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Stratford Tony

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Stratford Tony, also spelled Stratford Toney, is a tiny village and civil parish in southern Wiltshire, England. It lies on the River Ebble, about 4 miles southwest of Salisbury, and had a population of 55 in 2011. The parish is narrow from east to west; to the south it reaches chalk downland crossed by the A354 Salisbury-Weymouth road. The northern boundary is the Shaftesbury Drove, a byway that used to be used to move cattle to markets at Salisbury.

Salisbury Racecourse is just beyond the parish boundary, with some facilities inside Stratford Tony. Stratford Tony Down, south of the village, is a Site of Special Scientific Interest because of its botanically rich chalk grassland.

History and notable sites
- After the Norman Conquest, the Chalke Valley was divided into eight manors granted to Norman lords.
- The Domesday Book (1086) records a Stradford estate with 28 households and two mills, held by Earl Aubrey of Coucy.
- The parish church is St Mary and St Lawrence, a Grade I listed building cared for by the Churches Conservation Trust. It has a canonical sundial on the south wall. Parish records for baptisms, marriages, and burials are held at the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre.
- Stratford Tony House, west of the church, has a 17th-century core and a late-18th-century timber-framed barn. The north end manor house, dating to 1833, was built for George Purefoy-Jervoise, a landowner and MP.
- The population reached about 165 in the 1860s and has declined since.

Local government
- The civil parish does not have a parish council; instead, residents elect a parish meeting. Wiltshire Council is the unitary authority responsible for most local services.

Notable people
- John Bampton (1690–1751) was rector from 1718 until his death and left funds to establish the Bampton Lectures at Oxford University.
- The Impressionist painters Wilfrid de Glehn and his wife Jane Emmet lived at Stratford Tony manor from 1942.


This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 03:28 (CET).