Percy Hughes butcher's shop next to the Horse Shoe before it was rebuilt

Horse Fair, ponies on Church Green sold for pit ponies. By Bourton Cottages

The Horse Fair in Bridge Street looking east. At one time, it was one of the larger horse fairs in the country. Boys with barrows collected the horse dung for sale. The Wheatsheaf became the post office in 1972 and a private house in 2010 when the post office moved to the middle room of the Town Hall. The three semi-circular windows in the first floor of was the HSBC bank (in 2014) and Patrick Strainge butchers have been altered at some point to look like their neighbouring upstairs windows.

A personal account of time at the Horse Fair

Horse fair in Church View

Bridge St. Horses walking free

Newspaper. Popularity of the three-day horse fair & baker's cart upset

Scene of the horse fair in Bridge Street outside the Horse Shoe Inn and the butchers shop run by J Clark. It must have been taken well before 1925 because the Horse Shoe was gutted by fire that year and in 1925 it was owned by Percy Hughes who also had the butchers shop with his name over the door and on the east side of the building. Hurdles placed over the ground floor windows were to stop the horses from sticking their heads through the windows. Horses with a white spot on their rumps have been sold.

Newspaper August 29th 1930. Report on Fair with Horse Fair

The annual horse fair in Bampton. These horses are in Church Street. Note that both men and women wore hats and ladies' clothes were generally down to their ankles.