Brambridge

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Brambridge is a village in Hampshire, England, west of Eastleigh and close to the River Itchen. It lies in the south of Twyford civil parish.

The hamlet of Brambridge was granted by Bishop Richard Foxe to the newly-founded Corpus Christi College, Oxford, in the sixteenth century. In 1609-10, Brambridge, with other lands, belonging to three recusants, Ursula Uvedale, Richard Bruning and Thomas Welles was granted to John Pierson. Charles I granted Brambridge to Gilbert Welles in 1636 and the property remained in the Welles family until the late eighteenth century, when it passed to a cousin, Walter Smythe.

In the 17th century, the Welles were determined recusants and Swithun Welles was hanged for his faith in 1591. The house was once a refuge for Roman Catholic priests and the family assisted in the clandestine burials of Catholics in the local churchyard.

Brambridge House was the birth place of Maria Anne Fitzherbert, Walter Smythe's eldest daughter and the home of the High Sheriff of Hampshire. There has been a house on the site since the 16th century, although the current building was constructed after the old house burnt down in 1872. One of the rooms in the old Brambridge House was consecrated as a Roman Catholic chapel, but after the first of the Catholic Relief Acts, a small chapel was built in the village and endowed by Mrs. Fitzherbert in about 1782.

[edit] References

• Colden Common parish history