Pewsey is a large village and civil parish at the centre of the Vale of Pewsey in Wiltshire, about south of Marlborough and west of London. It is within reach of the M4 motorway and the A303 and is served by Pewsey railway station on the Reading to Taunton line.
The parish includes these small settlements: Kepnal – east of the village, south of the Burbage road Pewsey Wharf – north, where the A345 crosses the Kennet and Avon canal Sharcott – west, by the Avon; marked on some maps as East Sharcott as distinct from West Sharcott, a short distance downstream in Manningford parish Southcott – close to the southeast of the village.
History
Archaeological excavations on Pewsey Hill show evidence of a settlement in the 6th century. In the Tudor era, the Manor of Pewsey belonged to the Duchess of Somerset. Several of the village's houses were built in this era: the timber framed cruck house at Ball Corner, Bridge Cottage on the Avon and the Court House by the Church.
In 1764, the founder of the Methodist movement John Wesley (1703–1791) preached at Pewsey's Church of England parish church. The rector at that time, Joseph Townsend, was responsible for the building of Pewsey's first bridge over the River Avon.
The Kennet and Avon Canal reached Pewsey in 1810. Of more lasting effect for the village was the completion of the Hungerford to Devizes section of the GWR's Berks & Hants line in 1862, which allowed fast travel to London and to the West Country. Since 1906, the line at Pewsey has been part of the Reading to Taunton line, a more direct route via Westbury to the West Country.
In 1898 Pewsey Carnival was first held, a tradition that flourishes today with a fortnight of events, including The Feaste, culminating in an illuminated procession in mid to late September.
A prominent statue of King Alfred the Great, the former Anglo Saxon King of Wessex and a local landowner, stands in the middle of the village.
Pewsey White Horse
The Pewsey White Horse hill figure is located on a steep slope of Pewsey Hill about south of the village, and can be viewed from several places in the surrounding area. It was cut in 1937 and is one of the smaller Wiltshire white horses. It replaces an earlier one which was possibly cut in 1785.
Governance
An electoral ward in the same name exists. The ward starts in the west at Pewsey and stretches east to Easton Royal. The total population of the ward at the 2011 census was 4,649.
Education
Pewsey Vale School is a state secondary school, without a sixth form.
Pewsey has a state Primary Academy, Pewsey Primary School which is linked to Pewsey vale secondary school. It appeared in the 100 Most Improved Schools table for its 2013 results and its 2014 results put it in the top 100 schools nationally. An Ofsted inspection in 2012 rated the school as 'good' and this was confirmed by a short inspection in 2017.
St. Francis School, an independent preparatory school, is just outside the village.
Churches
Parish church
The parish church of St John the Baptist stands next to the main road in the south of the village and is built in flint and sarsen with limestone dressings.
A church at Pewsey was recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086. The present building has work from the late 12th or early 13th centuries in the four-bay arcades, on foundations of large sarsens; Pevsner suggests the arches were cut through the walls of an earlier building. The plain font bowl is also from the 12th century. The chancel was rebuilt in the late 13th or early 14th century, the clerestory added in the late 14th or early 15th century, and the ashlar west tower added in the 16th century.
In 1861 G.E. Street largely rebuilt the chancel and added the south chapel, reusing early windows from the chancel, and restoration in 1889-90 by C.E. Ponting included the addition of the north porch.
The tower has six bells, the oldest cast in 1620 by Purdue of Salisbury; two others from the 18th century are by Rudhall of Gloucester. On the outside of the tower's east wall hangs a sanctus bell cast by James Burrough of Devizes in 1754.
The church was recorded as Grade I listed in 1964. Today the church is central to the Vale of Pewsey Team, which includes many rural parishes around Pewsey.
Others
A Methodist chapel was built in 1873 and became a church in 1932.
The Roman Catholic Church of the Holy Family was built in 1964.