Bramshaw is a small 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 ...

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Berkshire to the north, Surrey and West Sussex to the east, the Isle of Wight across the Solent to the south, ...

, England. It lies just inside the

New Forest The New Forest is one of the largest remaining tracts of unenclosed pasture land, heathland and forest in Southern England, covering southwest Hampshire and southeast Wiltshire. It was proclaimed a royal forest by William the Conqueror, featu ...

. The name Bramshaw means Bramble Wood. Until 1895, Bramshaw was divided between

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 ...

and Hampshire. The village of Bramshaw is stretched out for several miles along the B3079 road, with the church to the north, the hamlet of Brook to the south and Stock's Cross at its centre.

Overview

Bramshaw is a village and civil parish in the

National Park. It includes large tracts of land owned by the

National Trust The National Trust () is a heritage and nature conservation charity and membership organisation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Trust was founded in 1895 by Octavia Hill, Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley to "promote the ...

, and

Crown Land Crown land, also known as royal domain, is a territorial area belonging to the monarch, who personifies the Crown. It is the equivalent of an entailed estate and passes with the monarchy, being inseparable from it. Today, in Commonwealth realm ...

administered by the

Forestry Commission The Forestry Commission is a non-ministerial government department responsible for the management of publicly owned forests and the regulation of both public and private forestry in England. The Forestry Commission was previously also respons ...

.Welcome to Bramshaw
– Bramshaw Parish Council It is located some 10 miles west of

Southampton Southampton is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Hampshire, England. It is located approximately southwest of London, west of Portsmouth, and southeast of Salisbury. Southampton had a population of 253, ...

. The parish contains the hamlets of Brook and

Fritham Fritham is a small village in Hampshire, England. It lies in the north of the New Forest, near the Wiltshire border. It is in the civil parish of Bramshaw. History The name Fritham may be derived from Old English meaning a cultivated plot (''ha ...

. The parish also contains the highest point in the New Forest at Pipers Wait, some 129 metres above mean sea level.

Heritage

Bramshaw Commons, owned by the

, comprise some of manorial wastes and commons.Points of Interest
– Bramshaw Parish Council It is some of the best surviving examples of lowland heath in Europe, still managed by the common grazing of ponies, pigs, donkeys, cattle and sheep. The site of a 14th-century Royal Hunting Lodge ("Studley Castle"), a

Scheduled Monument In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The various pieces of legislation that legally protect heritage assets from damage, visu ...

, can be seen nearby. The site of former

stocks Stocks are feet and hand restraining devices that were used as a form of corporal punishment and public humiliation. The use of stocks is seen as early as Ancient Greece, where they are described as being in use in Solon's law code. The law de ...

and

gallows A gallows (or less precisely scaffold) is a frame or elevated beam, typically wooden, from which objects can be suspended or "weighed". Gallows were thus widely used to suspend public weighing scales for large and heavy objects such as sa ...

can be seen at Stocks Cross, at the intersection of Furzley Lane and the B3079. The gallows were still in use in 1831, when records show that they were repaired. The Admiralty Shutter Telegraph Line had a station at Telegraph Hill, near Bramshaw. It was an optical shutter signal station used as a communication link for the Admiralty during the

Napoleonic Wars {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Napoleonic Wars , partof = the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars , image = Napoleonic Wars (revision).jpg , caption = Left to right, top to bottom:Battl ...

Possession

Pigs grazing on the road at Bramshaw - geograph

Bramshaw appears twice in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book ( ; the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book") is a manuscript record of the Great Survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 at the behest of William the Conqueror. The manuscript was originally known by ...

for

, when the lands were held by Wulfnoth and a certain Edmund.

Odo of Bayeux Odo of Bayeux (died 1097) was a Norman nobleman who was a bishop of Bayeux in Normandy and was made Earl of Kent in England following the Norman Conquest. He was the maternal half-brother of duke, and later king, William the Conqueror, and w ...

was overlord of these lands in Bramshaw at the time of the Survey. The name Bramshaw probably derives from an Old English word for "bramble bush wood." It may be that it is Bramshaw being referred to in 1418 in a legal record, (appearing as ''Bremelelsthaw''). The manor of Bramshaw, together with that of

Britford Britford is a village and civil parish beside the River Avon about south-east of Salisbury in Wiltshire, England. The village is just off the A338 Salisbury-Bournemouth road. The 2011 Census recorded a parish population of 592. Geography ...

, appears to have been granted by one of the Norman kings to the family of

de Lacy de Lacy (Laci, Lacie, Lascy, Lacey, Lassey) is the surname of an old Norman family which originated from Lassy, Calvados. The family took part in the Norman Conquest of England and the later Norman invasion of Ireland. The name is first reco ...

sometime during the 12th century.Victoria County History, (1912), A History of the County of Hampshire: Volume 5, Pages 623–626
/ref> In the 15th century, it was sold to Robert Lord Hungerford. It switched hands during the

Wars of the Roses The Wars of the Roses, known at the time and in following centuries as the Civil Wars, were a series of armed confrontations, machinations, battles and campaigns fought over control of the English throne from 1455 to 1487. The conflict was fo ...

, but in 1485 it was back in the hands of the Hungerford family, being awarded to Mary Hungerford, wife of

Sir Edward Hastings Edward Hastings may refer to: * Sir Edward Hastings (died 1437), English landowner and soldier * Sir Edward Hastings (died 1603), MP for Leicestershire and Tregony * Edward Hastings, 1st Baron Hastings of Loughborough (c.1521–1571) * Edward Hastin ...

. Their grandson, the third Earl, sold the manor of Bramshaw (which from this time seems to have been also known as "Moore Closes") in 1561. It was sold several times in the next 150 years, until it was purchased in 1713 by Richard Paulet, in whose family the manor remained until 1887.

Government

Bramshaw was partly in

and partly in

until the "County of Southampton Act 1894" placed it all into Hampshire. The county boundary ran through the churchyard,History of the Area
– Bramshaw Parish Council and through the church, which had its nave in Wiltshire and its chancel in Hampshire. There were separate parish councils, one for Bramshaw (Hampshire) and one for Bramshaw (Wiltshire), which survived as Bramshaw (West) and Bramshaw (East) until 1932 when they were unified.

Church

Saint Peter's church belonged at an early date to the

Premonstratensian The Order of Canons Regular of Prémontré (), also known as the Premonstratensians, the Norbertines and, in Britain and Ireland, as the White Canons (from the colour of their habit), is a religious order of canons regular in the Catholic Chur ...

priory of

. In 1158, however,

Henry II Henry II may refer to: Kings * Saint Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor (972–1024), crowned King of Germany in 1002, of Italy in 1004 and Emperor in 1014 *Henry II of England (1133–89), reigned from 1154 *Henry II of Jerusalem and Cyprus (1271–1 ...

granted the church to

Salisbury Cathedral Salisbury Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary, is an Church of England, Anglican cathedral in the city of Salisbury, England. The cathedral is regarded as one of the leading examples of Early English architecture, ...

, when it was appropriated to the resident

canon Canon or Canons may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Canon (fiction), the material accepted as officially written by an author or an ascribed author * Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture ** Western canon, th ...

s, and from that date the patronage was in the hands of the Dean and chapter of Salisbury. The current church dates from the 13th century, albeit with many later additions. The earliest part of the church is the west end of the nave, which is of mid-13th-century date, and there is a cambered beam roof of late 15th century date. Much of the rest of the church, including the chancel and vestry, are of 19th century construction.

Education

Bramshaw

village school One-room schoolhouses, or One-room schools, have been commonplace throughout rural portions of various countries, including Prussia, Norway, Sweden, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal, and Spa ...

was founded in 1812 and closed in July 1977. Through those 165 years it served the children of Bramshaw and nearby hamlets in the

, Brook,

and Furzley. Children passed through Bramshaw School, usually on their way to labouring and servant jobs in the forest and on the estates. The school began life as a Boys' School, registered as a National School in 1812 with the Girls' and Infants' School being registered in 1819. At that time it was described as 'privately owned', only being registered as a Public Elementary School in 1851 when it began to be supported with government funding. George Eyre (1772–1837), owner of the local Warrens Estate. founded the school, 'demonstrating a paternalistic attitude to the labourers and their children, while providing a picturesque addition to the village scene'. The school remained connected to the Eyre family until the death of the Mrs Eyre in 1933.Merson, 1979, p.86 After the

Education Act 1944 The Education Act 1944 ( 7 & 8 Geo. 6. c. 31) made major changes in the provision and governance of secondary schools in England and Wales. It is also known as the Butler Act after the President of the Board of Education, R. A. Butler. Histori ...

introduced the eleven plus examination, older boys and girls moved to a new

Secondary Modern School A secondary modern school () is a type of secondary school that existed throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland from 1944 until the 1970s under the Tripartite System. Secondary modern schools accommodated the majority (70–75%) of pupil ...

at Bartley, leaving two classes of 5 to 7 and 7 to 11-year-olds. When the school closed in 1977, 5 to 8+ year olds went to

Copythorne Copythorne is a village and civil parish in Hampshire, England, within the boundaries of the New Forest National Park. Overview Copythorne is in the north-eastern part of the New Forest. The village is on the A31 Romsey Road, just south of the ...

First School while children from 8+ to 12+ went to Bartley Middle School. The school building has become a private dwelling.

Notes

External links

Bramshaw Parish Council
{{authority control Villages in Hampshire New Forest