FAWLEY HUNDRED 



pond. The greater number of the older houses of 

 the village with the two inns, ' The Anchor ' and ' The 

 Angler,' are grouped here and higher up the road 

 beyond the old church of St. Mary (rebuilt in 1825, 

 now disused) and the Rectory. Many modern red- 

 brick cottages are now in process of building at both 

 ends of the village to supply the needs of the men 

 who are employed in the Eastleigh Railway Works, 

 which are rapidly increasing in size. The new church 

 of St. Mary, opened in 1891, is north of the village, 

 close to the new church schools. Further north, its 

 well-wooded grounds of about 100 acres stretching 

 away west to the River Itchen, is The Mount, the 

 residence of Mr. Thomas Atkinson Cotton. The 

 house, which is surrounded by a fine park in which a 

 herd of deer is kept, is modern and has a tower at 

 one end. The grounds contain a fine collection of 

 conifers, many rare plants, and a rock garden, while 

 in the house is a large collection of British birds number- 

 ing over a thousand specimens. There is also a clock 

 tower in the grounds containing a clock with carillon 

 chimes which play fourteen tunes. Longmead, 

 another fine house, the residence of Mr. Gubbins, 

 stands east of the village in a park and grounds of 

 about 46 acres. Longmead Farm is on the edge of the 

 estate. Stoke Lodge, the residence of Mr. George 

 Young, is north-east of The Mount near Stoke Com- 

 mon. 



The soil of the parish is mixed clay, loam, and sand ; 

 subsoil, clay and sand. The proportion of land in 

 the parish is as follows : I 3^- acres of arable land, 175 

 acres of permanent grass, and 8 acres of woods and 

 plantations. 1 The chief crops are wheat, barley, oats, 

 peas, and beans. The following place-names occur : 

 ' the High Bridge and Davis,' ' ' Mortimers and 

 Crowdhill ' (name still preserved) ; * Mayles Thomas 

 and Strowdelonde ; * The Reeve's Gore, Lower 

 Beddemeade, Breathfield, 5 Woodrowes Purrockes, 6 

 and ' Maveland.' ' 



Stoke Common itself is the hamlet which is the 

 nucleus of the small parish of Stoke Park. It is 

 reached from Bishopstoke by the road running north- 

 east from the village, and consists of a few scattered 

 houses, a Bible Christian Chapel, a smithy, and an inn, 

 ' The Foresters' Arms.' Stoke Park Farm lies away 

 to the east, surrounded by a belt of arable land which 

 stretches away to woodland, Upperbarn Copse, Crowd- 

 hill Copse in the east, and Stoke Park Wood in the 

 south. The meadow land west of Stoke Common is 

 often flooded, as the Itchen, which here divides into 

 many branches, overflows its banks during the rainy 

 season. On the lower part of the river is Withymead 

 Lock, where the several branches of the river meet in 

 one, and Stoke Lock still lower, where the Itchen 

 Navigation joins the River Itchen. 



The village of Fair Oak consists of widely scattered 



BISHOPSTOKE 



houses and farms reaching from Crowdhill on the 

 north to Horton Heath on the south. From Crowd- 

 hill, part of which is in Fair Oak, a fine view can be 

 gained of the surrounding country, the Itchen valley 

 stretching away to the south-west towards the Solent, 

 and the chalk downs which lie round Winchester 

 sweeping away to the north. A Wesleyan chapel and 

 two or three houses belonging to Crowdhill are in the 

 north in Fair Oak parish. In the north of Fair Oak 

 village itself is Blocks Farm, south of which are the 

 houses of the villa^ grouped round the church of 

 St. Thomas erected in 1 063. Close by are the church 

 schools, the smithy, and the inn. A few cottages 

 are scattered along the road to the south towards 

 Knowle Hill, which rises to a height of about 1 60 ft. 

 above the ordnance datum. Horton Heath, a detached 

 portion of Fair Oak village, lies round the four 

 cross roads formed by the road known as Burnett 

 Lane as it crosses the main road from Winchester. 

 Here is a Union Chapel, Hammersley Farm, the 

 Rising Sun Inn, and the post office. Fair Oak Park, 

 the residence of Mr. George Pember, stands east of the 

 village ; the house commanding a fine view of the 

 well-wooded park and grounds, which cover about 

 1 20 acres. On the northern edge of this estate is 

 Hall Lands House. Stroudwood is to the north-east. 

 Fair Oak Lodge, the property of Sir Arthur Grant, bart., 

 of Monymusk, N.B., lies south-west of the village. 

 The estate covers about 120 acres, and in the park is a 

 lake of about seven acres in extent called Quableigh 

 Pond, the home of several varieties of water fowl. 



The earliest reference to BISHOP- 

 MANORS STOKE seems to be in the year 948 

 when King Edred granted 1 1 mansae at 

 Stoke to the thegn ^Elfric. 8 Sixteen years later King 

 Edgar' endowed Winchester Cathedral with lands at 

 Bishopstoke, together with numerous other manors in 

 Hampshire, and at the time of the Domesday Sur- 

 vey the bishop was holding Bishopstoke in demesne 

 as he had formerly done ; it was assessed at 5 hides 

 and was worth 8.' In 1284 the king gave up to 

 John bishop of Winchester and his successors all his 

 right in the manor of Bishopstoke. 11 The manor 

 remained in the hands of the bishop from this date " 

 until the sale of the bishops' lands in 1650," when it 

 was sold to Dr. Thomas Cox and Malachy Dewdney 

 for 1,601 4/. 6J., }t and five years later the site of the 

 manor also was sold to Dr. Cox for 479 3/. 4^. 15 

 Bishopstoke was restored to the see of Winchester at 

 the Restoration and remained in the bishop's posses- 

 sion 16 until the year 1869, when the lands belonging 

 to the bishopric were vested in the Ecclesiastical Com- 

 missioners, who are lords of the manor at the present- 

 day. The bishop of Winchester had a park here at 

 an early date. In 1305, and again in 1334, certain 

 persons were indicted for hunting in the bishop of 



1 Statistics of Bd. of Agric. (1905). 



n Eccl. Com. Ct. R. I5957| ( 2 ) SI- 



Ibid. I58o3ol| s . 



Ibid. 1588261!'. 



5 Close, 1650, pt. I, m. 21. 



Eccl. Com. Ct. R. 151857^. 



7 Ibid. 1588781". 



8 Birch, Cart. Sax. iii, 7. 



9 King Edgar also granted a small piece 

 cf land at Stoke, probably Bishopstoke, to 

 his kinsman Osward in 975 (Birch, Carl. 

 Sax. iii, 468). 



10 V.C.H. Hants, i, 460. 



H Chart. R. 12 Edw. I, m. 5. 



Feud. Aid,, ii, 320 5 Eccl. Com. Ct. R. 

 159510 (i). 



18 The bishop occasionally leased small 

 pieces of land in Bishopstoke to various 

 tenants ; for instance, John Philpott held 

 land in Bishopstoke at his death in 1503 

 (Chan. Inq. p.m. [Ser. 2], vol. 16, No. 

 100). The Philpotts seem to have held 

 land in Bishopstoke for a considerable 

 period, for in 1650 Edward Bosden begged 

 that an inquiry might be made concerning 

 his right to lands at Bishopstoke purchased 

 by his father in 12 Chas. I from Henry 

 Philpott and then conveyed to Benjamin 



39 



Hiborne (Cal. of Cam. for Compounding, ii, 

 997). 



" Coll. Tof. etGen. i, 24; Dugdale, Man, 

 i, 203-4. 



"Close, 1650, pt. I, m. 21. In 1597 

 this had been leased by Thomas bishop of 

 Winchester to Queen Elizabeth for 50 

 years at a yearly rent of 8 fa. 8r/. 



16 Thomas Walker and his wife Anne 

 held a lease of the site of the manor of 

 Bishopstoke in 1787, and conveyed it in 

 that year to John Ramsay and others (Feet 

 of F. Hants, Mil. 27 Geo. III). 



