Piddlehinton the little Dorsetshire village of Piddlehinton is a very special place to me for it is another West Country location where I saw army service in the late 50s. Although sadly on a recent visit I saw the camp that held so many memories had closed down, Ah those were the days walking back from Dorchester, after missing the last bus, army pay unfortunately was never enough for the luxury of taxis.. Situated in the Piddle valley,the River Piddle is a small rural Dorset river which rises next to Alton Pancras church (Alton Pancras was originally named Awultune, a Saxon name meaning the village at the source of a river) and flows south and then south-easterly more or less parallel with its bigger neighbor, the .River Frome, to Wareham where they both enter Poole Harbour via Wareham Channel, many of the villages on it's banks are named after it Piddlehinton ,Pudletown, and Piddletrenthide to name a few. Piddlehinton lies 5 miles north of Dorchester deep in Hardy country, a very small picturesque village of if any village in England can be called a typical small English village this is it.

The village of Piddlehinton. is an very old, and historic little place, first mentioned during the reign of King Athelstan (A.D. 925 - 939) After the 'Norman Conquests' William the Conquer bestowed the manor of Piddlehinon on his half-brother Robert, Count of Mortain, the result of this magnanimous gesture was that Williams half brother became after the church the richest landowner in the country.Piddlehinton had a local government called liberty. it was a system of local government that originated in the Middle Ages. Liberties were areas of widely variable extent which were independent of the usual system of hundreds and boroughs for a number of different reasons, in 1888 this system of local government was repealed.
The hub of village is the village center and there you will find something what is all to common in every, city, town ,village, and hamlet in the country. Yes it is the war memorial. And alongside the memorial is a old horse trough a vivid reminder of days long gone one can not call them haycelon days, for life was indeed grim and hard for farm laborers.

The pretty thatched cottages in the village are a feature of the area and perfectly harmonize with the beautiful unspoilt Dorset countryside.The village church St Marys was originally built in 1299, but the church one sees today was re-built 14th century,in the graveyard lies buried Ann Winzer the nursing heroine who tended wounded troops after the Battle of Waterloo Piddlehinton has close connections to the famous Dorset novelist Thomas Hardy, for Hardy's sister taught at the village school. Part of the fascination of Hardys novels is the way he linked the names of towns and villages in his novels to towns and villages that exist in Dorset to-day a few examples are Abbot's Cernel, Cerne Abbas, Sherborne Abbey, Dorset, Milton Abbey, Milton Abbas, Dorset..A few miles to the north-west of Piddlehinton lies Cerne Abbas a place worth visiting for like Piddlehinton it is a charming village , one find the remains of Cerne Abbey, sadly an abbey gatehouse and a 15th. century tithe barn - all that remains of a once great Benedictine Abbey. Yes if you wish to wander down winding country lanes, study, nature and wildlife in beautiful scenery and enjoy a quiet relaxing holiday. Then this part of of Hardy's Wessex is for you and Piddlehinton, is the place to stay.!

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