Newbury, Berkshire

The Beauties of England and Wales, Or, Delineations, Topographical and Descriptive of Each County By Edward Wedlake Brayley, John Britton(1801):

Tnis town is situated in a fertile plain watered by the Rennet, which crosses the town near the centre. Its ancient name was Newbir which it appears to have received from its relation to the old town of Spine, (The Spinae of the Romans,) from which it is only separated by a brook, and from whose ruins it arose.

The principal streets of Newbury are disposed nearly in the shape of the Roman Y the angles branching off from the marketplace and the foot of the letter being formed by the village of Speenhamland they are spacious and well paved. The houses are about 950 in number mostly of brick The population may be estimated at 3800 being chiefly employed in trade. The church is a plain Gothic stone edifice supposed to have been built in the reign of Henry the Seventh This structure westward from the pulpit was raised together with the tower at the charge of the famous John Winschomb generally called Jack of Newbury.

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