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

in the west of the English county of

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated to Wilts) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It borders Gloucestershire to the north, Oxfordshire to the north-east, Berkshire to the east, Hampshire to the south-east, Dorset to the south, and Somerset to ...

, about north of the centre of

Trowbridge Trowbridge ( ) is the county town of Wiltshire, England; situated on the River Biss in the west of the county, close to the border with Somerset. The town lies south-east of Bath, Somerset, Bath, south-west of Swindon and south-east of Brist ...

and east of

Bradford on Avon Bradford-on-Avon (sometimes Bradford on Avon) is a town and civil parish in west Wiltshire, England, near the border with Somerset. The town's canal, historic buildings, shops, pubs and restaurants make it popular with tourists. The parish had ...

History

Staverton developed near a crossing point of the Bristol Avon, on a road between Trowbridge and Holt. The road bridge may date from the 15th century and was rebuilt in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. The Avon forms the entire north and west boundary of the parish, while its tributary the Biss is the boundary in the southwest. The

Kennet and Avon Canal The Kennet and Avon Canal is a waterway in southern England with an overall length of , made up of two lengths of Navigability, navigable river linked by a canal. The name is used to refer to the entire length of the navigation rather than sol ...

, built in 1804, is the boundary to the south and southeast. The early settlement was around a

watermill A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as mill (grinding), milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in ...

and on the nearby higher ground near the church. The ''Old Bear Inn'' is from the early 19th century, and there are two rows of three-storey weavers' cottages from the 18th or 19th. An

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

map of 1958 shows only the school and roadside dwellings south of the village, between the railway and the canal. Later in the 20th century much housing was built here, followed by a

marina A marina (from Spanish , Portuguese and Italian : "related to the sea") is a dock or basin with moorings and supplies for yachts and small boats. A marina differs from a port in that a marina does not handle large passenger ships or cargo ...

for canal users, with waterside houses and apartments. These developments made the built-up area contiguous with Hilperton, on the other side of the canal. The population of the parish increased from 453 at the 2001 census to 1,868 in 2011.

Staverton Mill

There has been a mill on the River Avon at Staverton since at least the 11th century, when it was mentioned in

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 at the behest of William the Conqueror. The manuscript was originally known by ...

. Over the centuries the mill has been used for corn and for

fulling Fulling, also known as tucking or walking ( Scots: ''waukin'', hence often spelt waulking in Scottish English), is a step in woollen clothmaking which involves the cleansing of woven cloth (particularly wool) to eliminate ( lanolin) oils, ...

woollen cloth; a six-storey cloth mill was built in 1824–5, then in 1897 the site was sold to a predecessor of the

Nestlé Nestlé S.A. ( ) is a Swiss multinational food and drink processing conglomerate corporation headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland. It has been the largest publicly held food company in the world, measured by revenue and other metrics, since 20 ...

company for condensed milk production. Since 2007 the site has been home to a

breakfast cereal Breakfast cereal is a category of food, including food products, made from food processing, processed cereal, cereal grains, that are eaten as part of breakfast or as a snack food, primarily in Western societies. Although warm, cooked cereals li ...

factory, operated by subsidiary Cereal Partners UK, a joint venture between Nestlé and

General Mills General Mills, Inc. is an American multinational corporation, multinational manufacturer and marketer of branded ultra-processed consumer foods sold through retail stores. Founded on the banks of the Mississippi River at Saint Anthony Falls in ...

. The large, landmark chimney at the factory was removed in November 2011.

Railway

The Wilts, Somerset and Weymouth Railway was opened through the parish on 2 September 1848, linking the

Great Western Main Line The Great Western Main Line (GWML) is a main line railway in England that runs between London Paddington and . It connects to other main lines such as those from Reading to Penzance and Swindon to Swansea. The GWML is presently a part of t ...

at Thingley Junction with

and Westbury, and forming a route from London to southwest England. Near where the road passed over the line south of the village, a small station called Staverton Halt was opened on 15 October 1905, largely to serve workers at Staverton Mill. At the time this was a factory producing condensed milk for the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Co. and a private siding to serve it was constructed in 1931, tankers being brought from Westbury after detachment from one of the

Penzance Penzance ( ; ) is a town, civil parish and port in the Penwith district of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is the westernmost major town in Cornwall and is about west-southwest of Plymouth and west-southwest of London. Situated in the ...

to London milk trains. A victim of the

Beeching cuts The Beeching cuts, also colloquially referred to as the Beeching Axe, were a major series of route closures and service changes made as part of the restructuring of the nationalised railway system in Great Britain in the 1960s. They are named ...

, the halt closed on 16 April 1966 along with the three other stations between

Chippenham Chippenham is a market town in north-west Wiltshire, England. It lies north-east of Bath, Somerset, Bath, west of London and is near the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The town was established on a crossing of the River Avon, ...

and Trowbridge then still extant. Scheduled passenger services continued to use the line intermittently until 1978, after which time the line remained open to freight traffic and as a diversionary route. Regular passenger services were restored to the line in 1985.

Religious sites

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, generally due to trav ...

at Staverton was recorded in the 14th century, belonging to the church of St James at Trowbridge. The chapel dedicated to St Paul was rebuilt and enlarged on the same site, above the Avon, in 1826; the style of the small limestone building with a low west tower is described as "naïve Tudor" by Orbach. It became a church in 1839 when Staverton was made a separate ecclesiastical parish. The porch was added in 1861. Changes in 1954 brought St Mary's church at Hilperton Marsh into the parish, and the name of the parish became Staverton with Hilperton Marsh. The following year, a western part of Hilperton parish was transferred to Staverton. St Paul's closed in 2011 due to dwindling numbers and was offered for sale. St Mary's continues as the parish church, now part of the Canalside Benefice. A Wesleyan Methodist chapel was built in 1824 and closed in 1985.

Local government

The civil parish elects a parish council. It is in the area of

Wiltshire Council Wiltshire Council, known between 1889 and 2009 as Wiltshire County Council, is the Local government in England, local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Wiltshire (district), Wiltshire in South West England, and has its headquarters a ...

unitary authority A unitary authority is a type of local government, local authority in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Unitary authorities are responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are ...

, which is responsible for all significant local government functions. Staverton was a tithing of the ancient parish of Trowbridge, and became a separate civil parish in 1894.

Amenities

Staverton Church of England Primary School was opened in 1996, replacing an 1880 National School building which is now used by an independent school called Emmaus School. Staverton School can accommodate 310 pupils aged between 4 and 11. Facilities include two hard surfaced play areas, a nature area, school library, ICT suite and a shared school field with a pavilion and tennis courts. The village has a

pub A pub (short for public house) is in several countries a drinking establishment licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term first appeared in England in the late 17th century, to differentiate private ho ...

, the ''Old Bear Inn''. Widbrook Wood is just outside the parish, on the other side of the Biss.

References

External links

Staverton Parish Council
{{authority control Villages in Wiltshire Civil parishes in Wiltshire