Goatacre is a village in the English county of

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 ...

, about north 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 ...

and south of Lyneham on the

A3102 road List of A roads in Great Britain, A roads in List of A roads zones in Great Britain, zone 3 in Great Britain starting west of the A3 road (England), A3 and south of the A4 road (England), A4 (roads beginning with 3). Single- and double-digit r ...

. It is in the parish of

Hilmarton Hilmarton is a village and civil parish in North Wiltshire, in the west of England. The village lies on the A3102 between the towns of Calne and Wootton Bassett, and south of Lyneham. The parish includes the village of Goatacre and the hamlets ...

and the closest major town is

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 ...

, some to the northeast. The hamlet of

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

is nearby, to the northwest.

History

The first recorded reference to "Godacre" occurs in 1242. The name occurs in 1348 as Gatacre and in 1408 as Gotagre, and is derived from the Old English word gat-aecre meaning, literally, goat-acre. The land was generally part of the Hilmarton estate, and was acquired by the Poynder family, owners at Hilmarton, in the mid 19th century. The Poynders built or rebuilt several buildings, including the farmhouse (in the centre of the village) and Corton House (to the west). The village has no Church of England presence, the nearest church being St Laurence at Hilmarton, one mile to the south.

Quakers Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abil ...

were active from the 17th century, and had a burial ground to the east of the village from 1678. A small

Primitive Methodist The Primitive Methodist Church is a Methodist Christian denomination with the holiness movement. It began in England in the early 19th century, with the influence of American evangelist Lorenzo Dow (1777–1834). In the United States, the Primiti ...

chapel was erected on the site of the burial ground in 1876, and replaced in 1909 by a larger red brick building by the main road, at the turning for New Zealand; this remained in use until 1994 and is now a private house. An independent, later

Congregational Congregational churches (also Congregationalist churches or Congregationalism) are Protestant churches in the Calvinist tradition practising congregationalist church governance, in which each congregation independently and autonomously runs its ...

, chapel was built in the village c. 1824 and closed in 1917.

Amenities

Goatacre has a cricket club, founded in 1928; their team won the Cricketer National Village Knockout competition in 1988 and 1990, and in 2017 won promotion to the Premier One division of the

West of England Premier League The West of England Premier League (WEPL) is the top level of competition for recreational club cricket in the West of England and is a designated ECB Premier League. Since its inception in 1999, the most successful club has been Bath, havin ...

, the region's top tier of recreational cricket. The village hall was extended in 2013 and is home to Goatacre Cricket Club and Goatacre Sports and Social Club. There are also facilities for playing football, including a pitch and changing facilities shared with the cricket club.

References

Villages in Wiltshire {{Wiltshire-geo-stub