[Transcription © SA Whittle-Bruce 2003]

Stowey, Stogursey & neighbourhoods

Pigot & Co.'s Royal National & Commercial Directory and Topography 1844

STOWEY, or NETHER STOWEY, is a small market-town and parish, in the hundred of Williton and Freemanners; 149 miles w. by s. from London, and eight w.n.w. from Bridgewater, a station on the line of the Bristol and Exeter Railway; situated on a rivulet tributary to the river Parret. The town, which consists of three streets, disposed in a triangular form, possesses nothing attractive or prepossessing in the eye of the stranger. Sir Peregrine Acland, Baronet, is lord of the manor, and holds a court leet and baron annually at Michaelmas, when some peace-offers are ppointed.

The parish church of St. Mary is a small plain edifice, situated at the east end of the town; the living is a vicarage, of which the dean and chapter of Windsor are the patrons; the Rev. Benjamin Pope is the present incumbent. Stowey is the birth-place of the celebrated jesuit, Robert parsons. The country around here is rather hilly; the land is fertile and well cultivated, husbandry being the chief employment of the inhabitants. The market days are Tuesday and Saturday, and the annual fair is held on the 18th of September. The population of the parish is about eight hundred.

About three miles north from Stowey, on the road to the coast, is the village of Stogursey or Stoke-Courcy, containing nothing meriting particular notice. The small church is dedicated to St. Andrew; the living is a vicarage with the perpetual curacy of Lilstock annexed, in the gift of the provost and fellows of Eton College. There is a school, with a small endowment, for the instruction of a limited number of children. The parish, which is bounded on the north by the Bristol channel, contains about 1,500 inhabitants.

POST OFFICE, Stowey, John Sealey, Post Master. -Letters from all parts arrive from and are despatched to BRIDGEWATER daily.

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