Uphills important landmark is the old St Nicholas church sitting proudly on the top of the hill overlooking the village below.
Although a part of Weston Super Mare, Uphill manages to maintain its own very distinctive village identity. What keeps Uphill a village is the fact that it is separated from the rest of Weston Super Mare by the beach road which becomes the towns principal southerly exit road.
Resulting from a small cave being uncovered in a local quarry Uphill can claim quite a history. At the rear of the cave butchered animal bones and simple tools were found which proved that the area had inhabitants as long ago as forty,000 years.
Then it was the turn of the Romans!
Did the Romans use Uphills strategic costal location to ship the valuable lead from their mines in charter house, most historian would agree that they did.
The medieval monks had a HUGE influence on the area also!
The drainage ditches and flood defences around the Uphill area dramatically changed the panorama and were initially constructed by the monks from Glastonbury. They additionally turned the river axe into a major inland waterway of the time.
As a result of this much land was reclaimed from the marsh and established as agriculture and grazing land. Sheep from the Welsh hills were imported and farmed some time during the 18th century.
A few extra Uphill facts.
Fifteen Ninety Two
There is written documentation of a French merchant ship being compelled to dock in uphill where it's cargo of mainly fish and oil was seized by merchants from Bristol.
1685 Uphill in the same year was used as a staging post for a riot by the Duke of Monmouth.
The steel mills in the north of England were at the heart of the industrial revolution had an insatiable appetitive for lime and uphill had a lime kiln near the modern boat yard, the produce of which was shipped by sea up the Bristol Channel.
The most noticeable landmark in Uphill is St Nicholas church which sits proudly over looking the village.
It is construct on the location of an even earlier Saxon church although the present building was constructed shortly after the 1066 conquest of the Normans.
Presumably because a it was a protracted walk for the villagers to the top of the hill particularly on a cold and blowy day, in eighteen sixty 4 they built a more modern and easily accessible church in the village below.
Uphill has two pubs with an interesting history. Both the ship and the dolphin are well-liked modern-day village pubs. However, in the past they had been frequented by smugglers. With skilful use of lanterns positioned of the hillside on darker nights they would guide boats ladened with contraband into Uphill for unloading.
The trick was to get in and out as rapidly as possible at the top of the tide which could be troublesome in the dark. One well documented account highlights when a smuggler lifted anchor too late and found himself marooned on the mud and when daylight came he was surrounded by the embarrassing evidence of his trade which lay around his stranded boat in the mud.
Another fact that makes Uphill an important place in the area is that the end of the village is the site of Weston Super Mare's hospital which is the biggest hospital this side of Bristol 17 miles to the north.
Uphill village has a lot going for it from the small and extremely fascinating harbour to the lengthy sand beach and unique location.
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You can discover more information by visiting uphill or more about Weston Super Mare at Weston Super Mare local pages
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