England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Berrow St Faith

The Parish

The parish of Berrow lies in the extreme southwest of Worcestershire forming not only part of the border with neighbouring Herefordshire but also with Gloucestershire. Berrow is little more than a hamlet which lies midway between the Herefordshire market town of Ledbury and the Gloucestershire town of Tewkesbury, being roughly 7 miles east of the former and west of the latter. Berrow sits a half mile south of the A438 road which connects the two. Berrow is a tiny place, just a cluster of farms with the wider parish having farms and cottages scattered across the land between the hamlet and the southern end of the Malvern Hills. Despite today's rural isolation modern developments have been made, the M50 motorway runs just over a mile to the south of Berrow. The area is a farming landscape but with a varied regime, pastures dominate but there is also cereals and cider orchards too, the local stone of the Malverns is also quarried for local use. Berrow is drained eastwards by a series of small brooks traveling the short distance to the River Severn, here matters turn south to reach the Bristol Channel. Berrow is sited at around 20 metres above the sea in gently undulating land which rises westwards to reach 191 metres on the southern end of the Malvern Hills at Chase End Hill. Berrow parish was fairly typically sized for its area, covering close to 2,100 acres it would have supported a population of 500 parishioners. Berrow is not specifically mentioned in Domesday Book despite the church showing styles of that period.

The Church

St Faith's church sits at the end of Church Lane, which forms Berrow's main access, it reaches a small triangular green outside what was clearly from its design the former village inn now a private house, from here a tarred path heads south the short distance to the church. From its Norman origins little remains, the northern doorway showing Romanesque styling in its shafts and arch. A scatter of lancet windows also remain from the early 13th century but much else was rebuilt during the late 13th and early 14th centuries. The chancel from this period has Decorated styles in its side windows but a Perpendicular east window, the southern arcade is also from the Perpendicular era. Tudor style windows on the southern aisle show work continuing into the 16th century whilst the Victorians also did their usual restoration in the 1850s to arrive at today's church. Parking by the green is possible, the tarred path leading the short distance to a churchyard which has no obstructions to the photographer.