The name 'Woodleas', a woodland pasture, was recorded in
1591, but the Woodleaze farmhouse was not built until about 1840, on the
site of a barn. Then named Upper Farm, it was bought from John
Salmon, with eight fields, by Dr Fox when he also acquired Manor Farm,
and was worked for some years by James Matthews at Manor. At some
unidentified date, Henry Bush bought the property; J H Tyler of West End
Farm absorbed it as a tenant in 1867 and in 1871 the house was used for
labourers employed in building the railway line from Yate to Thornbury
via Tytherington. Two rail labourers and their families, with two
bachelors, occupied the house, 11 people in all. Then W G Phillimore was farming here, 74 acres, employing 2 men and a boy; he
left to become the publican at The Swan for 5 years until struck down by
typhoid. Then followed Daniel Nichols from 1894 to 1903, who moved
onto Brook Farm, Tytherington, Charlie Lee, 1904-1914, and then Lewis
Bryant, succeeded by his son Eric who is pictured left in the photograph
of the farm in the 1980's. The farm was bought by by ARC, a quarry
company, for its reserves of limestone, and in 1984 they began to extend
the Grovesend quarry to the south of the railway. Before this the,
the M5 motorway had severed Ramsoak from the rest of the farm. The
building was demolished in the late 1990's.
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| Eric Bryant pictured at Woodleaze Farm c 1980 | Woodleaze Farm 1986 |
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Map of Woodleaze. Surveyed 1878 revised 1936 Click to enlarge. |
