Northmoor
Why so many pictures of Northmoor? The clue is on the back of the cards: they are all marked “Published by Baston, Post Office, Northmoor”.
Until at least 1876, Northmoor had no Post Office of its own: the nearest one was in Eynsham. But by 1891 George Baston was running a shop and post office in Northmoor in the house shown in the top two pictures. He was still there in 1900, but by 1908 Mrs Baston was running it on her own.
The figures in the doorway of the post office (detail, left) are amost certainly George and Lucy Baston, who would have sold these cards
Kelly’s Directory for 1891 describes Northmoor thus:
Northmoor is a parish separated from Berkshire by the Isis, which is crossed at Newbridge, 1½ miles south-west, by a stone bridge of 5 arches; and at Bablocke-Hythe, 1½ miles north-east, by a ferry; it is 5 miles south from Eynsham station on the East Gloucestershire railway, 6½ south-west from Oxford, 6½ south-east from Witney and 9 north-west from Abingdon in the Mid division of the county, hundred of Chadlington, petty sessional division of Bampton east, union and county court district of Witney, rural deanery of Witney, archdeaconry and diocese of Oxford.
The church of St. Denis is an edifice of stone, in mixed styles, consisting of spacious chancel, north chapel, nave, south porch, and an embattled western tower of Decorated date, curiously constructed upon piers from the interior of the original church, and containing 6 bells and a clock: the chancel is Early English, with an east window of singular design, now filled with stained glass as a memorial to Sarah Naider; it retains a piscina and three good sedilia of the same period and a painting of Our Saviour bearing the Cross; in the north chapel, a Decorated work, are a piscina and two sepulchral recesses, near which are recumbent effigies of a cross-legged knight and a lady: there is a memorial window in the nave to the Rev. E. Devon, a late vicar: the interior of the church has been restored, the chancel by St. John’s College, Oxford, and the nave by subscription amounting to about £300; the church was re-opened 12th April 1887: Richard Lydall gave a new bell and rebuilt the ringing loft in 1701: there are 50 sittings. The register dates from the year 1654. The living is a vicarage, net yearly value £110, including 44 acres of glebe and without vicarage house, in the gift of St John’s College, Oxford, and held since 1890 by the Rev. William Charles Bell.
Here is a Primitive Methodist chapel.
There are charities for distribution of about £21 yearly and for church purposes of about £37. Edward William Harcourt esq. J.P., D.L. of Nuneham Park, who is lord of the manor, and St. John’s College, Christ Church and Magdalen College, Oxford, are the principal landowners. The soil is limestone and gravel; subsoil, gravel. The chief crops are wheat, barley, beans, turnips, &c. The area is 2,037 acres; rateable value £2,614: the population in 1881 was 299.
Moorton is a hamlet one mile south-west, Sexton and Verger, Henry Webb
- Post Office — George Baston, receiver. Letters arrive from Oxford viâ Eynsham at 9.15am; dispatched 5.10pm. The nearest money order & telegraph office is at Eynsham
- Church of England School, built in 1873, to hold 80; average attendance, 43; Miss Sarah King, mistress
- Bell Rev. William Charles [vicar]
Baston George, shopkeeper, & post office
Buckingham Moses, Dun Cow P.H. & shopkeeper
Burden Charles, farmer
Castle Ann (Miss), farmer
Clifton William, Chequers P.H., Bablock-Hythe
Eagle Richard, Jun, farmer
Holtom George Henry & Sons, millers (water), Newbridge
Hutt Edwin James, Red Lion P.H.
Walker Christopher, farmer
Walter Mary Ann (Mrs.), farmer
Wright Sarah (Mrs.), Rose & Crown P.H. & wharfinger, Newbridge