Shirburn

Shirburn

All Saints' parish church
Shirburn
Shirburn shown within Oxfordshire
Area 17.68 km2 (6.83 sq mi)
Population 214 (2011 census including Adwell and Stoke Talmage civil parishes)[1]
• Density 12/km2 (31/sq mi)
OS grid reference SU6995
Civil parish
  • Shirburn
District
Shire county
Region
Country England
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town WATLINGTON
Postcode district OX49
Dialling code 01844
Police Thames Valley
Fire Oxfordshire
Ambulance South Central
EU Parliament South East England
UK Parliament

Shirburn is a village and civil parish about 6 miles (10 km) south of Thame in Oxfordshire. The parish has a high altitude by county standards and the eastern part of the parish is in the Chiltern Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Shirburn is to the south forested, is at one edge bisected by a motorway and is the largest civil parish in the District.

Manor

Shirburn is a spring line settlement at the foot of the Chiltern escarpment. The Domesday Book of 1086 records that the manor of Shirburn was divided equally between Robert D'Oyly and his brother in arms Roger d'Ivry.[2]

The building of Shirburn Castle was licensed in 1377. It was owned by the Chamberlaine family for many generations. [3][4] Shirburn Castle became a centre of Recusancy throughout the 16th and 17th centuries.[2]

Parish church

Shirburn had a parish church by the 12th century. Between 1146 and 1163 the church seems to have been given to Dorchester Abbey.[2] The oldest part of the present Church of England parish church of All Saints is the bell tower, which seems to be Norman except for the upper stage, which is 18th-century.[2] In the 13th century the north and south aisles and arcades were added to the nave.[2]

Thomas Parker, 1st Earl of Macclesfield, Whig politician and Lord Chancellor impeached in 1725, retired to Shirburn and was buried there after his death in London on 28 April 1732.[5]

In 1876 the architect T.H. Wyatt restored the building at the expense of the Earl of Macclesfield.[3] In 1943 All Saints' parish was combined with that of St. Mary's, Pyrton. The combined parish is now part of the Benefice of Icknield.[6] All Saints' church was made redundant in 1995 and now belongs to the Churches Conservation Trust.[6]

Demography

The 2011 Census incorporated its figures of Adwell and Stoke Talmage to the north into an output area accordingly used to equate to an arbitrarily enlarged civil parish definition of Shirburn due to the formers' small population.[7]

Economic and social history

A parish school had been established by 1808. By 1871 it was described as occupying a cottage that had been converted into a schoolhouse. In 1946 it was reorganised as a junior school, and older pupils went to school in Chinnor. In 1950 Shirburn school was closed.[2]

In 1869-72 the Watlington and Princes Risborough Railway was built through the parish. Its terminus was 0.5 miles (800 m) south of Shirburn in the parish of Watlington. The Great Western Railway took over the line in 1883. British Railways withdrew passenger services in 1957 and closed the line to freight traffic in 1961.[8]

References

  1. ↑ "Area: Shirburn Parish: Key Statistics: Population Density". Neighbourhood Statistics. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 18 March 2010.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Lobel 1969, pp. 178–198.
  3. 1 2 Sherwood & Pevsner 1974, p. 761.
  4. ↑ ecastles.co.uk: Shirburn Castle
  5. ↑ A. A. Hanham, "Parker, Thomas, first earl of Macclesfield (1667–1732)" (Oxford, UK: OUP, 2004 Retrieved 23 July 2017.
  6. 1 2 The Benefice of Icknield: All Saints Church, Shirburn
  7. ↑ Parish: Key Statistics: Population. (2011 census In particular the maps annexed to both definitions and data sets are identical. Retrieved 2016-05-04.
  8. ↑ Oppitz 2000, p. 22.

Sources

  • Lobel, Mary D, ed. (1969). A History of the County of Oxford: Volume 8: Lewknor and Pyrton Hundreds. Victoria County History. pp. 178–198.
  • Oppitz, Leslie (2000). Lost Railways of the Chilterns. Newbury: Countryside Books. pp. 20–23. ISBN 1-85306-643-5.
  • Sherwood, Jennifer; Pevsner, Nikolaus (1974). Oxfordshire. The Buildings of England. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. pp. 761–763. ISBN 0-14-071045-0.

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