Tarrant Crawford

St Mary's Church, Tarrant Crawford
© Jim Fisher, Dorset OPC 2018

Tarrant Crawford is a small village at the end of the Tarrant Valley where the Tarrant joins the larger River Stour. It is located about 3 miles south east of Blandford Forum and about 6 miles north west of Wimborne. The parish is very small in area, being only just over a mile along its longest axis, which runs north east to south west, and about four fifths of a mile at maximum in the other direction. The village consists of two small settlements: Crawford Farm and a few houses in the Stour Valley, and Tarrant Abbey Farm, a church, and a few houses in the Tarrant Valley about 0.5 miles north.

Tarrant Abbey Farm was in medieval times the site of Tarrant Abbey, founded in the 12th century by Ralph de Kahaines (of nearby Tarrant Keyneston) as a Cistercian nunnery. Two famous people are associated with the abbey: Queen Joan, the wife of Alexander II of Scotland and daughter of King John of England, is buried in the graveyard (supposedly in a golden coffin), and Bishop Richard Poore, builder of Salisbury Cathedral, who was baptised in the abbey church and later (in 1237) buried in the abbey, which he founded. He was at one time Dean of the old cathedral at Old Sarum, and later became bishop of first Chichester, then Salisbury and finally Durham.

Saint Mary's Church, near Tarrant Abbey Farm, is known for its 13th- and 14th-century wall paintings, many of which are in a remarkable state of preservation. The church is all that remains of Tarrant Abbey, for which it may have been a lay church. The flint chancel, dates from the 12th century, with the nave, tower and porch being built in the 14th century. The 15th-century tower houses three bells, two of them medieval and one 17th century. The nave roof added in the early 16th century. In 1911 a major restoration of the church was undertaken.

The remnants of the old cross stand prominently on a stone plinth at a junction of the "main" road through the village and a side lane leading to Shapwick. The inscription on its base reads: "This Wayside Cross was restored & set on new steps on the old site by many friends of Tarrant Crawford Anno Dom MDCCCCXIV".

Crawford Bridge dating from the 15th Century, is a nine-arched bridge just outside the parish where the Tarrant joins the Stour, and still carries the road linking the parish with neighbouring Spetisbury

Tarrant Crawford Church
© Dorset OPC 2018

The Online Parish Clerk (OPC) for Tarrant Crawford is Jim Fisher
Please place the words 'OPC Tarrant Crawford' as your subject for e-mails
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