Shalbourne is a civil parish in the English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 county of Wiltshire

Wiltshire

Wiltshire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire. It contains the unitary authority of Swindon and covers...

. Besides a village of the same name, the parish includes a number of widely spaced small settlements, including Bagshot and Stype, to the north, and Rivar and Oxenwood to the south. Before 1895, about half of the parish of Shalbourne (including its church) lay in Berkshire.

Local government

Shalbourne is a civil parish with an elected parish council. It also falls within the area of the Wiltshire Council

Wiltshire Council

Wiltshire Council is the unitary authority for most of the county of Wiltshire, in the West of England, the successor authority to Wiltshire County Council and to four districts—Kennet, North Wiltshire, Salisbury, and West Wiltshire—all of which had been created in 1973 and were...

 unitary authority

Unitary authority

A unitary authority is a type of local authority that has a single tier and is responsible for all local government functions within its area or performs additional functions which elsewhere in the relevant country are usually performed by national government or a higher level of sub-national...

, which is responsible for all significant local government

Local government

Local government refers collectively to administrative authorities over areas that are smaller than a state.The term is used to contrast with offices at nation-state level, which are referred to as the central government, national government, or federal government...

 functions. In the 2001 census

United Kingdom Census 2001

A nationwide census, known as Census 2001, was conducted in the United Kingdom on Sunday, 29 April 2001. This was the 20th UK Census and recorded a resident population of 58,789,194....

 the parish had a population of 600.

Notable people

From 1608 until late 1637, tenants of the parish's Westcourt Manor included William Carpenter and his namesake son, both of whom emigrated to Weymouth, Massachusetts

Weymouth, Massachusetts

The Town of Weymouth is a city in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. As of the 2010 census, Weymouth had a total population of 53,743. Despite its city status, it is formally known as the Town of Weymouth...

 in 1638 on the Bevis from Southampton

Southampton

Southampton is the largest city in the county of Hampshire on the south coast of England, and is situated south-west of London and north-west of Portsmouth. Southampton is a major port and the closest city to the New Forest...

. The younger William Carpenter was a founder of Rehoboth, Massachusetts

Rehoboth, Massachusetts

Rehoboth is a town in Bristol County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 10,172 at the 2000 census.-History:It was incorporated in 1643 making it one of the earliest Massachusetts towns to be incorporated. The Rehoboth Carpenter Family is among the founding families...

. The Rehoboth Carpenter family

Rehoboth Carpenter Family

The Rehoboth Carpenter family is an American family that helped settle the town of Rehoboth, Massachusetts in 1644.The first immigrant and founder of this line was William Carpenter The Rehoboth Carpenter family is an American family that helped settle the town of Rehoboth, Massachusetts in...

's descendants number in the tens of thousands, among whom are two U.S. presidents and a Project Mercury

Project Mercury

In January 1960 NASA awarded Western Electric Company a contract for the Mercury tracking network. The value of the contract was over $33 million. Also in January, McDonnell delivered the first production-type Mercury spacecraft, less than a year after award of the formal contract. On February 12,...

astronaut. William Carpenter [Jr.] married at Shalbourne in 1625 Abigail Briant, whose family had resided in the parish since at least the late 16th century.

Sources

• Wiltshire County Council Website page on Shalbourne, retrieved 20:15 Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)
• Kennet District Council Website page on Shalbourne Parish, retrieved 20:15 Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)