Brownsover
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  Map sources for Brownsover at grid reference SP515775
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Brownsover is a small village about 1½ miles north of Rugby, Warwickshire in England. Since 1960, it has been engulfed by suburban expansion of Rugby. Near Brownsover was a short, isolated row of terrace houses called Old Brownsover.
The original hamlet of Brownsover still remains (although now filled with modern roads and retail centres) and is to the west of A426 road, "Leicester Road", containing Brownsover Hall - a Victorian mansion house, formerly home to the Boughton-Leigh family, where Frank Whittle developed the jet engine in the 1930s. It also contains an old house which is believed to be where Lawrence Sheriff (c1510-1567), the founder of Rugby School, may have been born.
The old (Anglican) parish church of St. Michael & All Angels was founded in the 12th century as a chapel of ease, and was almost entirely rebuilt by Sir George Gilbert Scott in 1876 for Allesley Boughton-Leigh. The church has an interesting collection of English and foreign carved woodwork, including a splendid organ case, made in 1660 for St John’s College, Cambridge. There is one monumental inscription in the floor of the church, the grave of John Howkins (1579-1678), a great-nephew of the above-mentioned Lawrence Sheriff. The church is now closed to regular use and has been replaced by a modern structure elsewhere in Brownsover.
The new part of Brownsover, to the east of Leicester Road, contains modern housing estates built mostly during the 1960s and 70s. More recently, several building programs have been completed, specifically in the area referred to as 'Strawberry Fields', in the 1990s; with two other projects nearing their close.
The Brownsover area has in recent years had some problems with drug-related crime. However, local police have dealt with the problem rather successfully.
Brownsover is mentioned in Tom Brown's Schooldays.
