Nuneham Courtney, Oxfordshire

Historical Description

Nuneham Courtney, a village and a parish in Oxfordshire. The village stands near the river Thames at the boundary with Berks, 3½ miles ENE of Culham station on the G.W.R., and 5½ SSE of Oxford. It was transferred to its present site from the neighbourhood of Nuneham House by the first Lord Harcourt, consists mostly of neatly-arranged and pretty tiled cottages, and has a post and money order office under Oxford; telegraph office, Clifton Hampden. The parish comprises 2108 acres; population, 285. The manor, with Nnneham Park and most of the property, belonged to successively the De Courcis, the Courtenays, the Pollards, and others, and passed to the Harcourt family, in whose possession it still remains. The mansion, which is a large hut plain building of stone, stands on a wooded height above the Thames; contains a fine collection of paintings, a valuable library containing many rare MSS., and a rich collection of curiosities, relics, and porcelain; and has a pane of glass, brought from Pope's study at Stanton Harcourt, and bearing an inscription written by himself with a diamond, and recording that he there completed the fifth book of his " Homer." The grounds comprise about 1200 acres, were laid out by " Capability" Brown, include an eminence commanding a good view of the winding Thames up to Oxford, contain beautiful gardens, partly planned by the poet Mason, and contain also the beautiful conduit of Otho Nicholson, long a chief ornament of Oxford, and removed hither by reconstruction in 1787. Walpole says, "Nuneham is not superb, but so calm and comfortable, so live-at-able, one wakes in a morning on such a whole picture of beauty." The living is a rectory in the diocese of Oxford; net value, £277 with residence. The old church was rebuilt in 1764 by Earl Harcourt, and is a small structure in the Grecian style with a dome. It is not now used, a new church having been built in 1879-80 near the village. This is a building of stone in the Early English style.

Administration

The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.

Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.

Church Records

Ancestry.co.uk, in association with Oxfordshire Family History Society and Oxfordshire History Centre, have images of the Parish Registers for Oxfordshire online.

Directories & Gazetteers

We have transcribed the entry for Nuneham Courtney from the following:

• Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Nuneham-Courtney (All Saints))

Land and Property

A full transcript of the Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Oxfordshire is available online

Newspapers and Periodicals

The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following Oxfordshire newspapers online:

• Oxford Journal
• Banbury Advertiser
• Banbury Guardian
• Oxford University and City Herald
• Oxford Chronicle and Reading Gazette
• Faringdon Advertiser and Vale of the White Horse Gazette
• Oxford Times
• Banbury Beacon
• Ossett Observer

Visitations Heraldic

The Visitations of Oxfordshire, 1566, 1574 &1634 are available on the Heraldry page.