The hamlet of Carlingcott on the north-west edge of Peasedown is known to have existed before 1800 but the main modern development in the area began in the 19th century when the Somerset Coalfield was greatly expanded as the Industrial Revolution increased demand for coal across England.

[9] The 1841 census lists about fifteen households with around eighty people living at "Peas Down", mostly coal miners, with some agricultural labourers, two carpenters, a seamstress, and a stonemason.

[10] The sinking of the Braysdown colliery in 1845 meant that accommodation had to be built for the enlarged workforce to work the new pit and expansion of the village was now inevitable.

[3] By the second half of the 20th century there were at least six collieries within 3 km (1.9 mi) of Peasedown, including Braysdown, Camerton, Dunkerton, Writhlington and Shoscombe.

[11] With the closure of the coal mines in the period up to the 1970s, and the growing popularity of out-of-town living, Peasedown rapidly became a commuter village for the cities of Bath and Bristol.

Both involved the construction of what were intended as affordable family housing, the first phase being mainly in the southeast of the village and consisting mostly of terraced or semi-detached properties.

Although it was between 1850 and 1890 that Peasedown grew into being a distinct settlement, it was not until 1955 that it became a civil parish,[2] having been divided for administrative purposes between Camerton, Wellow and Dunkerton until that point.

[15] The parish is represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom as part of the Frome and East Somerset constituency.

The village of Wellow, 3 miles (4 km) to the east of Peasedown, marks the southern edge of the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

[19] In the summer the Azores high pressure affects the south-west of England, however convective cloud sometimes forms inland, reducing the number of hours of sunshine.

[32] First West of England provides Peasedown St. John with bus services to and from Bath, Radstock, Midsomer Norton, Paulton, Shepton Mallet, Bristol and Wells.

The current church building dates from 1893, and was designed by George Frederick Bodley and Thomas Garner, replacing an earlier iron structure.

[37] The church congregation is active in the community, hosting youth work, lunches for the elderly, drug intervention schemes, and children's clubs.

Peasedown St John was one of several local villages where, in the 1930s, budding children's author Roald Dahl used to sell kerosene.

As he described in his autobiographical work Boy: Tales of Childhood (published 1984): My kerosene motor-tanker had a tap at the back and when I rolled into Shepton Mallet or Midsomer Norton or Peasedown St John or Huish Champflower, the old girls and the young maidens would hear the roar of my motor and would come out of their cottages with jugs and buckets to buy a gallon of kerosene for their lamps and their heaters.

Nobody gets a nervous breakdown or a heart attack from selling kerosene to gentle country folk from the back of a tanker in Somerset on a fine summer's day.