Stonesfield

"STONESFIELD, a parish in the hundred of Wootton, county Oxford, 4 miles W. of Woodstock, its post town. The village is situated on the river Evenlode, near the Roman Akerman Street, and is the place where a Roman pavement, 35 feet by 20, was discovered in 1711. The inhabitants are chiefly employed in the slate quarries. The substratum is slaty oolite, in which remains of mammalia and impressions of ferns, insects, and other fossils are frequently met with. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Oxford, value £139. The church, dedicated to St. James, has been partly re-erected. The parochial charities produce about £19 per annum. There are day and Sunday schools. The Wesleyans and Primitive Methodists have chapels. The Duke of Marlborough is lord of the manor." [The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868) Transcribed by Colin Hinson ©2003]