[4] According to John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales, in 1872 the Basingstoke and Salisbury railway ran through Boscombe, and there was a post office, almshouses and a Norman church.

[8] The Bourne follows a winding course here, and the road from Salisbury forded it in two places, south and northeast of the church, until bridges were built in the late 18th century or early 19th.

Since 1939 the site has been a military aircraft test and research facility, now known as MoD Boscombe Down.

A church at Boscombe was mentioned in the 12th century, and the thick walls of the chancel and nave of the present building may survive from that period.

[3] The church, dedicated to St Andrew since at least 1763, is built of flint with ashlar dressings; the square bell-turret at the west end is clad in shingles.

The wooden pulpit was installed in 1633, then repositioned and provided with a tester in 1709; a small window was added nearby to light it.

[3] Richard Hooker, an influential theologian, was rector from 1591 to 1595: the income from this position supported him during the writing of his major work, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, a critique of the Puritans.

[21] The former rectory, northeast of the church, began as a 15th-century hall house in flint and brick,[22] and was made L-shaped by the addition of a north wing in 1836.