From Surf Wiki (app.surf) — the open knowledge base

Powerstock

Village and civil parish in Dorset, England

Summary

Village and civil parish in Dorset, England

Field	Value
country	England
official_name	Powerstock
static_image_name	Powerstock village centre - geograph.org.uk - 698231.jpg
static_image_caption	Powerstock
coordinates
map_type	Dorset
population	290
population_ref
unitary_england	Dorset
lieutenancy_england	Dorset
region	South West England
constituency_westminster	West Dorset
post_town	Bridport
postcode_area	DT
postcode_district	DT6
os_grid_reference	SY517962
website	Village photos
dial_code	01308

Powerstock is a village and civil parish in south west Dorset, England, situated in a steep valley on the edge of the Dorset Downs, 5 mi north-east of the market town of Bridport. The civil parish includes the village of West Milton to the west and the summit and northern slopes of Eggardon Hill to the south-east. Powerstock village contains many cottages and two inns: The Three Horseshoes near the church and The Marquis of Lorne Inn on the other side of the valley in a small hamlet called Nettlecombe. The small Mangerton River runs through the valley.

In 2013 the parish had an estimated population of 290.

Powerstock was rated as among the "20 most beautiful villages in the UK and Ireland" by Condé Nast Traveler in 2020.

History

The origins of the name Powerstock have not been fully determined; the second part derives from the Old English stoc, meaning an outlying farmstead, but the first part—similar to the nearby settlement of Poorton—is unresolved. In the Domesday Book of 1086 it was recorded as Povrestoch.

Powerstock Castle is a medieval motte and bailey castle. St Mary's Parish Church dates from the 12th century and is a Grade I listed building.

According to one source, the name was 'Poorstock' until the Bridport Railway was built through the village in 1857, when the change to Powerstock was made to avoid connotations of 'poor (rolling) stock'. However another source states the name existed in its current form as early as 1787. Powerstock railway station (and the entire Bridport branch line) closed on 5 May 1975.

Landscape

Poorstock Forest was one of the 80 royal forests created by the Normans in the 11th, 12th and early 13th centuries, in part to support medieval hunting. The term forest originally referred to land where hunting and forestry rights were reserved for a monarch or the aristocracy.

The nearby Eggardon Hill (height 252 m) lies about 1.5 mi south-east of the village. On the summit is a 14-hectare Iron Age hill-fort, from which can be viewed a wide panorama of the Dorset countryside. Just over a mile to the east of the village lies the nature reserve of Powerstock Common.

Another prominent hill is Drackenorth, some 3 km north-northeast, which lies on the Jubilee Trail.

A cricket match at The Weir Cricket Ground, Nettlecombe

There is also a cricket pitch located at The Weir playing field in Nettlecombe. This has traditionally been used by Powerstock and Hooke Cricket Club. It has also been used to host Powerstock's Village Fete.

In popular culture

Powerstock was used as the filming location for a BBC production of Agatha Christie's A Murder is Announced and the 2010 Springwatch series.

References

(20 January 2015). "Parish Population Data". Dorset County Council.
"Area: Powerstock (Parish), Key Figures for 2011 Census: Key Statistics". [[Office for National Statistics]].
"THE 20 MOST BEAUTIFUL VILLAGES IN THE UK AND IRELAND, 20 October 2020".
(2011). "A Dictionary of British Place-Names". Oxford University Press.
"Powerstock Pages 181-186 An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Dorset, Volume 1, West.". HMSO 1952.
Diana P Read ''Powerstock Station All Change''. {{ISBN. 0-9527522-0-4
Matt Wilkinson. (January 2014). "The Dorset drive: The valleys of the West and the scenic coast road". Dorset Life Magazine.

Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

villages-in-dorset

Want to explore this topic further?

Ask Mako anything about Powerstock — get instant answers, deeper analysis, and related topics.

Research with Mako

Free with your Surf account

Content sourced from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

This content may have been generated or modified by AI. CloudSurf Software LLC is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of AI-generated content. Always verify important information from primary sources.

Report