Place:Norton Fitzwarren, Somerset, England

Norton Fitzwarren (#20 on map) is a civil parish and a village in Somerset, England, situated 2 miles (3.2 km) northwest of Taunton. The village had a population of 3,046 in the UK census of 2011. The village is on the southern slope of Norton Camp, a large hillfort that shows evidence of occupation from neolithic times, through the Bronze Age, to the Roman occupation of Britain. The Church of All Saints dates from the late 13th and early 14th century. It has been designated as a Grade II* listed building. Norton Fitzwarren is located on the confluence of many fast flowing local water flows, and from the 1700s onwards became the base for many water-powered weaving mills. Silk merchants from Spitalfields in east London moved their weaving looms to Norton Fitzwarren after riots in the capital in 1769. For many years Norton Fitzwarren was the site of the main factory of the Taunton Cider Company producing cider brands such as Blackthorn Cider. Production was moved to Shepton Mallet in 1995.

The following description from John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72 is provided by the website A Vision of Britain Through Time (University of Portsmouth Department of Geography).

"NORTON-FITZWARREN, a village and a parish in Taunton [registration] district, Somerset. The village stands near the river Tone, the Bristol and Exeter railway, and the Taunton and Watchet railway, 2½ miles W N W of Taunton; is a pleasant place; and has a post-office under Taunton. The parish contains the tythings of Langford and Vanhampton, and comprises 1,307 acres. Real property: £3,521. Population: 634. Houses: 131. The property is divided among a few.

"The manor, with the Manor-House on a commanding site, belongs to N. Welman, Esq. Montys Court is the residence of Lady Slade; Norton Court, of the Hewetts; and Way House of Major A. Jones. ...

"The living is a rectory in the diocese of Bath and Wells. Value: £490. Patron: Mrs. Mary Hewett. The church is early English; comprises nave, aisles, chancel, and chapel with a tower; and has an E memorial window. The nave and the N aisle were rebuilt in 1853; and the chancel was restored, and the chapel built, in 1865. There are an Independent chapel and a parochial school."

Governance

Norton Fitzwarren was a parish in the Taunton Deane Hundred, one of the hundreds or early subdivisions of the county of Somerset. From 1894 until 1974 it was part of the Taunton Rural District.

In 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972, all urban and rural districts across England were abolished and counties were reorganized into metropolitan and non-metropolitan districts. Norton Fitzwarren joined the non-metropolitan Taunton and Taunton Deane District in 1974.

In May 2019, the districts of West Somerset and Taunton Deane merged into a single district named the Somerset West and Taunton District. The new district is not a unitary authority, and has not taken any county level functions from Somerset County Council. West Somerset covered a largely rural area, with a population of 35,300 in an area of 740 square kilometres (290 sq mi) and is the least populous non-unitary district in England. Taunton Deane's population was over 100,000, but it was still not considered a large enough district to be kept on its own.

Research Tips

• GENUKI page on Norton Fitzwarren.
• The Somerset Heritage Centre (incorporating what was formerly the Somerset Record Office and the Somerset Local Studies Library) can be found at its new location at Langford Mead in Taunton. It has an online search facility leading to pages of interest, including maps from the First and Second Ordnance Survey (select "Maps and Postcards" from the list at the left, then enter the parish in the search box).
  The Heritage Centre has an email address: archives@somerset.gov.uk.
• Three maps on the A Vision of Britain through Time website illustrate the changes in political boundaries over the period 1830-1945. All have expanding scales and on the second and third this facility is sufficient that individual parishes can be inspected.

• Somerset Hundreds as drawn in 1832. This map was prepared before The Great Reform Act of that year. Note the polling places and representation of the various parts of the county.
• Somerset in 1900, an Ordnance Survey map showing rural districts, the boundaries of the larger towns, the smaller civil parishes of the time, and some hamlets and villages in each parish
• Somerset in 1943, an Ordnance Survey map showing the rural districts after the changes to their structure in the 1930s

• Maps provided by the National Library of Scotland are also very useful. This map is currently set to an area now in the Sedgmoor District as it existed in the late 19th century, but can be moved to anywhere in the county using a variety of background maps. There is a very good search facility.
• A Vision of Britain through Time has a group of pages of statistical facts for almost every parish in the county
• GENUKI gives pointers to other archive sources as well as providing some details on each parish. The emphasis here is on ecclesiastical parishes (useful before 1837)
• A listing of all the Registration Districts in England and Wales since their introduction in 1837 and tables of the parishes that were part of each district and the time period covered with detailed notes on changes of parish name, mergers, etc. The compiler has gone to a lot of work to provide this material. Respect his copyright.
• The FamilySearch Wiki for Somerset provides a similar but not identical series of webpages to that provided by GENUKI
• English Jurisdictions, a supplementary website to FamilySearch outlining local parish boundaries in the middle on the 19th century. The information provided is especially useful for establishing the relationship of the ecclesiastical parishes in large towns and cathedral cities.
• The Victoria History of the Counties of England – History of the County of Somerset, produced by The Institute of Historical Research at the University of London is a scholarly website with articles tracing the history of individual parishes which are sorted into their hundreds, the early subdivisions of the county. It traces the ownership of estates and manors, describes the local church in detail, and usually provides a map of each parish. The volumes for Somerset are much more recent than those for other counties. It appears to be a work in progress, only covering about half the county so far. A map of the places covered in the series is given in Volume 6, but 3 more volumes have been published since then. If a parish is included there will be a note in its Research Tips.
• The Somerset and Dorset Family History Society
• The Weston super Mare Family History Society
• The Bristol and Avon Family History Society
• A list of all Somerset parishes with online transcripts of parish registers The size of Somerset makes this a huge project. If it does not yield what you are looking for, try getting in touch with the organizer with patience and politeness.
• Somerset Online Parish Clerk project home page
• A collection of West Somerset Parish Register Transcriptions are online courtesy of Martin Southwood