Glooston 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 ...
in the
Harborough district of
Leicestershire
Leicestershire ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. It is bordered by Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire to the north, Rutland to the east, Northamptonshire to the south-east, Warw ...
, England. According to the 2001 census the parish had a population of 54, increasing to 147 (including
Cranoe and
Stonton Wyville) at the 2011 census.
The village's name means 'farm/settlement of Glor'.
The parish covers an area of or . Its shape is long and narrow, being over in length north to south. The highest point in the parish is Crossburrow Hill, high.
The settlement of Glooston lies around a crossroads in the centre of the parish. There are several 17th- and 18th-century brick-built houses, and a terrace of early 19th-century stone-built cottages. The Roman
Gartree Road crosses the village east to west and the site of a Roman villa, by a stream north-east of the crossroads, was excavated in 1946.
The manor of Glooston was recorded 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 ...
of 1086 as being held by
Hugh de Grentemesnil. From 1180 to the middle of the 14th century the Basset family of
Drayton were mesne tenants. The manor was held of the Bassets by the Harington family, and from c. 1412-1422 held by the Brauncepath family, through the marriage of Margaret Harington to Richard Brauncepath. The manor passed to John Colly, a distant Harington relative, in 1480 after a protracted legal dispute. His descendant Anthony Colly put the manor in trust in 1587 to pay an annuity of £100 for 60 years to a skinner, Randall Manning of London. This payment was in arrears by 1592, and possession of the manor passed to Manning. In 1614 Colly redeemed it for £1,500, and in 1632 he sold it to the Brudenell family for £4,500, in whose possession it has remained.
By the 17th century half of the agricultural land in the parish (to the north of the village) was enclosed and laid down to pasture as sheep runs. To the south of the village were three open fields, Little Field, Burrough or Crosborough Field, and Willowsike Field. These were enclosed in 1828, with a total area of being allotted. The lord of the manor, the
Earl of Cardigan, who held the whole of the old enclosures, was allotted . The Rev. J. H. Dent of Hallaton, whose family held an estate in Glooston, was allotted . The Rector of Glooston was allotted in lieu of tithes and glebe.
The parish church of
St John the Baptist was rebuilt in 1866-67 by the architect Joseph Goddard of Leicester. Goddard appears to have retained the plan of the original church, whose fabric was mostly of 15th- or 16th-century date. It has an aisleless nave, chancel, south porch and a double bell-cote.
[Glooston. A History of the County of Leicestershire: Volume 5: Gartree Hundred (1964), pp. 112-115
]
References
External links
OS Mapping of Glooston from MultimapHistory of GloostonRecent housing development, Glooston Park
Images of Glooston from GeographOld Barn Inn and RestaurantGlooston Music Festival
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Villages in Leicestershire
Civil parishes in Harborough District