Shillingstone is a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred ...

and

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 authorit ...

in the

Blackmore Vale The Blackmore Vale (; less commonly spelt ''Blackmoor'') is a vale, or wide valley, in north Dorset, and to a lesser extent south Somerset and southwest Wiltshire in southern England. Geography The vale is part of the Stour valley, part of th ...

area of north

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset. Covering an area of , ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, situated on the River Stour between Sturminster Newton and Blandford Forum. In the 2011 Census the civil parish had 479 households and a population of 1,170. South of Shillingstone is a large area of

woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with trees, or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the ''plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade (se ...

on Okeford and Shillingstone Hill which forms part of Blandford Forest.

History

Shillingstone features in 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 manus ...

of 1086 as a settlement of 46 households, with meadow, woodlands and a mill, under the lordship of Ascelin. Its name is a derivation of Eschelling's (or Ascelin's) town. It once had the tallest maypole in Dorset – high. An agricultural community, it specialised in the production of moss. In the first World War, it earned the title, "the bravest village in Britain", because of the high proportion of residents who volunteered to join the armed forces. In 1924 the Shillingstone lime works was started to extract

lime Lime commonly refers to: * Lime (fruit), a green citrus fruit * Lime (material), inorganic materials containing calcium, usually calcium oxide or calcium hydroxide * Lime (color), a color between yellow and green Lime may also refer to: Botany ...

from the chalk beds at Shillingstone Hill. Shillingstone Parish Council meets monthly to discuss planning applications, maintenance of allotments and the local recreation ground, and other local amenities.

Parish church

The parish Church of the Holy Rood is a short distance away from the village and is of 12th-century origin, constructed in banded flint and ashlar masonry. It was enlarged in the 15th century and in the 19th century; G. F. Bodley added the north aisle. The font is of the 12th century and the pulpit of the 17th. The hymn writer Edward Dayman was appointed

Rector Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to: Style or title *Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations *Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...

of Shillingstone in 1842. About 165 yards

50m 5 (five) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number, and cardinal number, following 4 and preceding 6, and is a prime number. It has attained significance throughout history in part because typical humans have five digits on eac ...

south of the church is a Medieval cross base.

Railway station

Shillingstone railway station Shillingstone railway station was a station on the Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway (S&DJR), serving the village of Shillingstone in the English county of Dorset. Shillingstone is the last surviving example of a station built by the Dorset Ce ...

still survives intact on the former line of the

Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway The Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway, also known as the S&D, SDJR or S&DJR, was an English railway line connecting Bath (in north-east Somerset) and Bournemouth (now in south-east Dorset but then in Hampshire), with a branch from Evercreech ...

, now part of the North Dorset Trailway. The station is one of the best-preserved on the Somerset and Dorset line since the railway's closure in 1966. It opened on Monday 31 August 1863 and closed just over a century later on Sunday 6 March 1966. The station is undergoing extensive restoration by the Shillingstone Station Project, supported by the North Dorset Railway Trust. The village also had a light railway serving Shillingstone House, the post-war home of Sir Thomas Salt.

Education

The village has a primary school, affiliated to the Church of England and is also home to independent special school, The Forum School. Until around 1997, Shillingstone was the location of the now-defunct girls' boarding school, Croft House School. The independent

Hanford School Hanford School is a girls' boarding preparatory school located in Hanford, Child Okeford, Dorset, England, established in 1947 and located in a grade II* listed house built in 1604 by Sir Robert Seymer. History Hanford House was built in Jaco ...

is also near the village.

Governance

Shillingstone is the most populous area of Bulbarrow electoral ward, which extends south to Winterbourne Strickland and had a population of 1,850 in the 2011 census. Bulbarrow forms part of the constituency of

North Dorset North Dorset was a local government district in Dorset, England. It was largely rural, but included the towns of Blandford Forum, Gillingham, Shaftesbury, Stalbridge and Sturminster Newton. Much of North Dorset was in the River Stour vall ...

, which is currently represented in the UK parliament by the

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

Simon Hoare.

References

External links

*
Shillingstone Station Project
{{authority control Villages in Dorset