Barrow
Barrow in 2002.
Barrow is located about five miles (8 km) north-east of Oakham, between Cottesmore and Market Overton. It was in the Hundred of Alstoe.
This village is on the crest of a steep hill rising to about 460 feet (150 metres).
A small hill near the triangular green (shown in the photographs above and below) may be all that remains of the eponymous barrow or prehistoric burial mound. The barrow would have been visible from the lower-lying land to the east.
On the green stands the base and stump of an old market cross. Photograph taken in 2002.
This cross is clear evidence that Barrow was once much bigger i.e. a small market town. Seemingly it was once bigger than Cottesmore.
xenophobia
About 150 yards to the east of the cross is a picturesque thatched cottage. On one wall is a painted sign saying 'All Vagrants who are found Begging in this Town will be taken up & Prosecuted'.
Photograph taken in 2005.
The sign is thought to be seventeenth century when the punishment for vagrancy was a public whipping. Early in the twentieth century the sign was more prominently displayed on the wall of a cottage closer to the cross.
According to oral history recorded in the early 1970s, supposedly an underground tunnel runs westerly from Church House to a 'bolthole' alongside the Teigh Road.
places of worship
The remains of an old chapel of ease are in the garden of Church House.
This chapel was replaced in 1831 by a small Gothic Revival church which was pulled down in 1974.
Victoria County History page for Barrow.
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