History
The village name is Anglo Saxon in origin, and possibly means 'swan stream'. In the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in 792 the village was recorded as Suanaburna.
The manor of Swanbourne once belonged to Woburn Abbey. Swanbourne House was bought in 1798 by Thomas Fremantle (1765–1819), for his wife Elizabeth, known as Betsey, for 900 guineas. The Fremantle family, originally from Aston Abbotts, had strong naval connections. Their eldest son Sir Thomas Francis Fremantle (1798–1890) became a prominent Tory politician. Their second son Charles (1800–1869) followed his father into the British Royal Navy and was instrumental in founding the Swan River Colony in Western Australia. This accounts for the place names Fremantle, Swanbourne and Cottesloe in the Perth area of Western Australia.
Swanbourne House is still owned by the Fremantle family trust, but let (see "Schools"). The present head of the family is Commander John Tapling Fremantle, 5th Baron Cottesloe. A former Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire, he lives in the village, as does his daughter Elizabeth, the Hon. Mrs. Duncan Smith, with her husband Iain Duncan Smith, the Conservative politician.
There was an agricultural strike in Swanbourne in 1873, led by members of the Primitive Methodist Chapel who were in the National Agricultural Labourer's Union (NALU).
Attached to the village is the hamlet of Nearton End.
Read more about this topic: Swanbourne
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