Foxham is a village in

Bremhill Bremhill is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England. The village is about northwest of Calne and east of Chippenham. The name originates from '' 'Bramble hill'.'' Geography Bremhill civil parish is a rural area which stretches nort ...

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority ...

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated Wilts) is a historic and ceremonial county in South West England with an area of . It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset to the southwest, Somerset to the west, Hampshire to the southeast, Gloucestershire ...

, England, about northeast of

Chippenham Chippenham is a market town A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village ...

and a similar distance northwest of

Calne Calne () is a town and civil parish in Wiltshire, southwestern England,OS Explorer Map 156, Chippenham and Bradford-on-Avon Scale: 1:25 000.Publisher: Ordnance Survey A2 edition (2007). at the northwestern extremity of the North Wessex Downs h ...

Manor

The

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manusc ...

of 1086 recorded a small settlement of ten households at Cadenham, close to the east end of present-day Foxham. The

manor house A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The house formed the administrative centre of a manor in the European feudal system; within its great hall were held the lord's manorial courts, communal meals w ...

, Cadenham Manor, is a house of five bays built in the second half of the 17th century. It replaces an earlier house, from which part of a window-head survives in the north porch that was added in the 20th century.Pevsner & Cherry, page 251 The manor was owned by a branch of the Hungerford family, including George Hungerford (1637-1712).

Church and chapel

There is a record of Foxham being a

chapelry A chapelry was a subdivision of an ecclesiastical parish in England and parts of Lowland Scotland up to the mid 19th century. Status It had a similar status to a township but was so named as it had a chapel of ease (chapel) which was the communi ...

of the parish of Bremhill and Highway by 1219.Pugh & Crittall, 1953, pages 197-198 The present

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

John the Baptist John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...

was designed by the Gothic Revival architect

William Butterfield William Butterfield (7 September 1814 – 23 February 1900) was a Gothic Revival architect and associated with the Oxford Movement (or Tractarian Movement). He is noted for his use of polychromy. Biography William Butterfield was born in Lon ...

and built in 1878–81. The church is

Grade II* listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

, and has a stained glass window made in about 1855 that was part of the east window of St Martin's parish church, Bremhill. Today Bremhill parish is part of the Marden Vale benefice, alongside

St Mary Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of ...

and Holy Trinity at Calne, and the churches of Blackland and

Derry Hill Derry Hill is a village in the English county of Wiltshire, in the civil parish of Calne Without. It has an elevated position at the northern edge of the Bowood House estate, about south-east of the centre of the town of Chippenham. Geography ...

. A

Wesleyan Wesleyan theology, otherwise known as Wesleyan– Arminian theology, or Methodist theology, is a theological tradition in Protestant Christianity based upon the ministry of the 18th-century evangelical reformer brothers John Wesley and Charles W ...

chapel was built at Foxham in 1855, but it has been closed and converted into a house.

Canal

Construction of the

Wilts & Berks Canal The Wilts & Berks Canal is a canal in the Historic counties of England, historic counties of Wiltshire and Berkshire, England, linking the Kennet and Avon Canal at Semington near Melksham, to the River Thames at Abingdon, Oxfordshire, Abingdon. ...

began at

Semington Semington is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England. The village is about south of Melksham and about northeast of Trowbridge. The parish includes the hamlets of Little Marsh and Littleton.

in 1796 and had reached Foxham by December 1798, when Foxham

locks Lock(s) may refer to: Common meanings *Lock and key, a mechanical device used to secure items of importance *Lock (water navigation), a device for boats to transit between different levels of water, as in a canal Arts and entertainment * ''Lock ...

were under construction. By June 1800 the next section, from Foxham to

Dauntsey Dauntsey is a small village and civil parish in the county of Wiltshire, England. It gives its name to the Dauntsey Vale in which it lies and takes its name from Saxon for Dantes- eig, or Dante's island. It is set on slightly higher ground in ...

, was complete, and the canal was completed to Abingdon in September 1810. The canal passed Foxham just east of Cadenham Manor, with two locks just north of the Foxham-Hilmarton road. It brought coal from the Somerset coalfield to

Swindon Swindon () is a town and unitary authority with Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough status in Wiltshire, England. As of the 2021 Census, the population of Swindon was 201,669, making it the largest town in the county. The Swindon un ...

and Abingdon. Traffic declined after the Great Western railway was completed in 1841 and was minimal by the end of the century, then ceased altogether in 1901 after the partial collapse of the aqueduct over the River Marden at Stanley, some south of Foxham. The canal was formally abandoned by an Act of Parliament in 1914. The main line of the canal is now being restored. As of 2010, restoration of the section east of Foxham Top Lock was complete.

Amenities

Foxham has one

public house A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...

, the ''Foxham Inn''. The Reading Room was built in 1884 by the

Lansdowne Lansdowne or Lansdown may refer to: People * Lansdown Guilding (1797–1831), Saint Vincent and the Grenadines naturalist and engraver *Fenwick Lansdowne (1937–2008), Canadian wildlife artist * George Granville, 1st Baron Lansdowne (1666–1735) ...

family and extended in 1979. It is Foxham's

village hall A village hall is a public building in a village used for various things such as: United Kingdom In the United Kingdom, a village hall is usually a building which contains at least one large room (plus kitchen and toilets), is owned by a local ...

and also houses its Sub-Post Office.

References

Sources

* * *

External links

{{authority control Villages in Wiltshire