Settlement Association

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Abbots Langley in Hertfordshire also has a church named The Church of the Ascension in its local environs.

 

[DerekC]

Abbots Langley possesses a Prince Albert's Model Cottage, a design sponsored by the Prince for what would now be called social housing. Whilst the idea was popular with the public it was not a commercial success and few were built. The original was constructed in 1851 at Kensington Barracks, close to but not on the Great Exhibition site (because the organisers didn't want social issues to be portrayed in the Exhibition) and rebuilt at Kennington where it still stands.

 

[EbbwJunction1]

Kennington is the location of the Oval cricket ground; St John's Wood is the location of Lord's cricket ground.

 

[Calthrop]

J R R Tolkien lived in Edgbaston in his teenage years and the idea of two towers, good and evil, was apparently prompted by two towers in the town. Less plausible seems the idea that the industrial wilderness of Isengard and the tower of Orthanc was prompted by a water mill at Hall Green.

(Not a posting in the game -- just "general") -- mention Tolkien in my vicinity, at your peril ! Topic "him and water mills": I'm given to understand that the water mill at Sarehole -- south of Birmingham, in what was in JRRT's childhood a deeply rural setting, and is quite rural-looking even today -- was his inspiration for the establishment of that kind in Hobbiton, in the Shire in Lord Of The Rings: up to and including his feeling that the younger miller, of the father-and-son team who ran the place, seemed a rather dodgy-looking sort; hence Sam's enemy Ted the "young miller", in the book.

 

[Calthrop]

Kennington is the location of the Oval cricket ground; St John's Wood is the location of Lord's cricket ground.

Sir Bernard Spilsbury (1877 -- 1947), the highly eminent pathologist whose work assisted in the solving of many celebrated criminal cases, lived for a fair length of time in St. John's Wood; he was born in Leamington Spa.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Slough also lies on the line of the Grand Union Canal.

 

[Calthrop]

Concerning poems by John Betjeman: a famous one of his, anathemises Slough; but in another he writes favourably of Dawlish, Devon.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Brightwell-cum-Sotwell in Oxfordshire also has a church that is dedicated to St Agatha.

 

[Calthrop]

The Rev. William Ralph Inge -- Dean of St Paul's for a couple of decades early-ish in the 20th century, and widely regarded as somewhat misanthropic -- spent the latter years of his life in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. He was born in Crayke, North Yorkshire -- near Easingwold.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Sutton-under-Whitestonecliffe in North Yorkshire was also once administered by the Hundred of Yarlestre.

 

[DerekC]

Sutton-under-Whitestonecliffe has the distinction of being the longest (hyphenated) place-name in England. For contrast the shortest in the UK is Ae, Dumfries and Galloway.

 

[Calthrop]

Sutton-under-Whitestonecliffe has the distinction of being the longest (hyphenated) place-name in England. For contrast the shortest in the UK is Ae, Dumfries and Galloway.

Venerable folklore has ascribed to the young fellows of the above-bolded's general area, the traits of being rough and tough and not to be messed with. The same kind of sources have made the same claim for those of Mallow, Co. Cork.

 

[EbbwJunction1]

The Scottish singer, songwriter and guitarist Donovan (Donovan Phillips Leitch) was born on 10th May 1946 in Maryhill, Glasgow; he now lives near Mallow.

 

[Calthrop]

Maryhill is one of the remarkably many settlements in the more northerly reaches of Europe -- both British Isles, and on the Continent -- to have been referred to (often, one feels, incongruously) as "The Venice of the North": in Maryhill's case, for its canals and for its having been big in the glass industry. Another British settlement to have borne this appellation is Skipton, North Yorkshire.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Beaumaris in Anglesey also has a ruined castle.

 

[EbbwJunction1]

Abergavenny in Monmouthshire also has an Annual Food Festival.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Inverness was also chosen as the site for a lunatic asylum.

 

[DerekC]

Craig Phadraig near Inverness is the site of a vitrified fort, an ancient fortification whose walls have been partially vitrified by intense heat. There are many in Scotland but few elsewhere. Another example is at Trusty's Hill near Gatehouse of Fleet, Dumfries and Galloway

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Macclesfield in Cheshire East also has a church named the Church of the Resurrection.

The one in Gatehouse of Fleet was only opened in 1971 and the decision was taken in 2020 to close it and to use the site for housing.

 

[Calthrop]

Department of "settlements being regarded as sub-optimal" by various unkind folks: quoting Wiki, "In 2004, research was published in The Times naming Macclesfield and its borough the most uncultured town in Britain, based on its lack of theatres, cinemas and other cultural facilities." Suffering from rather similar opprobrium is Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire; voted in a 2013 poll mounted by the authors of the "C*** Towns" books, as England's ugliest town.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Bicester in Oxfordshire was also granted bailwick status in medieval times.

 

[341o2]

Bicester lies on the route of the A41, a road which has been largely rebuilt to near motorway standards, the first section to be rebuilt was the A41M Tring bypass, although this section has now been reclassified as an A road rather than a motorway

 

[Calthrop]

There's a nice limerick about a completely tone-deaf old fellow of Tring. Oddly, W.S. Gilbert of Gilbert & Sullivan was also tone-deaf or the nearest thing to it (the pair divided things up: Bill did the words, Art did the music). From his success with the operas, Gilbert had built an opulent country house -- where he spent his latter years -- in Harrow Weald, London Borough of Harrow.

 

[EbbwJunction1]

Captain William Leefe Robinson VC (1895 – 1918) was the first British pilot to shoot down a German airship over Britain during the First World War. For this, he was awarded the Victoria Cross (VC), the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces, and was the first person to be awarded the VC for action in the UK. He was born in India, and died in Stanmore, Middlesex; he is buried in All Saints' Churchyard Extension, Harrow Weald.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Kirby Bellars in Leicestershire was also chosen as a site for a priory of the Canons Regular of St Augustine.

 

[DerekC]

From Kirby Bellars it's a walk of only 1.5 miles on a public footpath to the neighbouring village of Frisby on the Wreake which I just had to mention!

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Dodbrooke in Devon also has a church that is dedicated to St Thomas of Canterbury.

 

[godfreycomplex]

Bowness on Windermere also has a holiday lodging dedicated to the goddess Aphrodite

(Whether the flats have been anointed with the blood of a sacrificial dove on the fourth day of Hekatombion in the customary fashion alas isn’t plain)

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Exeter also has a church that is dedicated to St Martin.

 

[EbbwJunction1]

Exeter Cathedral was founded in 1050 when the bishop's seat was moved from the nearby town of Crediton (the birthplace of Saint Boniface) because Exeter's Roman walls offered better protection against "pirates", presumably Vikings.