From the Archives
Snippets from the Parish Registers
A recent visit to the Gloucestershire Records Office to consult the Fairford parish registers
revealed some interesting pieces of information outside the usual baptisms, marriages and burials.
On the last page of the 18th Century register is the following information:
December ye 6th 1718 The Yew Tree was planted in Fairford Church-yard by Frampton Huntington A.M. Vicar.
NB: The Wall from ye Parsonage Stable to ye Street was built at ye cost of ye Revnd Mr James Oldisworth
Impropriator, but it was pointed & cop’d at ye charge of ye Revnd Mr Frampton Huntington Vicar purely for
ye good & benefit of ye trees planted against it.
It would be interesting to know which wall this referred to as it would then point to the location of
the parsonage stable and the parsonage itself. This was written before the Free School (Community Centre)
was built so the wall dividing that plot and the churchyard is a candidate.
Another passage on the same page of the parish register reads:
Thomas Carter Widower & William Reeve junior gave a black Cloth Pall to ye Parish of Fairford in
ye Year 1722 & Willm Green made ye 1st use of it.
William Green was the husband of Sarah and he was buried in the churchyard on 31 October 1722.
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Property for Sale
A source of useful and interesting information is advertisements for house sales or rentals
from the past. Estate agents often produce detailed descriptions of houses and some estate agent
brochures have been donated to the Records Office at Gloucester and the National Monument Record
Office in Swindon.
Advertisements in old newspapers can also be found and the following is from The Times
of 17 August 1878:
Fairford, Gloucestershire – To be let, furnished, MORGAN HALL, for the term of five or seven
years. The house, which is within half a mile of the Fairford Station, on the East Gloucestershire
Railway, consists of a good entrance hall, dining, drawing room, and library, five best bed
rooms, two dressing rooms, five servants’ rooms, housekeeper’s room, pantry, servants’ hall,
cellar, kitchen, scullery, larder; large coach-house, seven-stall stable, walled garden and
pleasure grounds. For terms and orders to view apply to Mr G.S. White, Fairford.
George Symmons White was an accountant and district auditor for Gloucestershire and Wiltshire,
and held many other important positions in Fairford until his death in 1881. These included agent
for Alfred Life and Accidental Insurance companies, secretary to the Gas Company, clerk to the
Magistrates’ Court, clerk to the Highway Board, auditor to the Retreat Asylum, and commissioner
of taxes. He was also involved in the administration of the Raymond Barker estate and was buried
next to the Raymond Barker plot in the churchyard where his grave is marked by a pink granite obelisk.
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