Bishops Ground

Bishops Ground

Of Stone Farm, a detached part of Preston Plucknett

 

Bishops Ground was a field southwest of Stone Farm House.

This area is actually a detached part of the parish of Preston Plucknett, known as Preston in Stone, and the Preston Plucknett Tithe Map of 1849 shows Bishops Ground as Parcel 178. It was bounded on the west by Stone Lane and Waste Plot (Parcel 180), to the north by Daniells Mead (Parcel 179), to the northeast by Hetts Mead (Parcel 178), to the south by Hundredstone (Parcel 182) and to the southwest by the nascent stream that formed this re-entry into the Yeovil escarpment and also formed the parish boundary between Preston in Stone and the parish of Yeovil.

The Preston Plucknett Tithe Apportionment of 1848 notes that Bishops Ground was in the ownership of Henry Goodford Esq. of Chilton Cantello and occupied by Mrs Phillis Coles, as indeed was the whole of Stone Farm at this time. The Tithe Apportionment shows Bishops Ground to be 8a 0r 4p.

Other known owners / occupiers had been James Harris (1800), Mr Pester (1810), Mr Spear (1818), Stephen Coles (c1821-1827). Phillis Coles, in her later years assisted by her sons, ran Stone Farm after the death of her husband Stephen until her own death in 1877. Her son Edmund ran the farm after her death until his death in 1885. By 1886 a Mr Russell was farming Stone Farm but his widow sold up and retired in February 1900. In 1901 the tenant farmer was John Sawtell.

As seen in the aerial photograph of 1946, shown below, by this time the eastern edge of Bishops Ground adjoining Stone Lane had been taken up with housing and gardens and is substantially unaltered today.

 

map and aerial photographs


The Stone area reproduced from the 1849 Tithe Map. Bishops Ground is south of Stone Farm House.

 

The 1946 aerial photograph showing the former Bishops Ground towards top centre, by this time the western part contained houses and gardens.

 

The modern aerial view showing the former Bishops Ground towards top centre, substantially unaltered since the 1946 photograph.