Rodborough

"RODBOROUGH, a parish in the hundred of Longtree, county Gloucester, 10 miles from Gloucester, and 1 S.W. of the Stroud railway station. The village, which is large, is situated on the S. bank of Stroud Water, and on the high road from Cirencester to Stroud. It was formerly a hamlet in the parish of Minchinhampton, but is now a separate parish and petty-sessions town belonging to Halliday of Froom Hall. It has traces of a Roman camp and watchtower on Rodborough Hill, near Woodchester. A large portion of the inhabitants are employed in the woollen mills. The surface is varied by hill and valley. The soil in the uplands is thin, being a mixture of sand and stone upon a subsoil of oolite rock, but in the valleys it is rich and luxuriant pasture.

The living is a rectory* in the diocese of Gloucester and Bristol, value £300. The church, dedicated to St. Mary Magdalen, is a modern stone structure with a tower containing one bell. The tower is old, and belonged to the ancient church, which was once a chantry of the priory of Minchinhampton. In connection with this church is a morning lectureship endowed by Edmund de Rodborough and Hugh de Neteling, and is in the gift of Brasenose College, Oxford. There are two endowed schools for both sexes in connection with the church, also Foreign and British schools. The Independents have a place of worship. In 1638 Richard Clutterbuck, a blind mechanical genius, was born here, as was also Sir Andrew Halliday. T. Marling, Esq., is lord of the manor."

[Description(s) from The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868)
Transcribed by Colin Hinson ©2003]