| HURSTBOURNE TARRANT | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Three villages lie can be
found within this parish in the north of Hampshire, Hurstbourne Tarrant,
Upton and Ibthorpe and often the reformer William Cobbett stayed here
'This, to my fancy, is a very nice country. It is continual hill and
dell. Now and then a chain of hills higher than the rest, and these are
downs or woods." Cobbett loved this village and stayed with his
friend Joseph Blount at Rookery Farm and it is here he wrote a lot of
his 'Rural Rides' which is one of the most popular books among
genealogists and historians in the south of England. He penned more than
a score of references to 'the village of Uphusband, the legal name of
which is Hurstbourne Tarrant' and in another he stated 'I love
this place'. His friend Joseph is buried just inside the lych gate
of St Peter's Church and he left instructions that the stone should be
big enough for children to play marbles on! Hurstbourne Tarrant lies in the midst of agricultural land but much of the higher ground was once forest, and there are still pockets of woodland dotted around most notably being Doles Wood in the south and Faccombe Wood in the north. The church of St Peter was built in the 12th century the font being 13th century. The vicar and many of the parishioners succumbed to the Black Death in the 14th century and there are some faint paintings form the same time which may have had some connection with this tragedy, one on the north wall shows 'The Seven Deadly Sins' and another The morality of the three living and the three dead' Little is known about the life of the village before the end of the 18th century but at this time most of the forest had been cleared and the land ploughed. And here Cobbett says "In no part of England, have I seen the labouring people so badly off as they are here'.
The local malt houses became brew houses in their own right and were able to serve the six village inns. The Cooper's Arms situated in the village centre with The Plough, The Five Alls at the top of Hurstbourne Hill near the tollgate. The King's Arms on the Newbury Road and the George and Dragon which has a fine Georgian frontage and was once a posting house, and is now the only one of the six remaining. The Cooper's Arms was destroyed by fire in 1904 and the White Hart at Ibthorpe as well as The Plough were converted into private dwellings. A frequent visitor to Ibthorpe House was the novelist Jane Austen and her brother James was married in St Peter's churn in 1800. The American born painter Anna Lea Merritt ,who came to London in 1873 set up a studio with her sister. Anna later married a fellow artist Henry Merritt, but he soon became very ill and died within a relatively short time of the marriage. Anna developed asthma and decided to leave London and move to the country and thus she came to Hurstbourne Tarrant and lived in a cottage known as 'The Limes' that was at the bottom of Hurstbourne Hill UPTON is one of the small hamlets i the parish but is mentioned in the Domesday Book and in the 11th century 'Optune' became part of the possession of Edith the queen of Edward the Confessor.
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