Middleton Stoney, Oxfordshire

Historical Description

Middleton Stoney, a village and a parish in Oxfordshire. The village stands E by S of Heyford railway station, and 3½ miles W by N of Bicester station on the L. & N.W.R., is a very pretty place, and has a post, money order, and telegraph office under Bicester. The parish comprises 1853 acres; population, 328. The manor belonged anciently to W. Longsword, passed to the Laceys and others, and belongs now, with all the land, to the Earl of Jersey. Middleton Park is the Earl's seat, succeeded a previous mansion destroyed by fire in 1753, contains some interesting portraits, and stands in a beautiful park of 600 acres. A castle of the Norman times stood near the church, and the foundations of it can still be traced. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Oxford; gross value, £420. Patron, the Bishop of Oxford. The church stands in the park, is an ancient building of stone in mixed styles in good condition; comprises nave, aisles, and chancel, with embattled western tower; has a good Early English arcade outside the tower, a grand Norman arch at S doorway, the famous font from the old King's chapel, Islip, and includes on the N side a mortuary chapel of the Earl of Jersey. There are some useful charities, bequests of the late Dowager Countess of Jersey.

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 Middleton Stoney from the following:

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

Land and Property

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

Maps

Online maps of Middleton Stoney 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 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.