Yapton is a village and civil parish in the Arun District of West Sussex, England. It is centred three miles (4.8 km) north east of Bognor Regis at the intersection of the B2132 and B2233 roads. The parish of Yapton lies on the coastal plain south west of

Arundel Arundel ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the Arun District of the South Downs, West Sussex, England. The much-conserved town has a medieval castle and Roman Catholic cathedral. Arundel has a museum and comes second behind much large ...

, between the South Downs and the sea. St Mary the Virgin parish church, 13th century or earlier in origin, is in the centre of the village. It houses a twelfth-century font. Nearby,

Yapton Free Church Yapton Free Church (also known as Yapton Evangelical Free Church) is an Evangelical church in the village of Yapton in West Sussex, England. The "pretty flint building" dates from 1861, when it was built for a group of Congregational worshipper ...

was built in 1861 as a Congregational chapel but is now Evangelical in character. Yapton C of E Primary School was founded in 1864. Other settlements in the parish include Bilsham and Flansham. The settlement of Bilsham was listed in the Domesday Book of 1086 as having 14 households.

Bilsham Chapel Bilsham Chapel is a deconsecrated former chapel in the hamlet of Bilsham in West Sussex, England. Founded in the 13th century as a chapel of ease to the parish church of Yapton, the nearest village, the small flint building fell out of religious ...

is a deconsecrated former

chapel of ease A chapel of ease (or chapel-of-ease) is a church architecture, church building other than the parish church, built within the bounds of a parish for the attendance of those who cannot reach the parish church conveniently. Often a chapel of ea ...

to St Mary the Virgin Church; it dates from the 13th–14th century but fell out of use in the mid-16th century. The building is now a house.

History

The disused

Portsmouth and Arundel Canal The Portsmouth and Arundel Canal was a canal in the south of England that ran between Portsmouth and Ford in the Arundel district, it was built in 1823 but was never a financial success and was abandoned in 1855; the company was wound up in 1888 ...

which linked nearby the River Arun to

Chichester Harbour Chichester Harbour is a large natural harbour in West Sussex and Hampshire. It is situated to the south-west of the city of Chichester and to the north of the Solent. The harbour and surrounding land has been designated as an Area of Outstandin ...

, runs through the village. This was built primarily on the financial case it would be a safe inland shipping route between London and Portsmouth avoiding the then risk of attack in the English Channel by the French. Throughout its lifetime, 1823-1855 - a time when the

Wey and Arun Canal The Wey and Arun Canal is a partially open, 23-mile-long (37 km) canal in the southeast of England. It runs southwards from the River Wey at Gunsmouth in Shalford, Surrey to the River Arun at Pallingham, in West Sussex. The canal compri ...

was open (having opened 7 years earlier and having closed in 1871) - the route was used for transporting agricultural goods and munitions, for instance, from Chilworth and Hanworth gunpowder works and to/from the military docks on the lower Thames in the Royal Borough of Greenwich.

Governance

electoral ward A ward is a local authority area, typically used for electoral purposes. In some countries, wards are usually named after neighbourhoods, thoroughfares, parishes, landmarks, geographical features and in some cases historical figures connected to t ...

in the same name exists. This ward stretches South East to

Climping Climping (also spelt as Clymping) is a village and civil parish containing agricultural and natural sandy land in the Arun District of West Sussex, England. The parish also contains the coastal hamlet of Atherington. It is three miles (5 km) ...

with a total population of 5,926 at the 2011 Census.

Notable residents

Duncan Goodhew Duncan Alexander Goodhew, (born 27 May 1957) is an English former competitive swimmer. After swimming competitively in America as a collegian at North Carolina State University, he was an Olympic swimmer for Great Britain and won Olympic gold a ...

, the Olympic swimming maestro was brought up in Yapton. There is a residential road, Goodhew Close, named after him. Sculptor Ginger Gilmour works from a 15th-century farmhouse near Yapton, where she has created several studios. The poet Andrew Young lived in Yapton after he retired in 1959.

References

External links

British History Online
{{authority control Villages in West Sussex Arun District