Eynsham, Oxfordshire

Description
Eynsham, or Ensham, a village and a parish in Oxfordshire. The village stands on the river Isis, 4 3/4 miles E by S from Witney, and has a station on the G.W.R., and a post, money order, and telegraph office under Oxford. It was known to the Saxons as Egonesham; is said to have been a British town before the times of the heptarchy; was a seat of royalty and the scene of a wittenagemot in the time of Etheldred the Unready; had a Benedictine abbey, founded in 1005 by Ethelmar or Aylmar, Earl of Cornwall; and figured at later periods as a market-town. The abbey was given at the dissolution to the Stanleys, and the only part of it now remaining is a window in the parsonage garden. The parish comprises 5446 acres; population of the civil parish, 1998; of the ecclesiastical, 1838. Ensham Hall is a large mansion standing in a park of 700 acres. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Oxford; gross value, £210. The church is ancient, and has a monument of Dr Rogers, and near it is an ancient cross. The interior of the church was restored in 1894. There are Baptist, Catholic Apostolic, Primitive Methodist, and Wesleyan chapels, and some useful charities. Barnard Gate is a hamlet 2 miles WNW of the village.