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Wraysbury
Wraysbury is a village and civil parish in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in England. It is under the western approach path of London Heathrow Airport. It is located on the east bank of the River Thames, roughly midway between Windsor and Staines-upon-Thames, and 18 miles (29 km) west by south-west of London. Historically part of Buckinghamshire, Wraysbury was made part of the new non-metropolitan county of Berkshire in 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972. The Wraysbury Reservoir is located to the east, administratively wholly in the Spelthorne district of Surrey, although it was historically divided between Buckinghamshire and Middlesex.
Investigation by Windsor and Wraysbury Archaeological Society of a field in the centre of Wraysbury to the east of St Andrew's Church revealed evidence of human activity in Neolithic times. Many hundreds of flint artefacts were found and are now in the care of the Windsor Museum collection. The village name was traditionally spelt Wyrardisbury; it is Anglo Saxon in origin and means "Wigred's fort". Its name is recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Wirecesberie and as Wiredesbur in 1195. The name is seen again as Wyrardesbury in 1422.
Magna Carta Island, in the parish of Wraysbury, is one of the sites traditionally suggested for the sealing of Magna Carta in 1215. On the Ankerwycke estate in the village are the ruins of Ankerwycke Priory, a Benedictine nunnery, founded in the reign of King Henry II. One of the 50 oldest trees in the United Kingdom can be found here: at around 2,000 years old, the Ankerwycke Yew dates from the Iron Age, and is so wide that you can fit a Mini Cooper behind its trunk and not see it from the other side. Local legend says that Anne Boleyn once sat under the tree, while residing at the Ankerwycke estate, but this has not been verified. Henry Stafford, 5th Baron Stafford died at Ankerwycke in 1637. The Ankerwycke estate was bought by John Blagrove, a prominent Jamaican slave owner, who did much to improve the estate.
The population of Wraysbury remained relatively static during the 19th century, with a slight increase between the 1801 return of 616 and the final census of the century which gave a population figure of 660. This compares to a population figure for Wraysbury of 3,641 in the 2001 census. For centuries, agricultural and mill work had been the principal areas of employment for the villagers; and as late as 1831, census returns show that of the 135 families in the village, 62 were employed in agriculture while 68 made their living in the mills. This compares to the most recent census in which around 12% of the population work from home and the average distance travelled to work is 9 miles (14.24 km).
The enclosure of the parish of Wraysbury was ordered by a private inclosure act[which?] of 1799 and was signed by the commissioners in 1803. The map of the village was redrawn by Thomas Bainbridge and shows the distribution of the lands in the following enclosure. Immediately prior to this the common land of the village was owned by the Lord of the Manor of Wraysbury, at that time John Simon Harcourt, the church and the trustees of William Gyll Esq., although, as common land, they were subject to legal rights of pasture and grazing for copyholders and other tenants. In addition to those with legal rights over the land, the poor of the district would have had 'real' or 'customary rights', for example to feed their livestock or gather wood for fuel.
The only beneficiaries from enclosure were those who could show legal rights over the common land, such as copyholders and tenants of the manor. The enclosure enshrined their rights, converting "rights of common" and allocating an area of land commensurate with their rights, as close to their farmhouse as was convenient. The poor were overlooked in this process, and were no longer allowed to forage for fuel or graze their animals. The smaller landowners of Wraysbury to benefit from enclosure included Nathanial Wilmot, Nathanial Matthews, Shadrach Trotman and Thomas Buckland, all of whose names had previously appeared on the Wraysbury Court rolls as copyhold owners.
The village saw another major change in 1848 with the arrival of the railway, which opened up employment opportunities and afforded the chance to travel easily and quickly to and from the village. In the History of Wraysbury published in 1862, G.W.J. Gyll extolled the benefits to the village:
Railways have much improved the locality and the condition of the people also, and it is a powerful solvent to diminish provincial rusticity, local and self-importance; class prejudice and all the elements of isolation melt away in its presence. The railway through our parish has been of great use to it; has enhanced the value of property, as is the case wherever such a project has been executed, despite the fears of those who repressed the enterprise.
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Wraysbury AI simulator
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Wraysbury
Wraysbury is a village and civil parish in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in England. It is under the western approach path of London Heathrow Airport. It is located on the east bank of the River Thames, roughly midway between Windsor and Staines-upon-Thames, and 18 miles (29 km) west by south-west of London. Historically part of Buckinghamshire, Wraysbury was made part of the new non-metropolitan county of Berkshire in 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972. The Wraysbury Reservoir is located to the east, administratively wholly in the Spelthorne district of Surrey, although it was historically divided between Buckinghamshire and Middlesex.
Investigation by Windsor and Wraysbury Archaeological Society of a field in the centre of Wraysbury to the east of St Andrew's Church revealed evidence of human activity in Neolithic times. Many hundreds of flint artefacts were found and are now in the care of the Windsor Museum collection. The village name was traditionally spelt Wyrardisbury; it is Anglo Saxon in origin and means "Wigred's fort". Its name is recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Wirecesberie and as Wiredesbur in 1195. The name is seen again as Wyrardesbury in 1422.
Magna Carta Island, in the parish of Wraysbury, is one of the sites traditionally suggested for the sealing of Magna Carta in 1215. On the Ankerwycke estate in the village are the ruins of Ankerwycke Priory, a Benedictine nunnery, founded in the reign of King Henry II. One of the 50 oldest trees in the United Kingdom can be found here: at around 2,000 years old, the Ankerwycke Yew dates from the Iron Age, and is so wide that you can fit a Mini Cooper behind its trunk and not see it from the other side. Local legend says that Anne Boleyn once sat under the tree, while residing at the Ankerwycke estate, but this has not been verified. Henry Stafford, 5th Baron Stafford died at Ankerwycke in 1637. The Ankerwycke estate was bought by John Blagrove, a prominent Jamaican slave owner, who did much to improve the estate.
The population of Wraysbury remained relatively static during the 19th century, with a slight increase between the 1801 return of 616 and the final census of the century which gave a population figure of 660. This compares to a population figure for Wraysbury of 3,641 in the 2001 census. For centuries, agricultural and mill work had been the principal areas of employment for the villagers; and as late as 1831, census returns show that of the 135 families in the village, 62 were employed in agriculture while 68 made their living in the mills. This compares to the most recent census in which around 12% of the population work from home and the average distance travelled to work is 9 miles (14.24 km).
The enclosure of the parish of Wraysbury was ordered by a private inclosure act[which?] of 1799 and was signed by the commissioners in 1803. The map of the village was redrawn by Thomas Bainbridge and shows the distribution of the lands in the following enclosure. Immediately prior to this the common land of the village was owned by the Lord of the Manor of Wraysbury, at that time John Simon Harcourt, the church and the trustees of William Gyll Esq., although, as common land, they were subject to legal rights of pasture and grazing for copyholders and other tenants. In addition to those with legal rights over the land, the poor of the district would have had 'real' or 'customary rights', for example to feed their livestock or gather wood for fuel.
The only beneficiaries from enclosure were those who could show legal rights over the common land, such as copyholders and tenants of the manor. The enclosure enshrined their rights, converting "rights of common" and allocating an area of land commensurate with their rights, as close to their farmhouse as was convenient. The poor were overlooked in this process, and were no longer allowed to forage for fuel or graze their animals. The smaller landowners of Wraysbury to benefit from enclosure included Nathanial Wilmot, Nathanial Matthews, Shadrach Trotman and Thomas Buckland, all of whose names had previously appeared on the Wraysbury Court rolls as copyhold owners.
The village saw another major change in 1848 with the arrival of the railway, which opened up employment opportunities and afforded the chance to travel easily and quickly to and from the village. In the History of Wraysbury published in 1862, G.W.J. Gyll extolled the benefits to the village:
Railways have much improved the locality and the condition of the people also, and it is a powerful solvent to diminish provincial rusticity, local and self-importance; class prejudice and all the elements of isolation melt away in its presence. The railway through our parish has been of great use to it; has enhanced the value of property, as is the case wherever such a project has been executed, despite the fears of those who repressed the enterprise.