Brampton Bryan, Herefordshire - Extract from National Gazetteer, 1868

"BRAMPTON BRYAN, a parish chiefly in the hundred of Wigmore, in the county of Hereford, but partly also in the hundred of Knighton, in the county of Radnor, South Wales, 6 miles to the N. of Presteign. Shrewsbury is its post town. It lies on the S. bank of the river Terns, and includes the townships of Boresford, the hamlets of Pedwardine and Brampton-Bryan, and the lordship of Stanage, the last being the only part of the parish in Radnorshire. The castle, which was founded here before the reign of Edward I., was the seat of the Harley family. It stood several sieges, and being garrisoned for the parliament in the civil war of the reign of Charles I., was at last burnt by the royalists.

The living is a rectory* in the diocese of Hereford, of the value of £350, in the patronage of Lady Langdale. The church is dedicated to St. Barnabas, and contains a monument; to Robert Harley, the first Earl of Oxford, by whose son, the second earl, the valuable collection of MSS. named after him the Harleian, and now in the British Museum, was formed. Part of the church was destroyed with the castle during the Civil War. There is a free school, endowed with £19 a year, the produce of a bequest by the Hon. Edward Harley in 1721. Coxwall Knoll, in an adjacent township, is interesting as the site of a camp occupied by the Britons under Caractacus, before his final defeat by Ostorius.

Not far from the church are the remains of the ancient castle, consisting of the gatehouse, flanked by two round towers, and part of the walls. Brampton Park occupies an elevated situation, and covers an area of above 6 miles in circuit, but contains no residence. A cattle fair is held in the village on the 22nd of June."

"BORESFORD, a township united with Pedwardine, in the parish of Brampton Bryan, hundred of Wigmore, in the county of Hereford, 4 miles to the N.E. of Presteign."

"PEDWARDINE, a hamlet in the parish of Brampton-Bryan, hundred of Wigmore, county Hereford, 4½ miles N.E. of Presteign. It is joined with Boresford to form a township Here was once a castle belonging to the family of Hay, barons of Pedwardine and earls of Kinnoul."

[Description(s) from The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868)
Transcribed by Colin Hinson ©2003]