Severn Stoke is an English village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of Parish (administrative division), administrative parish used for Local government in England, local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below district ...

in the

Malvern Hills District Malvern Hills is a local government district in Worcestershire, England. Its council is based in the town of Malvern, and its area covers most of the western half of the county, including the outlying towns of Tenbury Wells and Upton-upon-Se ...

, in the south of the county of

Worcestershire Worcestershire ( , ; written abbreviation: Worcs) is a county in the West Midlands of England. The area that is now Worcestershire was absorbed into the unified Kingdom of England in 927, at which time it was constituted as a county (see H ...

, alongside the A38 trunk road. It had a population of 611 in 2011.

History

In 1996 a hoard of 18 silver Saxon pennies were found near Severn Stoke. Severn Stoke was within the bounds of the

Royal forest A royal forest, occasionally known as a kingswood (), is an area of land with different definitions in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The term ''forest'' in the ordinary modern understanding refers to an area of wooded land; however, the ...

of Horewell during the medieval period. The woodlands were mostly removed around the time of the Civil War. Severn Stoke War Memorial at the corner of Ham Lane and Church is a Grade II listed monument in the form of a Classical

obelisk An obelisk (; from grc, ὀβελίσκος ; diminutive of ''obelos'', " spit, nail, pointed pillar") is a tall, four-sided, narrow tapering monument which ends in a pyramid-like shape or pyramidion at the top. Originally constructed by An ...

Portland stone Portland stone is a limestone from the Tithonian stage of the Jurassic period quarried on the Isle of Portland, Dorset. The quarries are cut in beds of white-grey limestone separated by chert beds. It has been used extensively as a buildi ...

, unveiled in 1920. It lists 14 servicemen who died in the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fig ...

, 82 others who served abroad, and 15 who served at home.

Notable people

* Moses Browne, poet and devotional writer, born in 1704.

Amenities

The village has a pub and restaurant, the ''Rose & Crown'' in Church Lane, which occupies a 15th-century half-timbered building in a garden. There is a village hall with wheelchair access in Ham Lane. The nearest shopping facilities are in Upton-upon-Severn (3 miles, 4.8 km).

Church

The Anglican parish church is dedicated to St Denys. It forms part of the parish of Kempsey in the Diocese of Worcester. The Grade II* listed church is built of grey rubble masonry throughout and dates mainly from the 14th and 15th centuries, but was restored in 1872 and 1890. The building consists of a

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-typ ...

with a south

aisle An aisle is, in general, a space for walking with rows of non-walking spaces on both sides. Aisles with seating on both sides can be seen in airplanes, certain types of buildings, such as churches, cathedrals, synagogues, meeting halls, parl ...

and porch, a

transept A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform ("cross-shaped") building with ...

on the south side of the church, a tower on the north side, and a

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

. There are Romanesque carved fragments set into the chancel walls both inside and out, and reset into a niche on the N side of the nave; the niche has an arched head.

Schools

The local primary school closed in 1986. The nearest primary schools today are at Kempsey and Upton-upon-Severn.

Public transport

The village has occasional daytime buses to and from Worcester and Upton upon Severn from Monday to Saturday. The nearest railway station is at

Great Malvern Great Malvern is an area of the spa town of Malvern, Worcestershire, England. It lies at the foot of the Malvern Hills, a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, on the eastern flanks of the Worcestershire Beacon and North Hill, and ...

(10 miles, 16.1 km), with hourly services to

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...

and to

London Paddington Paddington, also known as London Paddington, is a Central London railway terminus and London Underground station complex, located on Praed Street in the Paddington area. The site has been the London terminus of services provided by the Great W ...

, and two-hourly weekday services to Bristol Temple Meads. (Though Severn Stoke was never connected to the railway, a highly detailed

00 gauge OO gauge or OO scale (also, 00 gauge and 00 scale) is the most popular standard-gauge model railway standard in the United Kingdom, outside of which it is virtually unknown. OO gauge is one of several 4 mm scale, 4 mm-scale standards (4 mm ...

model can be seen, based on what the station ''may have looked like'' if there had been one.)Severn Stoke Model Railway
Website

References

External links

{{authority control Villages in Worcestershire Civil parishes in Worcestershire