England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Lower Slaughter St Mary

The Parish

The parish of Lower Slaughter lies in eastern Gloucestershire not too far from its border with neighbouring Oxfordshire. Lower Slaughter is located roughly 3 miles southwest of the market town of Stow on the Wold and sits a half mile west of the A429 road which connects Stow on the Wold with Cirencester. The A429 follows the line of the ancient Roman road, The Fosse Way, and the area abounds with Roman relics. Lower Slaughter is an attractive Cotswold village sitting in the valley of the River Eye and largely built either side of the crossing of that stream. The Gloucestershire Cotswolds were famous for their wool and Lower Slaughter would have met the demand for such wool as well as having a varied farming regime including cattle in the valley and some arable. The Eye drains the parish southwards joining the Windrush and eventually the Thames in Oxfordshire, after flowing through the capital water reaches the North Sea through the latter's estuary.  Despite its valley setting Lower Slaughter sits at around 140 metres above the sea and outside that valley land rises to ridges at close to 230 metres. Historically Lower Slaughter had been subservient to Bourton on the Water parish but when separated an area of just over 1,100 acres became Lower Slaughter parish, small by Gloucestershire standards, within that acreage a population of around 200 parishioners would have been supported. In Domesday times Lower Slaughter was a direct holding of King William, it offered 13 ploughs and possessed 2 mills.

The Church

St Mary's church sits at the heart of the village on the eastern side of the main lane (Copsehill Road) as it meanders through the village. Sadly the folk married in this transcript would not recognise today's church as it was essentially rebuilt in the 1860s after the end of this transcript. Only the four-bay northern arcade remains from the original medieval church and that after being heavily restored from its Norman Transitional style, that style was in vogue only for the last quarter of the 12th century before the early English Gothic became favoured. All else dates from the mid-Victorian period in a mixture of that early English Gothic and Geometrical Decorated styles which Pevsner can only deem "dull". Copsehill Road is sufficiently wide to allow street parking outside the churchyard which has a delightful limestone wall surrounding. The churchyard, whilst expansive to the northwest, an unfavoured angle, has many trees which restrict the favourable views from the southeast and severely limiting the choice for the photographer.