England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Little Hereford St Mary Magdalene

The Parish

The parish of Little Hereford, not to be confused with the county town, lies in the extreme north of Herefordshire, it forms not only the border with Shropshire but also with Worcestershire forming a peninsula of land extending into the neighbouring counties. Little Hereford is located roughly 5 miles southeast of the Shropshire town of Ludlow and sits on the A456 road which links Bewdley, in Worcestershire through to the main north to south highway through The Marches of the A49. Little Hereford is a rather loosely aggregated village with no real centre, a group of properties sits around the crossing of the River Teme whilst a further linear group sits along the dead-end lane heading north from the A456 opposite the route to the church, the remainder is a scatter of farms and cottages across a rolling and rather verdant landscape. In the west of England pastoral farming tends to dominate and in Little Hereford parish it is estimated, by early gazetteers, to be 2 to 1 in favour of this over arable. Modern developments have come and gone from Little Hereford, a branch line along the Teme valley running eastwards has since closed and been largely dismantled. It is the aforesaid River Teme which drains the parish eastwards and then south to join the Severn just south of Worcester, the Severn heads for the Bristol Channel as its marine exit. Little Hereford, in its valley setting, is sited at around 70 metres above the sea with land away from the valley rising in gentle undulations to local high points of only around 110 metres. Marches parishes are often fairly extensive and Little Hereford parish was no exception, covering just under 3,400 acres it would have supported a population of close to 450 parishioners. In Domesday times Little Hereford was a holding of the Canons of Hereford and a worthwhile holding at that, its assets of 17 ploughs together with the usual meadows and woodland was supplemented by an impressive 5 mills, presumably lining the banks of the Teme, a wealthy holding indeed.

The Church

St Mary Magdalene's church sits almost on the banks of the Teme accessed along the semi-surfaced track of Church Walk. Whilst one is immediately struck by the formidable western block-house of a tower it is not, in fact, the oldest part of the church. That honour goes to the nave which Pevsner assigns to the 12th century Norman Romanesque period by virtue of its remaining window of that style gracing its northern face, most other windows were replaced during the Perpendicular period of the 14th century. The impressive tower, which is St Mary's most noted piece, is of the 13th century, having the tall & narrow lancet windows characteristic of the Early English Gothic. One speculates as to why such an imposing unbuttressed tower, completed by its pyramidal slate roof, was required it bearing a similarity to defensive features rather than ecclesiastical need. Its position, close to the river, sparked trouble in 1886 when the chancel was flooded and required restoration, further under-pinning and restoration followed in 1905, both of these works following a typical Victorian restoration of the 1840s. The start of Church Walk, from the A456, is marked by the black-and-white of the village hall, parking may be here or at the church end of the track. The churchyard is hedged & almost in the river at its southernmost point. Unfortunately the church s tucked away in its southwestern corner which effectively removes most of the favoured southern aspects from the photographer's arsenal, it becomes a tricky subject on sunny days when shot from the north.