Bretforton
| Bretforton | |
|---|---|
 Bretforton post office | |
| Population | 1,023 [1] |
| OS grid reference | SP092440 |
| • London | 86 miles (138 km) |
| District | |
| Shire county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | EVESHAM |
| Postcode district | WR11 |
| Dialling code | 01386 |
| Police | West Mercia |
| Fire | Hereford and Worcester |
| Ambulance | West Midlands |
Bretforton [2] is a rural village in Worcestershire, England. Bretforton is 4.4 miles east of Evesham, in the Vale of Evesham. It is the largest farming village around Evesham. At 2001, Bretforton has a population of roughly 1,023 with roughly 428 households and the area of the parish is 7.33 square kilometres.
There is a post office/shop, village hall, garage, sports and social club and a Royal British Legion club. The National Trust owns The Fleece Inn, a popular tourist attraction, which suffered serious fire damage in February 2005 and has now been completely restored. Bretforton First School (pupils aged 4-10) is a local authority school with no ex-officio governorship responsibility. There is also an active and popular pre-school nursery group held in the village hall.
Bretforton also has an exceptional Cricket Club [3] which runs two teams on a Saturday in the Cotswold Hills Cricket League (The Cotswold Hills League covers a wide area of Warwickshire, Gloucestershire and Worcestershire) and one team on a Sunday in the Fearnley Worcestershire Sunday Cricket League.
Bretforton Cricket Club have just won the Cotswold Hills League Premier in 2009. It is their third Premier League title in 3 years [2006, 2007 and 2009] after winning the Cotswold Hills Division One in 2005. The 2nd Team play in the Cotswold Hills League Division Three title after being promoted in 3 consecutive years [2006; 2007 and 2008].
Bretforton is also proudly home to the renowned Bretforton Silver Band,a grand distinction from the usual Brass Bands familiar to rural areas.
Also unusual for a village of its size, Bretforton has three substantial large gentry dwellings with large Jacobean Manor House, A Gothic Hall and a Grange.
History
The Village name has changed little over the centuries, having been recorded as Bretforton in a Charter of AD709, the Saxon 'Ton' a modern spelling of the Saxon (Germanic) 'tun' which meant enclosure or village.
The village was owned as outlaying farmland of Evesham Abbey.
The settlement is distinguished historically by an unusual system of land ownership for, in the sixteenth century following the dissolution of the monasteries (and Evesham Abbey) in the 1540’s the Manor was sold to the tenants and a new class of land-owning Yeomen was set up. Some of them built the handsome houses still standing here, either of stone with mullioned windows or timber-framed. One of the Yeomen became Auditor to Catherine of Aragon.
Other noteworthy features of the settlement are several dovecotes, one dating to 1630 and another containing some 800 holes
Local Legends and Grisly History
The village has several local legends of ghosts and a surprising history of murder.
- Spot Loggins Well is an old water well, about four hundred years old and its said locally to be haunted by a Lady or Cattle Driver who committed suicide there about two hundred years ago. The Water Well is located on the old Bretforton House Farm of the Appleby family and the Spot Loggin ghost is celebrated locally in Novemeber at the local Fleece Inn
- A phantom funeral procession arrives at the church, though for whom it represents is a mystery.
- Fields on either side of the church are said to be haunted by a decapitated woman, carrying her head under arm
- Murder of Ann Cormell, 4th February 1707 by John Allen of Bretforton, Giles Hunt, Tom Dun, Thomas Palmer and Thomas Symonds. John Allen was later hung in a gibbet in Bretforton at what is now known as 'Allen's Barn'. This story is also the source of local couplet "Allen, Symounds, Palmer and Dun,the four biggest rogues under the sun"
- Murder of a black US Solider Private Walter F. Shaw [4] on the night of June 16/17th 1945. Albert Leslie Tomkins, Dennis William Tomkins and Royston Hay were later acquitted [5] on the lesser charge of manslaughter
- Bretforton Murder: Brenda Dawn Hirons [6]in January 1976, bludgeoned to death [7] at Fallon Bank by her adulterous husband Fred, so that he could be with his lover Muriel Faizey of Pershore [8] [9]
Education
Bretforton consists of two schools, one is a Pre-school and the other is a primary school. The schools are:
Places in Bretforton
The Fleece Inn
- The Fleece Inn [10] was originally built in about 1400 as a longhouse by a prosperous yeoman farmer called Byrd; longhouse is an early type of farmhouse which incorporated accommodation for livestock on the ground floor, alongside the family’s living quarters.
- This particular longhouse later became a pub and was rebuilt in the 17th century, but remained in the Byrd family until 1977 when Lola Taplin bequeathed it to the National Trust.
- Lola was a direct descendant of Mr Byrd and lived her entire life at the Fleece. She died at 83, having run the pub on her own for the last 30 years of her life.
- A curious mediaeval tradition also survives at the Fleece, preserved in accordance with Lola’s wishes. This is the practice of chalking ‘witch circles’ on the floor in front of each hearth to prevent witches from getting in through the chimneys.
- The BBC has also used the Fleece Inn and surrounding village 'green' for it's 1993 £5 million production of Charles Dickens Martin Chuzzlewit where the pub was renamed the 'Green Dragon' for the duration of shooting.
- Reputedly Oliver Cromwell’s Pewter Dinner service was exchanged on the way to the battle of Worcester and this is on display at the pub. Even if this account is not true, this is a superb example of 17th century English Pewter ware.
Bretforton Manor
- Although of earlier, medieval origin, the manor house, listed Grade II, was mainly built of local stone in 1605 and substantially remodelled in 1877 by the long standing Ashwin Family
- Reputedly haunted - local gossip includes a Spectral horse and carriage part of a funeral procession and the sounds of thumps and bangs from the former nursery rooms
- A secret priest-hole in the library
- Popular legend ascribes the panelling in the hall to a Spanish galleon wrecked in the Armada of 1588
- Bretforton Manor has four reception rooms, six bedrooms, five bathrooms and a staff flat.
- It stands in 7.3 acres of grounds next to the church with outbuildings include stabling, a 15th century dovecote, a cider house and an indoor swimming-pool complex.
Bretforton Hall
- Built in 1830 in neo-Gothic style
- Notable features include a full Octagon shaped Gothic tower and gorgeous ogee headed windows
- The Hall is now run as a private clinic providing treatment using Cymatics
St Leonards Church
- The Grade I [11] listed church building dates from 1140 onwards with medieval and some later additions; it seats 140
- Arcades of the church nave date to Norman times, whilst the tower is fifteenth century
- Some of the most striking features are Victorian Glass but fragments of medieval glass also survive.
- One window was designed by Frederick Preedy, one of the most renowned of Victorian church architects. He was born in 1820 at Offenham, near Evesham, and worked in Worcester before moving to London.
- There is a band of bell ringers and a flower guild and a church and brass cleaning rota.
Bretforton Home Farm
- Mixed Stone and redbrick building; a mixture of late Stuart and Georgian styles, parts of building maybe of earlier origin
- Location of the famous Spot Loggins Well
References
- ^ 2001 Census Worcestershire County Population Report (pdf), retrieved 2007-08-31
- ^ http://www.e-wychavon.org.uk/wychavon/council/services/planning/localplan/AdoptedLocalPlan/eve.htm
- ^ http://bretfortoncc.play-cricket.com/home/home.asp
- ^ Evesham Journal 30th September
- ^ Evesham Journal 30th September
- ^ Evesham Journal 30th September 1976, Pages 1 & 32 "Life Sentence for Bretforton Murderer
- ^ General Register Office: Death Certificate for Brenda Dawn Hirons, Application Number PAS11557009, Ref:QBDX 7654584"
- ^ Evesham Journal 8th January 1976, Page 1 "Woman Dead in Pond"
- ^ Evesham Journal 15th January 1976, Page 1 "Woman In Pond Had Head Injury"
- ^ http://www.thefleeceinn.co.uk/
- ^ http://www.achurchnearyou.com/bretforton-st-leonard
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