Reading is a historic market town in Berkshire, England, in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the River Thames and Kennet. It is on the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway, 40 miles (64 km) east of Swindon, 25 miles (40 km) south of Oxford, 40 miles (64 km) west of London, 15 miles (24 km) north of Basingstoke, 13 miles (21 km) southwest of Maidenhead and 15 miles (24 km) east of Newbury.
Berkshire is a county in South East England. One of the home counties, Berkshire was recognised by the Queen as the Royal County of Berkshire in 1957 because of the presence of Windsor Castle, and letters patent were issued in 1974. Berkshire is a county of historic origin, a ceremonial county and a non-metropolitan county without a county council. The county town is Reading.
Newbury is a market town in the county of Berkshire, England, which is home to the administrative headquarters of West Berkshire Council.
Speen is a village and civil parish in West Berkshire, England. Centred 2 miles (3 km) north west of the largest town in the district, Newbury, Speen has clustered settlements, the largest of which is Speen village and the others are buffered from the town by the A34 road and named Bagnor, Stockcross, Woodspeen and Marsh Benham.
West Berkshire is a local government district in Berkshire, England, administered from Newbury by West Berkshire Council.
Ashbourne is a market town in the Derbyshire Dales, England, with a population of 8,377 in the 2011 census, estimated at 9,163 in 2019. It contains many historical buildings and independent shops, and offers a historic annual Shrovetide football match. Its position near the southern edge of the Peak District makes it the closest town to Dovedale, to which it is sometimes referred as the gateway.
Aldermaston is a village and civil parish in Berkshire, England. In the United Kingdom Census 2011, the parish had a population of 1015. The village is in the mid-Kennet alluvial plain and bounds to Hampshire in the south. It is roughly equidistant from Newbury, Basingstoke and Reading, centred 46 miles (74 km) west-by-south-west of London.
Aldworth is a mainly farmland village and civil parish in the English county of Berkshire, near the boundary with Oxfordshire, in a rural area between Reading, Newbury and Streatley. It includes the hamlet of Westridge Green. It lies on the high ground of the Berkshire Downs, just off the B4009 road between Newbury and Streatley. The north of it is crossed by The Ridgeway, an 87-mile pre-Roman footpath. The parish church has large medieval figures in white stone, seemingly life-size, though some knights have an unlikely height of over seven feet. The Battle of Ashdown, where King Alfred defeated the Danes in January 871 CE, is said by some to have been fought near The Ridgeway and Lowbury Hill.
Theale is a large village and civil parish in West Berkshire, England, 5 miles (8 km) southwest of Reading and 10 miles (16 km) east of Thatcham.
Newbury Racecourse is a racecourse and events venue in the civil parish of Greenham, adjoining the town of Newbury in Berkshire, England. It has courses for flat races and over jumps. It hosts one of Great Britain's 36 annual Group 1 flat races, the Lockinge Stakes.
St. Bartholomew's School is a co-educational state funded academy school founded in 1466 in Newbury, Berkshire in the United Kingdom. It accepts students aged 11–18 and has approximately 1,700 students on roll, including a sixth form of around 400. St. Bartholomew's is thought to be the 42nd oldest school in the UK still in existence.
Newbury is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament from 2019 by Laura Farris, a Conservative. It was created by the Redistribution of Seats Act 1885 and has been in continual existence since then.
West Ilsley is a village and civil parish in Berkshire, England. The population of the village at the 2011 Census was 332.
Great Shefford is an English village and civil parish on the River Lambourn in the West Berkshire district of Berkshire. The modern civil parish includes the historical parish of Little or East Shefford, a small, much-reduced community downstream. It also covers the village of Shefford Woodlands, about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south-west of Great Shefford, near Junction 14 on the M4 motorway.
Brimpton is a mostly rural village and civil parish in West Berkshire, England. The village occupies a few square miles of land between the Kennet and Avon Canal, a long tributary the Enborne which is used as part of the Hampshire boundary and the winding slopes of an escarpment in the far south-east, beyond the Enborne which is almost contiguous with the larger settlement of Baughurst a wood-buffered part of Tadley post town. This high common field contains five round barrows from the period of the Heptarchy in Anglo Saxon England.
Ashmansworth is a village and civil parish in the Basingstoke and Deane district of the English county of Hampshire.
Historically, the English county of Berkshire has been bordered to the north by the ancient boundary of the River Thames. However, much of the border with Oxfordshire in the western part of the county was moved in 1974.
The Berkshire Yeomanry was an auxiliary regiment of the British Army formed in 1794 to counter the threat of invasion during the French Revolutionary Wars. It was the Royal County of Berkshire's senior volunteer unit with over 200 years of voluntary military service. After taking part in the Second Boer War, it saw action as mounted troops in the First World War and as artillery in the Second World War. Its lineage is maintained by 94 Signal Squadron, part of 39 (Skinners) Signal Regiment. The Headquarters of the Squadron is based in Windsor, Berkshire. The Berkshire Yeomanry had a number of battle honours won from Europe to the Far East and Private Frederick Potts was awarded a Victoria Cross for service during the Gallipoli Campaign.
Occupation at the site of Reading may date back to the Roman period, possibly as either a trading port on the River Thames, or as an intersection on the Roman road connecting London with Calleva Atrebatum near Silchester.
Edith Mary Sutton (1862–1957) was the first woman to become a councillor in England, the first female Mayor in Reading, and a suffragist.
