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Barford St.Martin is a little, village in South Wiltshire sited 2 miles from Wilton, the ancient capital of Wessex & some 13 miles from Shaftsbury. It is on the junction of the A30 & the B3089. The river Nadder runs through the village & Barford is known as one of the Nadder valley villages. Its history can be traced back to the 11th Century & there was mention to Barford in the Domesday Book compiled in 1085/1086. There’s 467 adult people & has a school, church, pub called The Barford Inn, & a petrol station. It also has a farm shop & a small landscape gardening company. Much of the adjacent farm land is owned by the Wilton Estate. Barford has an active Parish Council who is determined to improve services & the look of the village. The school is run by a Board of Governors & has 40 pupils. St Martin's Church is overseen by a Parochial Church Council & the vicar is responsible for three other parishes close by.
Recollections of the 1940s stress the lack of noise in Barford St. Martin & highlight the largest change to the village in the last 60 years: private transport - concurrently resuscitating & choking the village with its traffic. Barford's farms in the 1960s were still run by families: the Whatleys at Primrose Farm; the Hibberts at Church Farm; & the Coombes, with Jack at North End Farm & Geoffrey at Manor Farm. Chickens & ducks wandered about at leisure & donkeys & foals would be walked, untethered, from their paddock in Mount Lane to the meadows off the Shaftsbury Road. The village still retained its complement of shops & Reeves made fresh bread on site. Milk was delivered locally straight from the farm. The church, with its newly built Rectory, remained a strong & vital influence; it had a choir of 14 boys, a Sunday School & bell ringers for all occasions. Leave a Comment
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Grovely Wood is a big region of woods that is now owned by the Forestry Commission ''Grovely Grovely & all Grovely" is the cry of local people from Great Wishford as they use their ancient right to collect firewood from the nearby woods. Festivities are held early on Oak Apple Day - May 29th - & the villagers restate the ancient law with celebrating & dancing at Salisbury Cathedral. The former Royal Forest is peppered with earthworks, ancient paths & a Roman road, which brough lead from the Mendips & formed part of the network of Roman roads that met at Old Sarum.
There’s Grovely riding stables just under the bridge. Grovely isn’t very big it’s not far from the town of Wilton, there’s a post office & a few thatched cottages. Just up the road further along is Great Wishford, which I will explain later. Heading to wards Shaftsbury is the village of Barford St Martin which I will do something on. Grovely woods are famed for its carpets of bluebells during the Spring & Summer. With prehistoric oak woodlands the woods contain a better than average selection of woodland birds including nightjar Caprimulgus europaeus, woodcock Scolopax rusticola & nightingales Luscinia megarhynchos. Legend & folklore thrive in these south Wiltshire woodlands.
In more recent times, Grovely Woods was used during the 2nd World war, If you look hard enough, you can still find some old air raid shelters. Leave a Comment
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In 1939 New Hall at Bodenham was requisitioned by the Army & in 1944 General Dwight Eisenhower slept there prior to the Normandy Landings on D-day. After the war Lord Radnor purchased New Hall to save it from becoming a Lunatic Asylum. From 1947 New Hall was used as a training school for nurses. It is now a Private Hospital.
Capio New Hall Hospital is the favored Hospital used by BUPA & PPP Healthcare for their members in the Salisbury area. They are also recognized by all other major health insurance companies. They have close relationships with the Ministry of Defense, the Police Force & the National Health Service. In 2004, Capio Healthcare was chosen as the chosen company to work with the National Health Service to help reduce their waiting lists. At Capio New Hall Hospital, it is their aim to deliver high quality, cost effective healthcare services to all of their patients. Leave a Comment
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Just down the hill from Salisbury district hospital are two small villages called Odstock & Nunton. You can get to the village of Downton this way by bike by cycling through the village of Bodenham & along a cycle track which passes a river. It's quite pleasant, but please watch out as some cars come along this narrow streatch.
There’s also a pub here in Odstock called the Yew Tree Inn, there used to be a peacock here which used to enjoy chips but I haven’t seen him lately; perhaps he became a specialty!
The pub in Nunton is called The Radnor Arms, Lord Radnor lives in the area. There’s a bus service for Nunton & Odstock, but I have cycled up the hill to Salisbury, & it’s a KILLER! Leave a Comment
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Most people connect the village with Oak Apple Day on May 29th, when the villagers get up in the early hours to gather oak boughs from nearby woods. The event marks an ancient decree that lets people to get wood from Grovely Woods; the day includes a trip to Salisbury, dancing in the Cathedral Close, & brass band music back in the village. Knights passed through the village many years ago to hunt in the forests close by, & a thousand years ago, Great Wishford was in the hands of the Abbess of Wilton. Apparently in the Doomsday Book, the village at that time was no more than a hamlet called Wicheford. Old maps of the area divulge even more about Great Wishford's past - with the location of the notorious Powten Stone, with its paranormal connections. What happened to the stone itself? Some villagers say they have remote memories of its location but its never been found. There’s a pub at Wishford called the Royal Oak Inn, but none of the room are en-suit so I have been told. The river Avon runs through Great Wishford. Leave a Comment
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Pewsey is in the county of Wiltshire in the southern part of England. While mainly a quiet village of about 5000 residents, Pewsey has in current years become a pleasing place to live by those looking to travel to London, as it gives quick a quick route to Paddington station by train. Pewsey village boasts the "Oldest Carnival in Wiltshire", generally held yearly for two weeks in late September culminating in a colourful & wacky procession by local people of floats, bands, performers & people in all manner of fancy-dress! Crowds stand at the roadside chucking pennies at the float’s, the road (River Street) is usually cut off stopping any traffic from coming along; it must be a bugger to clear up the rubbish afterwards.
Pewsey was once owned by the Saxon king, King Alfred, the crossroads of Pewsey is still home to a statue of him. Around the village you will find attractive thatched cottages, a 700 year old church, Kennet & Avon Canal access, & lots of pubs with a mixture of entertainment like karaoke, darts, pub quizzes & pool. The pubs are called The Royal Oak & the Greyhound. The Q8 Garage on Swan Corner has a car wash service. You can save money on both your car wash & your petrol by downloading an online coupon on the net. There’s a library in Pewsey in Aston Close, a church, Heritage Centre, & many other thing's of interest. Leave a Comment
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on September 28, 2004
