Patrick Hook, director of PD Hook

Percy Sheppard

Witney Gazette March 11th 2015. John Jaques from Bampton has been made chairman of the Under 30s Farmers' Club.

The map is pre Inclosure and covers Clanfield, Bampton, Aston and Yelford. The note with the Yelford map says it was from a map of 1624/5. A note at the right side of the page suggests all these details were pulled together from various sources in 1833 which is post Inclosure, which for the Bampton area was 1821. I can't work out what maps were used for the non-Yelford map but it says HHH is Aston 1771.

This map of 1921 covers the area from Plantation south to Cowleaze Corner and east as far as the Elephant and Castle.

What was a watercourse off the Highmoor Brook to land with The Deanery can be clearly seen and was used for fish farming.

Cobb House is the only vicarage by now, the other two houses of the three-portion being in private hands, one Churchgate house the other now called Kilmore House.

Glebelands houses were not yet built, they didn't come until the 1960s.

The lake with Weald Manor House to its left used to freeze over and the owners of the Manor House used to invite locals to skate on it. Mr & Mrs Colvile lent the field to the west of the lake to the local football club but as it wasn't large enough for the side to play in a certain league, they had to find a new home and for a while used a field at the east end of New Road.

This map was produce by Morre, Allan and Innocent to accompany the sale for 5 residential and agricultural properties May 14th 1962. They are all east and south east of Bampton's main residential area.
Lot 1 is Meadow Farm
Lot 2 is to the north of the Aston road and include Ampney Lodge
Lot 3 is a strip with Calais farm
Lot 4 is a field approximately where Bampton Garden Centre is today
Love 5 is a group of fields to the south of the Great Brook

These four maps were all produce in 1971 and cover

Ordinance Survey Plan SP3002-3102 Weald, Hayway Lane, Weald St, Clanfield Road
Ordinance Survey Plan SP3003-3103. Bridge St east to end of houses, north to new school, Colvile Close
Ordinance Survey Plan SP3203-3303. 1971 Mt Owen Rd east inc. Gogg Lane, Aston Rod to Aston
Ordinance Survey Plan SP3002-3102 1971. Cowleaze Corner, Weald to Aston, north to Horse Shoe PH

Fields, property and farms are all clearly marked.

These are two parts of one map created in 1914. I've picked them out to show where the school used to be in Lew, next to University Farm and the Post Office a little to the east just before you get to Trinity Church.

This map was produce for the sale of the Lew Estate in 1914.
There used to be a Post Office and a school in Lew, both shown on this map between University Farm and Holy Trinity Church on the main road.

This threshing machine was used to thresh the grain from the stooks of corn and was the normal way to do this in the first half of the twentieth century, before the combine harvester did the job as the corn was cut in the field.

It was a labour intensive job with people taking stooks from the pile, others lobbed them on to the top where yet more people fed them into the machine. Two ladies and a man can be seen on top of the threshing machine doing this part of the job.

At least one person hooked sacks on to the back to catch the grain while others gathered up the straw and chaff. The straw would have been used for bedding animals under cover in winter and some used as feed.

The whole machine was belt driven - no protection - with power from a steam engine which had men keeping it going in good order. With a live fire in the steam engine, it's no wonder there were fires in the ricks from time to time.

There are 13 people working in this picture. Some have bailing string tied round their calves, probably to stop rats running up as the rick was slowly dismantled.

A threshing machine is nearly always seen working at the Fairford, Faringdon, Filkins & Burford ploughing match held the last Saturday in September on a farm within 16 miles of Lechlade.