Chilton Foliat 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 ...

on the

River Kennet The Kennet is a tributary of the River Thames in Southern England. Most of the river is straddled by the North Wessex Downs AONB (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty). The lower reaches have been made navigable as the Kennet Navigation, which � ...

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 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 ...

. The parish is in the North Wessex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It is on the county boundary with

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 ...

and is about northwest of the

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 ...

market town A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village or city. In Britain, small rura ...

of Hungerford. The village is on the B4192 Hungerford-

Swindon Swindon () is a town in Wiltshire, England. At the time of the 2021 Census the population of the built-up area was 183,638, making it the largest settlement in the county. Located at the northeastern edge of the South West England region, Swi ...

road, which was the A419 until 1977, when it was redesignated after the opening of the

M4 motorway The M4, originally the London-South Wales Motorway, is the third longest motorway in the United Kingdom, running from west London to southwest Wales. The English section to the Severn Bridge was constructed between 1961 and 1971; the Welsh ele ...

. The parish includes the hamlets of Straight Soley and Crooked Soley.

History

The ancient parish of Chilton Foliat straddled the Wiltshire/Berkshire border. In 1895 the Berkshire portion, including the village of Leverton and the Chilton Lodge estate, was transferred to Hungerford civil parish. Chilton Aircraft, a small manufacturer in the 1930s and 1940s, had its factory within the Chilton Lodge estate. From the estate of Lady Ward at Chilton Foliat, in 1942 U.S Army paratroopers trained with their British counterparts and deployed to combat in North Africa.

Religious sites

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 ...

dates from c. 1300. Restoration by

Benjamin Ferrey Benjamin Ferrey List of Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of London, FSA Royal Institute of British Architects, FRIBA (1 April 1810 – 22 August 1880) was an English architect who worked mostly in the Gothic revival architecture, Gothic Re ...

in 1845 included the addition of a south aisle. The church was designated as

Grade II* 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, H ...

in 1966. The churchyard has an early 19th-century mausoleum to the Pearse family, designed by William Pilkington and described by Pevsner as "heaviest Grecian". The church was the location of the 2008 memorial service for Gerald Ward, godfather to

Prince Harry Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, (Henry Charles Albert David; born 15 September 1984) is a member of the British royal family. As the younger son of King Charles III and Diana, Princess of Wales, he is fifth in the line of succession to ...

; the service was attended by the Prince with the

Prince of Wales Prince of Wales (, ; ) is a title traditionally given to the male heir apparent to the History of the English monarchy, English, and later, the British throne. The title originated with the Welsh rulers of Kingdom of Gwynedd, Gwynedd who, from ...

and the

Duchess of Cornwall The Duchess of Cornwall is a title held by the wife of the heir apparent to the British throne. The Duchess of Cornwall is usually also the Princess of Wales, and she uses that title. The current title-holder is Catherine, Princess of Wales, Ca ...

. A Wesleyan Methodist chapel was built in 1796, enlarged in 1932 and closed in 1988. The building is now a private house.

Notable buildings

Houses in the village include Vine Cottage, from the late 17th century. The Old Rectory, close to the church, is from the mid 18th century. Bridge House carries a date of 1766 but incorporates earlier work. The gateway leading to Chilton Lodge, and part of its parkland, are within the parish. The house itself, built in 1800 and Grade II* listed, is now in West Berkshire. It replaced an earlier house on the Wiltshire side of the county boundary, which was demolished. Chilton Park Farm, a house in neo-Georgian style, was built on that site in 1940; nearby is an early 18th-century barn. The Chilton estate is owned by Sarah Scrope, heiress to Sir John and Lady Ward.

Littlecote House Littlecote House is a large Tudor architecture, Elizabethan country house and estate in the civil parishes of Ramsbury and Chilton Foliat, in the English county of Wiltshire, about northeast of the Berkshire town of Hungerford. The estate inclu ...

, a Grade I listed country house completed in 1592, now a hotel and leisure centre, is upstream on the other site of the Kennet in Ramsbury parish. Part of its estate is in Chilton Foliat parish.

Notable residents

Littlecote House was the seat of Sir Ernest Salter Wills, 3rd Baronet of Hazelwood, a member of the Wills tobacco family dynasty.

Auberon Waugh Auberon Alexander Waugh ( ; 17 November 1939 – 16 January 2001) was a British journalist and novelist, and eldest son of the novelist Evelyn Waugh. He was widely known by his nickname "Bron". After a traditional classical education at Downsid ...

lived at the Old Rectory from 1964 to 1971.

Max Hastings Sir Max Hugh Macdonald Hastings (; born 28 December 1945) is a British journalist and military historian, who has worked as a foreign correspondent for the BBC, editor-in-chief of ''The Daily Telegraph'', and editor of the ''Evening Standard''. ...

, journalist, historian and author, lives here.

Amenities

The village has a

public house A pub (short for public house) is in several countries a drinking establishment licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption Licensing laws of the United Kingdom#On-licence, on the premises. The term first appeared in England in the ...

, the ''Wheatsheaf'' (in an early 19th-century thatched house) and a village hall (dating from 1895). A

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

primary school serves Chilton Foliat and nearby villages. A National School opened in 1835, and in 1847 moved to the north side of the main street. In 1970 the school moved to a new building at Stag Hill. Much of the Kennet floodplain within the parish has been designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), owing to the presence of the rare Desmoulin's whorl snail. An area of watermeadow southwest of the village, Chilton Foliat Meadows, is also an SSSI for its diverse flora and variety of birds.

Television appearances

The 1987

BBC Television BBC Television is a service of the BBC. The corporation has operated a Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television service in the United Kingdom, under the terms of a royal charter, since 1 January 1927. It p ...

programme '' The Victorian Kitchen Garden'', featuring head gardener Harry Dodson (1919–2005), was filmed at Chilton Lodge which lies between Chilton Foliat and the Berkshire hamlet of Leverton. Chilton Foliat is referred to in the 2001

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television service, which is the flagship property of namesake parent-subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is based a ...

series '' Band of Brothers'' as the location where Captain Herbert Sobel was sent to train non-combat military support personnel who needed paratrooper training.

References

Sources

External links

Chilton Foliat at Wiltshire Community HistoryChilton Foliat website
{{authority control Villages in Wiltshire Civil parishes in Wiltshire