Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for CAMPDEN (Chipping)

CAMPDEN (Chipping), a small town and a parish in the district of Shipston-on-Stour, and county of Gloucester. The town stands in a fertile valley, surrounded by cultivated hills and hanging woods, adjacent to the West Midland railway, 6 miles NNW of Morton-in-the-Marsh. It consists chiefly of one street, nearly a mile long; and has, about the centre, a court house and a market house, the former a structure of the beginning of the 15th century or earlier, the latter erected, in 1624, by Sir Baptist Hickes. It was the meeting place of the Saxon Kings, in 687, for consulting in the war against the Britons; and it became, in the 14th century, a principal mart for wool, and the residence of many opulent merchants; but it has lost nearly all of its manufacturing consequence. A large extant mansion, of nearly the same age as the court house, is believed to have been the dwelling of one of the wool merchants. The town has a post office‡ under Moreton-in-the-Marsh; a station, with telegraph, on the railway; a grammar school, with endowed income of £170, and an exhibition at Pembroke college, Oxford; two endowed schools, with £130 and £26; suites of alms-houses, founded by Sir Baptist Hickes, with income of £140; and a chief inn, called the Noel Arms. A weekly market is held on Wednesday; and fairs on Ash-Wednesday, 23 April, 5 Aug., and 11 Dec. The Cotswold games, instituted in the time of James I., and sung by Ben Jonson, Drayton, and other poets, were held on Dovers-hill, about ½ a mile from the town. Dr. Harris, the famous preacher, born in 1658, and George Ballard, author of "Memoirs of British Ladies," were natives.

The parish includes also the hamlets of Berrington, Broad-Campden, and Westington-with-Combe. Acres, 4,660. Real property, £10,725. Pop., 1,975. Houses, 474. The property is not much divided. The manor belonged at Domesday to Hugh Lupus, Earl of Chester; was purchased, in the time of James I., by Sir Baptist Hickes, who was created Viscount Campden; passed to the family of Noel, Earls of Gainsborough; and was bequeathed, in 1798, by the sixth Earl, to his nephew G. Noel Edwards, Esq., who assumed the name of Noel A magnificent mansion was built on the manor by Sir Baptist Hickes, at a cost of £29,000; and was destroyed by Lord Noel, grandson of Sir Baptist, but has left some remains. Campden House, now the seat of Viscount Campden, is a large modern mansion. A great battle was fought between the Mercians and the West Saxons at Berrington; and the "barrows" over the bodies of the slain are supposed to have given rise to its name. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Gloucester and Bristol. Value, £640.* Patron, the Earl of Gainsborough. The church is fine decorated English. A memorial chapel, in the early English style, was built in 1868. A chapel of ease is at Westington. There are three dissenting chapels, and charities £489.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a small town and a parish"   (ADL Feature Type: "cities")
Administrative units: Chipping Campden AP/CP       Gloucestershire AncC
Place names: CAMPDEN     |     CAMPDEN CHIPPING     |     CHIPPING CAMPDEN
Place: Chipping Campden

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