Almeley (pronounced ) 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 ...

Herefordshire Herefordshire () is a county in the West Midlands of England, governed by Herefordshire Council. It is bordered by Shropshire to the north, Worcestershire to the east, Gloucestershire to the south-east, and the Welsh counties of Monmouthsh ...

, England. The civil parish includes the

hamlets A hamlet is a human settlement that is smaller than a town or village. Its size relative to a parish can depend on the administration and region. A hamlet may be considered to be a smaller settlement or subdivision or satellite entity to a lar ...

of Almeley Wooton and Upcott. The 2011 Census recorded the parish's population as 601.

Location

Almeley is in the west of the county, about northwest of Hereford, southwest of

Leominster Leominster ( ) is a market town in Herefordshire, England, at the confluence of the River Lugg and its tributary the River Kenwater. The town is north of Hereford and south of Ludlow in Shropshire. With a population of 11,700, Leominster i ...

and from the border with

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

. The village is on the

Black and White Village Trail The term black and white village refers to several old English villages, typically in the county of Herefordshire, West Midlands of England. The term "black and white" derives from presence of many timbered and half-timbered houses in the area ...

General description of village

Much of the present village is built around a triangle of roads, with St Mary's parish church to the south, and on the edge of the built area. East of the church is Almeley Primary School. The village hall is at the eastern point of the triangle. North of the church are The Bells public house and a post office. At one of the road junctions by the church are the war memorial and a small sculpture depicting Almeley Parish. Of historical interest are the Oldcastle (on the north-west side of the village) and Almeley Castle just south of the church. A brook, offering a reliable water supply, runs past both castles. Almeley was awarded "Best Kept Herefordshire Village" in 1990.

History

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 records Almeley as a manor. Almeley is also recorded in 14th-century Feet of Fines (property transaction records). There is an entry for it in Samuel Lewis' ''Topographical Dictionary of England'' of 1848. The Church of England parish church of St Mary is largely 14-century and is a

Grade I listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

. Almeley is notable as the birthplace of Sir

John Oldcastle Sir John Oldcastle (died 14 December 1417) was an English Lollard leader. Being a friend of Henry V, he long escaped prosecution for heresy. When convicted, he escaped from the Tower of London and then led a rebellion against the King. Eventual ...

, a

Lollard Lollardy, also known as Lollardism or the Lollard movement, was a proto-Protestant Christian religious movement that existed from the mid-14th century until the 16th-century English Reformation. It was initially led by John Wycliffe, a Catho ...

sympathizer who was eventually executed for treason in 1417; his was the original name given to

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

's character of

Falstaff Sir John Falstaff is a fictional character who appears in three plays by William Shakespeare and is eulogised in a fourth. His significance as a fully developed character is primarily formed in the plays '' Henry IV, Part 1'' and '' Part 2'', w ...

. One of the early Quaker meeting houses is in Almeley Wootton, a hamlet in the parish about north of Almeley village. It was given to the Quakers in 1672 by its owner, Roger Prichard, and is still in use by Quakers today. Two of the Quakers who worshipped there (Roger's son, Edward Prichard, and Edward's brother-in-law, John Eckley) were involved with

William Penn William Penn ( – ) was an English writer and religious thinker belonging to the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, a North American colony of England. He was an early advocate of democracy a ...

in setting up the colony of

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

in 1682. A third castle is in the hamlet of Woonton in the Parish near The Mere at a place called Hall Mote. The whole parish has physical evidence of shrunken settlement at Woonton, Almeley Wootton, Hopleys Green, Upcott and Logaston, numbering more than 100 buildings. There is also map evidence for these lost buildings, which appear to have disappeared by the mid 19th century. Finds from the parish include

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several p ...

polished axe heads from Upcott, flint tools from various locations,

Roman coins Roman currency for most of Roman history consisted of gold, silver, bronze, orichalcum and copper coinage. From its introduction to the Republic, during the third century BC, well into Imperial times, Roman currency saw many changes in form, denom ...

from Spearsmarsh and Eccles Alley,

Roman pottery Pottery was produced in enormous quantities in ancient Rome, mostly for utilitarian purposes. It is found all over the former Roman Empire and beyond. Monte Testaccio is a huge waste mound in Rome made almost entirely of broken amphorae used for ...

from the Manor House area near the parish church, and coins of King John, Henry III, Edward I and most subsequent reigns until modern times, indicating continuous occupation for more than 4,000 years. Almeley railway station was opened in 1874 and worked by the Great Western Railway. The GWR closed the station in 1917, reopened it in 1922 and closed it again in 1940. The railway has since been closed and dismantled.

Demography and economy

United Kingdom Census data show that the population of Almeley declined by about 30% from 1801 to 1971 (from 753 to 521) but the ratio of males to females has remained at 1:1 over the same period. As a rural parish, its population density remained low (at about 1 person per five acres) from 1850 to 1950. In this 100-year period the national average rose from about 2 people per to about 5 people per . The parish has a large number of farmers. Its land use is based largely on

sheep Sheep or domestic sheep (''Ovis aries'') are domesticated, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Although the term ''sheep'' can apply to other species in the genus '' Ovis'', in everyday usage it almost always refers to domesticated ...

, pasture and cider

orchard An orchard is an intentional plantation of trees or shrubs that is maintained for food production. Orchards comprise fruit- or nut-producing trees which are generally grown for commercial production. Orchards are also sometimes a feature of ...

References

External links

* * {{authority control Civil parishes in Herefordshire Villages in Herefordshire