Excerpt from History of Witney: With Notices of the Neighbouring Parishes and Hamlets, Cogges, Crawley, Curbridge, Ducklington, Hailey, Minster Lovel, and Stanton Harcourt Those who are aware of the difficulties which attend the com ilation of a local history, will readily forgive the delay which occurred in the publication of this work. Where information to be gleaned, sentence b sentence, from many individuals, and various different works, t proccss must necessarily be Slow, and the result not always satisfactory. The copying many records, not from the ori 'ual spars - for in many cases their existense or their locality is gimb ul - but from copies perba imperfect, seldom fails to be the cause of man errors, and lg: author of the present work is convinced that his gook has much to crave, on this score, from the indulgence of his readers. Hopes that many curious facts have been here get toge ther, and much information that will interest the inhabitant of Witney he even flatters himself that no other town, of the same size. In all the three kingdoms, has, on the whole, been more tho roughly illustrated, than the town of Witney has been in the volume. Plates which are given in this volume, may be relied on for accuracy and faithful representation of the originals; but they have no higher pretensions: the price of the volume and the small number of copies printed have precluded the possibility of giving better ones. For the drawing of the old bridge, the work is indebted to Mr Wilkinson. The thanks of the author, and also of his readers, are due to J. M. Davenport ear], and to Mr W. Langford. The former communicated to the author the valuable ms. Collections of the late Rev. T. Symonds, vicar of Emhmfl, to the latter the editor is indebted for sundry comma nications, too many to be here specified. In conclusion, it may be remarked that a work of local present, should always be brought out by a writer, er a native, or has passed the greater part of his life on the spot. The author of the present volume has neither of these elm'ms to ensure accuracy to his work. It remains, therefore, for him to claim indulgence on this as on every other score, and is content that he has done his best according to the means allowed him, he is morally sure that no other person seemed. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.