Compton is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

in the

River Pang The River Pang is a small chalk stream river in the west of the English county of Berkshire, and a tributary of the River Thames. It runs for approximately from its source near the village of Compton, Berkshire, Compton to its confluence wi ...

valley in the

Berkshire Downs The Berkshire Downs are a range of chalk downland hills in southern England, part of the North Wessex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The Berkshire Downs are wholly within the traditional county of Berkshire, although split between ...

about south of

Didcot Didcot ( ) is a railway town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in South Oxfordshire, England, located south of Oxford, east of Wantage and north west of Reading, Berkshire, Reading. Historically part of Berkshire, the town is noted ...

Geography

Compton is buffered from neighbouring settlements by cultivated fields to all sides. The village is in a gently-sloped

dry valley A dry valley may develop on many kinds of permeable rock, such as limestone, chalk, sand stone and sandy terrains that do not regularly sustain surface water flow. Such valleys do not hold surface water because it sinks into the permeable bed ...

and the fledgling Pang seasonally enters from the north west and discharges in the south east and may be joined at the centre of the village by the Roden from the north, when winter bournes rise to fill their channels. Elevations vary from AOD. Compton has a site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) just to the south west of the village, called Ashridge Wood.

Parish church

The bell tower of the

Church of England parish church A parish church in the Church of England is the church which acts as the religious centre for the people within each Church of England parish (the smallest and most basic Church of England administrative unit; since the 19th century sometimes ...

Saint Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under titles of Mary, mother of Jesus, various titles such as Perpetual virginity ...

and

Saint Nicholas Saint Nicholas of Myra (traditionally 15 March 270 – 6 December 343), also known as Nicholas of Bari, was an early Christian bishop of Greeks, Greek descent from the maritime city of Patara (Lycia), Patara in Anatolia (in modern-day Antalya ...

was built in the 13th centuryPevsner, 1965, page 120 and has

Perpendicular Gothic Perpendicular Gothic (also Perpendicular, Rectilinear, or Third Pointed) architecture was the third and final style of English Gothic architecture developed in the Kingdom of England during the Late Middle Ages, typified by large windows, four-ce ...

features that were added in the 15th century.Page & Ditchfield, 1925, pages 15-21 In 1850 the

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

and

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the Choir (architecture), choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may termi ...

were modernised or rebuilt and in 1905 the Gothic Revival architect John Oldrid Scott added the north aisle.

Transport

Former railway

In 1882 the Didcot, Newbury and Southampton Railway was completed through the parish and Compton railway station was opened.

British Railways British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. Originally a trading brand of the Railway Executive of the British Transport Commis ...

withdrew passenger services from the line and closed Compton station in 1962. BR had closed Compton goods yard by 1964. Through freight traffic was withdrawn in 1964 and the line was closed and dismantled during 1967.

Bus service

From 18 February 2013, Compton is served by Newbury and District bus services 6 and 6A from Newbury.

Amenities and economy

Education

The academically successful The Downs School local authority

secondary school A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., b ...

is in Compton. In the 21st century its new science building was named The Hubble after American astro-physicist

Edwin Hubble Edwin Powell Hubble (November 20, 1889 – September 28, 1953) was an American astronomer. He played a crucial role in establishing the fields of extragalactic astronomy and observational cosmology. Hubble proved that many objects previously ...

. Compton

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

Primary School is located on School Road. The school emblem is a stag. One section of the Institute for Animal Health, now the

Pirbright Institute The Pirbright Institute (formerly the Institute for Animal Health) is a research institute in Surrey, England, dedicated to the study of infectious diseases of farm animals. It forms part of the UK government's Biotechnology and Biological S ...

was at Compton, along with the Edward Jenner Institute for Vaccine Research.

Industry

In 2006 Compton became the founding place of a chemical manufacturing company called Carbosynth. Since 2019, it has merged with Swiss company Biosynth AG within the

fine chemical In chemistry, fine chemicals are complex, single, pure chemical substances, produced in limited quantities in multipurpose plants by multistep batch chemical or biotechnological processes. They are described by exacting specifications, used f ...

industry and now operates under the name Biosynth^®.

Demography

Nearest places

In popular culture

Substantial portions of the

BBC Television BBC Television is a service of the BBC. The corporation has operated a Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television service in the United Kingdom, under the terms of a royal charter, since 1 January 1927. It p ...

series '' Trainer'' were filmed in and around Compton and the next nearest village,

East Ilsley East Ilsley is a village and civil parish in the Berkshire Downs in West Berkshire, north of Newbury. The village is centred immediately east of the A34 dual carriageway which passes the length of the village from north to south. It has the v ...

Notable people

Footballer Theo Walcott went to Compton Primary School and The Downs School. Theo held the 100m record at The Downs School between 2004 and 2011.

References

Sources

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External links

Compton Parish CouncilWest Berkshire Council Parish Plan for Compton
{{authority control Villages in Berkshire West Berkshire District Civil parishes in Berkshire