| All Cannings | |
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All Cannings
All Cannings shown within Wiltshire |
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| Population | 616 (2001 census)[1] |
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| OS grid reference | SU0761 |
| Parish | Allcannings |
| Unitary authority | Wiltshire |
| Ceremonial county | Wiltshire |
| Region | South West |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Police | Wiltshire |
| Fire | Wiltshire |
| Ambulance | Great Western |
| EU Parliament | South West England |
| Website | Welcome to AllCannings.net |
| List of places: UK • England • Wiltshire | |
All Cannings pr Allcannings is a village and civil parish in the Vale of Pewsey in the English county of Wiltshire. The parish includes the nearby smaller settlement of Allington.
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The earliest settlement in the area of All Cannings was at Rybury Camp, on the downs above the village. The Iron Age settlement at the farm of All Cannings Cross is an important site in study of that period. There is also evidence of settlement from Neolithic and Roman times.
The toponym is believed to be a derivation of "Old Canning" and a village probably existed on the current site by the 10th century as the invading Danes at that time referred to Canning Marsh. There was a church from early in the 13th century and the earliest features in the current Church of England parish church of All Saints are late Norman. By the 14th century the village had a water mill, but this had disappeared by the 18th century.
The Kennet and Avon Canal was built just north of the village and opened in 1810. The village's population peaked in the middle of the 19th century with the 1841 census showing 663 inhabitants.
In 1868 the Francis Baring, 3rd Baron Ashburton and his tenant farmer Simon Hiscock decided to each build a pair of semi-detached workers cottages. They had two plots adjacent of the same size. The tenant built his pair of brick, his Lordship of concrete - the only major difference is that in the absence of internal shuttering the concrete chimneys are straight rather than bent to combine into a single chimney stack. Both pairs of cottages still stand largely unaltered. One of the concrete houses has had an extension added in June 2006.
It is assumed that this was a trial into the efficacy of using shuttered reinforced concrete as a building method. It seems to have been successful as two more pairs were then built, followed by a more elaborate villa style pair of cottages and finally a large Farmhouse.
This experiment is unknown and unacknowledged outside the area. While these houses may not be the very first concrete houses built, they were built within a couple of years of the first one - the time-line is not clear and are certainly the biggest example of a group of dwellings built then.
All Cannings had a Sunday school by 1808 and a day-school by 1818.[2] 100 pupils were enrolled in the day-school but attendance was much less as many of the children worked in the fields during the week.[2]
By 1833 the village had two day-schools: the parish school with 105 pupils and a private school with 12 pupils.[2] The Rector, had the parish school built that year on land given by the Lord of the Manor, Alexander Baring.[2] The private school had closed by 1858.[2] The parish school was reorganised in 1961[2] and moved into a new building in 2000.[3]
Position: grid reference SU017619