Lower Heyford

Lower Heyford is a village in Oxfordshire next to the river Cherwell and the Oxford Canal and is about midway between Banbury and Oxford.

There has been settlement in the area since before Anglo-Saxon times, the pre-Saxon Aves ditch marking the Eastern boundary of Lower Heyford parish. The village is known in Saxon chronicles and the later Domesday Book as Hegford or Haiforde. The village is also sometimes known as Heyford Bridge. It is thought the village has been continually inhabited since the sixth century at least.

After the Norman conquest Lower Heyford was given to Geoffery de Montbray, a senior and trusted adviser of William and the bishop of Coutances. In later times (the sixteenth century) the manor was sold to Corpus Christi College, Oxford. Corpus Christi still owned the estate in the 1950s.

Economically Lower Heyford had always been a rural backwater and the local economy was mostly agricultural. The village had a couple of watermills on the Cherwell, the arrival of the Oxford Canal in the 1790 meant that coal could be easily bought from coal fields elsewhere in the Midlands and unloaded at Heyford Wharf.

[1] "Parishes: Lower Heyford." A History of the County of Oxford: Volume 6. Ed. Mary D Lobel. London: Victoria County History, 1959. 182-195. British History Online. Web. 2 March 2019. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/oxon/vol6/pp182-195.

Bicester North railway station

Bicester North railway station in Oxfordshire was built as a stop on the Great Western Railway Chiltern Main Line, opening in 1910. It was Bicester's second station - the other being the London and North West Railway's Bicester London Road, later called Bicester Town and nowadays Bicester Village on the line to Oxford).

The station as built was far more elaborate than the station which exists now. Like many stations before the Beeching cuts of the 1960s Bicester North had a goods yard and a couple of through roads. The Chiltern line was drastically cut back in the late 1960s, being singled for a lot of its stretch though a loop was retained at Bicester North [1]. The track was redoubled in the early 2000s and remodelled through the station to allow for higher speeds. The space formally occupied by the through road became the new Up (London) bound track through the station. The platform was widened as a result (which is why the waiting rooms and other buildings on that platform are so far back!)

The main station building is little changed since the opening of the station with the original canopy. The footbridge has been changed over the years though is largely as it was since the station was built, though lifts have been added. Originally the bridge had to span four tracks hence its width!

Chiltern 165 002 pulls into the station on a Marylebone bound service 

Main station building

View of the footbridge, note the width of the Up platform

View towards Banbury

Platform shelter, advertising Chiltern services to Stratford-upon-Avon

[1] Vic Mitchell & Keith Smith, Princes Risborough to Banbury (Middleton Press, 2001) plate 63

Tomb of John de Nowers... or is it?

Inside Christ Church cathedral in Oxford is the effigy of a tall knight in full armour however it is not quite how it first appears...

The figure bears the garb and crest of the Nowers family. Which Nowers the effigy represents however is in question. It is thought it represents John de Nowers who died in 1386. It has also been suggested it represents Sir George Nowers who was Lord of the Manor of Tackley and died in 1425. The armour the effigy wears would be wrong for the period however.

The tomb has an interesting origin [1]. Analysis of the tomb itself under the effigy has revealed what appears to be a greyhound and crests of the de Gaynsfords. The tomb was therefore possible appropriated by the Nowers and a new effigy installed on it. The effigy itself has signs parts of it coming from different origins, the feet being cut into a de Gaynsford greyhound. It is possible therefore that the feet are from the original effigy. The rest being removed and replaced by one representing Nowers.

[1] Mark Turnham Elvins, "The knight and the appropriated tomb", Christ Church Library Newsletter Vol 6 Issue 2 (2010) p. 12

Banbury Museum

Banbury Museum is small but has an interesting collection of artefacts from the town's industrial and civic past including the Civil War in Banbury and industries of Victorian Banbury.