Visit Pudleston Places

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The Walkfo guide to things to do & explore in Pudleston

  

Pudleston Places Overview: History, Culture & Facts about Pudleston

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Pudleston history

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According to A Dictionary of British Place Names and The Concise Oxfordshire Dictionary of English Place-names Pudleston derives from the Old English ‘pytell’ with ‘dūn’ meaning “hill of the mouse-hawk or of a man called Pytell”. Listed in the 1086 Domesday Book as ‘Pillesdune’, it was written in 1212 as ‘Putlesdone’, in 1242 as ‘Puttlesdune’, and in 1249 as ‘Pudlesdun’. Domesday describes Pudleston as a manor in the Wolfhay Hundred of Herefordshire, and with 14 households. There were five smallholders (middle level of serf below a villager), eight slaves, and a Frenchman. There was ploughland area defined by two lord’s and two men’s plough teams. In 1066, at the time of the Norman Conquest, Wulfward was the manorial lord, this later in 1086 passing to Hugh de Lacy, subordinate to Roger de Lacy the tenant-in-chief to king William I. In 1858 and 1909 Pudleston is described as a civil parish which included the hamlet of Brockmanton and the township of Whyle, with scattered population, on the north of the road (a turnpike in 1858), from Leominster to Worcester, with its boundary at the south formed by the Humber Brook, and about 2.5 miles (4 km) north-east from Steens Bridge station on the Leominster, Bromyard and Ledbury and Worcester section of the Great Western Railway. It was in the Northern division of Herefordshire, the Wolphy hundred, and under the Union,—poor relief and joint parish workhouse provision set up under the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834—petty sessional division and county court district of Leominster. Pudleston was in the Leominster rural deanery of the Archdeaconry and Diocese of Hereford. St Peter’s Church, which had been rebuilt in 1813, comprised a chancel, a nave of three bays and a clerestory, aisles, a south porch, and four bells, one of which was previously in the parish hamlet of Whyle, in a “low” western tower with a spire. The south aisle with arcade and clerestory was built in 1850 for £916, and the chancel restored in 1857 for £615, by Henry Woodyer. The chancel is floored with encaustic tiles and contains a carved stone reredos, a piscina, and a sedilia. All windows in the church contain stained glass. The church had seating for 200 people, and held a parish register dating to 1560. The 1909 incumbent’s living was a rectory with a net yearly income of £300 in 1858 and £180 in 1909, and 100 acres (40 ha) of glebe—an area of land used to support a parish priest—and a rectory house, the rector also being the curate—assistant to the parish priest—of Ducklow. The living was in the gift of Elias Chadwick of Pudleston Court in 1858, and George Ernest Wright JP in 1909 who was the lord of the manor, the chief parish landowner, and also of Pudleston Court which was described as a “handsome modern mansion, in the castellated style, standing on an eminence in a beautifully undulating park of over 200 acres (81 ha), ornamented with shrubberies, plantations and sheets of water,” and “commanding “beautiful and extensive views of a rich agricultural county, and the Welsh mountains.” Between 1900 and 1999 Pudleston Court was a school The parish, with a population of 316 in 1851, and 212 in 1901, had a water area of 9 acres (4 ha), and land area of 1,769 acres (716 ha), the soil of clay and loam over a subsoil of gravel, on which were grown wheat, beans, hops, clover and apples, with pasture. Parish hamlets were Whyle and Brockmanton. Whyle, less than 1 mile (1.6 km) to the north-west from the church, is noted as once containing an “ancient” chapel dedicated to St John, its site being within an orchard but of which no trace remained. Brockmanton, 1 mile to the west from the church, is described as “pleasantly situated near the Stamford Brook,” and containing the two “respectable” farmhouses of Brockmanton Hall and Brockmanton Court. At the southern edge of the parish is the farmhouse of Ford Abbey, which had been in religious possession connected to Leominster Priory; in 1858 there remained evidence of a chapel. The parish had no post office; a letter box was near the church rectory residence, the mail processed through Leominster which was the nearest money order office. A National School in 1858 accommodated 45 pupils. A new mixed public elementary school had been built in 1876 for 51 pupils; its average attendance in 1909 was 34. Land of one acre had been bought in 1873 for £56 by the chief landowner of Brockmanton, the rector, and churchwardens to build a school “for the education of poor persons in the parish of Pudleston in the principles of the Church of England.” The following year the school had been built, run by a headmistress who taught 51 pupils. The school closed in 1982, with the building converted to a village hall. Commercial occupations at Pudleston in 1858 included ten farmers, a schoolmaster, two shoe makers, two millers, a wheelwright, blacksmith, tailor, the schoolmaster and the parish clerk. In 1909 these included nine farmers, three of whom were a cottage farmers, and one who grew hops, two carriers—transporters of trade goods, with sometimes people, between different settlements—a shopkeeper, and a gardener. At Whyle there were two farmers, two shopkeepers, a blacksmith, a carrier, and a gamekeeper to the lord of the manor. At Brockmanton was a farmer & hop grower at Brockmanton Court. A parish shop and a post office closed in 1977. Elias Chadwick (1813 – 1875), born in Lancashire, was a director of the Shrewsbury and Hereford and Leominster and Kington railways, and was a Herefordshire Deputy Lieutenant, High sheriff, Freemason, public benefactor, and a Lancashire and Herefordshire Justice of the Peace. He bought Puddleston Court, an English country house, in 1845 after the death of its previous owner, the rector of Pudleston and curate of the adjacent parish of Hatfield. Over the following two years Chadwick rebuilt the house, in pink sandstone with a battlemented roof line, to the designs of Liverpool architect J.T. Brearley. In the late 20th century Pudleston Court was the home of Albert Heijn Jr., a Dutch supermarket entrepreneur, until his death in 2011.

Pudleston landmarks

The Grade II* Church of St Peter dates to c.1200, the chancel the 13th century, the north aisle to 1813, and the south aisle to 1850. Pudleston Court is a 19th-century English country house of two-storeys with attic in Tudor-Gothic style built for Elias Chadwick, and begun in 1846 by Liverpool architect J.T. Brearley. The house is of pink sandstone with grey stone and grey stone quoins.

Pudleston geography / climate

Pudleston parish is approximately 2 miles (3 km) from north to south and 2.5 miles (4 km) east to west, with an area of 7.19 square kilometres (719 ha) Adjacent parishes are Leysters at the north, Kimbolton at the west, Leominster at the south-east, Docklow and Hampton Wafer, Hatfield and Newhampton and the Worcestershire parish of Bockleton. The parish is rural, of farms, fields, managed woodland and coppices, streams, ponds, streams and ponds.

You can visit Pudleston places with Walkfo Pudleston to hear history at Pudleston’s places whilst walking around using the free digital tour app. Walkfo Pudleston has 7 places to visit in our interactive Pudleston map, with amazing history, culture & travel facts you can explore the same way you would at a museum or art gallery with information audio headset. With Walkfo, you can travel by foot, bike or bus throughout Pudleston, being in the moment, without digital distraction or limits to a specific walking route. Our historic audio walks, National Trust interactive audio experiences, digital tour guides for English Heritage locations are available at Pudleston places, with a AI tour guide to help you get the best from a visit to Pudleston & the surrounding areas.

“Curated content for millions of locations across the UK, with 7 audio facts unique to Pudleston places in an interactive Pudleston map you can explore.”

Walkfo: Visit Pudleston Places Map
7 tourist, history, culture & geography spots

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Pudleston historic spots	Pudleston tourist destinations	Pudleston plaques	Pudleston geographic features
Walkfo Pudleston tourism map key: places to see & visit like National Trust sites, Blue Plaques, English Heritage locations & top tourist destinations in Pudleston

  

Best Pudleston places to visit

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Pudleston has places to explore by foot, bike or bus. Below are a selection of the varied Pudleston’s destinations you can visit with additional content available at the Walkfo Pudleston’s information audio spots:

Visit Pudleston plaques