In 1870-72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described Wiveliscombe like this:
WIVELISCOMBE-popularly Wilscombe-a small town, a parish, and a subdistrict, in Wellington district, Somerset. The town stands on a 1ow hill,5½ miles NW of Wellington r. station; is traditionally said to have been built by the Saxons, when driven by the Danes from Castle hill, which had been occupied by the Romans; was given by Edward the Confessor to the cathedral of Wells, and had a palace of the Bishops; is now a seat of petty sessions and a polling place; consists of several streets, with some good modern houses and a number of old ones; and has a post-office‡ under Wellington, Somerset, a banking office two chief inns, a police station, a town hall, a church rebuilt in 1829, Independent and Wesleyan chapels, a national school, a dispensary, charities £100, a very large brewery, a weekly market on Tuesday, great markets on the last Tuesday of Feb. ...
and July, and fairs on 12 May and 25 Sept. The parish includes four hamlets, and comprises 5,984 acres. Real property, £13,958; of which £120 are in gasworks. Pop., 2,735. Houses, 607. The manor belongs to Lord Ashburton. There are slate quarries, and remains of Roman and Danish camps. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Bath and Wells. Value, £300. Patron, the Prebendary of Wiveliscombe.—The sub-district contains 4 parishes. Acres, 10,949. Pop., 3,526. Houses, 764.
Wiveliscombe through time
Wiveliscombe is now part of Taunton Deane district. Click here for graphs and data of how Taunton Deane has changed over two centuries. For statistics about Wiveliscombe itself, go to Units and Statistics.
GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth, History of Wiveliscombe, in Taunton Deane and Somerset | Map and description, A Vision of Britain through Time.
URL: https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/25
Date accessed: 16th April 2024
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