Sampford Arundel is a village and
civil parish in
Somerset, England. It is situated near
Wellington and south west of
Taunton in the
Somerset West and Taunton district. The village has a population of 268.
The parish, which lies at the western end of the
Blackdown Hills
The Blackdown Hills are a range of hills along the Somerset-Devon border in south-western England, which were designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) in 1991.
The plateau is dominated by hard chert bands of Upper Greensand wit ...
, includes the hamlets of Bagley Green, Sampford Moor, White Ball and Beam Bridge where a temporary terminus of the
Bristol and Exeter Railway
The Bristol & Exeter Railway (B&ER) was an English railway company formed to connect Bristol and Exeter. It was built on the broad gauge and its engineer was Isambard Kingdom Brunel. It opened in stages between 1841 and 1844. It was allied with ...
was established in 1843 until the line was completed to
Exeter
Exeter () is a city in Devon, South West England. It is situated on the River Exe, approximately northeast of Plymouth and southwest of Bristol.
In Roman Britain, Exeter was established as the base of Legio II Augusta under the personal comm ...
in 1844.
There is a Junior School, an interesting church and an old
telephone box. There are no shops and few street lamps. There is a
cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...
club and the main attraction for visitors is the
countryside.
History
The first part of the name 'Sampford' means ''sandy ford'' and the second part 'Arundel' commemorates Roger Arundel who was granted the manor by the time of the
Domesday Book of 1086, and to differentiate the village from
Sampford Brett.
The parish of Sampford Arundel was part of the
Milverton Hundred,
Governance
The
parish council has responsibility for local issues, including setting an annual precept (local rate) to cover the council’s operating costs and producing annual accounts for public scrutiny. The parish council evaluates local planning applications and works with the local police, district council officers, and
neighbourhood watch groups on matters of crime, security, and traffic. The parish council's role also includes initiating projects for the maintenance and repair of parish facilities, as well as consulting with the district council on the maintenance, repair, and improvement of highways, drainage, footpaths, public transport, and street cleaning. Conservation matters (including trees and listed buildings) and environmental issues are also the responsibility of the council.a
The village falls within the
non-metropolitan district of
Somerset West and Taunton, which was established on 1 April 2019. It was previously in the district of
Taunton Deane, which was formed on 1 April 1974 under the
Local Government Act 1972
The Local Government Act 1972 (c. 70) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales on 1 April 1974. It was one of the most significant Acts of Parliament to be passed by the Heath Gov ...
, and part of
Wellington Rural District before that.
The district council is responsible for
local planning and
building control, local roads,
council housing
Public housing in the United Kingdom, also known as council estates, council housing, or social housing, provided the majority of rented accommodation until 2011 when the number of households in private rental housing surpassed the number in so ...
,
environmental health,
markets and fairs,
refuse collection
Waste collection is a part of the process of waste management. It is the transfer of solid waste from the point of use and disposal to the point of treatment or landfill. Waste collection also includes the curbside collection of recyclable m ...
and
recycling,
cemeteries
A cemetery, burial ground, gravesite or graveyard is a place where the remains of dead people are buried or otherwise interred. The word ''cemetery'' (from Greek , "sleeping place") implies that the land is specifically designated as a buri ...
and
crematoria
Cremation is a method of final disposition of a dead body through burning.
Cremation may serve as a funeral or post-funeral rite and as an alternative to burial. In some countries, including India and Nepal, cremation on an open-air pyre i ...
, leisure services, parks, and
tourism.
Somerset County Council
Somerset County Council is the county council of Somerset in the South West of England, an elected local government authority responsible for the most significant local government services in most of the county.
On 1 April 2023 the county counc ...
is responsible for running the largest and most expensive local services such as
education,
social services
Social services are a range of public services intended to provide support and assistance towards particular groups, which commonly include the disadvantaged. They may be provided by individuals, private and independent organisations, or administe ...
,
libraries, main roads,
public transport,
policing
The police are a constituted body of persons empowered by a state, with the aim to enforce the law, to ensure the safety, health and possessions of citizens, and to prevent crime and civil disorder. Their lawful powers include arrest and th ...
and
fire services,
trading standards,
waste disposal and strategic planning.
It is also part of the
Taunton Deane county constituency represented in the
House of Commons of the
Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one
Member of Parliament (MP) by the
first past the post system of election.
Religious sites
The
Anglican
Anglicanism is a Western Christian tradition that has developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. It is one of th ...
parish Church of the Holy Cross has fourteenth-century origins and a fifteenth-century tower. However the rest of the church was largely rebuilt and the tower
restored in the 1870s. It has been designated as a Grade II
listed building.
The church was given by the Arundels to
Canonsleigh Priory which retained it until the
dissolution of the monasteries.
References
External links
{{Use British English, date=February 2016
Villages in Taunton Deane
Civil parishes in Somerset