Benson, Oxfordshire

Benson, Oxfordshire

Coordinates: 51°37′16″N 1°06′40″W / 51.621°N 1.111°W / 51.621; -1.111

Benson is a village and civil parish in South Oxfordshire, England. At the 2001 census it had a population of 4,464. The village lies about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) north of Wallingford at the foot of the Chiltern Hills at the confluence of a chalk stream (Ewelme Brook) and the River Thames, next to Benson Lock. Being on the northern (eastern) bank of the Thames, Benson has always been in Oxfordshire, unlike nearby Wallingford and Abingdon, Oxfordshire, which were part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes.

The village is on river silts and gravel, just above the surrounding marshy land that gives nearby settlements of Preston Crowmarsh and Crowmarsh Gifford their names. The fertile land which surrounds the village meant that farming was the main source of employment until the 20th Century.