England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Bradford on Avon Holy Trinity

The Parish

The parish of Bradford on Avon lies in the extreme west of Wiltshire forming a stretch of the border with neighbouring Somerset. Bradford on Avon is a large market and industrial town which is located roughly 8 miles southeast of the Somerset spa town of Bath and, of course as its qualifier signifies, lies on the course of the River Avon. Bradford on Avon sits on the A363 road which connects both it and nearby Trowbridge with the A4 (London to Bristol) road at Bathford, east of Bath. Bradford on Avon had its origins in Saxon times, a crossing of the Avon by a ford leading to its name, with the initial settlement being on the northern bank. Today Bradford on Avon has grown into a large town with both banks occupied and spreading for almost a mile away from the Avon's bridging point which forms a major traffic bottleneck for the A363. Bradford on Avon's economy grew from the sheep of its hinterland, the wider parish being dominated by the pastures needed to produce the wool for which it is known. Production of woollen cloth employed many of the folk within the town which also functioned as a typical market town in offering a periodic market as well as the specialist trades which cannot be supported in smaller settlements. Today Bradford on Avon is a thriving regional centre with light industry and services largely displacing the cloth manufacture. Modern developments have come to the town with construction of the railway line connecting Trowbridge with Bath passing through the southern part of the town and granting a busy station. The Avon drains the parish westwards, passing through both Bath & Bristol to reach the Bristol Channel through its iconic gorge. Bradford on Avon is sited at around 30 metres at its bridge but rises to the northern suburbs at almost 100 metres above the sea, local high spots top 140 metres to the northwest of the town. Bradford on Avon parish was a rather large one for southern Britain, covering almost 11,300 acres it would not look out of place as northern, upland, parish; within that large acreage a population of close to 10,600 parishioners could be found, almost a third in the town, itself. Even by Domesday times Bradford on Avon, a holding of Shaftesbury Abbey, was a wealthy place amongst the largest 20% by population recorded in that book, its assets totalled an impressive 40 ploughs, meadows, woodland and pastures and 2 mills.

The Church

Holy Trinity church sits right on the banks of the Avon to the west of the bridging point and squeezed in between Church Street and the river. The church has fabric dated to the 12th century Norman Romanesque period but has been rebuilt since largely from the wool revenues that built the town. The tall arched windows of the chancel and the base of the tower's stair turret are cited by Pevsner as potions from that period since modified by later work. The chancel, itself was lengthened by a single bay around the turn of the 14th century and this century saw the majority of the remainder at least rebuilt if not first constructed. The end of the 14th century saw the addition of the western tower in the Perpendicular style with battlements and a recessed spire whilst the 15th into 15th century saw the addition of the northern aisle. A major restoration of 1864 saw much work including the rebuilding of the tower as well as the southern wall of the nave together with the southern porch and chapel. Church Street is narrow and peters out beyond the church into a riverside path, a few spaces are provided but are often full. The site is a curious elongated lozenge parallel to the river with little depth to the north and dense trees to the south, these aspects totally remove all of the favourable aspects for the photographer and make the typical landscape view impossible.