Tufton, Pembrokeshire

The origin of the place name Tufton is not clear. There is a tenuous link with the Tufton Arms in the 1792 marriage of Joseph Foster Barham of Trecwn (who inherited Pembrokeshire property from his mother, Dorothea Vaughan,[1] and whose son Charles Henry was a Pembroke JP) to Lady Caroline Tufton, daughter of Sackville Tufton, 8th Earl of Thanet.[2][3]

The Tufton Arms inn stands at the crossroads. The pub holds a beer festival on the first Friday in July.[4] According to a 19th-century map, this was the only inn in the parish.[5] Coursing meetings were hosted by the pub in the mid-1800s[6] and, in a fox hunting report, it was described as having "good beer".[7] In 1863, the landlady, Mrs Thomas, died "at an advanced age".[8] A Mr Thomas was landlord in 1868, when he was called as a witness in Haverfordwest in a case of sheep-stealing.[9] The thief, Caleb Morris, was sentenced to five years, and later Thomas, after a collection, was presented with a watch in recompense for his sheep.[10] It was the annual custom of the Reverend C. H. Barham to entertain his tenants and friends at Thomas's inn, which in 1873 was able to provide a roast dinner and ale for "upwards of 90 persons".[11]

Siloh Chapel is a Calvinistic Methodist chapel in the Union of Welsh Independent churches.[12] It was founded in 1842, registered to solemnise marriages in 1844,[13] and restored in 1900.[14] Short biographical details of the early ministers and members of the congregation appeared in a history published in 1871.[15]

Tufton is on the B4329, a centuries-old route between Cardigan and Haverfordwest and is on a bus route. National Cycle Route 47 crosses the B4329 at Tufton.

The hymn tune Blaenwern is named after a farm near Tufton where the composer, William Penfro Rowlands, was either sent as a boy, or sent his son, to recuperate from an illness in the early 20th century.[16]

"Tufton Castle" is the name given by Coflein to an enclosure just north of the hamlet which may have been an ancient Iron Age settlement.[17] Coflein records a mediaeval strip field system, identified from aerial reconnaissance in 2007[18] and a post-mediaeval rubble stone house worthy of note.[19] An 1888 map shows a smithy at the crossroads.[20]

Richard Fenton, in the early 19th century, described a small roadside house as Poll-tax Inn.[21] Fenton attributes the name to a place where poll tax was collected, but other names have been used, such as Paltockes Inne in 1200,[22] Paltocksin, Battog's Inn or Baltox Inn.[23] It appears on an old parish map south of Tufton on the B4329, which has now bypassed the place (the old road forded a stream, shown on modern maps as Portrux Ford), which is in the parish of Castlebythe.[24]

• OS Map 017/NE, Map of Pembrokeshire 1868-1892