Beenham 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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

centred east of Newbury in the

West Berkshire West Berkshire is a unitary authority in the ceremonial county of Berkshire, England. It is administered from Newbury by West Berkshire Council. History The district of Newbury was formed on 1 April 1974, as a merger of the borough of Newbur ...

district of

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; abbreviated ), officially the Royal County of Berkshire, is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Oxfordshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the north-east, Greater London ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

Geography

Beenham is north of

Aldermaston Aldermaston ( ) is a village and civil parish in Berkshire, England. In the 2011 census, the parish had a population of 1,015. The village is in the Kennet Valley and bounds Hampshire to the south. It is approximately from Newbury, Basin ...

. The Old Copse is a woodland within the village that is a

Site of Special Scientific Interest A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain, or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland, is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle ...

History

Church history

The history of the

Church 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 each Church of England parish (the smallest and most basic Church of England administrative unit; since the 19th century sometimes ...

Saint Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under titles of Mary, mother of Jesus, various titles such as Perpetual virginity ...

begins in about the end of the 12th century.Page & Ditchfield, 1923, pages 277-279 An old print of the original building shows that it had some 13th century

lancet window A lancet window is a tall, narrow window with a sharp pointed arch at its top. This arch may or may not be a steep lancet arch (in which the compass centres for drawing the arch fall outside the opening). It acquired the "lancet" name from its rese ...

s and a 16th-century window. In 1794 the church was struck by lightning and burnt downPevsner, 1966, page 85 and was replaced with a Georgian building of brick. In 1859 the

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

was demolished and replaced by one in the

Gothic Revival style Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half of the 19th century ...

Henry Woodyer Henry Woodyer (1816–1896) was an English architect, a pupil of William Butterfield and a disciple of A. W. N. Pugin and the Ecclesiologists. Life Woodyer was born in Guildford, Surrey, England, in 1816, the son of a successful, highly resp ...

. The 1794 brick bell tower was retained and has a

peal In campanology (bell ringing), a peal is the special name given to a specific type of performance of change ringing which meets certain exacting conditions for duration, complexity and quality. The definition of a peal has changed considerably ...

of six bells. The church is a Grade II*

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

19th century summary

The following is an extract from the 1870s gazetteer of the

British Isles The British Isles are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner Hebrides, Inner and Outer Hebr ...

"Beenham, or Beenham-Vallence, a parish...adjacent to the
Kennet and Avon canal The Kennet and Avon Canal is a waterway in southern England with an overall length of , made up of two lengths of Navigability, navigable river linked by a canal. The name is used to refer to the entire length of the navigation rather than sol ...
and to the
Berks and Hants Railway The Berks and Hants Railway comprised two railway lines built simultaneously by the Great Western Railway (GWR) south and west from in an attempt to keep the London and South Western Railway (LSWR) out of the area that it considered to be its ...
, 1 ¼. mile N of station, and 8½ WSW of . It has a
post office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...
...Acres, 1,890. Real property, £2,548. Pop., 505. Houses, 105. The property is much subdivided. Beenham House and Beenham Lodge are chief residences. The living is a
vicarage A clergy house is the residence, or former residence, of one or more priests or Minister (Christianity), ministers of a given religion, serving as both a home and a base for the occupant's ministry. Residences of this type can have a variety of n ...
in the
diocese of Oxford The Diocese of Oxford is a Church of England diocese that forms part of the Province of Canterbury. The diocese is led by the Bishop of Oxford (currently Steven Croft (bishop), Steven Croft), and the bishop's seat is at Christ Church Cathedral, ...
. Value, £250. Patron, Mrs. Bushnell. The church was chiefly rebuilt in 1860. There are a
Primitive Methodist The Primitive Methodist Church is a Christian denomination within the holiness movement. Originating in early 19th-century England as a revivalist movement within Methodism, it was heavily influenced by American evangelist Lorenzo Dow (1777–18 ...

chapel A chapel (from , a diminutive of ''cappa'', meaning "little cape") is a Christianity, Christian place of prayer and worship that is usually relatively small. The term has several meanings. First, smaller spaces inside a church that have their o ...
and a National School. Stackhouse, the author of the "History of the Bible," was tsvicar."

However, the suffix, ''Valence'', is erroneous and was mistakenly transferred from the manor surrounding Benham Park.

1960s murderer

In October 1966 children's nanny Yolande Waddington, age 17, was found dead having been stabbed and strangled in Beenham. Less than six months later, two nine-year-old girls, Jeanette Wigmore and Jacqueline Williams, were found murdered at a local

gravel pit A gravel pit is an open-pit mine for the extraction of gravel. Gravel pits often lie in river valleys where the water table is high, so they may naturally fill with water to form ponds or lakes. Gravel pit lakes are typically nutrient rich and ...

. David Burgess, of Beenham, was jailed for life in 1967 for the murder of the two girls and spent more than 25 years behind bars. Waddington's killer was not identified at the time. Burgess subsequently admitted to the crime but challenged the police to "prove it". Following advances in

DNA profiling DNA profiling (also called DNA fingerprinting and genetic fingerprinting) is the process of determining an individual's deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) characteristics. DNA analysis intended to identify a species, rather than an individual, is cal ...

, in November 2011 the 64-year-old Burgess was re-arrested, and subsequently tried and convicted of her murder. He received his third life sentence with a minimum term of 27 years.

Amenities

Beenham has a

primary school A primary school (in Ireland, India, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, South Africa, and Singapore), elementary school, or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary ...

catering for approximately 60 pupils aged 4 to 11. There is one pub in the village, the Six Bells. The UK Wolf Conservation Trust is based at Butlers Farm, Beenham, the wolves can be heard howling within a three-mile radius.

Transport

Bus routes 41 and 44 connect the village with

Thatcham Thatcham is a market town and civil parish in West Berkshire, England. It is situated in the valley of the River Kennet east of Newbury, Berkshire, Newbury, west of Reading, Berkshire, Reading and west of London. The town has a long history d ...

and Calcot.

Demography

References

Sources

* *

External links

Beenham Parish web siteBeenham Primary School
{{authority control Villages in Berkshire West Berkshire District Civil parishes in Berkshire