HARESFIELD
HARESFIELD, a rural parish, lies 5 miles south of
Gloucester. The ancient parish, long and narrow in
shape, lay in three parts: Parkend tithing included
the hamlet of that name and 851 a. in the west of
the parish, Haresfield tithing comprised the central
area with 1,294 a., and Harescombe tithing was a
geographically distinct area of 725 a. east of Haresfield Hill, including Stockend and part of Harescombe village. (fn. 1) In 1885 Harescombe tithing, with a
population of 152 in 37 houses, was transferred to
Harescombe parish, and Colethrop, a tithing of
Standish with 79 people in 18 houses, was transferred to Haresfield. Haresfield also received small
areas of Brookthorpe and Randwick, and lost small
areas to Brookthorpe, Hardwicke, Quedgeley, and
Standish. (fn. 2) After the changes Haresfield parish
covered 2,948 a. (fn. 3) The account here printed relates
to the area of Haresfield and Parkend tithings; the
history of Harescombe tithing is reserved, with that
of Harescombe parish, for a later volume, and Colethrop is dealt with below as part of Standish.
The greater part of the parish, which extends to
within ½ mile of the Severn, lies on the Lower Lias
at c. 50 ft. To the east the land, formed by successive
layers of the Middle and Upper Lias and the
Inferior Oolite, (fn. 4) rises steeply to Haresfield Beacon (fn. 5)
at c. 700 ft. and beyond it to the ridge of the Cotswolds at over 800 ft. Two streams, the northern
called Puddingworth brook, the southern Budge
brook, (fn. 6) rise on the hill and flow westward through
the parish. Stone was being quarried on the hill in
the mid 15th century, (fn. 7) and there has been fairly
extensive working on its summit. The fortifications
on the hill are thought to have formed a single
early Iron Age camp, out of which the smaller camp
at the western end was made during occupation in
the Roman period; in 1837 a crock of 3rd-century
Roman coins was found in the western part of the
camp. (fn. 8) The fortifications were formerly known as
Evesbury. (fn. 9) In 1931 the western area was acquired
by the National Trust. (fn. 10) The Highwood mentioned
in 1460 was presumably on the hill, (fn. 11) and there was a
beech wood there in the 16th century. (fn. 12) In 1967 there
was a small wood below the summit on the northwest and another wood lower down the hill. In 1543
120 oaks were mentioned in the lower part of the
parish. (fn. 13) A park had been made west of the Gloucester-Bristol road by the mid 12th century; (fn. 14)
Humphrey de Bohun was given 16 deer to stock it in
1251, (fn. 15) and there were deer in it in the 16th century. (fn. 16) In the early 17th century the park, then
divided into several fields, covered 220 a. (fn. 17) The area
west of the park, which was liable to flooding by the
Severn, (fn. 18) was formerly all meadow land; the central
area of the parish contained some open fields,
inclosed by 1831, and a larger acreage of pasture and
orchard, and the hill was used for grazing. (fn. 19) An
airfield built in the Second World War east of
Parkend was used later, until c. 1965, as a testingground by the Gloucester Aircraft Co. (fn. 20) North of
the airfield is an outlying camp of R.A.F. Quedgeley.
A wartime military camp in the former park had
been dismantled by 1967.
The Mount, a moated mound on Puddingworth
brook, perhaps marks the earliest settlement in
Haresfield village. The church had been built near
it by the mid 12th century. (fn. 21) Budge brook was also
apparently exploited for a moat at Haresfield
Court. (fn. 22) The main village developed along the road
east of those two sites; the road was apparently the
main route from Gloucester to Standish and Stonehouse before the mid 13th century when the road
from Little Haresfield to the Gloucester-Bristol
road at Hardwicke was built by Gloucester Abbey. (fn. 23)
A few houses lay scattered near the Cross, the roadjunction east of the church, where there was a
village green until inclosure. (fn. 24) A medieval stone
cross stood at the junction; its remains were used for
road-mending in the early 19th century. (fn. 25) Starsmead, a 19th-century brick house to the west,
occupies the site of a house mentioned in the late
17th century, (fn. 26) and two timber-framed cottages to
the south of it were built by then. The Vales to the
north and another house to the east, which stand at
the limits of the former green, were also probably
built in the 17th century; both are in Cotswold style,
of rubble with stone-mullioned windows with
dripmoulds. Teekles, some way to the east, is a
larger house of similar type and date. A quarter of a
mile to the south of the Cross a more concentrated
group of houses formed a small village street east of
Haresfield Court. A few earlier rubble cottages
survive there, but most of the cottages in the street
were rebuilt in stone in Cotswold style in the 19th
century; they were probably, like the Beacon Hotel
built c. 1855 in the same style but in brick, designed
by Francis Niblett. (fn. 27) In the 19th century and early
20th a few brick cottages were built in the village,
and in the mid 20th century a small council estate
was built east of the Cross.
At Lower Green, where there was a green until
inclosure, (fn. 28) there is a gabled farm-house of rubble; a
cruck-framed barn stood beside it until the mid
20th century. Malthouse Farm, on the road leading
up the hill, replaced a timber-framed house in the
1950s. (fn. 29) Several houses had been built higher up the
road by the 17th century. The College, called by that
name in 1793 when it comprised 4 tenements, (fn. 30) is
a 16th- or early 17th-century house of coursed rubble, which had a timber-framed portion destroyed in
the mid 20th century. (fn. 31) Opposite there is a timberframed cottage, and on the same road, below the
camp, a small group of houses includes a rubble
cottage with mullioned windows with dripmoulds,
partly faced in rough-cast, and a later cottage and
farm-house in rubble. There are three farm-houses
on the north of the village. Chestnut Farm and
Mount Farm are described below. (fn. 32) Round House
Farm appears to be basically a house of c. 1500 and
has a west wing of close-studded timber-framing
with a jettied end and moulded bressummer. The
house was remodelled in 1688 by John Rogers, (fn. 33) who
gave it a south wing, possibly timber-framed but
rough-cast and tile-hung in 1967, and a hipped roof
of Cotswold stone tiles. A timber-framed barn was
added by Rogers in 1692. (fn. 34)
Parkend, a hamlet partly of timber-framed, partly
of early-19th-century cottages on the Gloucester-
Bristol road, is likely to have been a fairly early
settlement, although the name has not been found
recorded before 1588. (fn. 35) The George Inn in Haresfield, said to have belonged to Llanthony Priory
and to have been granted to William Partridge
c. 1563, (fn. 36) was apparently at Parkend. (fn. 37) Parkend was
described as a village and had an inn in 1675, (fn. 38) and
had 16 houses c. 1710. (fn. 39) Hiltmead Farm east of
Parkend is a 17th-century timber-framed farmhouse. West of Parkend, Oakey Farm was a medieval house, and Parkend Lodge occupies a medieval
site; both are discussed below. (fn. 40)
The Gloucester-Bristol road, the chief thoroughfare in the parish, was mentioned in the mid 12th
century; (fn. 41) it was called Hoskareslo in 1363 when the
lords of the manors and the township of Haresfield
were responsible for repairing it. (fn. 42) The road and that
running to it from Little Haresfield were turnpikes
from 1726 to 1877. (fn. 43) The road running north from
Haresfield village past Green Street Cottages was
evidently the Green Street mentioned in 1475. (fn. 44)
The Gloucester and Berkeley Canal crossing the west
of the parish was opened in 1827; (fn. 45) the Haresfield-
Epney road, called Park Lane from the 15th century, (fn. 46) is carried over it on a swing bridge where there
is one of the small Doric canal lodges. The Bristol
and Gloucester railway with a station in Haresfield
village was opened in 1844; (fn. 47) the station was closed
in 1965. (fn. 48)
Seventeen inhabitants of Haresfield were assessed
for tax in 1327. (fn. 49) There were c. 244 communicants
in 1551, (fn. 50) and 47 households in 1563. (fn. 51) In 1650
there were 130 families. (fn. 52) In 1678 592 people were
enumerated in the parish; (fn. 53) only a small proportion
of them lived in Harescombe tithing which had 13
houses in 1672 compared with 80 in Haresfield and
Parkend tithings. (fn. 54) About 1710, however, the population of the parish was estimated at c. 500, (fn. 55) and it
was said to have remained at that figure c. 1775. (fn. 56)
In 1783 there were 73 families in Haresfield and
Parkend tithings, and 37 in Harescombe tithing. (fn. 57)
In 1801 553 people were enumerated and the population remained at c. 600 until 1881; the boundary
changes of 1885 caused a reduction to 458. There was
no great variation from that figure until 1931; but
between 1931 and 1951 there was a considerable rise
to 718, resulting presumably from the presence of
military installations, but by 1961 the population
had fallen to 432. (fn. 58)
Alehouses at Haresfield were mentioned in 1662
and 1665; (fn. 59) both references may have been to the
inn at Parkend. There was a victualler in the parish
in 1755. (fn. 60) In 1891 there were three public houses,
the Beacon Hotel, the 'Merry Fellow', and another; (fn. 61)
in 1967 there was only the Beacon Hotel. A Benefit and Assurance Club was started in the parish
c. 1845. (fn. 62) In the 17th and 18th century there were
several leading families in the community, but from
the early 19th century the enlargement of the Haresfield Court estate gave the function of squire to the
Nibletts and their successors. (fn. 63)