Place:Wick St. Lawrence, Somerset, England

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NameWick St. Lawrence
Alt namesWick-St. Lawrencesource: Family History Library Catalog
Week St. Lawrencesource: spelling alternate/error
Bourtonsource: hamlet in parish
Iceltonsource: hamlet in parish
TypeChapelry, Civil parish
Coordinates51.385°N 2.914°W
Located inSomerset, England     ( - 1974)
Also located inAvon, England     (1974 - 1996)
See alsoCongresbury, Somerset, Englandancient parish in which it was a chapelry
Winterstoke Hundred, Somerset, Englandhundred in which it was located
Axbridge Rural, Somerset, Englandrural district 1894-1974
Woodspring District, Avon, Englanddistrict municipality covering the area 1974-1996
North Somerset District, Somerset, Englanddistrict municipality and unitary authority covering the area since 1996
the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Wick St. Lawrence (#35 on map) is a civil parish and village in Somerset, England. It falls within the unitary authority of North Somerset. The population of the parish in the 2011 UK census, which includes Bourton and Icelton, was 1,331.

Wick St. Lawrence was a chapelry of the parish of Congresbury in the ancient hundred of Winterstoke while Bourton hamlet was in Portbury Hundred. From 1894 until 1974, the whole of the parish was part of the Axbridge Rural District.

Between 1 April 1974 and 1 April 1996, Wick St. Lawrence was in the Woodspring District of the county of Avon. The Local Government Act 1972 recommended that this part of Somerset stretching north to Bristol (which was mostly in Gloucestershire) and east to Bath should be converted into a new county named Avon. Like other counties following 1974 Avon was made up of several district municipalities and the one covering Wick St. Lawrence was the Woodspring District. Avon lasted until 1996 when Gloucestershire and Somerset were given back their old borders with a few adjustments. Since 1996 Wick St. Lawrence has been in the North Somerset District which is a unitary authority.

Image:Axbridge Rural 1900 3.png

The village lies near a small creek known that flows into the River Yeo. The last wharf on the river was a pier connected by a spur to the former Weston, Clevedon and Portishead Railway. The railway track was removed between October 1942 and late 1943. The wharf was used to import coal from South Wales mostly by sailing barges. The coal was off-loaded by steam crane or by the barges’ derricks into wagons.

The Ebdon Bow Bridge which carries the road from the village to nearby Worle (#37) over the River Banwell was built in the late 18th or early 19th century. The parish has seen a vast increase in population in recent years, due to a housing development in this immediate area.

The village lies near the northwest extremity of the North Somerset Levels approximately 1 kilometre (0.6 mi) inland from Woodspring Bay on the Bristol Channel coast and between the estuaries of the River Banwell and the Congresbury Yeo. The M5 motorway runs along the parish's southeastern boundary.

The majority of the parish is farmland — primarily livestock rearing — with low-lying fields criss-crossed by hedgerows and rhynes or wide ditches.

The parish church of St. Lawrence, designated as a Grade II* listed building, dates mainly from the 15th century. It is built largely of pink or grey Lias limestone combined with other local limestones and sandstones. These were used during a major restoration in 1864–1865 by Foster and Wood of Bristol, made necessary after the church was struck by lightning in 1791. This caused cracks to open in the tower which was then reinforced with iron bands. However over the next 60 years the church began to fall apart, prompting the restoration. The intricately carved stone pulpit came from Woodspring Priory in 1536 following the dissolution of the monasteries. The Priory had been bought by a Bristol merchant, William Carr, and his son and heir John Carr arranged the pulpit's relocation. (John Carr subsequently became Lord of the Manors of both Congresbury and Wick St Lawrence.)

Research Tips

  • 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


This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Wick St. Lawrence. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.