DIRECTORY.] ~ HIRE. AXBRlDGE. 29 - Spencer esq. of Poundsmead, , are the chief land- The villages of NETTLEB&IDGE and GuRNEY SLADE are owners. Ifartly in this parish. Petroleum was discovered in this parish in 1894 on the estate of R. C. Strachey esq. and on examination by experts PosT & M. 0. 0., S. B. & Annuity & Insurance Office, was declared to be very pure, with the exceptionally high Gurney Slade.-James Brown, sub-postmaster. Letters flashing point of 175; its commercial importance has yet to received from Bath, arrive 7·5 a.m. & 6.20 p.m. for be determined. The soil is light loam ; subsoil, limestone. callers; dispatched 6.15 & 8.20 p.m. The nearest The land is chiefly in pasture. The area is 1,385 acres; telegraph office is at Oakhill. WALL Box, Nettlebridge, rateable value, £3,225 Ss. ; t.he population in 1891 was 816 cleared at 6 p.m. week days only m the civil and 640 in the ecclesiastical parish. D'Aguilar Rev. J ohnBurton B. A. Vicarage Fowler Abraham, farmer & public vaccinator No. 2 distric~ Davis Miss, Oakhill house Gould Abraham,shopkeeper,Nettlebrdg union & certifying Major Robert Augustus Hamblin Henry, engineer, Pound cot factory surgeon, court Powell Lewis, Ashwick court Hull William, farmer, Tape hill Selway Ann (Miss), private school, Spencer Mrs. John Maitland, Hillylands Lambert Edmund, farmer, West farm Harridge villa Webster CoL Charles Hy.Ashwick grove LongmanGeo.comsn.agent,Nettlebrdge Snook Richard, carpenter COMMERCIAL, Moon Alfred, farmer, Church farm Snook Robert, farmer, Highcroft cot Bown Edward, farmer, Gales farm Morgan George, farmer, Romead Speed :Frederick, farmer, Neighbourne Brown James, shopkeeper, Post office, Oram Frederick, carpenter & builder, TappJamesRichard,farmr.Neighbourne Gurney Slade Beech Row house Tapp William, farmer, Harridge house Burr Richard, Mendip inn Pearce Harriet (Mrs.), George inn, ThornArthurJas.farmer,Limekiln farm Chappell George Edwin,farmer & miller Nettlebridge Trussler Alban, gardener to Col. Charles (water), Gurney Slade Perry Mary Elizabeth (Mrs.), George 1 Henry Webster Chard Ernest, farmer, Rookery farm inn, Gurney Slade Tucker Benjamin, Duke of Wellington Cosh Waiter, farmer & assistant over­ Pope Albert, scripture reader Somerset inn, Nettlebridge seer, Highcroft Evangelist Society Wilcox Israel, Fire Engine inn Doman John, farmer, Strouds farm Powell Lewis L.R.C.P.Edin.,M.R.c.s.Eng. Young William, lime burner Fitch Geo. clerk at New Nock collieries physician & surgeon & medical officer

AXBRIDGE, formerly a borough, and once a market 1 repairs were effected : in a pew under the pulpit was found town, is the head of a union, petty sessional division and a singular painting of Our Saviour on oak panelling, and county court district, with a station on the Cheddar Valley conjectured to date from the latter part of the 14th century: branch of the , and is 20 miles from there are numerous marble monuments to the Prowse and , 10 north-west from Wells and 138 from London, in other families: in the north aisle there is a brass, in, good the hundred of Winterstoke, Wells division of the county, preservation, with kneeling effigies to Roger Harper, mer­ rural deanery of , archdeaconry of Wells and dio- chant of Axbridge, ob, 22 August, and Joan, his wife, ob. 22 cese of Bath and Wells. The town is irregularly built, and July, both in 1493 : in 1879, the whole of the exterior aud stands on the line of the old Roman road from Old Sarum interior stone work of the nave and aisles was restored and to the Bristol channel, south of, and immediately under, the the church reseated, at a cost of £3,192, of which Charles , and being sheltered from north and north-west Edwards esq . .J.P. of The Grove, Wrington, gave £ I,ooo : winds by those lofty heights the air is peculiarly soft and the chancel was afterwards restored at a cost of £856: in salubrious ; it is lighted with gas supplied by a company and 1884 a further sum of £140 was raised and s~ent on the supplied with water from wells. The now extinct borough restoration of the north transept, at which time a new organ was one of high antiquity, and charters exist among the of the value of £245 was placed there: aud in 1877 the archives of the dissolved corporation, renewed by different work was completed at a cost of nearly £r,3oo, when the monarchs from the days of Edward the Confessor down to stained east window was given by esq. of Lang­ the reign of Queen Elizabeth, under whose charter the town ford: in 1888 a beautiful low metal screen was presented was till recently governed; but the corporation, which con- by H. F. 'riarks esq. and four carved oak screenJ from sisted of a mayor, one alderman, recorder, 8 common coun- designs of the late Mr. J. D. Sedding, architect, were erected cillors and 22 burgesses, was abolished in 1886 by the Un- at a cost of £280; the total cl!lst exceeded£s,soo: there are reformed Corporations Act, 1883 (46 and 47 Vict. c. 18). 400 sittings. The register dates from the year 1562. Th() Under a scheme of the Charity Commissioners, dated 1oth living is a rectory, net yearly value £150, including 30 acres May, 1889, the funds of the town are now administered by of glebe and residence, in the gift of the Bishop of Hatband a Town Trust, consisting of ten trustees. Axbridge appears Wells, and held since 1883 by the Rev. Henry Toft,chaplain to have been a place of some importance in the Roman to Axbridge union and surrogate. There is a Wesleyan period, as several Roman roads intersect here; in later chapel in High street, with about 250 sittings. The Town times it was the centre of a royal hunting forest, and after- Hall, in The Square, is a modern building ; here the magis­ wards, for a long time, a demesne of the Crown, but the trates for the county hold meetings every fortnight. In the nominal royalty was vested in the corporation. In the years basement are shambles for butchers, but the market is now :1295, 1313, 1321·5, the town was represented in Parlia- extinct. The Axbridge and West Mendip Friendly Society ment, but on the petition of its inhabitants, representing hold its meetings here. There are also branches here of the their inability to bear the expense, it was "excused" in the Independent Order of Foresters, the Oddfellows and the 17th Edward Ill. (1343-4) from further representation. United Patriots Benefit Society. A very considerable por­ The church of St. John the Baptist, standing on an eminence, ~ion of the trade of the town and neighbourhood arises from is a large and handsome cruciform edifice in the Decorated the culture of strawberries, potatoes and peas, which are and Perpendicular styles, consisting of chancel with north produced in immense quantities under the Mendip range, and south chapels, nave, transepts, aisles, south porch aud and the early Axbridge potatoes are found in London, a fine tower with angle buttresses, terminating in crocketed Bristol, Manchester and Birmingham markets among the pinnacles and a richly pierced parapet: the tower contains first of the year. Iron ore has been found here, but it is 6 bells and a clock with chimes, placed in the tower in 1892 not worked. Three fairs are held here, on February 3rd at a cost of £126 Ios. raised by subscription ; on the west and March 25th and second Tuesday in October, according side is a canopied niche, inclosing a crowned figure carrying a to the charter ; and a monthly market on the second Toes­ sceptre, and probably representing Henry VII. who probably day in every month for the sale of cattle is well attended. rebuilt the tower; and on the ea.