Charney Bassett is a village and civil parish on the river Ock, in the north of the Vale of the White Horse, about 4.5 miles north of Wantage. It was part of Berkshire until the boundary changes of 1974 moved it into Oxfordshire.

Size

1,209 acres (489 hectares) in 1924

Population

271 in 2001; 259 in 1851

Hundred

Ganfield/Gainfield

Poor law union

Faringdon

Registration district

Faringdon

Present-day local authority

Charney Bassett is in the Longworth Ward of the Vale of the White Horse District, Oxfordshire County Council

Grid reference

SU 37 94

Adjoining parishes in 1851

Buckland, Denchworth, Hinton Waldrist, Longworth, Lyford, Pusey and Stanford in the Vale

Genealogical resources

See Berks FHS Books for coverage of this parish in the society’s range of CDs.

See also Berkshire Record Office holdings.

Published local history

Bruce Hedge Charney Bassett watermill a description and brief history (2002) and J S Howe Charney Bassett through the centuries (1975) are in Oxford Central, Abingdon and Wantage libraries.

Charney Bassett Watermill and Charney Manor 1300 – 1970 are listed in the holdings of Longworth and District History Society‘s library.

Anglican church and parochial organisation

Charney Bassett was formerly a chapelry of Longworth parish. The living is a vicarage. The parish is now part of the benefice of Cherbury with Gainfield in the deanery of the Vale of the White Horse, in the archdeanconry of Berkshire within the diocese of Oxford. 

St Peter’s churchwas built on the Saxon foundations of its predecessor in the twelfth century, and is Grade-I listed.

Other churches

A Wesleyan preacher was enumerated in the 1851 census, and a Wesleyan chapel was noted in 1924.

Schools

A schoolmistress was enumerated in the 1851 census.

In 1871 Miss Mary Dewe bequeathed £5 yearly to the infants’ and Sunday schools. 

Village children now attend St James CofE Primary School at East Hanney.

Pubs

The Chequers claims to have existed since the early 1800s. www.chequerscharney.co.uk A publican was enumerated in the 1851 census, but no pub named.

Other local history

One mile north of the village and within the parish boundary lies Cherbury Camp, an Iron Age fortification. It has been claimed both for King Canute and Alfred the Great, but neither claim is taken seriously by historians.

Thirteenth-century Charney Manor is a Grade-I listed building, now used as a Quaker guest house and conference centre.

Charney Water Mill and its adjoining cottage are owned by Oxfordshire County Council. The mill is being restored by the Vale of White Horse Industrial Archaeology Group.

Picture of Berkshire Family History Society

Berkshire Family History Society