Winterborne Clenston

Winterborne Clenston
The Manor House, Winterborne Clenston
Winterborne Clenston is located in Dorset
Winterborne Clenston
Winterborne Clenston
Location within Dorset
Population40 (2013 est.)
OS grid referenceST838031
Civil parish
  • Winterborne Clenston
Unitary authority
Ceremonial county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townBLANDFORD FORUM
Postcode districtDT11
Dialling code01258
PoliceDorset
FireDorset and Wiltshire
AmbulanceSouth Western
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Dorset
50°49′37″N 2°13′48″W / 50.827°N 2.230°W / 50.827; -2.230

Winterborne Clenston is a small village and civil parish in Dorset, England, around 3+1⁄2 miles (5.5 kilometres) southwest of Blandford Forum. In 2013 the civil parish had an estimated population of 40.[1]

The first part of the village name comes from the River Winterborne, which flows from north to south through the village.[2] The river only flows overground during the winter, hence the name. In 1312 the patron of the church was Roger de Clencheston, who most likely had a farm here, after which the second part of the village name derives.[3]

To the north of the village is Winterborne Stickland and to the south is Winterborne Whitechurch. The river flows through both these villages as well.[4]

The parish church of St Nicholas dates from 1840. It is built in bands of stone and flint and has a spire on top of a narrow tower. It stands alone above the Winterborne on the site of an earlier church.[3]

The village manor is a late-15th- to early-16th-century building of Purbeck and Portland stone with courses of flint. It was built in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and is a Grade I listed building.[5] It has mullioned windows and a gabled staircase turret on the west side.[3][6] Nearby is a sixteenth-century tithe-barn with a hammerbeam roof, also a listed building but falling into disrepair. In 2008, Historic England funded the erection of scaffolding and temporary repairs to the structure, but by 2016, a permanent repair had not been made.[7]

About 100 metres (300 feet) east of the manor house is a field barn which is also a Grade II listed building. It is also built in bands of flint and stone and has a door made of planks and a thatched roof. It forms an important group with the Manor House and the Manor House Barn.[8]

  1. ^ "Parish Population Data". Dorset County Council. 20 January 2015. Archived from the original on 21 November 2015. Retrieved 8 February 2015.
  2. ^ "Dorset: Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty - Walking the River Winterborne" (PDF). Dorset AONB Partnership. 2011. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 December 2013. Retrieved 18 April 2016.
  3. ^ a b c Gant, Roland (1980). Dorset Villages. Robert Hale Ltd. p. 180. ISBN 0 7091 8135 3.
  4. ^ "Dorchester, Weymouth and surrounding area" (Map). Landranger 194. Ordnance Survey.
  5. ^ "Manor House, Winterborne Clenston". British Listed Buildings. Retrieved 26 August 2016.
  6. ^ Accessed 31 Mar 2023 Youtube video by ethnography Jack Hargreaves visiting site in early 1980s, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Pk_x-mbNow&list=TLPQMDEwNDIwMjPv9zUWvDQDJg&index=6
  7. ^ "Manor Farm Barn, Winterborne Clenston - North Dorset". Heritage at risk. Historic England. Retrieved 26 August 2016.
  8. ^ "Barn approximately 100 metres west of Winterborne Clenston Manor House". Historic England. Retrieved 26 August 2016.