SHAPWICK, a parish in the hundred of BADBURY,
SHASTON (East) division of the county of DORSET, 4
miles (S. E.) from Blandford-Forum, containing 409
inhabitants. The living is a vicarage, in the archdeaconry
of Dorset, and diocese of Bristol, rated in the
king's books at £7. 9. 4., and in the patronage of
Lord Rivers. The church is dedicated to St. Bartholomew.
The navigable river Stour bounds the parish
on the south. James Alexander, Esq., in 1818, gave a
moiety of the dividends arising from £300 three per
cents, for the education of poor children. Here was a
small Carthusian priory, a cell to that of Sheen in Surrey.