the visitor.
The first indication of this change was the opening
in 1937 of the 'model village' (a miniature replica of
the centre of Bourton) in the grounds of the New
Inn, thereafter called the Old New Inn. (fn. 128) Later
enterprises, which do not have the same logic behind
their location in the village, include an aquarium, an
aviary, a vivarium, and a 'witchcraft museum'. The
number of tea-shops, snack-bars, souvenir-shops,
and filling-stations has increased correspondingly.
Manors.
The manor of BOURTON was among
those which Evesham Abbey claimed to have been
granted in the early 8th century by Coenred. (fn. 129) In
the years 779 and 949, however, the estate was the
subject of royal grants to laymen (to Offa's thegn
Duddo in 779 and to Edred's miles Wulfric in 949), (fn. 130)
and it may be that what the abbey later regarded as
the redemption of the estate in the early 11th century (fn. 131) in fact represents the abbey's original acquisition of Bourton. (fn. 132) From the Anglo-Saxon period the
estate evidently included the neighbouring parish
of Clapton, (fn. 133) which is not mentioned in Domesday.
In the 12th century Evesham Abbey clearly held the
whole of Clapton, which was then closely connected
with Bourton manor (fn. 134) and was in 1535 regarded as
part of that manor. (fn. 135) It was only with the dispersal
of the monastic estates that Clapton was separated
from Bourton manor. (fn. 136)
Nearly all the parish of Bourton, as well as Clapton, was within the manor belonging to the abbey,
which received grants of various estates in fee in
Bourton in the 12th, 14th, and 15th centuries. (fn. 137) The
manor, rated as ten hides in 1086, (fn. 138) was held as one
knight's fee with Broadwell. (fn. 139) The profits from the
manor belonged to the abbey's chamber until the
late 12th century, when the abbot appropriated them,
and c. 1200 the monks ceded Bourton to the abbot,
getting Adlestrop in exchange. (fn. 140) The abbot was
granted free warren in his demesne lands of Bourton
in 1251. (fn. 141)
The reversion of the manor, which with the
abbey's share of the tithes (fn. 142) had been let before the
Dissolution, (fn. 143) was granted by the Crown in 1562 to
Edmund Brydges, Lord Chandos (fn. 144) (d. 1573), whose
grandson, Gray, Lord Chandos (d. 1621), (fn. 145) sold the
manor in 1610 to Sir Thomas Edmunds, (fn. 146) later
Treasurer of the Household. Sir Thomas, who
died at Bourton in 1639, settled the manor in 1635
on his daughter and coheir, Isabella, who had married
Henry West, Lord de la Warr (d. 1628); her grandson John, Lord de la Warr (d. 1723), sold it, apparently after 1687, to Charles Trinder, whose
family had owned land in Bourton in 1648. (fn. 147) Trinder
is said to have been a descendant of Sir Thomas
Edmunds, (fn. 148) and in 1671 he occupied the largest
house in Bourton. (fn. 149)
By 1721 the manor had passed to John Wright and
Charles Bodenham, (fn. 150) who were related to Trinder
and may have been trustees, (fn. 151) and in 1729 they
conveyed the manor to Thomas Church. (fn. 152) In 1735
and 1738 the lord of the manor was a Mr. Partridge
and in 1743 Samuel Ingram of Coln St. Aldwyn, (fn. 153)
who was succeeded c. 1777 by his brother Thomas
Ingram (d. 1806) and his daughter Frances, who
married John Rice of Bourton-on-the-Water.
Frances died a widow in 1834, having settled the
estate on a distant cousin named in her uncle's
will, Bowyer Vaux, a Birmingham surgeon. (fn. 154) Soon
afterwards the estate was sold off in small lots. (fn. 155) By
1885 part of the manor belonged to William Snooke
Stenson, who was one of the main landowners; his
widow, regarded as sole lady of the manor, called
her house the Manor. This house, and the titular
lordship, passed c. 1920 to Roger Pilkington Young,
whose widow, though she did not live in the village
and no longer owned the house, was titular lady of
the manor in 1962. (fn. 156)
In the 12th century Robert of Nethercote held of
Evesham Abbey one hide in Bourton, for which he
made suit of the county for the township, and a
messuage and two and a half yardlands for which he
paid rent. (fn. 157) This Robert is presumably the same as
the Robert of Slaughter who held five yardlands in
Bourton (fn. 158) and in 1192 successfully resisted the claim
of Osbert Scot to five yardlands specifically stated
to be in Nethercote. (fn. 159) A Robert of Nethercote
witnessed a charter of 1209, and granted land in
Sherborne to Winchcombe Abbey, (fn. 160) and a man of
the same name was one of Evesham Abbey's knights
in 1237. (fn. 161) In the early 14th century people of
the same surname were substantial landowners in
Bourton, and may have held the sub-manor of
NETHERCOTE: Sir Simon of Nethercote occurs
in 1269 and c. 1300, William of Nethercote in 1312,
Robert of Nethercote in 1311 and 1327, and Robert's
son William in 1333. (fn. 162)
Nethercote does not reappear in the records (fn. 163)
until the early 15th century. In 1412 John Browning,
lord of the Leigh, made a settlement of land in
Nethercote and the neighbourhood, (fn. 164) and in the
middle of the century William Browning claimed
that his farmer had been violently ejected from
Nethercote manor. (fn. 165) In 1484 Alexander Browning
conveyed the manor to Robert Tailor of Bourton,
in the hundred court of Slaughter, (fn. 166) and in 1486 this
conveyance was confirmed by a suit in the king's
court, to which it had been remitted by the Abbot
of Evesham. (fn. 167)
By 1532 the manor, containing over 100 a. of
arable and meadow, was held by Henry Tailor of
Bourton, who then received it at farm from Evesham
Abbey, apparently in return for his surrendering the
freehold, (fn. 168) and whose widow was granted a lifetenure of the manor the same year. (fn. 169) In 1547
Nethercote manor was granted to Lord Seymour
along with Stow-on-the-Wold, (fn. 170) with which it
passed in 1550 to Henry Willoughby. (fn. 171) In 1567
Thomas Willoughby, who in 1580 sold his estate in
Stow, made a settlement of the manor, and in 1590
was succeeded by his son Robert who died in 1595.
Robert's daughter and heir Eleanor (fn. 172) married, in
or before 1612, Thomas Berington, (fn. 173) who in 1617
sold Nethercote manor to Sir Thomas Edmunds, (fn. 174)
lord of Bourton manor. It passed with Bourton manor
until the late 17th century when it was sold to
Thomas Collett, (fn. 175) who in 1689 built the house at
Nethercote that bears his initials. Another Thomas
Collett was succeeded, in or before 1759, by his son
William, who in 1765 sold Nethercote to William
Palmer. Palmer died in 1807 or 1808, and his son
Samuel soon afterwards went bankrupt. (fn. 176) In the
late 19th century part of the estate and the former
manor-house belonged to William Snooke Stenson,
who also owned Bourton manor. His son sold the
Nethercote estate to Mr. E. H. Cook, the owner in
1962. (fn. 177)
Economic History.
In 1086 Bourton-onthe-Water, together with Clapton, supported 13½
ploughs on land assessed as 10 hides, and the value
of the estate had risen by half since 1066. (fn. 178) This expansion continued, for about a century later Bourton
alone contained 10 plough-lands and 3½ yardlands.
Another half yardland, making up the number of
plough-lands to 11, may have comprised the four
parcels each of 4 acres held by tenants, (fn. 179) and this
calculation in turn suggests a yardland reckoned as
32 acres.
The demesne, which supported six ploughs in
1086, (fn. 180) amounted to four plough-lands in the 12th
century, (fn. 181) at the end of which one plough-land
was alienated. (fn. 182) Thereafter the demesne remained
constant: 3 plough-lands in 1291, (fn. 183) 12 yardiands in
1620 when it was consolidated and inclosed. (fn. 184) From
the early 16th century, and presumably for a century
or more before, the demesne was let at farm. (fn. 185)
In the tenants' land there was no such continuity.
The number of tenants' yardiands doubled between
the late 12th century and the early 16th, and this is
likely to have resulted from the division of yardlands more than from the breaking of new ground.
The free tenants, two in 1086, (fn. 186) numbered nine in
the late 12th century holding from six and a half
yardiands to a single cottage. (fn. 187) The grants of estates
in fee to the abbey (fn. 188) increased the customary land
and reduced the number of free tenants, and there
were only three in the early 16th century. (fn. 189) The
other tenants in 1086 comprised 16 villani and eight
bordars; (fn. 190) in the 12th century there were 17 unfree
tenants holding varying amounts of land who all
owed money-rents and aid but of whom only two
owed labour-services (one of them was the smith who
held a yardland for making or maintaining the
demesne ploughs), and there were also 14 agricultural
labourers owing money-rents and works and nine
cottagers owing works only. (fn. 191) Cash sums instead of
works were being paid in 1291. (fn. 192)
By the early 16th century there were 19 copyholders in Bourton holding about half the land of
the parish in lots of from half a yardland to five.
A few more copyholders held houses only or smaller
areas of land. (fn. 193) The copyholds were not heritable, (fn. 194)
and in the early 17th century the tenants appear to
have co-operated with the lord of the manor in
converting the copyholds into leases, mostly for
terms of years, a process that was completed after
1620. (fn. 195) Heriots, some in cash and some in kind in
the 16th century, (fn. 196) continued to be payable on some
if not all leases. (fn. 197) The larger leaseholds were in turn
mostly converted into freeholds in the late 17th
century. (fn. 198)
In the early 14th century there were at least two
open arable fields. The South field, to judge from
the names of places within it, covered a considerable
part of the land south of the Windrush, while the
North field lay in the northern corner of the parish;
besides these two there was also a field called the
Bury field, which was also north of the village and
may have contained only permanent grass-land. (fn. 199) By
the early 16th century all the open land north of the
village was regarded as one field called the Bury
field or North field, and the southern piece of open
arable was called the Town field. The Town field was
divided into two, (fn. 200) with the road to Farmington
separating what were called West field and South
field in the 17th century. (fn. 201) In the Bury field a similar
division may have survived from the division between the former Bury field and North field, as is
suggested by descriptions of holdings there in the
mid-17th century. (fn. 202) This sub-division, however, does
not necessarily indicate the use of a four-course
rotation, and is more likely to arise from the dissimilarity between the Bury field, which in 1584
contained a high proportion of meadow and ley, (fn. 203) and
Town field: the arable land of Nethercote manor in
the early 16th century comprised 34 a. in each part
of the Town field and only 6½ a. in the Bury field
(then called the North field). (fn. 204) Both the Bury field
and the Town field were divided into furlongs. (fn. 205)
In the 16th century the land of each estate lay
mostly in single ridges, though sometimes up to
seven successive ridges were in a single ownership.
The ridges were described as acres or lands, (fn. 206) and
on the evidence of a statement in 1620 that the pieces
of land were acres, half-acres, or roods (fn. 207) it may be
inferred that when both acres and lands were mentioned those called acres were thought to approximate to statute acres while those called lands were
smaller. The size of the yardland may have been
larger for the demesne and the glebe than for most
of the copyholds, perhaps because (as suggested
above) some of the 16th-century copyhold yardlands
represented only fractions of earlier ones: the five
yardlands of the glebe appear to have averaged over
20 a. of arable each, the twelve of demesne just under
20 a. In 1620, before inclosure, there were 76 yardlands in all; the arable totalled 1,400 a. (an overall
average of 184 a. to the yardland), the common down
256 a., and the meadow and lowland pasture 332 a.,
the rest of the total acreage being made up of old
inclosures, lammas meadow, and roads, waste, and
water. (fn. 208)
While the open fields, half of which seem likely
to have been fallow at any one time, occupied more
than half the total parish area, arable farming was
perhaps less dominant in the medieval agricultural
economy of Bourton than in many of its neighbours,
and this is possibly reflected in the comparatively low
value given to the demesne plough-lands in 1291. (fn. 209)
Not only were sheep grazed in numbers (fn. 210) that made
them more than merely complementary to cereals
in a traditional sheep-and-corn husbandry, but
Bourton was also provided with meadows of unusual
richness and extent, as was noticed by Rudge in the
early 19th century. (fn. 211) Bourton's meadow-land was
not mentioned in Domesday, but by the 12th
century, even though the tenants held a large amount,
there was evidently some to spare to help provide
for Farmington manor, (fn. 212) and at a later date some of
the meadow in Bourton was attached to Eyford
manor. (fn. 213) In the early 13th century the Abbot of
Evesham leased meadow in Bourton to the Templars
of Guiting. (fn. 214) Nearly one-sixth of the land in
Nethercote manor in the early 16th century was
meadow, and almost as much again was open-field
ley that was used as meadow. (fn. 215) One-fifth of Bourton
manor demesne (fn. 216) and a quarter of the glebe were
meadow. (fn. 217)
A shepherd, holding only a messuage, was among
the tenants in the 12th century, (fn. 218) and in 1214 Ralph
of Bourton tried to start a large-scale sheep-farm
there. (fn. 219) The calling of shepherd had provided the
surname of two of the inhabitants by 1381. (fn. 220) Early
16th-century wills specify large numbers of sheep, (fn. 221)
and Nethercote manor included a sheep-house, and
pasture on the fields and the downs for 300 sheep. (fn. 222)
The rectory also included a sheep-house, and what
seems to have been Rectory Lane was called Sheep
Lane. (fn. 223) Two of the main reasons for the partial
inclosure of 1620 were said to be the excessive
number of animals pastured on the fields and the
effects of damp on sheep feeding in the low-lying
undrained open fields. (fn. 224)
The inclosure of 1620 appears to have been set in
motion by Sir Thomas Edmunds, who had acquired
the manor ten years earlier (fn. 225) and had already made
some attempts to improve his property. (fn. 226) The
inclosure was agreed to in the manor court in 1618
and the redistribution of land and commons was
confirmed by a decree in an apparently collusive suit
in Chancery. The decree redistributed for inclosure
953 a. of arable or open-field land and 306 a. of
marsh and meadow. Most of the arable land inclosed
was in the Bury field, because it was more promising
for conversion to meadow or pasture and because it
was more in need of drainage than the Town field.
One-fifth of the inclosed land was allotted to the
demesne of the manor, and allotments were made for
34 other estates of which about half were copyholds
which were to be converted to leaseholds under the
terms of the decree. Rights of common over all the
land to be inclosed were extinguished; common on
the 468 a. of open field that were to remain open and
under the plough was limited to those holding land
there, at the rate of three sheep (and no other animals)
for two acres; and on the 256 a. of downland, to be
used only as a sheep-pasture, eight sheep were to
be grazed throughout the year for each yardland, the
yardlands being reckoned as formerly. To compensate the 13 cottagers for their cow-pastures in
the former open fields and meadows 26 a. of meadow
were set aside for them in which to graze one cow
each. Common of pasture in the lammas meadows,
which were not inclosed, was rated at two cows for
each yardland. (fn. 227)
Some, (fn. 228) and presumably most, of the arable land
inclosed was converted to permanent grass-land. In
the 18th century some leases encouraged the ploughing up of permanent pasture by a reduction in rent, (fn. 229)
but rotational practices stipulated in leases were
vague and rudimentary; (fn. 230) it may be supposed that
they were so on the surviving open fields. The
number of farms had shrunk, and compared with
the 34 people holding yardlands or fractions of
yardlands in 1620 there were eight farmers, four
graziers, and perhaps six farming gentlemen and
esquires in 1771. (fn. 231) Although by no means all the
holders of land in 1620 were farmers, these figures
suggest that the farms grew larger and fewer.
The completion of the process of inclosure came
in 1774, under Act of Parliament: 873 a. of openfield arable, downland, and common meadow were
affected, and out of this there were three allotments
of c. 200 a. (to the lord of the manor, the rector, and
Mary Collett, the first two receiving most of their
shares to replace tithe), three of c. 50 a., and 19 of
¼20 a. (fn. 232) The long-term result may have been to
reduce the number and increase the size of farms
further: in 1831 there were 11 farmers, of whom
only one did not employ labour. (fn. 233) The number of
farms rose slightly in the third quarter of the 19th
century, fell in the last quarter, and recovered again
by 1939. (fn. 234) In 1962 there were ten farms of between
100 and 400 a. (fn. 235)
Inclosure in 1774 changed the type of farming in
that more of the higher land was put under the
plough, and was used to produce a large quantity of
barley and oats by 1801. (fn. 236) There was presumably
a corresponding decline in sheep-farming. Throughout the 19th century the upland farms were mainly
arable: the proportion was five-sixths on Bourton
Hill farm in 1807, (fn. 237) three-quarters on Sweetslade
farm in 1900. The valley farms were dairy farms, as
perhaps they had mainly been since 1620: in 1858
three-quarters of an estate of 120 a. beside the
streams was grass, and nine-tenths of Harp farm in
1898 was permanent pasture. (fn. 238) In the early 20th
century the acreage of arable shrank until in the midthirties it included less than half the land above
500 ft. and little below 500 ft. (fn. 239) After much ploughing up in the forties, these proportions of arable and
permanent grass-land were roughly restored again
by 1962, when most of the farming was dairying,
beef, and cereals, with sheep unusually few for the
Cotswolds.
There are indications, apart from the size of the
village, (fn. 240) that from the 14th century Bourton
supported a wide variety of trades and minor
industries. The fulling-mill mentioned below (fn. 241)
suggests the existence of a local woollen industry by
the end of the 12th century, when the inhabitants
included two weavers, a cobbler, and a smith. (fn. 242)
Wool-workers' trades gave rise to several of the
surnames current in 1381. These surnames also
show that people living in Bourton in 1381, or their
near ancestors, followed the trades of smith, mason,
tiler, cooper, fletcher, and lorimer, (fn. 243) and Bourton
seems to have served as a centre of rural crafts for
the immediate neighbourhood. Bourton retained the
character of something more than an agricultural
village: in the late 16th century, for example, two
butchers from Bourton were frequently trading at
Northleach, (fn. 244) and in 1608 the population included
four tailors, two smiths, a slater, and a butcher. (fn. 245)
In the 17th and 18th centuries there is little
evidence of the woollen industry in Bourton,
although mercers and tailors occur and there were
two weavers in 1771; in 1856 it was said that the
clothing business there had long since declined. The
footwear industry, however, established in a small
way by the late 17th century, included five cordwainers in 1771, and there was said to be a large
number of shoemakers in the early 19th century;
there were still at least six in 1889. No reference to
masons resident in the village has been found
between 1381 and 1771, when there were two, but
the evidence of the buildings in the village suggests
that all the building trades are likely to have been
represented there from the 16th century at least.
Carpenters and slaters occur from the early 18th
century. Descendants of one of the smiths of 1608
continued in his trade until 1710, apparently at the
smithy on the corner of High Street and Moore Road.
In 1771 (three years before inclosure) the population
included, in addition to those tradesmen already
mentioned, two wool-staplers, two mercers, three
tailors, a stay-maker, and a mantua-maker; two
butchers, four bakers, a maltster, a fruiterer, and a
shopkeeper; a collar-maker, two blacksmiths, two
wheelwrights, four carpenters, and a millwright; a
cutler, a glazier, and two slaters. (fn. 246)
In the early 19th century trades and crafts were
a more important source of livelihood than agriculture in Bourton, (fn. 247) but in that period a significant
change was the growth in numbers of the shopkeeping, professional, and leisured classes. The
professions, in 1771 represented (if at all) by one
surgeon, (fn. 248) included in the thirties and forties four
surgeons, a physician, and two solicitors, (fn. 249) while the
shopkeepers (notably grocers and drapers) had by
the middle of the century outgrown any other group
of self-employed people. The growing importance
of Bourton as a local centre for goods and services
continued steadily from the mid-19th century, with
the arrival of (for example) a branch bank, an
auctioneer, a brewery, a chemist, and a watchmaker, (fn. 250)
and with the easier access provided by the railway. (fn. 251)
As elsewhere, agricultural trades declined in
importance in the late 19th century, (fn. 252) but in the mid20th century a wheelwright, (fn. 253) a blacksmith, and a
saddler were still active, though the blacksmith
alone remained in 1962. This decline was balanced
and perhaps outweighed by expansion of the building
trades; (fn. 254) even more important, economically, has
been the growth of the tourist trade, (fn. 255) accompanying
the increase in road traffic. The attractions to the
tourist have also attracted numbers of people
seeking retirement and seclusion, and Bourton has
overtaken the earlier centres of Stow-on-the-Wold
and Northleach both in population (fn. 256) and in amenities—even apart from those designed to tempt the
tourist. Since c. 1930, however, the building of
large numbers of houses that were to be occupied
by people whose work lay outside Bourton has
provided a contrast to the older centripetal forces.
A small factory was established during the Second
World War, producing aluminium goods; that and
garages and agricultural engineering, with commercial and professional work, provided some employment in 1962, but many of the men worked at
Little Rissington airfield and many of the women in
Cheltenham. (fn. 257)
Mills.
In the 12th century there were three mills
on Evesham Abbey's estate. One was kept in hand
by the abbot with one yardland, another was held
with one yardland by Maud widow of Robert
Ainulf for rent alone, and the third was held with
one hide by Robert son of Hugh for rent and
services. The two tenants' mills were held freely, (fn. 258)
and only one mill was listed among the abbey's
property in Bourton in 1291. (fn. 259) At the end of the
14th century the reversion of a mill was granted to
the abbey, (fn. 260) and in the mid-16th century there were
two mills, both held on lease, belonging to the
manor. (fn. 261) One was the mill later called Upper Mill,
and the other, used as a fulling-mill, was apparently
Lower Mill, in the village. (fn. 262) One of the three 12thcentury mills had evidently disappeared; it was
presumably in Nethercote, where there was a mill
in 1292 and 1326, (fn. 263) and may have been near the
confluence of the Windrush and the Dikler, where
the name Smiths Mill survived as a field-name. (fn. 264) It
is difficult to identify the three 12th-century mills:
the fulling-mill with one yardland recorded in 1206
as paying rent to the abbey's infirmary (fn. 265) is likely to
have been both Lower Mill and the mill held by the
abbot in the 12th-century, but in 1824 Lower Mill
was called Hughes Mill (fn. 266) which suggests an identity
with another of the 12th-century mills. Lower Mill
was not distinguished as a fulling-mill in 1620, and
may by then have been converted to corn. Upper
Mill was then leased to Walter Kyte, (fn. 267) and in 1777,
when it was known as Kyte's Mill, (fn. 268) the miller was
Thomas Kyte. By 1858 it was distinct from the rest
of the manorial estate, (fn. 269) and Lower Mill was in the
same ownership as the manor-house in 1859. (fn. 270) Both
mills were in use as corn-mills in 1921, (fn. 271) and Lower
Mill was still so used with water power in 1942 (fn. 272) and
with electric power in 1962. Upper Mill was converted for use as a private house before the Second
World War. (fn. 273)
Local Government.
Draft rolls of the
manor court survive for 1573–93, (fn. 274) and a few rolls
for 1610–19; (fn. 275) they show the court administering
tenures, regulating agriculture, and exercising at least
some leet jurisdiction. Courts continued to be held
after 1664, (fn. 276) but by the mid-18th century leet
jurisdiction had passed to the court held at Stow for
the liberty that had belonged to Evesham Abbey:
in 1761, for example, the two surveyors of Bourton
were presented there for failing to drain the village
street adequately. (fn. 277)
There are overseers' accounts for the parish for
1715–59, with lists of parish officers for 1657–1767,
and vestry minutes for 1782–1800 and from 1830. (fn. 278)
The vestry was run mainly by the richer farmers;
only after the beginning of the 19th century did the
rector start to play a dominant role in the vestry. (fn. 279)
Expenditure on poor-relief rose less in Bourton than
in most neighbouring parishes in the late 18th
century, and in 1803 the rate was 3s. compared with
an average of 4s. 8½d. for the lower division of the
hundred. (fn. 280) In the 12 years after 1803, however,
expenditure nearly doubled. (fn. 281) This may have resulted from the methods of poor-relief used. From
1783 one of the two overseers appointed was salaried,
the other being described as his nominal partner. By
1783 payments were being made to a doctor for the
poor, some of whom were sent to the Gloucester
Infirmary, and about the same time the vestry began
to rent a house for use as a workhouse and introduced
the roundsman system. In 1785 a scheme for setting
the poor in the house to work was evidently effective,
and from 1787 the workhouse was farmed. From
1789 to 1800 the workhouse master also accepted
at farm the roundsman's wages, the expenses of the
justices, and the sale of coal to the poor, (fn. 282) but by
1803, when 18 families received permanent relief and
another 18 people were relieved occasionally, the
workhouse had gone out of use, (fn. 283) perhaps because
the vestry was trying to drive too hard a bargain.
In 1830 it was decided that parishioners would
not be relieved unless they went to church or chapel
on Sundays. By this time there seems to have been
revived enthusiasm in dealing with poverty, and
between 1830 and 1833 financial help was given to
12 families to emigrate to North America. The vestry
was conscientious about nuisances and public
health in general, an improvement in which was
attributed to the liberal help of resident doctors. In
1834 it was resolved that the building then used as
a poorhouse should be put in good condition and
reopened as a workhouse. (fn. 284)
Under the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834
Bourton became part of the Stow-on-the-Wold Poor
Law Union. (fn. 285) It became part of the Stow-on-the
Wold highway district in 1863, (fn. 286) and of the Stow-onthe-Wold Rural Sanitary District under the Local
Government Act of 1872 (being transferred to the
newly formed North Cotswold Rural District in
1935). (fn. 287) In the mid-20th century the parish council,
which in addition to the normal functions administered the graveyard and the Moore village trust, (fn. 288)
was meeting once a month. (fn. 289)
Church.
There was a priest in Bourton in 1086, (fn. 290)
presumably endowed and presented by Evesham
Abbey. In 1209 Bourton was one of the churches for
which the abbey claimed exempt jurisdiction; (fn. 291) by
that date there was also a chapel at Clapton, which
so far as is known has always been dependent on
Bourton. Not long afterwards the church of Lower
Slaughter was also dependent; it may have originated
as a dependent chapel, as it remained until 1954. (fn. 292)
Evesham Abbey, which by 1291 was receiving an
annual pension of £1 from the church, (fn. 293) was given
papal authority for its appropriation in 1345, (fn. 294) but
in fact the abbey appropriated only two-thirds of the
tithes of corn and hay in Bourton and Clapton, and
the benefice remained a rectory. (fn. 295) The appropriated
tithes passed with other property of the abbey to the
lord of the manor, (fn. 296) but during the 17th century
were mainly divided among the owners of the land
on which the tithe was payable. (fn. 297)
The patronage of the rectory, exercised until the
Dissolution by Evesham Abbey, (fn. 298) was granted in
1579 to Sir Christopher Hatton; (fn. 299) it passed soon
afterwards to the lord of the manor, who presented
in 1584, 1586, 1589, and 1590. (fn. 300) Presentations were
made by John Dutton of Sherborne in 1624, and by
Sir Thomas and John Rouse in 1629, (fn. 301) and the
advowson passed in the late 17th century to George
Vernon, rector 1667–1720, members of whose
family continued to present until 1782. (fn. 302) Presentations were made in 1793 by John Ireland, in 1816 by
Robert Croome, in 1834 by John Daubeny Croome,
and in 1836 by Robert Waller, who presented himself and later granted the advowson to Wadham
College, Oxford, (fn. 303) where it remained in 1960. (fn. 304)
The rectory, valued at £13 6s. 8d. in 1291, (fn. 305)
remained a rich one even after it had lost some of its
tithes, and at £27 2s. 8d. clear was the richest in
Stow deanery in 1535. (fn. 306) It was valued at £164 in
1650, (fn. 307) and after inclosure rose to a gross value of
over £800 a year in the mid-19th century. (fn. 308) The
glebe comprised five yardlands in Bourton and half
a yardland in Clapton, (fn. 309) for which 70 a. in all were
allotted at inclosure in 1774. The rector's share in
the tithes of Bourton and Clapton were mostly exchanged for land amounting to 209 a. in 1774, (fn. 310) and
the remainder was commuted in 1847 for a corn-rent
assessed at £100. (fn. 311) For the tithes of Lower Slaughter,
all of which belonged to Bourton rectory, and for
two yardlands of glebe there c. 250 a. were allotted
at inclosure in 1731. (fn. 312) Thus in 1845, when uncommuted tithes were paid by composition, the
rectory owned 594 a. and received £100 a year for
tithes. (fn. 313) The parsonage house was completely
rebuilt c. 1580, (fn. 314) in the 1620's, (fn. 315) and in the early
19th century; (fn. 316) in 1960 it was sold, and the stables
were converted to provide a house for the rector.
The earliest rector known by name (in the 1230's)
was physician to the king, (fn. 317) and several of his successors in the late 13th century and early 14th were
pluralists or otherwise non-resident. (fn. 318) In the later
15th century the three known rectors were M.A.'s. (fn. 319)
The rector in 1551 was an absentee who, though he
had a doctor's degree, was found to be unlearned. (fn. 320)
He put the rectory to farm and the farmer paid two
curates, one of them to serve Lower Slaughter and
Clapton. (fn. 321) His successors included Nicholas Bond,
later President of Magdalen College, Oxford, and
William Symonds, the divine, (fn. 322) and, in 1625, Robert
Wright, bishop successively of Bristol and Lichfield,
and first Warden of Wadham College, Oxford. (fn. 323)
None of these, however, held the living for long, and
Wright was already Bishop of Bristol when instituted
to it. (fn. 324) Wright's successor, Dr. Thomas Temple, who
was involved in scandalous legal suits with his
brother-in-law, his neighbours, and his parish clerk, (fn. 325)
and who had another benefice in Oxfordshire, was
chaplain to the Prince of Wales. It was with him that
Charles I lodged a night in 1644. Temple actively
resisted sequestration in 1646, and was restored in
1661. (fn. 326) Anthony Palmer, who held the living during
the Interregnum, was a prominent Congregationalist. (fn. 327)
George Vernon, instituted in 1667, was an author
and a man of some learning, though a pluralist. He
acquired the advowson, and was succeeded in 1720
by his son Richard, (fn. 328) whose neglect of the chapels
at Lower Slaughter and Clapton (fn. 329) may indicate his
attitude to his office as a whole. William Vernon, a
pluralist, was rector 1753–80, (fn. 330) and after little more
than a year a fourth member of the family, Edward,
whose presentation, it was hinted, was simoniacal,
and whose learning, morals, and previous career were
attacked, (fn. 331) became rector. Robert Waller, who as
patron became rector in 1836, (fn. 332) remained until 1872;
W. E. White was rector for almost as long a period,
1901–35. (fn. 333) From 1667 until the Second World War
curates for Bourton were licensed at frequent intervals; with few exceptions their function was evidently
to serve Lower Slaughter and Clapton, and from the
mid-19th century they lived at Lower Slaughter. (fn. 334)
Until the 16th century an additional priest was
provided by St. Mary's chantry, founded by Walter
of Bourton, Vicar of Yarnton (Oxon.), in 1323 and
further endowed by the founder in 1331. (fn. 335) The
patronage of the chantry was given to Evesham
Abbey. (fn. 336) In 1549 the priest's stipend was 7¼ marks,
and the remaining ½ mark of the chantry's income
was paid out in rents. (fn. 337) In 1948 the church received
an endowment of £1,000 for general purposes under
the will of George Frederick Moore (d. 1927). (fn. 338)
The church of ST. LAWRENCE (which in the
19th century was thought by some to be St. Mary's) (fn. 339)
is built mainly of ashlar and has a Cotswold stone
roof. It comprises chancel and north vestry, nave
with north aisle and south porch, and (its most
striking feature) west tower. The chancel is mainly
of the 14th century, the tower of the 18th, and the
rest of the 19th.
The earliest known building was apparently late
Saxon, and the nave of that period survived in part
(with some later windows) until the late 18th century,
with two small round-headed windows high up in
the north wall. In the early 12th century a tower was
built at the east end of the nave; in 1780 it had a
gabled roof. (fn. 340) Traces of a 12th-century chancel arch
have been found, but the chancel was extensively
rebuilt in the 14th century, with its roof line higher
than the nave's and with the sanctuary placed over
the vaulted crypt (blocked up in the 19th century)
that may be the earliest part of the building. (fn. 341) A
south transeptal aisle was built apparently in the
early 14th century, for the chantry mentioned above:
the priest said mass in a lady chapel joined (contigua)
to the church, (fn. 342) and a stone coffin buried under the
aisle is locally reputed to have been the founder's.
This aisle became known as the Clapton aisle, (fn. 343) and
it may be that the rectors that were unwilling to hold
services at Clapton encouraged the inhabitants to
regard the aisle as their own.
During the 18th century the aisle was rebuilt, and
some work was done on the north wall of the nave.
The north and south doors of the nave were blocked,
as was the window of the Clapton aisle, and the
entrance to the church was through a square-headed
opening in the west wall. (fn. 344) By 1783 the church was
thought to be very ruinous, (fn. 345) perhaps because of a
legacy of £1,500 for rebuilding it from Sarah Yates, (fn. 346)
and the vestry accepted a design for a new church
from William Marshall, an inhabitant of Bourton.
The chancel, included in the original scheme, was
not structurally altered because, it is said, the rector,
Edward Vernon, discovered that none of his family
would succeed him in the living. The west tower,
built in 1785, has a rusticated base, Ionic pilasters at
the angles, and a parapet with vase finials; the spire
that was to have surmounted it was replaced by a
lead-covered dome because the foundations were not
stable enough. On the site of the former nave, aisle,
and tower the new nave was built and apparently
finished by 1794, with a domed plaster ceiling supported on Ionic columns; it had a west gallery and a
colonnaded three-decker pulpit, and opened on the
chancel, which was also pewed, by a wide roundheaded plaster arch. (fn. 347) A clock with a chiming barrel
was placed in the tower, and its face, dated 1786,
survived the installation, at a higher level, of a new
clock in 1911; the new clock has the Westminster
chimes and a seven-tune carillon. (fn. 348)
Between 1873 and 1878 the chancel was restored,
retaining the three-light 14th-century east window,
the two-light north and south windows, and a large
trefoiled ogee opening for a piscina, the north aisle
with the vestry and organ chamber at its east end
was added, the chancel arch was rebuilt, and the
south aisle was removed. In 1890 the nave was rebuilt with a south porch. All this work was carried
out to designs in a 14th-century style by T. G.
Jackson. (fn. 349) The windows were filled with stained
glass in the late 19th century and early 20th.
The oval-shaped bowl of the 18th-century font,
which was replaced during the 19th-century rebuilding and the pedestal of which was lost, (fn. 350) was reset in
the 20th century in the west wall of the aisle. A roodscreen was set up in 1924, a reredos in 1928, and the
chancel roof was panelled with painted woodwork,
all in memory of members of the Moore family. In
1949 a new organ was bought in place of the one
that had been bought second-hand in 1880. (fn. 351)
On the chancel wall is a monument to George
Vernon (d. 1720), rector, and members of his family.
In the mid-16th century the only chalice in the
church was that belonging to the chantry, which in
1555 the parish hoped to buy. (fn. 352) In 1708 the parish
acquired two chalices, which with a flagon dated
1748 and a paten made in 1890 from two plates also
dated 1748, comprised the church plate in the 20th
century. (fn. 353) There were five bells c. 1700, (fn. 354) including
one of 1650 by James Keene of Woodstock. The
other four were replaced or recast by the Rudhall
foundry between 1717 and 1785. A blank 19thcentury bell and two added in 1914 brought the
number to eight. (fn. 355) The registers begin in 1654, but
have gaps for 1712–15 and 1806–12.
Roman Catholicism.
In 1667 Bourton was
clearly a known centre of papists, and figures for that
year indicate that half the papists in Stow deanery
were gathered there. (fn. 356) Charles Trinder, who was
living in Bourton in 1671 and later became lord of
the manor, (fn. 357) was a papist, (fn. 358) and chaplains are thought
to have lived at the manor-house. (fn. 359) In the 19th
century rooms on the top floor of the house were
traditionally called the priest's room and the chapel,
and what was believed to have been a priest's
hiding-place was discovered in the same part of the
house. (fn. 360) In the 20th century Roman Catholics in
Bourton went to the church at Stow until 1940,
when services began to be held in private houses in
Bourton. From 1942 the church hall of the parish
church was used for Roman Catholic services. In
1957 a site was acquired beyond the railway station
and in 1960 the temporary stone church of OUR
LADY HELP OF CHRISTIANS was opened
there. It was served from Stow, and provided for
people from the surrounding villages as well as for
26 Roman Catholic families in Bourton. (fn. 361)
Protestant Nonconformity.
Bourton
has long had a strong tradition of religious nonconformity, which can be traced as far as the late
16th century when the puritan divine, Richard
Stock, was domestic chaplain to the lessee of the
manor. (fn. 362) Anthony Palmer, ejected from Bourton
rectory in 1661, removed to London, (fn. 363) but another
Congregationalist, John Dunce, who may have been
Rector of Condicote during the Interregnum, was
preaching at Bourton in 1667 and was given a
licence for a meeting there in 1672. (fn. 364) Figures for
1676 suggest that Bourton had a higher proportion
and a far higher number of Protestant dissenters
than anywhere else in Stow deanery. (fn. 365)
The main strength of dissent in Bourton has been
with the Baptists. The Baptist community there,
said to have been founded in 1650, (fn. 366) was represented
by three men at the Baptist meeting of 1655 at
Warwick. (fn. 367) In 1660 two Bourton men were preaching as Baptists in Bury field (perhaps exploiting the
ramparts of Salmonsbury); one of them was Thomas
Collett, (fn. 368) possibly the man who owned Nethercote
manor, (fn. 369) was a dissenting preacher in 1715, (fn. 370) and
was buried beside the Baptist chapel in 1720, (fn. 371) and
whose house was licensed for meetings in 1689. A
barn licensed later the same year (fn. 372) may have either
replaced it or provided for another group of Baptists.
Collett's group were Paedobaptists: (fn. 373) in 1700 they
opened a graveyard in Salmonsbury (fn. 374) and in 1701
their newly built chapel was licensed. (fn. 375) The group,
however, seems not to have survived separately for
very long, and to have been absorbed by another
group of Baptists led by Joshua Head (fn. 376) who was
preaching in Bourton in 1690 and died in 1719. (fn. 377)
The absorption may have taken place after Head's
death, when 48 Baptists signed certain articles of
agreement, (fn. 378) or perhaps in 1735: the licensing of
two houses as meetings in that year (fn. 379) may be the
result of re-alignments among the Baptists, and in
the same year a diocesan survey recorded that a
congregation largely composed of Anabaptists
heard sermons on alternate Sundays from an
Anabaptist called Flower and a Presbyterian grazier
called Collett, (fn. 380) perhaps another owner of Nethercote: the distinction between Anabaptist and Presbyterian may be a mistake for that between Baptist
and Paedobaptist. That the Baptist community in
Bourton was in some confusion is attested in 1724
by the simultaneous licensing for dissenting worship
of the houses of John Collett, Andrew Paxford, and
Thomas Kyte, all in Bourton; the denomination is
stated for none of them, (fn. 381) but the first two have
names with strong Baptist associations.
By 1740, when Benjamin Beddome, the hymnologist, began his 45 years as Baptist minister of
Bourton, (fn. 382) the Baptists appear to have been united,
meeting in the chapel built in 1701. In 1748 a manse
was built, and the chapel was rebuilt. (fn. 383) A new chapel
was opened in 1765 on the occasion of the meeting
in Bourton of an association of 15 Baptist churches.
The numbers of Baptists in the Bourton congregation rose from c. 100 in 1735 to nearly 200 in the
1750's; it included people from many neighbouring
parishes, Naunton and Stow-on-the-Wold among
them, and the severance of those places under their
own ministers accounts for the apparent drop in
numbers at Bourton before 1795. (fn. 384) Beddome's
death in that year was followed by dissension among
the Baptists of Bourton, and it was not until 1801
that they were again united under a single permanent minister. By then the numbers had dropped to
47, (fn. 385) and from this time the community was one of
Particular Baptists. In the 1850's the membership
was nearly 100, and was said to include a high
proportion of the wealthier inhabitants. Congregations of over 400 were claimed. (fn. 386)
The 18th-century chapel, (fn. 387) the site of which was
visible in 1962 in the graveyard off Station Road,
was replaced in 1876 (fn. 388) by the church, built of stone
with a Welsh slate roof, at the High Street end of
Station Road. In 1962 the church, which was in
membership with the Baptist Union, had branches
at Aston Blank and Clapton, and membership
totalled over a hundred. (fn. 389)
The old manse was sold in 1928, and a new one
built in Moore Road. The proceeds, £653, of the sale
in 1950 of land belonging to the chapel was invested
in stock, and another £300 was given for the maintenance of the church under the will of C. V.
Wilkins (d. 1951). (fn. 390)
Rooms in private houses were registered for worship in 1829, 1831, and 1845 (the last two, apparently,
for the same group). A Zion chapel in Lansdown,
registered in 1843, (fn. 391) may have been Methodist, but
no return for it was made in 1851. (fn. 392) By 1872 it was
used as a school, and continued as such until 1902. (fn. 393)
The chapel was apparently the building converted
into a private house by 1962 and bearing an inscription stone from which all but the date 1842 had
been erased. A Primitive Methodist chapel in
Clapton Row was built in 1868; in 1904 it became a
Christadelphian meeting, (fn. 394) and was still so used in
1962.
Schools.
By will dated 1717 Anthony Collett of
Bourton gave a rent-charge of £10 for the teaching
of 12 boys of the parish, who were to learn the
Church of England catechism. (fn. 395) In 1738 the £10
was paid as a salary to the schoolmaster, (fn. 396) but by
1828 the schoolmaster, who was also the parish clerk,
used the money to pay the rent for the school
buildings and took additional pupils who paid fees: (fn. 397)
the day school numbered 18 in all in 1825, when there
was also a Sunday school with 42 pupils. (fn. 398) Other
children were presumably taught in dame schools:
in 1771 the population included two schoolmistresses besides the schoolmaster. (fn. 399)
In 1849 the Church school acquired its own
building on the corner of Rectory Lane, for use as
a school in union with the National Society. (fn. 400) A
British school was established in 1841 (fn. 401) in a room
built on to the old Baptist chapel, (fn. 402) and was moved
about ten years later to the former Zion chapel in
Lansdown, (fn. 403) and in 1868 had a certificated teacher
and nearly 70 children who mostly paid fees of a
penny; an extra penny was charged for instruction in
writing. (fn. 404) By 1872 attendance had fallen to 38, (fn. 405) and
in that year a school board for the parish was
formed (fn. 406) and took over the work of both the British
school and the National school. The National school
building was used for girls and infants, the British
school building for boys. (fn. 407) The combined attendance
was over 150, and fees of up to 4d. were charged. (fn. 408)
Collett's charity was used partly for prizes and partly
to support the Sunday school. (fn. 409)
Both buildings were condemned in 1899, and a
new school behind the church was opened for all
departments in 1902. (fn. 410) In 1958 a county secondary
school to serve a wide area was opened, and in 1962
had nearly 300 children. (fn. 411)
There was a boarding school for boys between
1791 and 1799, (fn. 412) and a private girls' school in 1885
and (at Camp House) in the early 20th century. (fn. 413)
Charities.
Besides the £10 a year for schooling,
charitable donations in 1815 were said to amount
to £10 a year. (fn. 414) This probably referred to the poor's
plot, since Jane Farran's gift of a £10 rent-charge
for apprenticing, under her will dated 1779, never
became effective, and Dorothy Vernon's gift remained inoperative until after 1828. (fn. 415) The poor's
plot was 12 a. allotted at inclosure in 1774 to grow
fuel for the poor, (fn. 416) but in the late 18th century the
land was let and the rent distributed by the vestry. (fn. 417)
The Heythrop Hunt rented the land for £18 as fox
covert until 1873, when the vestry decided to convert
the land to allotments. The allotments were let to
poor men at low rents, and in 1890 the rent of £5 9s.
was distributed in coal. Under a Scheme of 1957 the
land was sold and interest on the capital realized
was distributed in coal: the sum so distributed in
1958 was £8 9s. (fn. 418)
Dorothy Vernon (d. 1764) by her will gave a
quarter of her money on mortgage or bond for the
poor of Bourton, Lower Slaughter, and Clapton who
were members of the Church of England. The
charity, inoperative in 1828, (fn. 419) may not have taken
effect until 1865 when a Scheme was made by which
the money, then c. £70 a year, was distributed in the
form of tickets for coal and clothing at half price;
Bourton's share of the distribution was threefifths. (fn. 420) In 1962 the income of nearly £40 was
distributed (Bourton's share being the same) in the
form of tickets presentable at local shops. (fn. 421) John
Jordan Ansell by deed of 1835 gave a rent-charge of
£8 9s. 4d. for distribution among four needy spinsters
who had been domestic servants; (fn. 422) this charity,
called Jordan's charity, was so distributed in 1962. (fn. 423)
The same donor is also said to have given for bread
for the poor, by will dated 1846, a yearly sum of
19 guineas which had been lost by 1912. (fn. 424) George
Frederick Moore (d. 1927) gave £1,000 in trust for
coal for the poor in 1924, and by his will gave another
£1,000 for the same; the second of these gifts took
effect in 1948, (fn. 425) and £80 a year from the two gifts
was distributed in coal in 1961. (fn. 426)