East Witton is a village 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 Wensleydale in

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is the largest ceremonial county (lieutenancy area) in England, covering an area of . Around 40% of the county is covered by national parks, including most of the Yorkshire Dales and the North York Moors. It is one of four co ...

, England. It lies south of Leyburn, in the

Richmondshire {{Infobox settlement , name = Richmondshire District , type = District , image_skyline = , imagesize = , image_caption = , image_blank_emblem= Richmondshire arms.png , blank_emblem_type = Coat ...

district. Richard Whiteley is buried there; he and his partner,

Kathryn Apanowicz Kathryn Apanowicz ( ; born 3 June 1960, Bradford, West Riding of Yorkshire), is a British actress and presenter. Apanowicz grew up in Horsforth, Leeds, with a brother, Stephen. Her father was a Polish RAF pilot in the Second World War. She firs ...

, lived in the village. The village lies at the mouth of Coverdale. The River Cover and the River Ure are on the northern boundary of the parish. The parish also includes

Jervaulx Abbey Jervaulx Abbey in East Witton, 14 miles north-west of the city of Ripon, was one of the great Cistercian abbeys of Yorkshire, England, dedicated to St Mary in 1156. It is a Grade I listed building. The place name ''Jervaulx'' is first att ...

, east of the village, and Braithwaite Hall, a 17th-century manor house owned by the

National Trust The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...

, west of the village. The western part of the parish is in the

Yorkshire Dales National Park The Yorkshire Dales National Park is a national park in England covering most of the Yorkshire Dales. Most of the park is in North Yorkshire, with a sizeable area in Westmorland ( Cumbria) and a small part in Lancashire. The park was d ...

. Most of the eastern part is in the Nidderdale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

History

East Witton was originally known simply as Witton, and was mentioned (as ''Witun'') in the Doomsday Book. The name is

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th ...

, from ''widu'' and ''tūn'', meaning "wood settlement", suggesting a place where wood was felled or worked. By the late 12th century the village became known as East Witton to distinguish it from another Witton, now known as

West Witton West Witton is a village and civil parish in the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, England. Located in Wensleydale in the Yorkshire Dales it lies on the A684 (the main road between Leyburn and Hawes). The civil parish also includ ...

, further up Wensleydale. The village was originally sited along what is now Lowthorpe (which leads to the site of the old church (St Martin in the Field). It acquired a town charter (and is shown on older

Ordnance Survey Ordnance Survey (OS) is the national mapping agency for Great Britain. The agency's name indicates its original military purpose (see ordnance and surveying), which was to map Scotland in the wake of the Jacobite rising of 1745. There was a ...

maps as East Witton Town) in 1307, and a market. During the Black Death, the market was moved to

Ulshaw Bridge Ulshaw Bridge is a hamlet on the River Ure, near to Middleham, in North Yorkshire, England. The hamlet derives its name partly from the Medieval stone bridge which spans the River Ure to the immediate south of the hamlet. Ulshaw Bridge is w ...

and died out shortly thereafter. A market was mentioned again in 1728, but subsequently lapsed. The Earl of Ailesbury, owner of the Jervaulx estate, rebuilt most of East Witton in the early 19th century, the houses and gardens in the same places as they were in 1627 according to an old

estate map Estate maps were maps commissioned by individual landowners or institutions, to show their extensive landed property, typically including fields, parkland and buildings. They were used for display and estate management and were fashionable from ...

. In 1809 a church was built by the road on the new site on the east of the village; it replaced the old church of St Martin, the site of which is now covered in trees and contains the tomb stone of conjoined twins. The village green is complete with three village taps, with mains water being installed in most houses in the late 1950s from the new Sowden Beck pumping station. The parish of East Witton was historically divided into the

township A township is a kind of human settlement or administrative subdivision, with its meaning varying in different countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, that tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, ...

s of East Witton Within or East Witton Town (the village and Braithwaite) and East Witton Without or East Witton Out (which included Jervaulx Park, Witton Moor and Colsterdale). The townships became separate civil parishes in 1866. In 1886 Colsterdale was transferred from East Witton Without to Healey with Sutton, and became a separate civil parish in 1894. Until 1934 the parish also shared the uninhabited Masham Moor with the ancient parish of

Masham Masham ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the Harrogate district of North Yorkshire, England. It had a population of 1,205 at the 2011 census. Etymology In Wensleydale, on the western bank of the River Ure, the name derives from t ...

. In 1934 the moor was divided between the civil parishes of Colsterdale, Healey and

Ilton cum Pott Ilton is a village and civil parish in Somerset, England, situated south-east of Taunton, and north of Ilminster in the South Somerset district. The village has a population of 854. The parish includes the hamlets of Ilford and Cad Green wi ...

. In 1974 the parishes of East Witton Town and East Witton Out were transferred to the new county of North Yorkshire. In 2002 the two parishes were abolished to create the new combined parish of East Witton. The population of the parish at the 2001 census was 258, which had dropped to 246 by the time of the 2011 census. North Yorkshire County Council estimated the population at 240 in 2015.

Popular culture

East Witton is featured in the British television series '' All Creatures Great and Small'', in the episode "The Prodigal Returns", as the home of the two Mrs Altons.

References

External links

East Witton Church in Yorkshire Dales Directory
{{authority control Villages in North Yorkshire Civil parishes in North Yorkshire Wensleydale