Rotherfield Greys, Oxfordshire

Historical Description

Rotherfield Greys, a village and a parish in Oxfordshire. The village stands 2½ miles W of Henley station on the G.W.R., and 7½ N of Reading; gave the title of Baron in the 14th century to John de Grey; includes a village green planted with cherry trees, and has a post office under Henley-on-Thames; telegraph office, Henley-on-Thames. The parish comprises 2928 acres; population, 2747. There is a parish council consisting of five members. The manor belonged to the De Greys, passed to the Levels, the Knollys, and the Stapletons, to whom it now belongs. Greys Court is part of a stately, spacious, fortified residence, erected. in the time of King John by the Archbishop of York for his nephew, John de Grey; retains four well-preserved towers-of the original structure; is now much modernized and of Tudor character, and stands in a well-wooded deer park-containing a curious dairy. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Oxford; net value, £475. Patron, Trinity College, Oxford. The church is a small but ancient building of flint and stone of the Early English period, consisting of chancel with chapel, nave, N porch, and wooden belfry, and contains some interesting monuments. Sections of the parish are in the chapelries of Trinity and Highmoor. Trinity chapelry includes also small sections of Rotherfield Peppard and Henley-on-Thames parishes, and was constituted in 1849. The living is a vicarage in the patronage of the rector of Greys;. net value, £70. The church was built in 1849, at a cost of about £3000, and is a building of flint and stone in the Early English style. Highmoor chapelry is separately noticed.

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.

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 Rotherfield Greys from the following:

• Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Rotherfield-Grays)

Land and Property

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

Maps

Online maps of Rotherfield Greys 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.