South Leigh
Encyclopedia
South Leigh is a village and civil parish on Limb Brook, a small tributary of the River Thames
, about 2.5 miles (4 km) east of Witney
in Oxfordshire
.
of 1086, but was recorded in 1190 as Stanton Lega.
The manor house
was built in the second half of the 16th century. It is now called Church Farm House.
In the middle of the 17th century William Gore acquired the manor. The Gores consolidated South Leigh as a separate estate within Stanton Harcourt
parish, but this led to a series of disputes over landholdings intermixed between the two. When Stanton Harcourt's common land
s were being enclosed
in 1773, its enclosure commissioners suggested promoting a single Parliamentary bill to enclose both estates. Edward Gore and his tenants in South Leigh disagreed due to the unresolved boundary disputes and consequent disagreement over what lands would be allotted to whom under the enclosure award. Instead Stanton Harcourt's enclosure commissioners were empowered to settle a definitive boundary between the two estates.
of Saint James the Great began as a chapel
of the parish of Stanton Harcourt, and remained so until 1868. The oldest parts of the church building date from the latter part of the 12th century. The present chancel
arch was built about 1300, the tower arch was built during the 14th century and the south doorway of the nave dates from about 1400. The church building was extensively altered in the 15th century: the north aisle and chapel were added, the bell tower
was completed, and new windows were inserted in the south and east walls of the chancel.
In 1871-72 the architect Ewan Christian
restored the chancel and C.C. Rolfe began restoring the nave
. Rolfe's cousin H.W. Moore
completed the nave restoration in 1887-88. During the restoration extensive 15th century wall paintings
were discovered. They include a Doom painting over the chancel arch, the seven deadly sins
, Saint Michael
weighing souls, the Virgin Mary
(originally part of an Annunciation
scene) and a rare painting of Saint Clement
. Burlison and Grylls
heavily restored the paintings, re-drawing the weighing of souls at twice its original size.
St. James' tower has a ring
of eight bells, all of which were cast
by Mears & Stainbank of the Whitechapel Bell Foundry
in 1907. The church has also a Sanctus bell cast by an unknown founder in about 1399.
preached in South Leigh in 1771. A small Methodist
congregation was established in the village by 1817, and met in private houses until it had its own chapel built in 1876. By 1968 the chapel was used for worship only once a month, and in 1969 it was sold. It is now a private house.
elms to supply wood for various purposes. Between 1793 and 1795 Sibthorp had more than 3,000 trees around the estate, most of them pollarded elms, were felled to make fences for the new enclosures. Sibthorp wrote that in the first ten months after the enclosure award:
The Sibthorps felled large timber trees as well as wood, and early in the 19th century there were two major auctions of ash, elm and oak.
The Witney Railway
was built through the parish and opened in 1861. South Leigh railway station
served the parish until 1962, when British Rail
ways withdrew passenger services from the line. BR closed the line to freight traffic in 1970 and the track was dismantled sometime thereafter.
St. James' National School
was built in 1871 and was reorganised as a junior school in 1931. Declining numbers of pupils led to the school being closed down in 1946. The former school building is now the village hall
.
St. James' College next to the parish church was founded in 1875 as a preparatory school
. By 1923 it had become an orphanage
, Holyrood Hospital.
: the Mason Arms gastropub
, whose traditional French menu and Old World wine
list have been favourably reviewed by Raymond Blanc
and Marco Pierre White
. The Mason Arms has a number of celebrity customers and its facilities include a helipad
for customers.
The Mason Arms' landlord, Gerry Stonhill, is a cigar smoker who allowed his customers to continue smoking indoors in defiance of the ban on smoking in public buildings in England introduced in 2007 under the Health Act 2006
. In April 2008 West Oxfordshire
District Council successfully prosecuted Mr Stonhill at Witney Magistrates' Court, which imposed five separate fines and prosecution costs totalling £5,750. After his conviction Mr Stonhill told news reporters "You make up what you want, old boy. I'm not making any comment, except Tony Blair
can stick his anti-smoking law up his arse". However, he also conceded that thereafter he would comply with the law.
River Thames
The River Thames flows through southern England. It is the longest river entirely in England and the second longest in the United Kingdom. While it is best known because its lower reaches flow through central London, the river flows alongside several other towns and cities, including Oxford,...
, about 2.5 miles (4 km) east of Witney
Witney
Witney is a town on the River Windrush, west of Oxford in Oxfordshire, England.The place-name 'Witney' is first attested in a Saxon charter of 969 as 'Wyttannige'; it appears as 'Witenie' in the Domesday Book of 1086. The name means 'Witta's island'....
in Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
.
Manor
South Leigh was not mentioned in the Domesday BookDomesday Book
Domesday Book , now held at The National Archives, Kew, Richmond upon Thames in South West London, is the record of the great survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086...
of 1086, but was recorded in 1190 as Stanton Lega.
The manor house
Manor house
A manor house is a country house that historically formed the administrative centre of a manor, the lowest unit of territorial organisation in the feudal system in Europe. The term is applied to country houses that belonged to the gentry and other grand stately homes...
was built in the second half of the 16th century. It is now called Church Farm House.
In the middle of the 17th century William Gore acquired the manor. The Gores consolidated South Leigh as a separate estate within Stanton Harcourt
Stanton Harcourt
Stanton Harcourt is a village and civil parish in Oxfordshire about southeast of Witney and west of Oxford.-Archaeology:Within the parish of Stanton Harcourt is a series of paleochannel deposits buried beneath the second gravel terrace of the river Thames...
parish, but this led to a series of disputes over landholdings intermixed between the two. When Stanton Harcourt's common land
Common land
Common land is land owned collectively or by one person, but over which other people have certain traditional rights, such as to allow their livestock to graze upon it, to collect firewood, or to cut turf for fuel...
s were being enclosed
Enclosure
Enclosure or inclosure is the process which ends traditional rights such as mowing meadows for hay, or grazing livestock on common land. Once enclosed, these uses of the land become restricted to the owner, and it ceases to be common land. In England and Wales the term is also used for the...
in 1773, its enclosure commissioners suggested promoting a single Parliamentary bill to enclose both estates. Edward Gore and his tenants in South Leigh disagreed due to the unresolved boundary disputes and consequent disagreement over what lands would be allotted to whom under the enclosure award. Instead Stanton Harcourt's enclosure commissioners were empowered to settle a definitive boundary between the two estates.
Church of England
The Church of England parish churchChurch 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 the smallest and most basic Church of England administrative region, known as a parish.-Parishes in England:...
of Saint James the Great began as a chapel
Chapel
A chapel is a building used by Christians as a place of fellowship and worship. It may be part of a larger structure or complex, such as a church, college, hospital, palace, prison or funeral home, located on board a military or commercial ship, or it may be an entirely free-standing building,...
of the parish of Stanton Harcourt, and remained so until 1868. The oldest parts of the church building date from the latter part of the 12th century. The present chancel
Chancel
In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar in the sanctuary at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building...
arch was built about 1300, the tower arch was built during the 14th century and the south doorway of the nave dates from about 1400. The church building was extensively altered in the 15th century: the north aisle and chapel were added, the bell tower
Bell tower
A bell tower is a tower which contains one or more bells, or which is designed to hold bells, even if it has none. In the European tradition, such a tower most commonly serves as part of a church and contains church bells. When attached to a city hall or other civic building, especially in...
was completed, and new windows were inserted in the south and east walls of the chancel.
In 1871-72 the architect Ewan Christian
Ewan Christian
Ewan Christian was a British architect. He is most notable for the restoration of Carlisle Cathedral, the alterations to Christ Church, Spitalfields in 1866, and the extension to the National Gallery that created the National Portrait Gallery. He was architect to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners...
restored the chancel and C.C. Rolfe began restoring the nave
Nave
In Romanesque and Gothic Christian abbey, cathedral basilica and church architecture, the nave is the central approach to the high altar, the main body of the church. "Nave" was probably suggested by the keel shape of its vaulting...
. Rolfe's cousin H.W. Moore
Harry Wilkinson Moore
Harry Wilkinson Moore, FRIBA was a Victorian and Edwardian architect. He was the son of Arthur Moore and Mary Wilkinson , and a nephew of the architects George Wilkinson and William Wilkinson.-Career:...
completed the nave restoration in 1887-88. During the restoration extensive 15th century wall paintings
Mural
A mural is any piece of artwork painted or applied directly on a wall, ceiling or other large permanent surface. A particularly distinguishing characteristic of mural painting is that the architectural elements of the given space are harmoniously incorporated into the picture.-History:Murals of...
were discovered. They include a Doom painting over the chancel arch, the seven deadly sins
Seven deadly sins
The 7 Deadly Sins, also known as the Capital Vices or Cardinal Sins, is a classification of objectionable vices that have been used since early Christian times to educate and instruct followers concerning fallen humanity's tendency to sin...
, Saint Michael
Michael (archangel)
Michael , Micha'el or Mîkhā'ēl; , Mikhaḗl; or Míchaël; , Mīkhā'īl) is an archangel in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic teachings. Roman Catholics, Anglicans, and Lutherans refer to him as Saint Michael the Archangel and also simply as Saint Michael...
weighing souls, the Virgin Mary
Mary (mother of Jesus)
Mary , commonly referred to as "Saint Mary", "Mother Mary", the "Virgin Mary", the "Blessed Virgin Mary", or "Mary, Mother of God", was a Jewish woman of Nazareth in Galilee...
(originally part of an Annunciation
Annunciation
The Annunciation, also referred to as the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary or Annunciation of the Lord, is the Christian celebration of the announcement by the angel Gabriel to Virgin Mary, that she would conceive and become the mother of Jesus the Son of God. Gabriel told Mary to name her...
scene) and a rare painting of Saint Clement
Pope Clement I
Starting in the 3rd and 4th century, tradition has identified him as the Clement that Paul mentioned in Philippians as a fellow laborer in Christ.While in the mid-19th century it was customary to identify him as a freedman of Titus Flavius Clemens, who was consul with his cousin, the Emperor...
. Burlison and Grylls
Burlison and Grylls
Burlison and Grylls is the name of an English company who produced stained glass windows from 1868 onwards.The company of Burlison and Grylls was founded in 1868 at the instigation of the architects George Frederick Bodley and Thomas Garner. Both John Burlison and Thomas Grylls had trained in the...
heavily restored the paintings, re-drawing the weighing of souls at twice its original size.
St. James' tower has a ring
Change ringing
Change ringing is the art of ringing a set of tuned bells in a series of mathematical patterns called "changes". It differs from many other forms of campanology in that no attempt is made to produce a conventional melody....
of eight bells, all of which were cast
Bellfounding
Bellfounding is the casting of bells in a foundry for use in churches, clocks, and public buildings. A practitioner of the craft is called a bellmaker or bellfounder. The process in Europe dates to the 4th or 5th century. In early times, when a town produced a bell it was a momentous occasion in...
by Mears & Stainbank of the Whitechapel Bell Foundry
Whitechapel Bell Foundry
The Whitechapel Bell Foundry is a bell foundry in Whitechapel in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, in the East End of London. The foundry is listed by the Guinness Book of Records as the oldest manufacturing company in Great Britain...
in 1907. The church has also a Sanctus bell cast by an unknown founder in about 1399.
Methodist
John WesleyJohn Wesley
John Wesley was a Church of England cleric and Christian theologian. Wesley is largely credited, along with his brother Charles Wesley, as founding the Methodist movement which began when he took to open-air preaching in a similar manner to George Whitefield...
preached in South Leigh in 1771. A small Methodist
Methodist Church of Great Britain
The Methodist Church of Great Britain is the largest Wesleyan Methodist body in the United Kingdom, with congregations across Great Britain . It is the United Kingdom's fourth largest Christian denomination, with around 300,000 members and 6,000 churches...
congregation was established in the village by 1817, and met in private houses until it had its own chapel built in 1876. By 1968 the chapel was used for worship only once a month, and in 1969 it was sold. It is now a private house.
Economic and social history
Somewhen after 1773 the Gores sold South Leigh estate to John Sibthorp. In 1792, a generation after Stanton Harcourt's enclosure, two thirds of South Leigh's land remained unenclosed. Sibthorp obtained an Act of Parliament that led to their enclosure in 1793. About 1663 acres (673 ha) were enclosed, of which the commissioners awarded 1233 acres (499 ha) to Sibthorp. South Leigh had coppices of pollardedPollarding
Pollarding is a pruning system in which the upper branches of a tree are removed, promoting a dense head of foliage and branches. It has been common in Great Britain and Europe since medieval times and is practiced today in urban areas worldwide, primarily to maintain trees at a predetermined...
elms to supply wood for various purposes. Between 1793 and 1795 Sibthorp had more than 3,000 trees around the estate, most of them pollarded elms, were felled to make fences for the new enclosures. Sibthorp wrote that in the first ten months after the enclosure award:
I have worked up between 2000 and 3000 trees to posts and rails for my enclosure, besides a great quantity of timber used in the general repair of the farmhouses and cottage. I have quicked near upon 100 furlongFurlongA furlong is a measure of distance in imperial units and U.S. customary units equal to one-eighth of a mile, equivalent to 220 yards, 660 feet, 40 rods, or 10 chains. The exact value of the furlong varies slightly among English-speaking countries....
s and fenced with posts and rails one-half of it. Gates and gateposts on the enclosures. I had three teams of horses constantly employed during the summer, yet unequal to my work.
The Sibthorps felled large timber trees as well as wood, and early in the 19th century there were two major auctions of ash, elm and oak.
The Witney Railway
Oxford, Witney and Fairford Railway
The Oxford, Witney and Fairford Railway was a single track railway line, long, in Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.-The Witney Railway:In 1849 a branch line was proposed from the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway at Wilcote near Charlbury via North Leigh to Witney, but the route was...
was built through the parish and opened in 1861. South Leigh railway station
South Leigh railway station
South Leigh railway station was a single-platformed station that served the Oxfordshire village of South Leigh on the Oxford, Witney and Fairford line between and . The Witney Railway opened the station in 1861. British Railways closed the station to passengers in 1962 and to goods in...
served the parish until 1962, when British Rail
British Rail
British Railways , which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was the operator of most of the rail transport in Great Britain between 1948 and 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the "Big Four" British railway companies and lasted until the gradual privatisation of British Rail, in stages...
ways withdrew passenger services from the line. BR closed the line to freight traffic in 1970 and the track was dismantled sometime thereafter.
St. James' National School
National school (England and Wales)
A national school was a school founded in 19th century England and Wales by the National Society for Promoting Religious Education.These schools provided elementary education, in accordance with the teaching of the Church of England, to the children of the poor.Together with the less numerous...
was built in 1871 and was reorganised as a junior school in 1931. Declining numbers of pupils led to the school being closed down in 1946. The former school building is now the village hall
Village hall
In the United States, a village hall is the seat of government for villages. It functions much as a city hall does within cities.In the United Kingdom, a village hall is usually a building within a village which contains at least one large room, usually owned by and run for the benefit of the local...
.
St. James' College next to the parish church was founded in 1875 as a preparatory school
Preparatory school (UK)
In English language usage in the former British Empire, the present-day Commonwealth, a preparatory school is an independent school preparing children up to the age of eleven or thirteen for entry into fee-paying, secondary independent schools, some of which are known as public schools...
. By 1923 it had become an orphanage
Orphanage
An orphanage is a residential institution devoted to the care of orphans – children whose parents are deceased or otherwise unable or unwilling to care for them...
, Holyrood Hospital.
Amenities
South Leigh has a public housePublic house
A public house, informally known as a pub, is a drinking establishment fundamental to the culture of Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. There are approximately 53,500 public houses in the United Kingdom. This number has been declining every year, so that nearly half of the smaller...
: the Mason Arms gastropub
Gastropub
Gastropub or Gastrolounge refers to a bar and restaurant that serves high-end beer and food.The term gastropub, a portmanteau of gastronomy and pub, originated in England in the late 20th century. English pubs were drinking establishments and little emphasis was placed on the serving of food. If...
, whose traditional French menu and Old World wine
Old World wine
Old World wine refers primarily to wine made in Europe but can also include other regions of the Mediterranean basin with long histories of winemaking such as North Africa and the Near East. The phrase is often used in contrast to "New World wine" which refers primarily to wines from New World wine...
list have been favourably reviewed by Raymond Blanc
Raymond Blanc
Raymond Blanc OBE is a French chef, born in Besançon, France. Today he is one of the Britain's most respected chefs. Blanc is the owner and chef at Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons, a hotel-restaurant in Great Milton, Oxfordshire, England. The restaurant has two Michelin stars and scored 9/10 in the...
and Marco Pierre White
Marco Pierre White
Marco Pierre White is a British celebrity chef, restaurateur and television personality. He is noted for his contributions to contemporary international cuisine, and his exceptional culinary skills....
. The Mason Arms has a number of celebrity customers and its facilities include a helipad
Helipad
Helipad is a common abbreviation for helicopter landing pad, a landing area for helicopters. While helicopters are able to operate on a variety of relatively flat surfaces, a fabricated helipad provides a clearly marked hard surface away from obstacles where a helicopter can safely...
for customers.
The Mason Arms' landlord, Gerry Stonhill, is a cigar smoker who allowed his customers to continue smoking indoors in defiance of the ban on smoking in public buildings in England introduced in 2007 under the Health Act 2006
Health Act 2006
The Health Act 2006 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It provides for a number of administrative changes in the National Health Service.-Chapter 1 - Smoke-free premises, places and vehicles:...
. In April 2008 West Oxfordshire
West Oxfordshire
West Oxfordshire is a local government district in north west Oxfordshire, England including towns such as Woodstock, Burford, Chipping Norton, Charlbury, and Witney ....
District Council successfully prosecuted Mr Stonhill at Witney Magistrates' Court, which imposed five separate fines and prosecution costs totalling £5,750. After his conviction Mr Stonhill told news reporters "You make up what you want, old boy. I'm not making any comment, except Tony Blair
Tony Blair
Anthony Charles Lynton Blair is a former British Labour Party politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2 May 1997 to 27 June 2007. He was the Member of Parliament for Sedgefield from 1983 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007...
can stick his anti-smoking law up his arse". However, he also conceded that thereafter he would comply with the law.