Place:Colerne, Wiltshire, England

source: Family History Library Catalog

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Colerne is a village and civil parish in north Wiltshire, England. The village is about 3.5 miles (6 km) west of the town of Corsham and 7 miles (11 km) northeast of the city of Bath. It has an elevated and exposed position, 545 feet (166 m) above sea level, and overlooks the Box valley to the south (where Brunel's Box Tunnel is).

The parish includes the hamlets of Eastrip and Thickwood. It is bounded to the west by a stretch of the Fosse Way Roman road, which forms the county boundary with Gloucestershire, and to the east by the Bybrook River. Part of the northern boundary is the Doncombe Brook, a tributary of the Bybrook, and part of the southern boundary is the Lid Brook, another tributary.

History

A Roman villa has been found on the site of the present airfield. The 1086 Domesday Book recorded 28 households at Colerne and six at Thickwood. The enclosure known as Colerne Park (today largely woodland) was created in the early 14th century by William of Colerne, Abbot of Malmesbury.

In the 14th century the local economy was based on sheep-rearing, cloth production (assisted by mills on the By Brook) and stone quarrying. The former farmhouse known as Daubenys, on the High Street, is a long house from c. 1400, now Grade II* listed.

The Manor House, near the church, bears a date of 1689. The country house at Lucknam Park was built in the late 17th century. Many houses in the village are from the 18th century, partly as a result of a large fire of 1774.

By the 19th century, cloth-making had migrated to industrial towns and the economy was mainly agricultural. Some of the watermills were converted to paper production, an example being Chapps Mill near Slaughterford. In the 1840s many labourers were employed on the construction of the Great Western Railway and its Box Tunnel.

From 1939, employment was provided by the construction of RAF Colerne close to the north of the village, followed by its operation and current use as an Army base.

Research Tips

• From this Ancestry page you can browse the Wiltshire parishes which have parish register transcripts online, quite often from very early dates. However, reading the early ones requires skill and patience. Transcriptions should also be in FamilySearch.
• A further collection of online source references will be found on the county page for Wiltshire.