England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Trent St Andrew

The Parish

The parish of Trent is nowadays one of the northernmost parishes in Dorset but was previously in Somerset as one of its southernmost parishes, Trent has moved county in 1896. Trent is located roughly 4 miles west of the market town of Sherborne and sits about 2 miles north of the A30 road which links Sherborne with Yeovil. Trent is a long straggle of a village lying along an east to weest running lane for almost 3/4s of a mile. Trent runs eastwards from the Yeo valley onto slightly higher ground below an escarpment on which Sherborne sits. This geographical arrangement gave Trent a varied farming economy with early gazetteers estimating it as 2:1 in favour of pastoral over arable methods. Modern developments have come to Trent, the railway line linking Yeovil with Castle Cary passes between the village and the Yeo without granting Trent a station. Trent is drained northwestwards by the River Yeo which heads into the Somerset levels to eventually meet the Parrett and the outer |Bristol Channel. Trent is sat on rising ground from 40 metres above the sea at its western end rising to 60 metres at its east, above the village rises the escarpment with its highest points standing at 149 metres on Charlock Hill and totally dominating southeastern views. Covering just under 1,600 acres Trent parish was typically sized for this area and that acreage would have supported a population of close to 500 parishioners. Domesday Trent was a typical small rural manor held by Count Robert of Mortain and offering 5 ploughs backed by meadows, pastures and woodland.

The Church

St Andrew's church sits at the western end of the village on the western side of the lane which heads south from the village to cross the A30. The earliest fabric found in the church is the west window, a 13th century Early English Gothic piece, the main body and especially its tower, are in the Decorated style of the first half of the 14th century. Pevsner points out that this style in unusual and quite rare in Dorset. The church's stand-out feature is the southern tower, a graceful and slim structure of the 14th century, the tower is topped by a spire rebuilt in a restoration of 1911 and topped by a copper weathercock of 1698. The nave is also Decorated in style and set-off by a parapet. Moving east the chancel is later and 15th century in the Perpendicular style, it was extended in the last decade of the 17th or in the 18th century and restored in a Victorian restoration of 1841. That restoration also added the polygonal vestry and created the plaster rib-vaulting in the nave. There is ample parking alongside the lanes either adjacent to the church or towards the Rose & Crown Inn. The churchyard is relatively open with few obstacles to concern the photographer, the view from the lane from the south is particularly appealing showing off the splendid tower rather well.