Woolvercot or Wolvercote, Oxfordshire

Historical Description

Woolvercot or Wolvercote, a parish in Oxfordshire, 2½ miles SE from Yarnton Junction station on the G.W.R., and 2½ N by W of Oxford. It has a post office under Oxford; money order and telegraph office, Summertown. Acreage, 1160; population of the civil parish, 840; of the ecclesiastical, 845. At the taking of the census of 1891 one house and five persons belonging to this parish were in the administrative county borough of Oxford. There is a parish council consisting of eight members. The Isis and the Oxford Canal pass through the parish. The manor belongs to the Duke of Marlborough. There is a paper mill belonging to the University of Oxford. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Oxford; gross value, £197 with residence. Patron, Merton College, Oxford. The church is a small, plain building of stone chiefly in the Late Rectilinear style. It was restored in 1860, and consists of chancel, nave, N aisle with chapel, S porch, and W battle-mented tower, with five bells. In the aisle chapel is a fine monument to John Walter, baron of the exchequer, who died in 1630. The locality of Godstow, in this parish, is noticed separately.

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.

Land and Property

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

Maps

Online maps of Woolvercot or Wolvercote 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.