Hullavington 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 ...

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, just to the north 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 village lies about southwest of

Malmesbury Malmesbury () is a town and civil parish in north Wiltshire, England, which lies approximately west of Swindon, northeast of Bristol, and north of Chippenham. The older part of the town is on a hilltop which is almost surrounded by the upp ...

and north 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, ...

. The

Fosse Way The Fosse Way was a Roman road built in Britain during the first and second centuries AD that linked Isca Dumnoniorum (Exeter) in the southwest and Lindum Colonia ( Lincoln) to the northeast, via Lindinis ( Ilchester), Aquae Sulis ( Bat ...

, a

Roman road Roman roads ( ; singular: ; meaning "Roman way") were physical infrastructure vital to the maintenance and development of the Roman state, built from about 300 BC through the expansion and consolidation of the Roman Republic and the Roman Em ...

, forms the western boundary of the parish. The Gauze Brook, a tributary of the

Bristol Avon The River Avon ( ) is a river in the southwest of England. To distinguish it from a number of other rivers of the same name, it is often called the Bristol Avon. The name 'Avon' is loaned from an ancestor of the Welsh word , meaning 'rive ...

, crosses the parish from southwest to northeast.

History

A settlement of 35 households at Hunlavintone was recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086, and at that time the land was held by Ralf de Mortimer. The place-name means 'the town of Hunlaf's people'. The spelling ''Hunlavyngton'' is recorded in 1418. Hullavington church and manor belonged to the abbey of Saint-Victor-en-Caux (

Saint-Victor-l'Abbaye Saint-Victor-l'Abbaye () is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Normandy region in north-western France. Geography A farming village situated by the banks of the river Scie in the Pays de Caux, some south of Dieppe at the juncti ...

, Seine-Maritime) in the early Middle Ages. The establishment also had Clatford manor, some to the southeast, and was known as Clatford Priory or Hullavington Priory. In 1443 its land was given to

Eton College Eton College ( ) is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school providing boarding school, boarding education for boys aged 13–18, in the small town of Eton, Berkshire, Eton, in Berkshire, in the United Kingdom. It has educated Prime Mini ...

, who retained it until 1958. The monastic house was presumably northwest of the church; Court House was built on that site in the 16th century, with alterations and extension in the 17th and later centuries. Bradfield (north of Hullavington village) and Surrendell (in the west of the modern parish) were recorded in the Domesday Book and became medieval hamlets, then declined to single farmsteads. Bradfield had 21 poll-tax payers in 1377 but by the later 15th century there were no buildings beyond the manor house and its farm. Bradfield Manor Farmhouse, now

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 ...

, is described by Pevsner as a "rare survival of a C15 hall". Surrendell had a church in 1249, and 37 poll-tax payers in 1377. A manor house was built in the 16th century and Surrendell farmhouse was begun c. 1620-40. The church was in ruins in the late 17th century and the manor house was demolished c. 1871. A pillow mound rabbit warren, some 36 metres in length, survives near Surrendell Farm. Schooling began in a small way in the village in 1690. Two small schools, which became

National Schools In Ireland, a national school () is a type of primary school that is financed directly by the state, but typically administered jointly by the state, a patron body, and local representatives. In national schools, most major policies, such as the ...

, were built in 1832 and 1833; the larger of them, on the east side of The Street, was enlarged in 1873 and became the sole school in 1879. A new school was built on the northern edge of the village in 1970. In 1903 the

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...

opened the

South Wales Main Line The South Wales Main Line (), originally known as the London, Bristol and South Wales Direct Railway or simply as the Bristol and South Wales Direct Railway, is a branch of the Great Western Main Line in Great Britain. It diverges from the co ...

which passes to the north of Hullavington village, and had a

station Station may refer to: Agriculture * Station (Australian agriculture), a large Australian landholding used for livestock production * Station (New Zealand agriculture), a large New Zealand farm used for grazing by sheep and cattle ** Cattle statio ...

on the road towards Norton. The station closed to passengers in 1961 and to goods traffic in 1965; the line remains in use but there are no longer any local stations on this stretch between Swindon and Bristol Parkway. The parish population at the beginning of the nineteenth century was 395 (1801 census), rising to 823 in 1901 and was 1,223 in 2011.

Parish church

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 ...

of St Mary was begun in the 12th century. The three-bay north arcade is from the late 12th century while the south arcade and northeast Bradfield chapel are from the 13th century. The timber roof of the north aisle is 15th century, and there are pew ends from the same period. Restoration took place in the early 1870s and the tower was rebuilt in 1880, both to designs of A.W. Blomfield or his nephew

Reginald Blomfield Sir Reginald Theodore Blomfield (20 December 1856 – 27 December 1942) was a prolific British architect, garden designer and author of the Victorian and Edwardian period. Early life and career Blomfield was born at Bow rectory in Devon, w ...

. At one time the church had a plaque commemorating the death at Malmesbury in 1703 of Hannah Twynnoy, believed to be the first person in Britain to have been killed by a tiger. Her gravestone with its inscribed epitaph can still be seen at

Malmesbury Abbey Malmesbury Abbey, at Malmesbury in Wiltshire, England, is a former Benedictine abbey dedicated to Saint Peter and Paul the Apostle, Saint Paul. It was one of the few English religious houses with a continuous history from the 7th century throug ...

. The church was designated as

in 1959. The parish is now one of eight served by the Gauzebrook group ministry.

Local government

Hullavington is a

with an elected parish council. It is in the area of

Wiltshire Council Wiltshire Council, known between 1889 and 2009 as Wiltshire County Council, is the Local government in England, local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Wiltshire (district), Wiltshire in South West England, and has its headquarters a ...

, a

unitary authority A unitary authority is a type of local government, local authority in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Unitary authorities are responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are ...

, which is responsible for most local government functions.

Amenities

Hullavington has a garage, a shop, a pub and two churches, one of which meets in the village hall. The village school continues as Hullavington CofE Primary School, where pupils include those from families posted to Buckley Barracks. There are three

Girlguiding Girlguiding is the operating name of The Guide Association in the United Kingdom, previously named The Girl Guides Association, which was formed in 1910. It is the original Girl Guides organisation in the world and, in 1928, became a founding m ...

units in Hullavington: Brownies,

Rainbows A rainbow is an optical phenomenon caused by refraction, internal reflection and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a continuous spectrum of light appearing in the sky. The rainbow takes the form of a multicoloured circular ...

and a

Guide A guide is a person who leads travelers, sportspeople, or tourists through unknown or unfamiliar locations. The term can also be applied to a person who leads others to more abstract goals such as knowledge or wisdom. Travel and recreation Exp ...

unit which opened in September 2007.

Military connections

Hullavington Airfield, formerly RAF Hullavington, is next to the village. Most of the airfield is in the neighbouring parish of

Stanton St Quintin Stanton St Quintin is a small village and civil parish in the county of Wiltshire in England. It is about north of Chippenham and south of Malmesbury. The parish church dates in part from the 12th century. The parish includes the hamlets of C ...

, along with the associated barracks which were renamed Buckley Barracks in 2003.

Notable residents

Jazz vocalist and pianist

Jamie Cullum Jamie Paul Joseph Cullum (born 20 August 1979) is an English jazz-pop singer, pianist, songwriter and radio presenter. Although primarily a vocalist and pianist, he also accompanies himself on other instruments, including guitar and drums. He h ...

was brought up in Hullavington. The former MP Neil Hamilton and his wife Christine moved to Hullavington in October 2004.

References

External links

Hullavington Parish Council
* {{authority control Villages in Wiltshire Civil parishes in Wiltshire