The Parish Magazine
January '26
BERWICK ST JAMES
Happy New Year to everyone.
Welcome to Millie Night, we do hope you enjoy living in Berwick.
Speedy recovery to Margaret Mustill and all who are under the weather.
Many thanks go to everyone who helps in the village in all kinds of ways, and makes it such a special place to live.
Christmas Wreath making at the Boot Inn.
We had a great time making Christmas Wreaths at the Boot Inn, and would very much like to thank those who worked so hard to make it such a success and such fun. Special thanks to Winterbourne Stoke for including Berwick in this fun event.
CHURCH NEWS
I write this a week before the Carol Service so I am hopeful that all the hard work will make it a memorable service. As usual, very many thanks to Stephen Bush for organising it all, to Martin Gairdner and choir for the singing, to our readers, to the flower arrangers, to Ailsa Bush for the refreshments. Many others are contributing their time so sincere thanks to everybody involved in making this a wonderful service.
In January we have our two usual services, a Holy Communion at 9.30a.m on Sundy 4th January and our annual Plough Sunday Service at 11.00am on Sunday 18th. During this service at the traditional start of the agricultural year, we will bless a plough, which close up is a large and impressive piece of machinery. Bill Hiscocks.
TEA and CAKE and CHAT in the Reading Room
The January Tea and Chats are on Tuesdays 6th and 20th from 2.30 to 4pm. And the February ones on Tuesdays 3rd and 17th. Everyone is very much welcome – there is no charge. It was lovely to have small children playing whilst we had tea cakes and crumpets. We welcome all ages, and I will bring toys if needed! Nicky and Christine.
VILLAGE MEETINGS – 2026 DATES FOR YOUR DIARY
We have set a date for our Village Meeting for Thursday 22nd at 7pm as we must vote on our Precept early in the new year. Details of the Precept will be emailed beforehand. We are also planning to keynote guest speaker/s that evening for an open discussion about road concerns. Beyond that we have two further dates: Monday 2 March for a Cheese & Wine evening to discuss social events and Thursday 21 May for our AGM. All meetings take place in the Reading Room. Please pop these dates in your diary so we can ensure good attendance and variety or input. Julian Glyn-Owen Chair.
BERWICK BOOK CLUB
The Book Club has been reading many different entertaining and thought provoking books, and having fun chatting over wine once a month. Our next book is The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave.
CHRISTMAS FAIR AT BERWICK READING ROOM
The Reading Room Committee is delighted to let you know that we made a fabulous £460 for the Reading Room at the Christmas Fair on Saturday 22nd November. Thank you so much to everyone who donated, helped and came. It was lovely to have the extra stalls and the Hot Mulled Apple Juice was delicious! Thank you all again.
WILDLIFE WATCH
A pied flycatcher was seen in a Berwick garden in late November. This is surprising as they are migrants and usually long gone by November. Presumably there was still food available. Few blackbirds have been seen recently, I haven’t had any at my bird table for some time. However, the “Merlin” app heard at least one in the middle of Berwick at the start of December. Are there blackbirds in any of our villages?
LOCAL HISTORY
Dr Tom Heritage, who is an academic living in Barnet in London, has very kindly submitted this article as outreach for a project he is researching. He visited Berwick whilst a student at Southampton University, and he was “captivated by the closed-knit nature of the community, and the extent to which it has remained unchanged since the nineteenth century”.
LOCAL HISTORY – THE VICTORIAN POOR OF BERWICK ST JAMES
When we think of the Victorians, we conjure up images of urban poverty, squalor, and Dickens’ Oliver Twist asking for more in a workhouse, but what was life like for the rural poor of Berwick St James?
There are clues from the historical 1841 census, where 19 out of the 247 villagers were described as ‘paupers’. Under the 1834 New Poor Law, this was the official term for anybody that received a form of welfare known as poor relief. They would be granted ‘outdoor relief’ if paid at home. This was either a weekly allowance of cash (for example, one shilling to two shillings and sixpence), or in kind (such as bread, or clothing). Widows with children were often recipients, although most outdoor relief was prescribed to older people, who could receive up to five shillings weekly based on medical conditions, or retirement. In fact, the 1841, 1851 and 1861 censuses show that Elizabeth Marshall (b. abt. 1785-1786) claimed outdoor relief throughout her late fifties, sixties, and seventies.
By contrast, the Wilton Union Board of Guardians (those responsible for treating the poor of Berwick St James) could refuse outdoor relief to an applicant, and instead offer a stay in the Wilton Union workhouse, termed ‘indoor relief’. The workhouse was designed to deter those from applying for welfare, but also provided institutional care for those disabled. One inmate, born in Berwick St James, was described in the 1871 census as having a mental disability – to quote the Victorians, an ‘imbecile from birth’ – and an 1861 parliamentary report reveals that he had remained in the workhouse since 1847.
By the late nineteenth century, the Victorians began to stress that poverty was society’s failure to tackle inequality, far removed from the culpability of the poor. To that end, the Old Age Pensions Act of 1908 decreed that those aged 70 years and over were entitled to five shillings weekly (with ten shillings for married couples), to be collected from the Post Office. The 1911 census captures Berwick St James resident Ann Humphries, aged 73 years, described as an ‘old age pensioner’. Away from the unfamiliar workhouse environment, villagers like Ann were at long last afforded a decent quality of living among their family and friends.
Written and researched by Dr Tom Heritage