Bishops Waltham, Hampshire

Description
Bishops-Waltham, a small town and a parish in Hants. The town stands at the source of the river Hamble, and has a station on the L. & S.W.R., 81 miles from London, 3 1/2 NNE of Botley, and 9 1/2 SE of Winchester. It figured at Domesday as a considerable village, was mentioned by Leland as a "praty tounlet," and is now a neatly-built market-town. It has a post, money order, and telegraph office (S.O.), a bank, a church, a chapel, and the ruins of an episcopal palace. A reading-room with library was established in 1873. The church is ancient and large, built of brick, stone, and flint£the chancel possibly erected by William of Wykeham; the rest is chiefly in Perpendicular English, of the 17th century. It was restored in 1868, and an organ was added in 1873. The palace was originally built by Bishop Henry de Blois, brother of King Stephen; underwent much alteration by subsequent bishops, particularly by William of Wykeham, who died in it; was a parallelogram of two courts, with square towers at the angles; and suffered demolition in the Civil War. Henry II. held a great council in it in 1182; Richard Coeur de Lion was grandly entertained in it after his coronation at Winchester; and Bishop Poynet made it over to the Marquis of Winches-terin the time of Edward VI. The chief parts of it now standing are a ruined tower of early date and the front of the great hall, 65 feet long, possibly the work of Wykeham. A large pond lies in front of it, receiving brooks from the neighbourhood, and discharging the Hamble river. A park of 1000 acres lay around it devoted to the chase, but is now under cultivation. Waltham Chase lay to the SE, well stocked, with deer till the beginning of the 17th century; infested then by a notorious gang of deer-stealers known as the Waltham Blacks; and now a rough common of about 2000 acres. The manor belonged to the Bishops of Winchester from the earliest times, and though alienated by Bishop Poynet along with the palace, came back to them at the Restoration. Fairs are now extinct. The Royal Albert Infirmary stands on a neighbouring hill, was founded in 1864, and has over the entrance a fine terra-cotta statue of the late Prince Consort. The parish includes the tithings of Ashton, Curdridge, and West Hoe, and the hamlets of Dean and Dundridge. Acreage, 7429 ; population of the civil parish, 2842; of the ecclesiastical, 2176. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Winchester; value, £900. Patron, the Bishop of Winchester. The perpetual curacy of Curdridge is a separate charge. There are Congregational and Methodist chapels and numerous charities.