Bosham, Sussex

BOSHAM is a village and parish, 4 miles west from Chichester, in the hundred of the same name, Western division of the county, rape, county court district, diocese and, archdeaconry of Chichester, deanery of Boxgrove; and Westbourne union; Two branches of the great estuary, Chichester Harbour and Bosham Creek, form the boundaries of the parish east, west, and south, and Funtington on the north. The church of the Holy Trinity is partly in the Early English style and partly in that which prevailed in the fourteenth century: the prebendal stalls still remain in the chancel, and in the north wall is a niche, with crocketed ornaments, enclosing a female recumbent figure, of a style of earlier than the reign of Edward I. The living is a vicarage, yearly value £270, with residence, in the gift of the Dean and Chapter of Chichester, and held by the Rev. Henry Mitchell, M.A., of Lincoln College, Oxford. Here are the extensive brick, tile and fancy pottery works of A. Cheesman, Esq., under the management of George Hounsom. The principal landowners are Lord FitzHardinge, Col. Webber Smith, Alfred Cheesman, Esq., the representatives of the late E. Humphry, Esq., Mrs. Farndell, E. W. Johnson, Esq. Thomas Heaver, Esq., and John Baring, Esq. The South Coast Railway passes through the northern portion of the parish, and has a station at Broadbridge, called the Bosham station. The area is 3,839 acres; the population in 1861 was 1,158.

[Kelly's Post Office Directory of Essex, Herts, Middlesex, Kent, Surrey and Sussex, 1867.]