While the recent closure of the Three Horseshoes pub might lead you to believe it was the only pub in Brimpton, there have actually been a number over the years. We’ve already covered the Pineapple in Brimpton Common, but over on Hyde End Lane they also used to have their own public house, in the shape of the Horse and Jockey. As the pub has now been converted to a residential home, it’s hard to find out much about its…
Until as recently as 2016, Brimpton still had a village shop, occupying the building that now houses Georgina Hill hairdressing. We don’t have much information about the building itself, but the stores opened in around 1920, where they traded for almost 100 years. Before that, the main store for the village was Tanners in Hyde End Lane. There’s a wealth of information about the ownership and establishment of the Store in the ‘Brimpton Story’ book, but here’s a short run-down…
The bungalow known as Byeways appears to date to the early 1930s or 40s, when it was built by the owners of East View (now Eastbank) in what was their garden. The house was originally built to house the Brimpton Post Office (one of at least 4 present buildings that has housed this at one time or another!) – you can still see some of the features on the modern building, if you look closely. The old shed you can…
Not a lot is known about the house known as East View (now Eastbank), short of one notable previous owner – Mrs Norman, who also owned what is now the Old Post Office, in the 1930s/40s. Mrs Norman ran the post office at the time, and during her ownership of East View she built a bungalow in its garden to house the Brimpton Post Office – the building now known as Byeways. Before this, and based solely one what we…
Like a number of other old buildings in the village (including the Old Post Office), Close Cottage was once the home to Brimpton’s Postal Service. In fact, it was the very first – home to the Penny Post from 1847, run by villager Stephen Stair (a local shoemaker). According to the ‘Brimpton Story’, letters arrived from Newbury at 9am and were dispatched around the area at 4pm. The Post Office continued to operate from Close Cottage for nearly 70 years…
According to the details recorded in the ‘Brimpton Story’ book, the St Peter’s Almshouses (to give them their full name) date back to 1854 when they were built to accommodate the poor, the elderly and widows. They were built and maintained by the Brimpton Charity, and endowed by the Countess of Falmouth. The building originally housed six separate almshouses, each of which was made up of a living room with a bedroom above. The six dwellings shared a single outside…