Colesbourne, Gloucestershire
Historical Description
Colesbourne or Cowlesborne, a village and a parish in Gloucestershire, among the Cotswolds, near the highest source of the river Thames, 3 miles E of Ermine Street, 5½ SE of Charlton Kings station and 6 SW of Andoversford station on the G.W.R., 7½ NW of Cirencester, 7¼ SSE of Cheltenham, and 3 SW of Wittington on the Midland and South-Westem Junction railway. Post town, Andoversford; money order office, North Cerney; telegraph office, Andoversford. Acreage, 2198; population, 242. Colesbourne Park, the seat of the Elwes family, is a modern Elizabethan mansion. Colesbourne Pen Hill is one of the highest summits in the county. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Gloucester and Bristol; gross value, £102. The church is Ealry Perpendicular English, and has been restored.
Administration
The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.
Ancient County | Gloucestershire | |
Ecclesiastical parish | Colesborne St. James | |
Hundred | Rapsgate | |
Poor Law union | Cirencester |
Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.
Church Records
The Gloucestershire Parish Registers are available online at Ancestry, in association with Gloucestershire Archives.
Civil Registration
For general information about Civil Registration (births, marriages and deaths) see the Civil Registration page.
Directories & Gazetteers
We have transcribed the entry for Colesbourne from the following:
- Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Colesborne (St. James))
Land and Property
The Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Gloucestershire is available to browse.
Maps
Online maps of Colesbourne are available from a number of sites:
- Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- Google Streetview.
- National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
- OpenStreetMap.
- old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
- Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)
Newspapers and Periodicals
The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following newspapers covering Gloucestershire online:
- Gloucester Citizen
- Gloucester Journal
- Gloucestershire Chronicle
- Gloucestershire Echo
- Cheltenham Chronicle
- Cheltenham Looker-On
Visitations Heraldic
The Visitation of the county of Gloucester, 1623 is available on the Heraldry page.