GILLINGHAM, a parish in the liberty of GILLINGHAM,
Shaston (West) division of the county of DORSET,
4 miles (N.W. byW.) from Shaftesbury, containing, with
the chapelry of Bourton, 3059 inhabitants. The living,
a vicarage, is a royal peculiar within the jurisdiction of
the Lord of the Manor, rated in the king's books at
£40.17.6., and in the patronage of the Bishop of Salisbury.
The church, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary,
is a large edifice partly in the Norman style, with a chantry
chapel attached to it, and a high tower. There is a place
of worship for Wesleyan Methodists. A library of six
hundred volumes, given by Thomas Freke, Esq., is
deposited in the vicarage-house, for the use of the
vicars. The river Stour runs through the parish, which
lies in the northernmost part of the county, bordering
on the counties of Somerset and Wilts; it is of great
extent, being about forty-one miles in circumference,
and includes the ancient Forest of Selwood, which was
disafforested by-Charles I., on condition that the lessee
should maintain four hundred deer for the king's use.
About half a mile eastward from the church, on the
road to Shaftesbury, are traces of the ancient palace of the
Saxon and Norman kings, who made it their residence
when they came to hunt in the forest. The manufacture
of linen has been carried on here from a very early
period, but the inhabitants derive their principal profits
from the rich pastures and dairy-lands abounding in
the parish. There are fairs for horses, bullocks, and
sheep, on Trinity-Monday and September 12th. John
Grice and others, in 1526, founded and endowed a free
school, which was in much repute during the parliamentary
war, and in which the celebrated Hyde, afterwards
Earl of Clarendon, received part of his education.
Edmund Ironside, in 1016, having vanquished Canute
at Pen in Somersetshire, the pursuit is said to have
extended hither, which is probable from the number of
pits now discernible in the neighbourhood, on the
supposed field of a second battle.