Cropredy

Cropredy
Cropredy shown within the United Kingdom
OS grid reference	SP4646
- London	81.7mi
District	Cherwell
Shire county	Oxfordshire
Region	South East
Constituent country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Postcode district	OX16
Dialling code	01295
Police	Thames Valley
Fire	Oxfordshire
Ambulance	South Central
UK Parliament	Banbury
European Parliament	South East England
List of places: UK • England • Oxfordshire

Coordinates: 52°′″N 1°′″W / 52.0605, -1.3362 Cropredy is a village in Oxfordshire in England, five miles North of Banbury.

Cropredy, showing the canal.

Cropredy stands on the West bank of the River Cherwell. It has Anglo-Saxon origins, and is recorded in the Domesday Book. The name of the village springs from the Saxon words cropp (a hill) and ridig (a stream). Its church, St Mary's, is medieval and built of the local ironstone.

From 1519 onwards, Brasenose College, Oxford owned extensive property in Cropredy, a fact commemorated in the name of the pub The Brasenose Arms. The village has another pub called The Red Lion; there are also several shops, a Post Office and a village school for children aged between 5 and 11 years.

To the West of the village runs the main railway line from Oxford to Birmingham. The line was built by the Great Western Railway and there was a station at Cropredy until the 1960s.

The village is bounded to the East by the Oxford Canal. There is a lock here, and at the South end of the village a wharf. Nowadays this is used by pleasure boats, but it was originally built as a coal wharf. The canal connects the Coventry Canal to the River Thames and opened from Coventry in 1778, although it was not completed southward to Oxford until 1790. The canal runs beside the River Cherwell.

Cropredy Bridge on the River Cherwell was the site of a major battle in 1644 during the English civil war. King Charles' engaged the Parliamentarian army led by Sir William Waller. The battle was a stalemate; Parliamentarian side suffered heavy casualties but ultimately prevented the King's forces from crossing the bridge. A plaque on the bridge bears the inscription: “Site of the Battle of Cropredy Bridge 1644. From Civil War deliver us.”

Cropredy Music Festival

On farmland East of the village the electric folk band Fairport Convention stage an annual three-day event called the Fairport's Cropredy Convention, which attracts up to 20,000 music fans. Many bands appear on this 3 day festival and Fairport Convention always headline on the Saturday night. Other bands such as Richard Thompson and Robert Plant also perform. A lot of people camp there and, as it a canal side village, a lot of people come to the festival on canal boats. The 2007 festival sold all 20,000 tickets. The first time this had been achieved.

Highlights in the 2007 festival included Liege and Lief, performed by the 1969 line up of Fairport Convention, with Chris While standing in for the late Sandy Denny, and also Strawbs, who stormed the show on Saturday. This was the first year that Strawbs had played at Cropredy, despite Fairport Convention and Strawbs sharing a common history. (Sandy Denny originally recorded with Strawbs before leaving to join Fairport).

External links

• Cropredy village website
• Cropredy School website
• Strawbsweb

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