Almondsbury

This article is about the village in South Gloucestershire. For the village in West Yorkshire, see Almondbury.

Almondsbury
Part of Almondsbury from The Tump. The spire is Saint Mary the Virgin church.
Almondsbury is located in Gloucestershire
Almondsbury
Almondsbury
Location within Gloucestershire
Population4,705 (2011 census)[1]
OS grid referenceST604843
Civil parish
  • Almondsbury
Unitary authority
Ceremonial county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townBRISTOL
Postcode districtBS32
Dialling code01454
PoliceAvon and Somerset
FireAvon
AmbulanceSouth Western
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Gloucestershire
51°33′24″N 2°34′21″W / 51.5567°N 2.5725°W / 51.5567; -2.5725

Almondsbury (English: /ˈɑːməndzbərɪ/) is a large village and civil parish in South Gloucestershire, England. It is situated on the A38 road in the Avon Green Belt 7 miles (11 km) north of Bristol city centre. It is adjacent to junction 16 of the M5 motorway and Almondsbury Interchange, where the M4 and M5 cross. It is part of the Bristol Built-up Area.

The civil parish also includes the villages of Hortham, Gaunt's Earthcott, Over, Easter Compton, Compton Greenfield, Hallen and Berwick.

The village is split by a steep hill, part of the escarpment overlooking the Severn floodplain. At the bottom of the hill is Lower Almondsbury where a pub and hotel, The Bowl Inn, is situated. South Wales, the Forest of Dean, the River Severn and both Severn Bridges are visible from the higher parts of the village, which consists mainly of ribbon development along the A38 and has more of an urban characteristic.[citation needed]

Governance

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Almondsbury is in the South Gloucestershire unitary authority area. Almondsbury is part of the Severn Vale electoral ward,[2] which elects two of the 61 members of South Gloucestershire Council.[3]

Historically, Almondsbury was in Thornbury Rural District from 1895 to 1974, and then the Northavon district of the county of Avon from 1974 to 1996, when South Gloucestershire was created.[4]

For elections to the UK Parliament, Almondsbury is in the Thornbury and Yate constituency,[5] which as of 2024 is represented by Claire Young of the Liberal Democrats. Historically, it was in the Thornbury constituency from 1885, moving to Stroud and Thornbury at the 1950 election, South Gloucestershire in 1955, Northavon in 1983, and Filton and Bradley Stoke in 2010.

History

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The place-name 'Almondsbury' is first attested in the Domesday Book of 1086, where it appears as Almodesberie. The name means 'Æthelmod's or Ealhmund's burgh or fortified place'.[6]

St Mary's Parish church

The local church, dedicated to Saint Mary the Virgin, was built in 1140 AD. The lead-covered spire was added to the original tower some time before 1619.

In 1817, a woman purporting to be Princess Caraboo was found in the town, in what was to become one of the more elaborate deceptions of the period.[7]

Amenities

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The Bowl Inn

The Bown Inn pub takes its name from the bowl shape of the land surrounding the estuary. Parts of this whitewashed-stone inn were originally the three cottages erected in 1146 to house the monks building the adjacent church of St Mary the Virgin. The present building became a licensed inn in 1550.[8]

Another pub, The Swan Inn, is located on the A38 in the upper part of the village, almost opposite an open space known as Almondsbury Tump.

In March 2009 a community shop was opened in the village by the not-for-profit Almondsbury Community Services Association, situated opposite the Old School Hall at 14 Church Road. The community shop is staffed entirely by unpaid volunteers. The aim of the project goes beyond a village shop, being a service for the village, to support local suppliers wherever possible, and to be another focal point where people in the village can meet. A proportion of the surplus generated by the shop is returned to community projects and organisations in the village. In 2018, the village community purchased the premises from the church through a Community Share issue. The chairman of the shop committee is John Mclevy.

The village also has an ambulance station, a motorway police station, a garden centre, and a restaurant/pub. A helicopter base is present next to the Almondsbury Interchange as a new home for National Police Air Service Filton and the Great Western Air Ambulance.[9]

Education

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Education is provided by Almondsbury Church of England Primary School. This is a state maintained school. The most recent Ofsted report has been rated outstanding. For secondary education, Almondsbury is served by The Castle School and Marlwood School.

Sport and leisure

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Almondsbury is home to non-League football club Almondsbury F.C. who play at Almondsbury Sports & Social Complex on Gloucester Road.[10] Almondbury Cricket Club and Almondsbury Tennis club are also based at the same site. Gloucestershire FA are also based in Almondsbury at Oakland Park.[11] North Bristol RFC play next door.[12]

Almondsbury is home to St Nick's Gaelic Athletic Association club.[13]

Notable residents

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  • Cattelena (died 1625), an African woman, kept a small dairy business in Almondsbury during the early 17th century.[14]
  • Alex Kapranos (born 1972), the lead singer of Franz Ferdinand.[15]
  • Reginald Crompton (1870–1945), stage and silent film actor.
  • Sir Miles Partridge (1488-1551), Courtier to King Henry VIII, Head of Court entertainment which included gambling evenings, infamous for winning a bet with Henry VIII, a gift of St. Paul’s Jesus Bells. He removed and broke them as a defiant gesture and publicity stunt for the reformation. (Cite: Sir Miles Partridge of Bristol and Almondsbury, a Royal Servant, by N.A. Deas 2000, MS, Bristol Libraries).

Civil parish

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The civil parish of Almondsbury is much larger than the village. It includes the villages of Hortham, Gaunt's Earthcott, Over, Easter Compton, Compton Greenfield, Catbrain and Hallen. It also includes Cribbs Causeway and the site of the village of Charlton, now the western end of Filton Airfield.

When it was originally created in 1866 the civil parish also included Patchway, but not Easter Compton, Compton Greenfield, Hallen, Cribbs Causeway or Charlton, all of which were transferred from the parish of Henbury in 1935. The parish of Patchway was separated from Almondsbury in 1953.[16]

Notes and references

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  1. ^ "Parish population 2011". Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 18 March 2015.
  2. ^ Census 2021 Ward Profile: Severn Vale (PDF) (Report). South Gloucestershire Council. 2023. p. 1. Retrieved 19 August 2024.
  3. ^ "Your Councillors by Ward". South Gloucestershire Council. Archived from the original on 2 August 2024. Retrieved 19 August 2024.
  4. ^ "A guide to archive sources for the history of South Gloucestershire" (PDF). Gloucestershire Archives. February 2018. p. 514. Retrieved 19 August 2024.
  5. ^ "The Parliamentary Constituencies Order 2023". Schedule 1 Part 7 South West region.
  6. ^ Eilert Ekwall (1936) The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-names, p. 7.
  7. ^ Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. 2004.
  8. ^ "About Us". The Bowl Inn. Archived from the original on 5 April 2015. Retrieved 12 March 2015.
  9. ^ Colston, Sarah (15 December 2016). "Emergency service's air base plan in Almondsbury given all-clear for take-off". Gazette Series. Archived from the original on 6 February 2017. Retrieved 17 February 2017.
  10. ^ "Almondsbury UWE Football Club". Toolstation League. Archived from the original on 23 October 2016. Retrieved 17 February 2017.
  11. ^ "Find Us". Gloucestershire FA. Archived from the original on 21 April 2017. Retrieved 17 February 2017.
  12. ^ "About". North Bristol RFC. Archived from the original on 18 February 2017. Retrieved 17 February 2017.
  13. ^ Dolan, Damien (16 January 2019). "The West's awake". The Irish World. Archived from the original on 16 January 2019. Retrieved 16 January 2019.
  14. ^ Kaufmann, Miranda. "The Men and Women in BLACK TUDORS: THE UNTOLD STORY". Miranda Kaufmann.
  15. ^ IMDB Archived 26 September 2017 at the Wayback Machine.
  16. ^ "Almondsbury Gloucestershire". Vision of Britain. University of Portsmouth. Archived from the original on 2 September 2017. Retrieved 2 September 2017.
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