England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Littlebredy St Michael

The Parish

The chapelry of Littlebredy, its mother parish being Longbredy from which it is connected through the subsidiary hamlet of Kingston Russell, lies in southern Dorset not too far from its English Channel coastline. Littlebredy is located about 7 miles west of the county town of Dorchester and sits about 1 mile south of the A35 road which links Dorchester through to Exeter. Littlebredy is an estate chapelry with most land sitting within the estate of Bridehead, complete with extensive landscaped park and lavish mansion first built in the 16th century and substantially extended in late Georgian era. Littlebredy, itself, is a collection of estate cottages and farms set within a steeply sided chalk valley surrounded to both north and south by high chalk downs. The chalk was extensively quarried as well as being grazed by sheep, the valley saw a little arable. At the eastern end of the valley which is dry in today's times there is evidence of very early settlement where Bronze Age field systems are preserved, the surrounding chalk hills are dotted with tumuli, barrows and even stone circles. The landscaped lake within the park takes advantage of the spring-line at the bottom of the valley which forms the infant River Brede, this drains the parish westwards to reach the English Channel at Burton Bradstock. Littlebredy is sited at 90 metres above the sea at the ornamental lake, all around chalk downs rise reaching 190 metres on Pitcombe Down to the north and 212 metres above the long barrows of the Grey Mare & her Colts. Littlebredy chapelry was granted just over 1,600 acres for its use that acreage would have supported a population of close to 200 parishioners. In Domesday times Littlebredy was a simple rural holding of Cerne Abbey offering 8 ploughs backed by meadows, pastures & woodland.

The Church

St Michael's church sits within the Bridehead estate but can be accessed by footpath from the main lane approaching from Longbredy from the west. This is a church which was almost rebuilt in 1850 for the Williams family residents of Bridehead. Two elements of the church were left reasonably intact so we can deduce the building sequence. The chancel, despite much sympathetically styled Victorian restoration is essentially a 13th century Early English Gothic piece, the restorers were immaculate in staying true to the style with some features such a the rere-arches and piscina getting Pevsner puzzled as to the veracity. Also medieval and relatively untouched is the unusually placed southern tower which is late and from the early half of the 14th century and the Decorated style. Much else is from the rebuild of 1850 but sensitively done to leave a picturesque church in a wonderful setting overlooking the landscaped park and lake. From the lane where the verge is widened a sloping footpath descends to the churchyard which has few obstacles for the photographer.