Filkins
Coordinates: 51°44′10″N 1°39′22″W / 51.736°N 1.656°W
Filkins is a village in the civil parish of Filkins and Broughton Poggs, about 2.5 miles (4 km) southwest of Carterton in Oxfordshire.
Church and chapel
Church of England
The Gothic Revival architect G.E. Street designed the Church of England parish church of Saint Peter, and it was built in 1855–57.[1] The parish is now part of the Benefice of Shill Valley and Broadshire, which includes also the parishes of Alvescot, Black Bourton, Broadwell, Broughton Poggs, Holwell, Kelmscott, Kencot, Langford, Little Faringdon, Shilton and Westwell.[2]
Methodist
The Methodist chapel was dedicated in 1833.[3]
Local government
Filkins was historically a hamlet in the ancient parish (and civil parish from 1866) of Broadwell. It became a separate civil parish in 1896, within Witney Rural District. In 1954 the civil parish was merged with the parish of Broughton Poggs to form the civil parish of Filkins and Broughton Poggs, part of West Oxfordshire since 1974.[4]
Social and economic history
Swinford Museum occupies a 17th-century cottage in Filkins and stands alongside the former village lock-up. George Swinford founded the museum in 1931 with the help of Sir Stafford Cripps.
In 2007 the Filkins estate, which Sir John Cripps (son of the post-war Labour minister Sir Stafford Cripps) bequeathed upon his death in 1993, but which had been partly passed over to the Ernest Cook Trust[5] since then, was fully transferred to the Trust's portfolio. The Filkins Estate is on the county boundary between Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire and includes one 500 acres (200 ha) farm and a number of cottages, with a small area of commercial units housing the Cotswold Woollen Weavers and Filkins Stone Company.
Amenities
Filkins has a public house, the Five Alls.[6] The village has an outdoor swimming pool owned by the Centre Trust which was established by Sir Stafford Cripps under the control of the parish council (acting as trustees). The pool, now managed by the Filkins Swimming Club, is open from May until September. Next to it are the village shop, post office and bowls club. A large 18th-century barn is now the premises of Cotswold Woollen Weavers, which set up business there in 1982, and is the last company in the area to uphold the traditions of woollen cloth design and manufacture.[7] Filkins has a theatre club. The former village school is now a pre-school nursery.[8]
References
- ↑ Sherwood & Pevsner 1974, p. 604.
- ↑ Archbishops' Council (2010). "Benefice of Shill Valley and Broadshire". Church of England. Retrieved 28 June 2013.
- ↑ "Filkins Methodist chapel". Filkins & Broughton Poggs.
- ↑ Vision of Britain website
- ↑ The Filkins Estate and the Ernest Cook Trust
- ↑ The Five Alls
- ↑ Cotswold Woollen Weavers
- ↑ The Old Station Nursery
Sources and further reading
- Fisher, A.S.T. (1968). The History of Broadwell, Oxfordshire, with Filkins, Kelmscott and Holwell. privately published.
- Sherwood, Jennifer; Pevsner, Nikolaus (1974). Oxfordshire. The Buildings of England. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. p. 604. ISBN 0-14-071045-0.
External links
Media related to Filkins at Wikimedia Commons
