Atcham

Atcham is a village, ecclesiastical parish and civil parish in Shropshire, England. It lies on the B4380 (once the A5), 5 miles south-east of Shrewsbury. The River Severn flows round the village. To the south is the village of Cross Houses and to the north-west the hamlet of Emstrey.

Atcham once belonged and gave its name to Atcham Rural District, before the village merged into the Borough of Shrewsbury in 1974 and came under Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council. From 2009, Shrewsbury and Atcham joined the other districts of non-metropolitan Shropshire under Shropshire Council. The Parliamentaryconstituency covering the borough remained as Shrewsbury and Atcham until under constituency boundary changes in 2024 it was redesignated as Shrewsbury, dropping the Atcham name.^[2] In population (243 in 2001),^[1] Atcham was the smallest village to be named in a UK Parliamentary constituency.

The village has the only church in England dedicated to Saint Eata, Bishop of Hexham.^[3] The reason for the dedication is unclear, as there is no written record of Eata coming so far south. However, there is a crop photograph from the 1970s of a field in Attingham Park showing the site of a Saxon palace identical to one excavated near Hexham. "Atcham" is a contraction of "Attingham", meaning "the home of Eata's people". The church building dates from the 11th century.^[3]

The local airfieldRAF Atcham, now returned to agriculture and light industry, was held by an American training unit for much of World War II. It used P-47 Thunderbolts and later P-38 Lightnings for operational training of fighter pilots posted in from the United States. Almost 50 pilots were lost in accidents flying from there.

The A5 London–Holyhead road once crossed the village, but now runs to the north on a dual-carriageway.

In order of birth:

• Ordericus Vitalis (1075 – c. 1142), chronicler and Benedictine monk, was baptised in the village.^[4]
• Sir Rowland Hill of Soulton, convenor of the Geneva Bible translation, possible inspiration for the character Old Sir Rowland in Shakespeare's play As You Like built the first stone bridge over the river here as part of his wider civic projects across London and Shropshire.
• Noel Hill, 1st Baron Berwick (1745–1789), politician and landowner, builder of Attingham Park, was buried at the village church.
• Anna Kingsford (1846–1888), first female English medical graduate and vegetarian, was buried at the village church.
• Thomas Wallace Southam (1900–1990), businessman and amateur composer, was born in Atcham.
• Marjorie Chibnall (1915-2012), eminent medieval historian and editor of Orderic Vitalis'Historia Ecclesiastica.
• Digby Tatham-Warter (1917–1993), Second World War British Army officer famed for carrying an umbrella.
• Dick Sale (1919–1987), first-class cricketer and school headmaster, was born in the village.

Landmarks at Atcham include Attingham Park, seat of the Berwick barons until the title became extinct in 1953. The hall at Attingham Park is now the regional headquarters of the National Trust.^[5] Also on the estate is the Shropshire office of Natural England. Adjacent to Attingham Park is Home Farm, Attingham. Now separate from the hall that it traditionally supplied, it is a family-run organic farm and tearoom open to the public.

El más antiguo de los dos puentes de Atcham, construido entre 1769 y 1771 por John Gwynn , ^{[ 6 ]} se conoce comúnmente como Puente de Atcham. Está catalogado como Grado II* ^{[ 7 ]} y es un monumento protegido . ^{[ 8 ]} Su sustituto, inaugurado en 1929, transporta la antigua carretera A5 (B4380) sobre el río Severn . ^{[ 9 ]}

El pueblo tiene una taberna, el Mytton & Mermaid , que en su día perteneció a Clough Williams-Ellis y que servía de parada para su emblemático pueblo italianizante de Portmeirion . La escuela cerró hace medio siglo. La oficina de correos y la gasolinera, situadas junto a la antigua escuela, también han cerrado. Los antiguos edificios escolares y la casa contigua se vendieron al Sr. y la Sra. Caswell en 1982, ^{[ 10 ]} quienes desde entonces gestionan un pequeño negocio de venta y reparación de automóviles.

Atcham cuenta con un salón de actos con estructura de madera, el Malthouse, construido en el siglo XVII como tal, pero que tras quedar en desuso se convirtió en el siglo XIX en un taller de carpintería para la finca de Attingham. Fue reabierto tras su restauración en 1925 como salón de actos y dedicado a la memoria de los hombres de Atcham que murieron en la Primera Guerra Mundial . Tiene un suelo flotante adquirido de un salón de baile en Shrewsbury. ^{[ 11 ]}

Fuera de la parroquia, al este, se encuentra el pueblo de Wroxeter , antigua ciudad romana y actualmente sede de uno de los viñedos comerciales de Shropshire . También se ubica el Parque Empresarial/Polígono Industrial de Atcham en el emplazamiento del antiguo aeródromo. A pesar de su nombre, pertenece a la parroquia civil vecina de Wroxeter y Uppington , ^{[ 12 ]} aunque tras algunos cambios de límites realizados por la Diócesis de Lichfield , ahora se encuentra en la parroquia eclesiástica de Atcham.

• Edificios catalogados en Atcham

• Shrewsbury and Atcham B.C. - parish profile
• Atcham in the Domesday Book