Shepton Mallet

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Shepton Mallet

Coordinates: 51.1925° N 2.5458° W
Population	8,440
OS grid reference	ST619438
District	Mendip
Shire county	Somerset
Region	South West
Constituent country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	SHEPTON MALLET
Postcode district	BA4
Dial code	01749
Police	Avon and Somerset
Fire	Somerset
Ambulance	South Western
UK Parliament	Wells
European Parliament	South West England
List of places: UK • England • Somerset

Shepton Mallet is a small rural town in Somerset, England, situated five miles to the east of Wells and just south of the Mendip Hills. The town has a population of 8,440 (2002 estimate). The town contains the administrative headquarters of Mendip District Council.

1 Overview
2 History
3 Prison
4 Events
5 Transport
6 Tesco
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Overview

Rich in history, the market cross in the town centre dates back to the 1500s.^[1] It boasts England's oldest prison still in use. National treasures such as the Domesday Book were kept safe here in World War II. Archaeologists uncovered a significant number of Roman artefacts in the early 1990s at a site adjacent to the nearby Fosse Way, including a Chi-Rho amulet, held to be among the earliest evidence of Christianity in England. In honour of this the town's underused 1970s entertainment complex, generally held to be a white elephant, was renamed The Amulet.

Shepton Mallet is home to Europe's largest cider plant. This produces Blackthorn Cider and Gaymer's Olde English cider, and Babycham.

On 27th April 2006 a plan was unveiled to transform the centre of Shepton Mallet with "The Amulet" becoming the centre of a new Shepton Mallet Performing Arts Academy and the centre of the town returned to a "more traditional form".

To the north of the town are several Caves of the Mendip Hills including Thrupe Lane Swallet which is a geological Site of Special Scientific Interest.

[edit] History

The Market cross

Parish church of St. Peter and St.Paul

Shepton Mallet was listed in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Sepeton, meaning 'The sheep enclosure' from the Old English scoep and tun.^[2] The town's first name derives from the Anglo-Saxon for sheep fold, pointing to the original source of the town's wealth. It was part of lands given to the Malet family by Henry I in 1100, making it one of the first double place names in the country.

Shepton Mallet was a site of one of the original gatherings of the Monmouth Rebellion, after Monmouth rallied troops there in 1685 after landing at Lyme Regis. Many rebels joined the cause, but Monmouth had to return to Shepton after failing to take Bath or Bristol. Following the Bloody Assizes, a number of rebels were hanged from the market cross.

The traditional wool and silk industries were joined by brewing in the 19th century. The Anglo-Bavarian Brewery,^[3] still a local landmark, was reputedly the first in England to brew lager. The town, home to Babycham, is still an important centre for cider production. In recent years there has been the addition of hi-tech services from companies such as the ISP UK Online. A factory that once made Clarks shoes and later Doc Martens boots has closed and the site is planned to be taken by the Tesco food retailer for a supermarket, not without local misgivings.

The town's weekly newspaper, part of the Mid-Somerset Series, is called the Shepton Mallet Journal.

[edit] Prison

Shepton Mallet Prison

HMP Shepton Mallet was opened as a civilian jail from 1610 to 1930. A total of 7 executions took place within its walls between 1889 and 1926:

Samuel Rylands - 13 March 1889
Henry Dainton - 15 December 1891
Charles Squires - 10 August 1893
Henry Quarterly 10 November 1914
Verney Hasser - 5 March 1918
William Bignall - 24 February 1925
John Lincoln - 2 March 1926

The prison was then closed until 1939 and the start of the Second World War, when it was reopened, at first for the storage of important government archives, but subsequently for the use of the US Army for American Military use. The prison was entirely staffed by American military personnel during this period. Under the provisions of the Visiting Forces Act of 1942, a total of eighteen American servicemen were executed within the prison walls. Sixteen were hanged and two were shot by firing squad. Of the 18 men executed, nine were convicted of murder, six of rape, and three of both crimes. A small, two-story brick-built building containing a gallows was constructed adjoining one of the prison wings. The building which housed the gallows still exists, but has since been converted to other uses. The names and dates of American military executions are as follows:

David Cobb - 12 March, 1943 - Murder
Harold A. Smith - 25 June, 1943 - Murder
Lee A Davis - 14 December, 1943 - Murder
John Waters - 10 February, 1944 - Murder
J.C. Leatherberry - 16 March, 1944 - Murder
Wiley Harris - 26 May, 1944 - Murder
Alex Miranda - 30 May, 1944 - Murder (firing squad)
Eliga Brinson & Willie Smith - 11 August, 1944 - Rape
Madison Thomas - 12 October, 1944 - Rape
Benjamin Pyegate - 28 November, 1944 - Murder (firing squad)
Ernest Clarke & Augustine Guerra - 8 January, 1945 - Murder
Robert Pearson & Parson Jones - 17 March, 1945 - Rape
William Harrison - 7 April, 1945 - Murder
George Smith - 8 May, 1945 - Murder
Aniceto Martinez - 15 June, 1945 - Rape

Initially, the remains of executed American prisoners at Shepton Mallet were interred in unmarked graves at Brookwood Cemetery in Surrey. However, circa 1950 all eighteen were exhumed and reburied in Plot E at Oise-Aisne military cemetery in France. Plot E is a private section for the "dishonored dead" which adjoins (but is not part of) the main cemetery. Visits to Plot E are not encouraged. In any case, all the black grave markers bear numbers not names, so identification of individual soldiers is impossible without the key.

After the war, the prison was taken over by the British Army and became a British Military prison for service personnel. It became well known to British servicemen as 'the glass house', including the Kray twins who, while serving out their national service in the gaol after absconding met Charlie Richardson. The prison was finally returned to civilian use in 1966. It has held and still does hold many notorious criminals. Shepton Mallet prison remains a prison today, and has a capacity of 186 inmates. The prison is a grade II* listed building.^[4]

[edit] Events

Two annual agricultural shows are held close to the town: the four-day Royal Bath and West of England Society Show which is held on the society's showground near Evercreech, and the one-day Mid-Somerset Show, on fields on the town's southern edge.

The Bath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music was held at Shepton Mallet in 1970.

The Glastonbury Festival, the largest music festival in Europe, is held in the village of Pilton, approximately 3 km (2 miles) from the town.

Soul Survivour is held at the nearby showgrounds every summer

[edit] Transport

Shepton Mallet had railway stations on two lines, both now closed.

The first station, called Shepton Mallet (High Street) in British Railways days, was on the East Somerset Railway branch line from Witham and opened in 1859. The line was extended to Wells in 1862 and later connected to the Cheddar Valley line branch of the Bristol and Exeter Railway from Yatton to Wells via Cheddar. Through services between Yatton and Witham started in 1870. The line was absorbed into the Great Western Railway in the 1870s.

A second station, later called Shepton Mallet (Charlton Road), opened in 1874 with the building of the Bath extension of the Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway. This station was some distance east of the centre of the town and was approached on a long viaduct, which still remains.

Both stations closed in the 1960s as part of the Beeching Axe. Shepton Mallet (High Street) closed with the withdrawal of passenger services on the Yatton to Witham line in 1963, though part of the former East Somerset line remains open for freight and as a heritage railway. Shepton Mallet (Charlton Road) closed in 1966 with the closure of the Somerset and Dorset line.

[edit] Tesco

Shepton Mallet became home to a group of roughly 30 protesters in February 2006, as they fought a planning decision by the town council to allow construction of a Tesco store nearer the town centre to replace the existing Tesco supermarket on the edge of the town. The development, on a brownfield site that previously housed a shoe factory and plastics factory, required the felling of an avenue of mature trees, present since the 19th Century. (cf the very similar controversy in Stroud some years earlier). After the group were evicted by bailiffs following a court order, a second group established themselves just outside the planned development, to help protect a second avenue of trees, seemingly not scheduled for destruction but ultimately reduced in number by about 75% after the second group's eventual eviction.

It was widely believed that very few of the protesters were local to the area, many coming from as far afield as Brighton and Nottingham. Some observers felt that they had completely missed the point that the full planning process had been followed for two or more years prior to the granting of planning permission. Many of the townsfolk were quoted as being dismayed and disgusted by the protests - especially those who had given up their free time during the planning process to attend meetings and press for changes to the original plans, though the group had some supporters from the local community. The counter-argument was that many of the trees being "protected" by this protest were scrubby Norfolk Pines that were (and had been in the past) in danger of falling in high winds. Tesco argued that the total number of trees being removed was around 180, many of which were in urgent need of maintenance, and that 210 new trees would be planted to replace them, an argument that ultimately won the Council's support.

[edit] References

^ Market Cross. Images of England. Retrieved on 2006-10-25.
^ Robinson, Stephen (1992). Somerset Place Names. Wimbourne: The Dovecote Press Ltd. ISBN 1874336032.
^ Anglo Trading Estate (former Brewery now warehouses). Images of England. Retrieved on 2006-10-25.
^ HM Prison and perimeter wall. Images of England. Retrieved on 2006-10-25.