South Marston 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 authority ...

in the Borough of Swindon,

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated Wilts) is a historic and ceremonial county in South West England with an area of . It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset to the southwest, Somerset to the west, Hampshire to the southeast, Gloucestershire ...

, England. The village is about north-east of

Swindon Swindon () is a town and unitary authority with Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough status in Wiltshire, England. As of the 2021 Census, the population of Swindon was 201,669, making it the largest town in the county. The Swindon un ...

town centre.

History

The earliest documentary evidence for continuous settlement dates from the 13th century, but there is fragmentary archaeological evidence of occupation as far back as the

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...

. It is claimed that there were

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

remains just outside South Marston in a field belonging to Rowborough Farm, but these have long disappeared.

Ermin Way Ermin Street or Ermin Way was a Roman road in Britain. It linked Glevum (Gloucester) and Corinium (Cirencester) to Calleva (Silchester). At Glevum, it connected to the road to Isca (Caerleon), the legionary base in southeast Wales. At Corini ...

, a major Roman road linking Silchester and

Gloucester Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean to the west, east of Monmouth and east ...

, passed close to the village on the south-west side, separating it from

Stratton St Margaret Stratton St Margaret is a civil parish in the Borough of Swindon, Wiltshire, England. The parish covers north-eastern suburbs of Swindon including Stratton St Margaret itself along with Upper Stratton, Lower Stratton and Kingsdown. Since May 20 ...

. There was a Roman station at ''Durocornovium'', now Covingham, one mile south of the village. The name "Marston" derives from a common

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 settlement of Britain, Anglo ...

toponym Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of '' toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...

meaning "marsh farm". This suggests that the village was founded before the

Norman conquest of England The Norman Conquest (or the Conquest) was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Normans, Norman, Duchy of Brittany, Breton, County of Flanders, Flemish, and Kingdom of France, French troops, ...

in 1066, although it is not recorded in 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 manusc ...

of 1086. Documentary evidence of the village exists from about 1280, when it is mentioned as part of

Highworth Highworth is a market town and civil parish in the Borough of Swindon, England, about northeast of Swindon town centre. The 2011 Census recorded a population of 8,151. The town is notable for its Queen Anne and Georgian buildings, dating ...

Hundred 100 or one hundred (Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 and preceding 101. In medieval contexts, it may be described as the short hundred or five score in order to differentiate the English and Germanic use of "hundred" to de ...

. South Marston became a civil parish in 1894. For church purposes, South Marston was a

chapelry A chapelry was a subdivision of an ecclesiastical parish in England and parts of Lowland Scotland up to the mid 19th century. Status It had a similar status to a township but was so named as it had a chapel of ease (chapel) which was the communi ...

until it became a separate church parish in 1889.

Industries

Early in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, a Ministry of Aircraft Production

shadow factory A shadow is a dark area where light from a light source is blocked by an opaque object. It occupies all of the three-dimensional volume behind an object with light in front of it. The cross section of a shadow is a two- dimensional silhouette, ...

and airfield were built for Phillips & Powis Aircraft Ltd, and 1,090

Miles Master The Miles M.9 Master was a British two-seat monoplane advanced trainer designed and built by aviation company Miles Aircraft Ltd. It was inducted in large numbers into both the Royal Air Force (RAF) and Fleet Air Arm (FAA) during the Second Wor ...

training aircraft were built there.

Short Brothers Short Brothers plc, usually referred to as Shorts or Short, is an aerospace company based in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Shorts was founded in 1908 in London, and was the first company in the world to make production aeroplanes. It was particu ...

Ltd also used another part of the airfield for final assembly and testing of locally-built Short Stirling bombers.

Vickers-Armstrongs Vickers-Armstrongs Limited was a British engineering conglomerate formed by the merger of the assets of Vickers Limited and Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company in 1927. The majority of the company was nationalised in the 1960s and 1970s, w ...

Supermarine Supermarine was a British aircraft manufacturer that is most famous for producing the Spitfire fighter plane during World War II as well as a range of seaplanes and flying boats, and a series of jet-powered fighter aircraft after World War II ...

acquired the site in 1945 and produced Supermarine aircraft including

Spitfire The Supermarine Spitfire is a British single-seat fighter aircraft used by the Royal Air Force and other Allied countries before, during, and after World War II. Many variants of the Spitfire were built, from the Mk 1 to the Rolls-Royce Grif ...

Seafire ''SeaFire'', first published in 1994, was the fourteenth novel by John Gardner featuring Ian Fleming's secret agent, James Bond (including Gardner's novelization of ''Licence to Kill''). Carrying the Glidrose Publications copyright, it was f ...

Attacker In some team sports, an attacker is a specific type of player, usually involved in aggressive play. Heavy attackers are, usually, placed up front: their goal is to score the most possible points for the team. In association football, attackers a ...

Swift Swift or SWIFT most commonly refers to: * SWIFT, an international organization facilitating transactions between banks ** SWIFT code * Swift (programming language) * Swift (bird), a family of birds It may also refer to: Organizations * SWIFT, ...

and

Scimitar A scimitar ( or ) is a single-edged sword with a convex curved blade associated with Middle Eastern, South Asian, or North African cultures. A European term, ''scimitar'' does not refer to one specific sword type, but an assortment of different ...

there until 1961; the factory continued to produce components for Vickers until the early 1980s. In 1985,

Honda is a Japanese public multinational conglomerate manufacturer of automobiles, motorcycles, and power equipment, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Honda has been the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer since 1959, reaching a product ...

bought the site, which straddles the boundary with

parish, and turned it over to car manufacture. It was the company's sole British plant and employed 3,500 in 2019 when Honda announced that it would close in 2021. In that year the site was sold to

Panattoni Panattoni Development Company is an international real estate developer specializing in industrial real estate and warehouses. It has 35 Full Service Development offices in across the United States, Europe and Canada. The company has delivered ove ...

, an American industrial real estate developer, who intended to use it for a large-scale

logistics Logistics is generally the detailed organization and implementation of a complex operation. In a general business sense, logistics manages the flow of goods between the point of origin and the point of consumption to meet the requirements of ...

operation. The principal book storage facility for Oxford's

Bodleian Libraries The Bodleian Libraries are a collection of 28 libraries that serve the University of Oxford in England, including the Bodleian Library itself, as well as many other (but not all) central and faculty libraries. As of the 2016–17 year, the librari ...

has been on South Marston Industrial Estate since 2010.

Sport

Teams at the Vickers-Armstrongs works included a football team and a rugby team, who continue today under altered names: Swindon Supermarine F.C. and Supermarine RFC. Since the 1980s they have shared facilities at Hunts Copse just north of South Marston, alongside other sports, a bowls club and the Supermarine Sports & Social Club.

Notable resident

Alfred Williams Alfred Hamilton Williams (born November 6, 1968) is a former American football player. He was a linebacker and defensive end in the National Football League (NFL) for the Cincinnati Bengals, San Francisco 49ers and Denver Broncos. His nicknames ...

, poet and steam-hammer operator at Swindon Railway Works, died in South Marston on 10 April 1930 aged 52.

Demography

A large residential development was built on the site of the Manor House in the mid-1980s. Further development plans were made in 2015.Village site. Retrieved 3 August 2020.
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References

External links

Parish CouncilHistory section of the Parish Council website
a referenced resource that summarizes research into the village's history
South Marston's aircraft industry
at Swindonweb {{authority control Civil parishes in Wiltshire Borough of Swindon Villages in Wiltshire