| Ledbury | |
The Market House, Ledbury |
|
|
Ledbury
Ledbury shown within Herefordshire |
|
| Population | 9,900 [1] |
|---|---|
| OS grid reference | SO710373 |
| Unitary authority | Herefordshire |
| Shire county | Herefordshire |
| Region | West Midlands |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | LEDBURY |
| Postcode district | HR8 |
| Dialling code | 01531 |
| Police | West Mercia |
| Fire | Hereford and Worcester |
| Ambulance | West Midlands |
| EU Parliament | West Midlands |
| UK Parliament | North Herefordshire |
| List of places: UK • England • Herefordshire | |
Ledbury is a town in Herefordshire, England, lying east of Hereford, and south of the Malvern Hills.
Today, Ledbury is a thriving market town in rural England. The town has a large number of timber framed buildings, in particular along Church Lane and High Street. One of Ledbury's most outstanding buildings is the Market House, built in 1617, located in the centre of the town. Other notable buildings in the area include the parish church, the Painted Room (containing sixteenth century frescoes), the St Katherine's Hospital site, founded c1231, is a rare surviving example of a hospital complex, (with hall, chapel, The Master's House, almshouses and a timber-framed barn), and Eastnor Castle.
Contents |
Ledbury is an ancient borough, dating back to around 690AD. In the Domesday Book it was recorded as Liedeberge, and returned members to Parliament in the reign of Edward I. Ledbury probably takes its name from the River Leadon, on which it stands. The Old English berg (hill) has been added to the river name. The Feathers at Ledbury was a famous 16th century drover's inn.[2]
Ledbury was once home to the poetess Elizabeth Barrett Browning, who spent her childhood days at Hope End. It is also the birthplace of poet laureate John Masefield, after whom the local secondary school is now named - John Masefield High School (JMHS). William Wordsworth's sonnet St. Catherine of Ledbury, dated 1835, begins "When ... Ledbury bells broke forth in concert".[3] In 1901 St. Katharine's priest was Charles Madison Green, whose wife, Ella, was the eldest sister of author H. Rider Haggard.
The Herefordshire and Gloucestershire Canal, which was opened from Gloucester as far as Ledbury in 1798, passed through the lower part of the town with wharves at Bye Street and at what is now the Ross Road near the Full Pitcher public house. After closing in 1885, part of the Ledbury to Gloucester section of the canal was used by the Great Western Railway for the Ledbury and Gloucester Railway. The original line of the canal northwards towards Hereford can still be seen, where it went underneath the Ledbury to Hereford railway - an additional smaller bridge was made for the towpath. When the Gloucester railway closed in 1964, as a result of the Beeching cuts, it gradually became overgrown but the route through Ledbury then was used as a footpath. In 1997 a 1.6 mile (2.5 km) section from the bypass / Ross Road roundabout to the railway station was upgraded to a 2 m (6.5 ft) wide path with a surface of compacted limestone chippings that could also be used by cyclists and those with wheelchairs. This included creating several access points, thinning out but retaining many of the trees that had grown since the 1960s and reopening the skew bridge across the A438 Hereford Road. Unfortunately the proposed bridge to take the Town Trail (as it is now known) across the B4214 Bromyard Road into the station yard was never built. The Trail ends at the Hereford/Bromyard road junction.
The main roads through the town are the A449 and the A417, and the M50 motorway runs to the south. Ledbury railway station is near the western end of the Cotswold Line and offers direct services to Hereford, Worcester, Birmingham, Oxford and London.
For many years, the Robertson's factory, which was a subsidiary of for Rank Hovis McDougall, produced jam. Production was moved to Histon in Cambridgeshire in September 2007 following the parent company's acquisition by Premier Foods.[4] The site is now used by Universal Beverages to process fruit for cider producers such as Bulmers and includes two giant fermentation tanks, each capable of holding 800,000 litres.[5][6]
Ledbury is also home to Amcor's flexible packaging manufacturing plant. This plant has been awarded both the "Carbon Reduction Cost Saving Award - over 250 employees" and "Most Promising New Low Carbon Product / Service Award - over 250 employees" in the West Midlands Low Carbon Economoy 2010 awards.[7]
Ledbury also enjoys an income from tourism, being a small tranquil market town, steeped in history, in an attractive rural area.
Ledbury is the venue for various festivals including the Ledbury Poetry Festival and The Big Chill music event at nearby Eastnor Castle, which brings thousands of people to the town each year.
The Ledbury hunts (Ledbury, which dates from 1846, and North Ledbury, established in 1905) are well-supported.[8]
Ledbury is home to the Silurian Border Morris Men. There are a number of singing groups in the town, including Ledbury Choral Society and Ledbury Community Choir, the latter with over 60 singers.
The Market Theatre is situated the town centre, in Market Street. Ledbury Amateur Dramatic Society (LADS) runs the theatre, mounting three of its own productions a year. They also show films on a regular basis and play host to small and mid-scale professional touring shows, including events in the Ledbury Poetry Festival. The society its own active youth theatre, which mounts productions throughout the year, giving local children a chance to participate in drama outside of an educational establishment.
At Tedstone Delamere the Sapey Brook runs its course to Upper Sapey. A story is told of a mare and a colt that had been stolen and the hoofprints stopped at the bank of the brook. The owner was Saint Catherine of Ledbury who prayed for their safe return and upon examining the bed of the brook saw hoofprints clearly visible in the rocky bottom. These hoofprints were followed and the thief caught, the horses being safely recovered. The nearby Hoar Stone is said to be the horse thief petrified for his crimes A local pastime was once the creation of fake hoofprints for visitors, however the original petrosomatoglyphs are still visible in the brook to this day.[9]
|
||||||||||||||