Bowden Hill is a village in

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated to Wilts) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It borders Gloucestershire to the north, Oxfordshire to the north-east, Berkshire to the east, Hampshire to the south-east, Dorset to the south, and Somerset to ...

, England, in

Lacock Lacock is a village and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in the county of Wiltshire, England, about 3 miles (5 km) south of the town of Chippenham, and about outside the Cotswolds area. The village is owned almost in its enti ...

parish about south of

Chippenham Chippenham is a market town in north-west Wiltshire, England. It lies north-east of Bath, Somerset, Bath, west of London and is near the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The town was established on a crossing of the River Avon, ...

and to the east of Lacock village. Bowden Hill has about 50 houses, a pub, and a small industrial estate.

Origins of the name

The spelling 'Bowdon Hill' was used on Andrews’ and Dury’s maps of 1773 and 1810. There are a number of theories around why the village got its name. One is that the name comes from the old English words 'bow', meaning bow shaped, and 'dun' meaning hill. However, alternative theories suggest the name comes from a corruption of 'bdl' (meaning dwelling) into 'bow' meaning 'hill slope on which are dwellings'. Another theory from 'Wiltshire Collections' by Aubrey and Jackson suggests that the name means 'the winding hill'.

Location

Bowden Hill sits on the side of a hill and rises up from the River Avon, at an elevation of 50m, to its peak at 172m above sea level. The village has views to the south and south-west of the river's flood plain and is surrounded by a mixture of woodlands and agricultural land. Bowden Hill borrows many of its facilities from the nearby village of Lacock and doesn't provide amenities such as a school or post office. The village encompasses the small hamlet of Bewley Common and enjoys a relatively sparse population density due to its designation as a conservation area.

Landmarks

Parish church

In 1856, John Gladstone, owner of Bowden Park, had 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 Anne According to apocrypha, as well as Christianity, Christian and Islamic tradition, Saint Anne was the mother of Mary, mother of Jesus, Mary, the wife of Joachim and the maternal grandmother of Jesus. Mary's mother is not named in the Bible's Gosp ...

built to celebrate the birth of a son in the Gladstone family. The architect was S.B. Gabriel of Bristol who designed 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 ...

and

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the Choir (architecture), choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may termi ...

in the

Early English Gothic English Gothic is an architectural style that flourished from the late 12th until the mid-17th century. The style was most prominently used in the construction of cathedrals and churches. Gothic architecture's defining features are pointed a ...

style but gave the northeast tower Norman details and a Rhenish helm, a German Romanesque roof. The parish of Lacock was split and the new parish of Bowden Hill served around 300-400 people, but the two parishes were reunited in 1958. Today services are held at St Anne's on the first Sunday of each month.

Conduit House

Sitting in the common land in the village is a small building which was used as a supply of water for the nearby

Lacock Abbey Lacock Abbey in the village of Lacock, Wiltshire, England, was founded in the early 13th century by Ela, Countess of Salisbury, as a nunnery of the Augustinian order. The abbey remained a nunnery until the Dissolution of the monasteries in ...

. Built in the 16th century, this small 3.7m square building still supplies water to the abbey albeit through a modern water pipe. The original conduit house was built in around 1280 when Willian Bluet of Bewley Court granted Beatrice, Abbess of Lacock, the right to operate a watercourse on his land to serve the

nunnery A convent is an enclosed community of monks, nuns, friars or religious sisters. Alternatively, ''convent'' means the building used by the community. The term is particularly used in the Catholic Church, Lutheran churches, and the Anglican Comm ...

. This original building was replaced by the owner of the abbey, William Sharington, after its dissolution. The new building is built of limestone and has a steep roof, reaching 4.64m high, constructed of interlocking stone slabs.

Bowden Park

One of largest landmarks in Bowden Hill is the Bowden Park estate with its

country house image:Blenheim - Blenheim Palace - 20210417125239.jpg, 300px, Blenheim Palace - Oxfordshire An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a Townhou ...

of 1796, designed by

James Wyatt James Wyatt (3 August 1746 – 4 September 1813) was an English architect, a rival of Robert Adam in the Neoclassicism, neoclassical and neo-Gothic styles. He was elected to the Royal Academy of Arts in 1785 and was its president from 1805 to ...

for Barnard Dickinson. The Dickinson family had owned plantations in Jamaica since 1655, and were among Wiltshire's biggest users of slave labour. The property had a previous building, built for George Johnson who lived there in the 1600s. The estate was sold in 1751 to Ezekiel Dickinson who modified the house; it was later owned by the Dickinson Harmer family. The house was bought in 1849 and extended by Captain John Gladstone, older brother of Prime Minister

William Gladstone William Ewart Gladstone ( ; 29 December 1809 – 19 May 1898) was a British politican, starting as Conservative MP for Newark and later becoming the leader of the Liberal Party. In a career lasting over 60 years, he was Prime Minister ...

. In the 20th century it was the seat of the former chairman of the

General Electric Company The General Electric Company (GEC) was a major British industrial conglomerate involved in consumer and Arms industry, defence electronics, communications, and engineering. It was originally founded in 1886 as G. Binswanger and Company as an e ...

Arnold Weinstock Arnold Weinstock, Baron Weinstock, Kt., OMRI, FSS (29 July 1924 – 23 July 2002) was an English industrialist and businessman known for making General Electric Company one of Britain's most profitable companies. The City (London) criticized ...

. The house was remodelled in the mid 1950s, and the extensions were made smaller by owner K. Peacock who sold Bowden Park in 1967 to Lord Weinstock. A 2020 report summarizes the building as: "Built on two storeys of ashlar under a slate roof, the grand 15,900sq ft house is Classically symmetrical in style, with a central bow front, where the original front door was placed, and finely detailed wings to either side". Bowden Park was designated as

Grade I listed 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 ...

in 1960.

Spye Park

Spye Park lies on the edge of Bowden Hill to the southeast of the village. Although most of Spye Park is in Bromham parish, the gatelodge at its northwest entrance (originally a 16th-century building) stands on the edge of Bowden Hill village.

References

External links

* {{authority control Villages in Wiltshire