Bickenhill is a small village in the
civil parish of Bickenhill and Marston Green, in the
Solihull district, in the county of the
West Midlands, England, on the eastern fringe of the
West Midlands conurbation. Bickenhill is home to
Birmingham Airport. Bickenhill is also a
ward. It is in the
historic county of
Warwickshire.
History
The
manor
Manor may refer to:
Land ownership
*Manorialism or "manor system", the method of land ownership (or "tenure") in parts of medieval Europe, notably England
*Lord of the manor, the owner of an agreed area of land (or "manor") under manorialism
*Man ...
of Bickenhill was held by
Edward the Confessor
Edward the Confessor ; la, Eduardus Confessor , ; ( 1003 – 5 January 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon English kings. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066.
Edward was the son of Æth ...
, by Alward, and then by Turchil. It is recorded in the
Domesday Book of 1086. The descendants of Turchil, the Arden family, settled in the area and adopted the surname 'de Bickenhill,' though spelt differently. The name developed into de Bickenhill in the 13th century. In 1295, Alice de Langley gave herself the title ''Lady of Bickenhill''. A manor then developed in Bickenhill and by the 15th century, there were two manors. It is believed that both manors shared rights by the end of the century. The manors were no longer existing by the end of the 16th century.
The parish was rural in the 19th century but began to develop in the early 20th century into a populous area.
Many changes to the area were made during the nineteenth century.
Solihull parish received a detached part of Bickenhill parish, known as Lyndon Quarter, in 1874. The area had been known as Lyndon or Ulverley, after the Ulverlie family who were the original land-owners in the area. When they constructed a new town at a nearby crossroads, which was to become Solihull, old Ulverley became the Old Town, later corrupted to
Olton. Though Elmdon parish lay between Olton and Bickenhill proper, the area was administratively Bickenhill until transfer to Solihull, and finally independent with the building of St. Margaret's
parish church. The area had been rapidly suburbanising because of the opening of a railway station at Olton, which allowed those who worked in Birmingham to live there and commute. It soon became a suburb of
Birmingham.
Marston Green, in the north of the parish proper and now the other side of the airport, suburbanised similarly due to having its own station.
Bickenhill proper, however, was not to benefit from the railway boom, despite having what is now the
West Coast Main Line running very nearby. No station was opened near the village until
Birmingham International at
Birmingham Airport in the 1970s.
The M42 motorway and the busy A45 road run close by to the East and North of the village respectively.
Before the decision was taken to rebuild
Wembley Stadium in north London, Bickenhill was a contender to be the site of the new national stadium, indeed the supposed forerunner. National posters on behalf of the Wembley bid proclaimed, 'One day I'll play at Bickenhill...', in a tongue-in-cheek offensive against the proposal.
Solihull's landfill site is located in Bickenhill, and that of North Warwickshire in Little Packington, visible from the village.
Parish
The parish of Bickenhill and Marston Green
covers the village of Bickenhill itself and the town of
Marston Green. Also in the parish are
Birmingham Airport, the
National Exhibition Centre, and the
National Motorcycle Museum. In the
2011 census the parish population was 7,153, an increase from the
2001 Census figure of 6,583. Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council maintain a waste recycling centre in the parish. The civil parish was renamed from Bickenhill to Bickenhill and Marston Green in 2014.
The parish is crossed by two major roads: the
M42 and the
A45. The A45 is referred to locally as the Coventry Road.
Village
The village of Bickenhill is south of the A45 road (whereas the rest of the parish is north of the A45). The
Church of England parish church
A parish church in the Church of England is the church which acts as the religious centre for the people within each Church of England parish (the smallest and most basic Church of England administrative unit; since the 19th century sometimes ca ...
of
Saint Peter is
Norman and as built in 1140. The
toponym 'Bickenhill' is derived from the
Old English
Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, Anglo ...
for 'projecting hill'. The majority of the older houses in Bickenhill village are
Georgian or
Victorian
Victorian or Victorians may refer to:
19th century
* Victorian era, British history during Queen Victoria's 19th-century reign
** Victorian architecture
** Victorian house
** Victorian decorative arts
** Victorian fashion
** Victorian literature ...
.
Government backs second runway
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The village boasts Páirc na hÉireann
, near Bickenhill, Solihull, England, is the principal Gaelic games sports facility in the West Midlands. It is administered by the Warwickshire GAA. is located east of Birmingham near Birmingham International Airport. It is currently the hom ...
, the primary venue for Gaelic games
Gaelic games ( ga, Cluichí Gaelacha) are a set of sports played worldwide, though they are particularly popular in Ireland, where they originated. They include Gaelic football, hurling, Gaelic handball and rounders. Football and hurling, the ...
in the West Midlands. It boasts three full-size Gaelic Athletic Association pitches with eight changing rooms, bar area and car-parking.
Local villages include Catherine-de-Barnes, Hampton-in-Arden and Meriden.
Governance
The two main local authorities responsible for the parish are Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council and Bickenhill Parish Council.
Further reading
*
*
References
{{authority control
Villages in the West Midlands (county)
Solihull
Conservation areas in England