Tetbury
Tetbury is a village and civil parish within the Cotswold area of Gloucestershire, England. It lies on the site of an old hill fort, on which an Anglo-Saxon abbey was founded, probably by Ine of Wessex, in 681. The population of the parish was 5,250 in the 2001 census, increasing to 5,472 at the 2011 census. During the Middle Ages, Tetbury came to be a crucial market for Cotswold wool and thread. The Tetbury Woolsack Races, founded 1972, is an annual competition where participants have to carry a 60-pound (27 kg) sack of wool up and down a high hill (Gumstool Hill). The Tetbury Woolsack Races take place on the "late May Bank Holiday", the last Monday in May annually. Significant structures in the community consist of the Church House, Market House, constructed in 1655 and the late-eighteenth century Gothic revival parish church of St Mary the Virgin and also St Mary Magdalene and much of the remainder of the town centre, dating from the sixteenth as well as seventeenth centuries. The Market House is a fine example of a Cotswold pillared market home as well as is still in use as a meeting place as well as market. Other tourist attractions include the Police Bygones Museum. Chavenage House, Highgrove House and also Westonbirt Arboretum exist simply outside the town. Tetbury has won 5 successive Gold awards in the Regional "Heart of England in Bloom" competitors in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 and also 2010 and was category champion "Best Small Town" in 2008, 2009 as well as 2010. In 2010 Tetbury was Overall Winner of Heart of England in Bloom and also won a Juries Discretionary Award for Area Achievement. Tetbury won Silver Gilt as a new participant in the National Britain in Bloom Campaign in 2009 and a 2nd Silver Gilt in Britain in Bloom in 2011. The Tetbury community crest features two dolphins.
