INTRODUCTION

It is interesting to consider why Wraysbury was chosen as a site for early settlement. What was it about its situation that singled it out? A number of factors contributed to man’s early appearance here:-

1.  Its riverside situation afforded excellent means of communication both by the river Thames itself and also by its tributary, the river Colne. These rivers must have provided both a means of communication and a natural defensive barrier. The Thames afforded a route eastwards to Europe and westwards, through the Goring Gap, it connected with the Icknield and Ridge Ways . The Thames Valley with its flat and easy travelling country channelled the merchandise this way.

2.  The flood plain gravel terraces of Wraysbury, being free draining and above flood level, provided man with an attractive site on which to settle and build, together with adequate water supplies.

3.  The soil in the immediate vicinity was found to be suitable for cultivation, the scattered deposits of brickearth being especially good, as well as providing the raw material for one of the earliest of artefacts, the clay pot.
 

THE NAME WRAYSBURY

 The name "Wiresesberie" quoted in the Domesday Survey may be derived from the words "Weir" meaning a dam and "Bury" a fortified place.  Although it is more likely that a Saxon landowner by the name or "Wyrarad" gave the name "Wyrardisbury" which, until fairly recently, has continued to be used in conjunction with the title of the local parish council.

There have been more than 30 different spellings of the name but always with the same pronunciation as at present and since the War this has come to be the acceptable form.  Christiana de Mariscis made a deed of gift to the Priory of Ankerwycke (29 E.1 1300) in which the name was variously written as "Wyresdysbury", "Wiredesbery", "Wyrardesbury", "Wardesbury" and "Wraisbury" and in a grant to Lord Wyndsore (31 Henry VIII 1540) it was written as "Wyredysbury".

The following extract occurs in "The Journeys of Celia Fiennes" (b. 1662 d. 1741)..."from London to Rusbery, 18 miles by Stanes, pretty house and gardens in sight of Windsor in Buckinghamshire".  A further extract records that she rode from Windsor, ferried across the Thames  " and so went a nearer way which is a private road made for the kings coaches and so to Colebrook  three miles more thence to Houndslow Heath and so to London."