St James's Church
The parish church, on this spot since soon after the Norman Conquest.
- 1615 to 1923Somerton's rectors are listed on the Rectors page. Not all of them lived in the village.
Read more: St James's Church · Rectors of Somerton
An interactive map of the village showing its historic houses and buildings, and the families and individuals associated with them over the centuries.
Click on any pin to find out about that building, its history and the people recorded as living there in the past. Information has been gathered from census records, parish registers, historical documents, and local memory.
This map is a growing record. If you have memories or information to share about a house or its former residents, please use the form at the bottom of this page.
Click a pin to see who lived there. Pins marked with a dot in the middle are approximate. Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Whose names are here? Only people named in historical records and published memories: censuses, directories, the 1910 valuation survey, the 1919 estate sale, parish records, former pupils' recollections, tributes published in the Valley News and villagers' memories of people who have died. We do not list people living in the houses today. All of these houses are private homes, so please enjoy them from the road or the footpath.
The parish church, on this spot since soon after the Norman Conquest.
Read more: St James's Church · Rectors of Somerton
Home of Somerton's rectors, when they chose to live here. William Juxon, rector from 1615 and later Archbishop of Canterbury, built a new rectory, though we do not know how much of it survives in the present house. Several later rectors lived elsewhere and left curates in the house. It was sold at auction in November 1983. Rumour has it that a lady in grey stands looking out of the top window.
Memories
‘The Great Frankie Brain’, an epithet given to Frank by the last rector to live in the huge village rectory, Rev. EP Baker, who left the village in 1954.
From the tribute to Frank Brain, Valley News, August 2023. Fondly Remembered
Read more: The Rectory & Clergy · The Good, the Bad & the Absent
The Old Rectory's coach house, seen on the right as you walk down the fishpond field path.
Read more: Archaeology & Castle Yard
In 1580 Thomas Fermor left money for a free school, and the old castle chapel became the schoolroom. The Old School House is said to stand on the spot. The Victoria County History thought the schoolroom probably the oldest house in Somerton, built in the late sixteenth or early seventeenth century, with a schoolmaster's house rebuilt in about 1750. The 1910 valuation map marks it "School", beside the remains of the fishponds. The girls' and infants' schools were merged into it by 1871, when there were 74 pupils, and from 1930 it was a junior school. It is now a private home.
Memories
The school day began at 9.00 a.m. with the ringing of the school bell. Miss Bernice Edwards, the teacher, would choose who was to ring it and she had her favourites.
Former pupils, remembering the 1930s and 40s at a meeting in the old schoolroom in 2009. School Days
Read more: The School · School Days
The Manor Farm of the 1910 valuation survey and the 1919 estate sale, when it was Lot 2, about 450 acres. The Victoria County History describes the house as seventeenth century, two storeys with cellars and a steep stone-slate roof, and says William Fermor built his manor house near it; its outline can still be traced to the east. When the Earl of Jersey's Somerton estate was sold, much of it went to Thomas Edwin Emberlin, who became lord of the manor. Today it is a large dairy and arable farm, and its herd of Jersey cows is remembered locally as appearing in an Anchor butter advert, playing football.
Memories
At Manor Farm the Miss Emberlins would hide pennies in the wall for them to find.
Former pupils, remembering May Day in the 1930s and 40s, 2009. School Days
Read more: 1919 Estate Families
Behind Fermor House, east of the Heyford Road, are the remains of the Fermor family's Tudor manor house: one standing wall with its great window, and the outline of the house in the field. The 1910 valuation map marks it "Manor House (Remains of)", with the village bowling green just to the north-west.
Read more: The Fermor Family · Catholicism in Somerton
In 1910 and 1919 "The Paddock" was a row of estate cottages just south of the old post office, with a timber yard, a carpenter's shop and the Methodist chapel at the end of the row.
Read more: The Village
In the 1970s and 80s the Callows grocery van from Upper Heyford stopped by the bus stop below Adam's Cottages. We do not yet know how the cottages got their name.
Read more: Economic Life
The post office, shop and bakehouse stood opposite the church, at the junction east of the churchyard.
Read more: Economic Life
The village pub, at the bottom of Water Street opposite the station, with the wharf. It is now a private house.
Memories
The inquest was held in the “upper room” at the Railway Inn and my father was one of those on the Jury.
Albert Fox, on an accident at the level crossing in the 1930s. The Railway
Read more: The Railway
The house that went with Somerton station, on the railway at the foot of the village.
Memories
There were two porters who worked in shifts 6am - 2pm and 2pm - 10pm. I remember Ted Giles and Walter Mold from North Aston.
Albert Fox, remembering the station. The Railway
When she married Monty they went to the Station House.
Sheila Stevens, in the former pupils' notes, 2009. School Days
Read more: The Railway
A row of cottages once known as New Buildings.
Memories
Brenda was up at the New Buildings when the electricity came. She and other children made a seesaw with some big planks which they laid across the big wheels of wire.
Former pupils' memories, 2009. School Days
We lived in a small cottage known as No. 1 New Buildings, Somerton, now known as Aston View.
Brenda Moignard's sister, in her tribute to Brenda, Valley News, October 2021. Fondly Remembered
Read more: School Days · Fondly Remembered
The farmhouse was built in the early 1960s. Cows were brought up from the meadows to be milked here until the mid-1970s (Valley News tribute to Ray Clare).
Read more: Maps & Agriculture
Read more: The Church Bells · Somerton Social Club
Read more: Somerton Social Club
Beside Somerton Deep Lock on the Oxford Canal, reached only along the towpath. A listed building and a private home.
Read more: Visit Somerton
Local memory says this was a school house, though we do not yet know when. Somerton had more than one school in the nineteenth century. From 1815 Lady Jersey paid for a school for twelve girls and another for twelve children, and by 1854 she was supporting two schools, for 24 girls and 18 infants. They were merged into Fermor's school between 1864 and 1871. Whether either of them met here we do not know. If you can tell us more, please use the form below.
Read more: The School
The Barnes Memorial Hall, opened on 23 April 1924 by the Dowager Countess of Jersey. The rector, George Barnes, had worked for a hall for the village, and after his death his widow gave it. It was rebuilt in 2010.
Memories
It was said that the Village Hall floor was the best dance floor in North Oxfordshire. They used to put bath crystals on the floor to make it slip.
Former pupils' memories, 2009. School Days
A clinic was held at the Village Hall and Mrs Waddup who kept the shop would stand outside in her big white apron and with a beckoning finger call, “come on, come on” to give them a dose of cod liver oil.
Former pupils' memories, 2009. School Days
Read more: The Village Hall
At the top of the village street, and named after its dovecote, which is dated 1719: a square stone building with a four-gabled stone-slate roof and room for 1,100 nesting birds. The farmhouse is three buildings joined together. The Fermors owned it before they moved to Tusmore, and the Brown family have farmed here for many years.
Read more: Listed Buildings · 1919 Estate Families
In 2013 an archaeological dig on land next to Dormer House found two buildings put up in the mid eleventh century, at the very start of the village's history.
Read more: Archaeology & Castle Yard
Beside the Old Rectory's coach house.
We have not yet matched this plot to the 1910 valuation map.
No early records found yet.
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Do you know who lived in one of these houses, or have memories or photographs to share? We'd love to hear from you.