Romsey - Hampshire: Historical Connections Of A Small English Town

Romsey - Hampshire is a small market town with a population of 15,000. Despite its small size it has some interesting historical connections.

The town center is dominated by a large Norman abbey. The original abbey community was founded by nuns led by one of Alfred the Great's granddaughters. This was in 907. In 960 the abbey was refounded by King Edgar as a Benedictine nunnery. The abbey survived a Viking attack in 993 although the church was destroyed. Soon after this the abbey was rebuilt in stone.

The Normans rebuilt the abbey again between 1120 and 1140. It is their building which now survives to dominate the town center. The abbey and the adjoining town both prospered in the Early Middle Ages. Markets and fairs were allowed to be held in Romsey, under the terms of various royal charters. But in 1348 the plague or Black Death carried off half the townsfolk, and most of the nuns. At one point only 19 nuns lived in the abbey.

The life of the abbey ended in 1539 when Henry VIII split with the Pope in Rome. Henry seized religious properties in England in the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Romsey abbey was only saved from falling into ruins like many other English abbeys because the local parish church was inside the abbey. The town purchased the abbey from Henry in 1544. The price was 100 pounds.

Today the abbey is open to visitors every day. It also still serves as the Parish Church of Romsey (Church of England).

The town's prosperity in the Middle Ages had been based on the woollen industry, but this was supplanted by brewing, sack making and paper making in the eighteenth century. Both the old and new industries relied somewhat on water power from Romsey's watermills. Sadler's Mill is the best known watermill still in existence. It existed at least as early as the sixteenth century. It fell into disrepair after its closure in 1932, but has now been restored by the current owners.

Quite near to Romsey is a large, elegant Palladian mansion known as Broadlands. The gardens here are by Capability Brown. Broadlands was the home of the Victorian PM Lord Palmerston, who is said to have invented gunboat diplomacy, and of Lord Mountbatten of Burma. Lord Mountbatten was buried in Romsey Abbey after his murder by terrorists in 1979. Broadlands House and the Mountbatten Exhibition are closed in 2010 (for renovations) but the gardens are still open.