The Monday Photo

This is where we used to go as kids, to fish for sticklebacks. It’s the bridge that was built to carry the new 1722 turnpike over Shipton Brook, just outside Winslow. On summer days we would paddle around with our jam jars and nets, just here in front of the bridge.

The old turnpike didn’t go through Winslow. The closest it got was East Claydon.

This is the downstream side. On the upstream side, you can still make out the route of the ford, gently sloping towards the brook.

The bridge hasn’t been part of the main road since 1937, when a new bridge was built and the road was straightened.

It wasn’t the first time the road had been altered at Shipton. At the top of the rise, where the road now sweeps round to the left, was a ’T’ junction. Part of the ’T’ junction remains as the first right angle bend in the side road through Shipton.

The two timber framed cottages set back on your right as you drive up the main road were once right against it. Other houses on the other side of the road, and there wasn’t a huge gap between them, were demolished in 1822 when the main road was altered.

Upstream from the bridge, the brook is fed by streams from Mursley, Stewkley Dean, and Hoggeston. Just downstream from here, another stream from the top of Oving hill joins the brook.

From there, the brook heads West, then joins another brook near Padbury. Then the bigger brook flow North and under the ancient bridge at Thornborough.

I still visit the bridge at Shipton brook when I’m passing.