England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Stoke Bliss St Peter

The Parish

The parish of Stoke Bliss lies in the extreme northeast of Herefordshire forming a stretch of the historic county border with Worcestershire, a situation that changed in 1897 when Stoke Bliss was ceded to that county. Stoke Bliss is located roughly 6 miles southeast of the Worcestershire spa town of Tenbury Wells and sits  a little over a mile east of the B4214 road which connects Tenbury Wells with Bromyard. Stoke Bliss is a dispersed community with no distinct centre other than a few cottages along a lane eastwards from the church, rather a scatter of farms and cottages occupies a slope below a notable escarpment running down the the course of the Kyre Brook. Historically the parish also included the chapelry of Little Kyre, unlicensed for marriages during the transcript period, a similarly dispersed settlement west of the B4214. Like much of its county the local farming is dominated by Herefordshire's traditional beef herds with pastoral methods the default, a few orchards also are scattered about often for cider apples. The Kyre Brook drains the parish northwestwards to meet the River Teme at Tenbury Wells, the Teme heads east becoming a feeder to the Severn and eventually reaching the sea as the Bristol Channel. Stoke Bliss is sited at 120 metres above the sea at the church, the escarpment rises a half mile to the east topping out at 230 metres at Wolferlow Park and at 248 metres further north, a notable landscape feature. Covering almost 2,100 acres Stoke Bliss was one of the larger parishes in its area, that acreage would have supported a population of around 350 parishioners. In Domesday times Stoke Bliss was a rather small place held by one Gruffydd Boy, definitely not a Norman knight, it could offer just 4 ploughs and 9 households as a small farming manor.

The Church

St Peter's church stands on a narrow lane which zig-zags eastwards from the B4214 towards the escarpment forming Wolferlow Park. This is a church where Victorian work was extreme, almost amounting to a complete rebuild of the church between 1852 and 1854. Beneath the veneer of Victorian work, however, lies a 13th century Early English Gothic church. Remaining fabric is confined to the northern wall of the nave, the southern wall of the chancel, most of the southern aisle and 3 bays of the southern arcade, retained lancets in the chancel wall confirms the 13th century date. Virtually everything else in the church dates from the Victorian work including the standout feature, the southwestern standing tower complete with shingled broach spire. Most of the participants would hardly recognise today's church accordingly. The church stands on a right-angled bend of the lane with a sloping access allowing a car to safely get off-road. The churchyard sits above road height in the main as the road slopes below the site headed eastwards. For the photographer an intrusive large tree stands in the southeastern aspect making standard landscape shots from there impossible but all other angles are available