Hurst

"HURST, a parochial chapelry partly in the hundreds of Sonning and Charlton, county Berks, and partly in the hundred of Amesbury, county Wilts, 3 miles N.W. of Wokingham, 6 from Reading, its post town, and 3 from the Twyford station, on the Great Western railway. It contains the hamlets of Bean Wood, Broad Hinton, Newland, Winnersh, and Whistley Hurst. The Great Western railway intersects the parish. The living is a perpetual curacy with the curacy of Twyford annexed, in the diocese of Oxford, value £413, in the patronage of the bishop. The church, dedicated to St. Nicholas, is an ancient structure, containing monuments to the memory of Margaret, wife of Sir Henry Savile, founder of the Savilian professorship at Oxford, and to Sir Richard Harrison, who twice raised, at his own expense, a troop of cavalry for the service of Charles I. The parochial charities produce about £450 per annum, including the endowment of Barker and Twyford's almshouses, and of Polehampton's free school. Hurst Place is an old Elizabethan seat built by the lord-treasurer Ward, and once occupied by the queen of Bohemia, daughter of James I."

"BEARWOOD, a village in the parish of Hurst, hundred of Sonning, in the county of Berks, 2 miles to the S. [W!] of Wokingham. The living is a perpetual curacy in the diocese of Oxford, value £40, in the patronage of J. Walter, Esq., M.P. BearWood is the seat of the Walters."

"BROAD HINTON, a liberty in the parochial chapelry of Hurst, which was formerly in the hundred of Amesbury, in the county of Wilts, but is now included in the county of Berks, 3 miles to the N. of Wokingham."

"NEWLAND, a liberty in the parish of Hurst, hundred of Sonning, county Berks, 4 miles W. of Wokingham."

"WHISTLEY HURST, a liberty in the parish of Hurst, hundred of Charlton, county Berks, 5 miles N.E. of Reading."

"WINNERSH, a liberty in the parish of Hurst, county Berks, 3 miles N. of Wokingham."

From The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland(1868). Transcribed by Colin Hinson ©2003.

Other descriptions can be found from other periods in various trade directories covering Berkshire from the early 19th century onwards from Berkshire FHS (members only) and from A Vision of Britain Through Time.