Barford St. Martin

Barford St. Martin lies about 6 miles west of Salisbury on the northern bank of the River Nadder, in the south of the county. The earliest mention of the village is in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Bereford; the meaning is 'Barley ford' - a river crossing which could carry a wagon laden with corn. 'St. Martin', from the dedication of the church, had been added by 1304, thus distinguishing it from Barford in Downton parish.

The modern village is sited on a bend of the A30 road from Salisbury to Shaftesbury (Dorset) where the road turns sharply across the river over a hump-backed bridge. The earlier important route was the east - west road from Salisbury to Dinton, Teffont and Chilmark. The present main road came into being in 1788 when the old turnpike from Salisbury to Shaftesbury was allowed to expire and a new Act turnpiked the easier route through Barford to Whitesheet Hill.

This was a fairly typical chalk valley parish with an area of arable and meadow land in the valley bottom and pasture land on rising ground to the north towards Grovely Wood. The inhabitants of Barford and Great Wishford were given the right to gather 'snapping' wood in Grovely and on Oak Apple Day (29th May) to gather oak boughs, decorate their churches with some, and take others in procession to Salisbury Cathedral where they laid claim to their ancient rights in front of the high altar. Today the ceremony is only observed in Great Wishford.

It is possible that this area has been continuously occupied since the late Iron Age as a large Romano-British village had its origins in that period. This is to the north of the village being called Hamshill Ditches, comprising extensive earthworks with enclosures, ditches, and many house platforms. This was a large settlement site of the Iron Age and Roman periods which had a large field system around it.

The Saxons may have had a wooden preaching cross here that was later replaced by a stone cross. There was certainly a substantial population here in late Saxon times. In the Domesday Book Barford is divided into four estates with the largest, Hurdcott, being as large as the other three put together and with twice their population. Altogether there were 5.5 hides of land worked by seven plough teams. There were 20 acres of meadow and eight acres (in Hurdcott) of pasture. The mill was in Hurdcott. The total population is estimated to have been between 90 and 105 people.

A church had been built by the 13th century but the preaching cross could indicate a much earlier congregation here. By the early 15th century the House of Ball, on the site now occupied by East End Farm, is believed to be the house where pilgrims obtained tickets of admission to Wilton Abbey. For later travellers the Barford Inn originated in the 17th century as the Dragon, or Green Dragon. By the early 19th century it was a coaching inn for local traffic and by mid-century it was home to the Green Dragon Slate Club; their annual feast was held on Whit Monday when members paraded to the Green Dragon for lunch and then had tea, with their families, at Manor Farm, where there were stalls and dancing.

In 1812 the villagers bartered the rights to live wood in Grovely Forest for £5 a year from Lord Pembroke. By the mid 19th century Lord Pembroke forbade the right to gather dead wood there, but this was challanged by four local women who deliberately went out and gathered firewood. They were fined but refused to pay and were sent to prison. Faced with this demonstration of determination the village rights to dead wood were confirmed the following day and the women were released from prison, being feted on their return to the village.

There are about 240 houses in the parish and they range from the Old Rectory and Little Orchard, originally of the 15th century, East End Farmhouse of around 1600, several houses and cottages of the 17th and 18th centuries, a few of the 19th and modern housing from the 1950s, with the first council houses built in 1946. In 1980 Gall Bridge, the narrow hump-backed bridge across the original Barley Ford, was swept away and replaced with a modern, but less characterful, bridge.

The soil in the parish is mainly chalk and the chief farming has been arable and pasture, mainly for sheep. The area of the parish is 1,646 hectares.