This week Gerry Brooke travels beyond Pensford to the Chew Valley villages of Publow and Woollard

Just a mile or so downstream from busy Pensford is the scattered village of Publow - now linked for administrative purposes with its larger, main road, neighbour.

There a convenient spot to park right by the church, old vicarage and charming medieval bridge over the River Chew.

A well signed riverside walk from here will take you across the fields to Wolllard - but more of that village later.

All Saint’s church, which is mostly kept locked, once belonged, like much of the land hereabouts, to the monks of Keynsham Abbey.

After the dissolution it came into the hands of the St Loe family of Newton St Loe, near Bath, and then the Hungerfords.

Probably the best known landowners were the Pophams of Hunstrete, who as well as being Lords of the Manor were also lawyers and adventurers.

It surprising to learn that this now tranquil village was once a hive of industry.

In Georgian and Victorian times John Freeman’s copper company, which had originated in Bristol, had a mill here.

It closed in 1860.

Other well known local families - the Cottles, the Sages and the Babers - worked in the nearby coal mines.

And the name Publow? It’s said to mean “public meadow.”

Between here and Compton Dando is charming, stone built Woollard which, like its neighbour, once had an ancient bridge.

But after this was swept away in the disastrous floods of July 1968 and a new road bridge constructed only a few old stones - plus a memorial plaque - survive to tell the tale.

Ancient Bell Farm, next to the bridge and complete with hooded doorway, was once the village inn.

Look carefully at the high wall and you will see a blocked pre-Reformation window.

Further up the hill, away from the river, are a row of labourer’s cottages, dated 1782, romantically called Paradise Row.

Woollard, like Publow, was also once a hive of industry.

A grist mill on the river here was converted into an early tin plate rolling mill and then, in 1781 was acquired by the Elton and Tyndall copper company.

The mill was later owned by John Freeman’s copper company which operated here, as well as in Publow and Pensford, until the 1860s.

Another local industry, now long ceased but which required the labour of the villagers, was tanning.

In 1990 Woollard, which still has a romantic derelict mill as well as millponds, sluices and weirs, was declared a Conservation Area.