Ardington

Ardington today

Ardington lies on the spring line where the Downs meet the Vale, a short distance south of the A417 between Wantage and Rowstock. Most of the village belongs to the Lockinge Estate, and much of it was built by the estate in the late 19th century in a recognisable style of red brick and decorative timber framing. At the time of writing the village has a pub, the Boar’s Head; a village shop and tearoom; the Loyd-Lindsay Rooms, used as the village hall and a function venue; a nursery; and the Ardington and Lockinge Sports Club. Ardington House is a private home that opens to visitors on a limited number of days each year and is also a wedding venue.

The parish is long and narrow, running about five miles from the Downs, where the Ridgeway crosses its southern end, to the clay of the Vale. The brook that rises at Lockinge flows through the village past the old mill.

History

Name and Domesday

The name, Ardintone in Domesday Book, probably means the farm or estate associated with a man called Earda. Before 1066 the land was held by two free men, Edwin and Saewin. By 1086 both holdings belonged to Robert d’Oilly, the Norman lord of Wallingford, and together they had 24 households, three mills and meadow, worth the considerable sum of £20 a year. The Portway, an old road between Wallingford and Wantage, runs just north of the village.

Medieval owners

In the 12th century the manor was held by the Basset family; Gilbert Basset gave the church to his new priory at Bicester around 1182. The manor later passed to great families who seldom lived here: Ralph de Cobham, Mary, Countess of Norfolk, Alice Perrers (Edward III’s mistress), the Holland earls of Huntingdon and dukes of Exeter, and from 1484 the Stanley earls of Derby.

The Clarkes and Ardington House

Around 1560 the Earl of Derby leased Ardington to John Clarke, who settled here, and his grandson Edward bought the manor outright in 1606. The Clarkes held it for about two centuries. Edward Clarke built the present Ardington House around 1720, probably to designs by Thomas Strong of Oxford: a grey and red brick house of seven bays with a central pediment. The last of the family, William Nelson Clarke, wrote a history of Wantage hundred, and sold the manor about 1833 to Robert Vernon, a dealer in army horses whose picture collection, the Vernon Gift, went to the nation in 1847. The open fields were enclosed in 1808. In the 19th century the Wilts and Berks Canal and the Great Western Railway were built across the north of the parish.

Lord Wantage’s village

Around 1860 Colonel Robert Loyd-Lindsay, later Lord Wantage, bought Ardington and made it part of the Lockinge estate. He and Lady Wantage rebuilt much of the village: new cottages, a school, a mill and dairy, the Boar’s Head, and a village shop run as a co-operative on the Rochdale model for estate tenants. Profits from the pub helped pay for a reading room and street lamps. Ardington House was let; since 1939 it has been the home of the Baring family.

Church

Holy Trinity has a nave, south arcade and chancel arch of about 1200, a north doorway with dog-tooth ornament, and a 13th-century chancel and north tower. In 1856 the tower was refaced and given its stone spire by Joseph Clarke, and in 1887 Somers Clarke lengthened the nave and redecorated the chancel, largely at Lord Wantage’s expense. Inside are a painted Jacobean monument to John Clarke and his wife, a kneeling marble figure of Robert Vernon, a 14th-century font and a Jacobean pulpit. The churchyard has the base and shaft of a medieval cross and a carved memorial of about 1911 to Robert Hamilton Lindsay.

The 20th century

After Lady Wantage’s death in 1920 the estate stayed with the Loyd family. Christopher Loyd, who took it on after the Second World War, converted redundant farm buildings into workshops and offices, which helped keep Ardington a working village rather than a dormitory. Ardington moved from Berkshire to Oxfordshire in 1974.

Things to see

• Holy Trinity Church, with its c.1200 arcade, Clarke monuments and Victorian chancel decoration (Grade II*).
• Ardington House, built about 1720 for Edward Clarke (Grade II*; open on selected days, check before visiting).
• The churchyard cross and the Lindsay memorial of about 1911 (both Grade II).
• The former co-operative shop and post office of about 1895 in the estate’s ‘Old English’ style (Grade II).
• Ardington Mill and its attached former dairy, rebuilt by the estate in the late 19th century (Grade II).
• The Ridgeway across the south of the parish, with the Lord Wantage Monument just to the west.