place

Bradford Leigh

Hamlets in WiltshireWiltshire geography stubs
The Plough at Bradford Leigh geograph.org.uk 141533
The Plough at Bradford Leigh geograph.org.uk 141533

Bradford Leigh is a hamlet in Wiltshire, England. It lies in the parish of South Wraxall, about 1.3 miles (2.1 km) northeast of the centre of the town of Bradford on Avon. The area was formerly a tithing of the parish of Bradford on Avon. A Methodist chapel was built in 1892, belonging to the Methodist church at Bradford on Avon; the chapel closed in the mid-20th century.The local pub, the Plough, closed in 2014 and was offered for sale in 2015.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Bradford Leigh (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 51.362 ° E -2.231 °
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Address


BA15 2RW
England, United Kingdom
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The Plough at Bradford Leigh geograph.org.uk 141533
The Plough at Bradford Leigh geograph.org.uk 141533
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Nearby Places

Christ Church, Bradford-on-Avon
Christ Church, Bradford-on-Avon

The Anglican Christ Church is in the northern Hillside Terraces district of Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltshire, England. It is in the Bradford Deanery of the Diocese of Salisbury. Early in the 19th century, people in this area of town objected to going down the hill to the northern town centre to their parish church, the originally Norman church of Holy Trinity, which was considered to be "in a bad part of the town." The church was in need of repair and the nearby Saxon Church of St Lawrence across the road from Holy Trinity was yet to be discovered.The new parish of Christ Church was created and a new structure was commissioned to be designed by Bath architect G. P. Manners in 1839. Consecrated in 1841, it was "originally...a simple design with plain walls, clear glass windows and stone flagged floors and was in the Perpendicular style." Later Victorian taste in churches was for something more elaborate, so in 1875 it was "restored" by Sir George Gilbert Scott; the east end was rebuilt, with an extra bay beyond the east wall to form a sanctuary. After Scott's death in 1878, interior work was overseen by his son John Oldrid Scott. Further work in 1884 included the addition of a south porch, and in 1919 C.E. Ponting added the south chapel as a war memorial to C. Eric Moulton.The church has a memorial to Eric Moulton in the Lady Chapel, and a ring of eight bells cast in 1923 by Gillett & Johnston of Croydon.The church was designated as Grade II* listed in 1952. Pevsner describes it as a "big, prosperous church". Today the parish forms part of the North Bradford-on-Avon benefice.

St Laurence's Church, Bradford-on-Avon
St Laurence's Church, Bradford-on-Avon

St Laurence's Church, Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltshire, is one of very few surviving Anglo-Saxon churches in England that does not show later medieval alteration or rebuilding. The church is dedicated to St Laurence and documentary sources suggest it may have been founded by Saint Aldhelm around 700, although the architectural style suggests a 10th- or 11th-century date. St. Laurence's stands on rising ground close to the larger Norman parish church of the Holy Trinity. The building was used as a combined school (nave) and cottage (chancel) for many years, both on more than one storey. It was rediscovered in 1856 by William Jones, rector of Holy Trinity, and restored between 1870 and 1880. In 1952 the church was designated as Grade I listed. The date of the building has been much debated. H. M. Taylor stated some 50 years ago that he believed the main fabric of the walls to their full height belongs to Aldhelm's time, after discussions with Dr Edward Gilbert. Most recent sources give a later date for all or most of the structure. It has been suggested it was built after 1001, when King Æthelred the Unready gave the site to the nuns of Shaftesbury Abbey, refugees from the Vikings. They were the custodians of the body of King Edward the Martyr, Æthelred's half-brother and already regarded as a saint, and it may have served as a mortuary chapel for him for a period, which might help explain why such a small but elaborate building was created. It is the most complete Anglo-Saxon survival from this period, and follows what seems to have been a typical monastic plan at the time, though in miniature. In particular the decoration including fragments of large reliefs gives a hint of richness which documentary remains record in monastic churches. Although the existing church seems all or almost all Anglo-Saxon, it has clearly been altered in a number of ways, apart from the modern restoration, which included removing the stairs inside and filling in windows. For its small size, with the nave only some 7.5 metres (25 ft) long and a little over 4 m (13 ft) wide, the height of the building (around 8 m (26 ft) inside the nave) is notable. A porticus to the south has been lost, but otherwise the structure of the building seems complete in its final Anglo-Saxon state. The pair of angels flying horizontally, in relief at about half life-size, probably flanked a large sculptural group of the Crucifixion, perhaps over the chancel arch.The arcading on the exterior walls is produced, not by incision (as thought by Jackson and Fletcher), but by setting the massive stone pilaster-strips forward from the wall-face. In this they are similar to Great Dunham and the tower of Tasburgh parish church in Norfolk, and also to the parish churches at Earls Barton and Barton-upon-Humber.