North Aston

One of the barons, Hugh Despenser the Younger, obtained North Aston, which was now a manor of two and a half knight's fees.

[3] By the late 14th century the Earls of March held an estate of one knight's fee at North Aston as part of the barony of Clifford Castle.

[3] The manor descended via Broke's son John and grandson Sir Basil (died 1646) to Thomas Brooke.

Sir Basil Brooke and his son were recusants and Thomas was a Royalist, so in 1653 the Commonwealth authorities sequestrated his estates.

[3] The Parliamentarian Major John Wildman, who speculated in confiscated lands, bought North Aston[3] but in 1655 he was jailed.

[3] Rowe's son-in-law Trevor Hill, 1st Viscount Hillsborough inherited North Aston from him but sold it in 1733.

[3] When Foster-Melliar died in 1906 a Captain John Taylor of Southgate, Middlesex bought North Aston, which included a 990 acres (400 ha) estate.

[3] Lionel Hichens, chairman of Cammell Laird, bought North Aston Hall in 1929[4] and his family still owned it in 1980.

In 1976 the Captain's son, Colonel Anthony Taylor, sold the Manor itself to Charles Mackenzie Hill, who subsequently[when?]

[7] However, the south aisle ends in a chapel that has a 15th-century Perpendicular Gothic east window[7] and the nave has a 15th or 16th-century clerestory.

[11] Since 1976 St Mary's has been part of a united Church of England Benefice with the neighbouring parishes of Steeple Aston and Tackley.

[13] It runs along the Cherwell valley and for a short distance it forms the eastern boundary of North Aston parish.

[3] In 1872 it moved to new premises when William Foster-Melliar converted the original coach house to the North Aston Hall into a schoolroom with two teachers' cottages attached.

After the second World War the number of pupils steadily declined, and in 1955 North Aston school was closed.

St Mary the Virgin parish church: 15th-century alabaster monument to a knight and his lady; reputedly John and Alicia Anne
St Mary the Virgin parish church: 19th-century stained glass in the east window of the chancel
Traditional cottages in Somerton Road
Oxford Canal bridge on the parish boundary between North Aston and Somerton
Baptismal font in St Mary the Virgin parish church