Ashwick

infobox UK place
country = England
official_name= Ashwick
latitude= 51.2335
longitude= -2.5192
civil_parish=
population = 1,291
shire_district= Mendip
shire_county = Somerset
region= South West England
constituency_westminster= Wells
post_town=
postcode_district=
postcode_area=
dial_code=
os_grid_reference= ST637484

Ashwick is a village in the Mendip district of Somerset, England, about three miles north of Shepton Mallet and seven miles east from Wells. It has also been a civil parish since 1826. The parish had a population of 1,291 according to the 2001 census, and apart from Ashwick village also includes Gurney Slade, and Oakhill: Although Oakhill is the larger village today, Ashwick is the older settlement, dating back to Anglo-Saxon times. It appears in the Domesday book as a settlement called Escewiche, which translates as the hamlet or farmstead by the ash trees. The Fosse Way passes to the east of the parish.

The village is the site of Ashwick House, a country house dating from the late 17th century and grade II* listed. [cite web | title=Ashwick Court | work=Images of England | url=http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/search/details.aspx?id=266404 | accessdate=2006-12-11]

Church

The parish Church of St. James is basically a Victorian Gothic building erected between 1876 - 1881 by Browne and Gill of Bath. [cite book |last=Atthill |first=Robin |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Mendip: A new study |year=1976 |publisher=David & Charles |location=Newton Abbott |isbn= 0715372971 ] However, the church tower dates back to 1463. It is a grade I listed building. [cite web | title=Church of St James | work=Images of England | url=http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/search/details.aspx?id=266400 | accessdate=2006-12-11] The earliest record of a church on the site is 1413, when Bishop Bubwith dedicated a churchyard at Ashwick and authorised burials to take place there, but it is not known when the church was first built. The church was originally a chapel of ease connected to the vicarage at Kilmersdon, near Radstock. It remained so until the formation of Ashwick parish. The benefice of Oakhill was added in 1923 and Binegar was added in 1969, since when one Rector has overseen all three villages.

At the west end of the aisles in the Church of St. James two memorial tablets can be seen. These are dedicated to John Billingsley, his wife Mary, and their family. [cite web | title=Nicholas Billingsley tomb and Railed Enclosure in churchyard | work=Images of England | url=http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/search/details.aspx?id=266401 | accessdate=2006-12-11] The writer of the 1794 Survey of Somerset, Billingsley was a leading agriculturalist who was one of the founders of the Bath and West Society, known today as the Royal Bath and West of England Society. He lived all his life at Ashwick Grove, which is in the nearby village of Oakhill.

References