Ewelme

Ewelme is a village and civil parish in the South Oxfordshire district of the county of Oxfordshire in England.

The village lies in a little picturesque valley, four miles east of the town of Wallingford. Its name derives from the remarkably fine spring just to the north which forms the 'King's Pool', which empties into a rapid stream known as the Ewelme Brook. This flows past Fifield Manor and then through nearby Benson before emptying itself into the Thames: Ae-whylme is Anglo-Saxon for 'waters whelming'. This stream formed the basis of the village's watercress beds, which formed the basis of much local employment until well into the 20th Century.

To the east of the village is Cow Common and to the west, Benson Airfield, the north-eastern corner of which falls just within the parish boundary. The soil is chalk and gravel over galt clay.

Ewelme is chiefly known for its beautiful 15th century cloistered almshouses, officially called 'The Two Chaplains and Thirteen Poor Men of Ewelme in the County of Oxford'. The thirteen almsmen have now been reduced to eight, but the building is still run as a charity by the Ewelme Trust.

The almshouses were established in 1437 by the Duchess of Suffolk. She was the daughter of Thomas Chaucer, Speaker of the House of Commons and granddaughter of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer. As lords of the manor, she and her father had both lived at Ewelme Palace which once stood in the village and they are both buried in parish church St. Mary adjoining the almshouses: Thomas with a memorial brass on a fine tomb chest and Alice beneath one of the most magnificent medieval church monuments in the country, complete with rotting cadaver. Her effigy was examined by Queen Victoria's commissioners in order to discover how a lady should wear the Order of the Garter. Married three times, Alice was a powerful and influential lady. Amongst her husbands were the 4th Earl of Salisbury and the 1st Duke of Suffolk, Lord Chamberlain of England. Her six-year-old step-great-granddaughter, the 15th Countess of Warwick, also died at Ewelme (but was buried at Reading Abbey).

The nearby Ewelme school, dating from the same time, is said to be the oldest school building in the UK still in use as a state school.

In the churchyard are buried Jerome K. Jerome, author of Three Men In A Boat, and his wife Ettie.

The village has an active cricket club.

External links

* [http://www.fordsfarm.co.uk/History-of-Ewelme.html Prister-Crutwell, M., "Ewelme - A romantic village, its past and present, its people and its history"] Accessed 21 December 2006
*http://www.ewelme.info - The Village Website
* [http://gallery.beautifulengland.net/main.php?g2_itemId=12175 Information and photographs of the village]
*http://www.ewelme.net - Another Village Website