Template:Wp-Caversham, Berkshire-History

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The first written description of Caversham as Cavesham appeared in the Domesday Book (1086) within the hundred of Binfield. This entry indicates that a sizeable community had developed with a considerable amount of land under cultivation. Some time before 1106 a Shrines to the Virgin Mary was established in Caversham. Its precise location is unknown, but it may have been near the present St Peter's Church. It became a popular place of pilgrimage, along with the chapel of St. Anne on the bridge and her well, whose waters were believed to have healing properties. By the 15th century the statue was plated in silver; Catherine of Aragon is recorded as visiting here on 17 July 1532. The shrine was destroyed on 14 September 1538 under the command of Henry VIII. Only the well survives, now dry and surrounded by a protective wall, topped with a domed iron grill. A modern shrine to Our Lady has been re-established at the Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady and St. Anne.

In the Middle Ages Caversham Manor was one of the demesnes of William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke and regent during King Henry III's minority. It was the place of his death. The medieval community was clustered on the north side of Caversham Bridge east of St Peter's Church, which was built in the 12th century. The third Earl of Buckingham donated the land for the church and neighbouring rectory, together with a considerable amount of land around it, to the Augustinian Notley Abbey near Long Crendon in Buckinghamshire. After the Dissolution of the Monasteries, these lands were given to Christ Church.^[1] The rectory stood in what is now Caversham Court park and herb garden where there are remains with information panels and flat foundation stones as well as a ha ha wall below giving a view over the River Thames and much of Reading and Tilehurst.

In the Civil War there was fierce fighting around Caversham Bridge for a short time in April 1643.^[2] Reading had been held by Royalists and was besieged by a Parliamentary force under the Earl of Essex. Royalists marched south from Oxford to try to relieve the town's defenders but were heavily defeated, and the town fell to the Parliamentarians a few days later. The fortified manor house was replaced by Caversham House and Park in the 16th century. Several houses have stood on the site, notably the home of William Cadogan. The present Caversham Park House, built in 1850, is occupied by BBC Monitoring, which is a section of the BBC World Service that analyses news, information and comment gathered from mass media around the world. It is also the premises of the BBC Written Archives Centre and BBC Radio Berkshire. The BBC announced in July 2016 that it planned to leave the site and transfer its operations elsewhere. Caversham was an urban district and part of Oxfordshire until 9 November 1911, when it was transferred to Berkshire and became part of the county borough of Reading.