IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Frome Road, TROWBRIDGE, BA14 9QF

Southwick National School was founded in 1867. It was enlarged in 1898 to hold some 200 pupils and was the only source of education for all the village's children until 1931, when only younger ones were admitted. It finally closed in 1975. See Image] for another detail.

Quite an unusual design, the school has a clock tower with a short octagonal spire. See Image] for another look.

A fine Gothic style building on the Frome Road was the school. It was a National School, built in 1867 on land donated by the Conservative M.P. Richard Penruddocke Long. It served until 1975, whereupon the pupils were sent to a new school. See Image] for a detail.

The tower has clock faces to keep the school day running along. Despite the school closing in 1975, time is still kept. See Image] for a wider view of the old school.

Now a private residence, the chapel was founded in 1861. Southwick was a largely agricultural village for centuries with additional work in the form of hand weaving for a time. However, the area was not particularly rich and against this background the Baptist movement took hold from the 1770s onwards. It became a stronghold for the faith and there are a number of churches still evident. However, the movement also had disagreements and so a Calvinist breakaway group founded the society of strict Baptists; this was the church they worshipped in. Grade II listed.

The building is essentially an old farmhouse (the eighteenth century Southwick Farm) which was converted into a restaurant in the 1970s. Grade II listed.

The only public house remaining in Southwick (that I know of).

Southwick is hardly a place of outstanding beauty, natural or otherwise. This is about as good as it gets, but it is still better than Slough. The mini roundabout is at the junction of the A361 (Trowbridge to Beckington) and the road to North Bradley. You could call it the heart of the village.

The church stands at a prominent junction of the Frome Road. It was founded and built in 1899-1904 to designs by C. E. Ponting. His work is largely Gothic but with other features more in style of Arts and Crafts such as splayed buttressing, exaggerated eaves, the four-square tower and its stonework. The tower itself is surmounted by a fleche, which is covered with oak shingles. See Image] for a closer look at them. Grade II listed.