Fonthill Gifford is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England, to the north of the Nadder valley, west of Salisbury. History The name of the village and parish derives from the Giffard family, landowners, beginning with Berenger Giffard who was lord in 1086. The Marvyn family were lords of the manor from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century. Among them were Sir John Marvyn (c.1503–1566), MP and High Sheriff, who purchased the adjoining Compton Bassett manor; and his son James (1529–1611), also MP. Fonthill then passed by marriage to George Tuchet, later Earl of Castlehaven. His son Mervyn was executed in 1631, and in the next year the estate was granted by the king to Baron Cottington, ambassador and Chancellor of the Exchequer. Apart from an interruption during the Civil War the estate continued with the Cottingtons until sold to William Beckford, future Lord Mayor of London, in 1745. His son, also William, built the grandiose Fonthill Abbey but was obliged to sell the estate in 1823, after which it was broken up. The parish had 70 taxpayers in 1377. From the 16th century until the 20th, most of the population were employed by the parish's wealthy households; 493 were recorded at the 1801 census, and numbers declined since then, reaching a new low of 102 in 2011. 20th century In 1944, the 55th Armored Infantry Battalion of 11th Armored Division of the United States Army trained for two months on Salisbury Plain and was encamped at Fonthill New Abbey and in Fonthill Park. In 2004 a plaque was added to the war memorial at Tisbury in their memory. In 1952, John Morrison (later Baron Margadale) began to breed racehorses at 19th-century stables to the east of the village. His son James, 2nd Baron took over the Fonthill Stud in 1972, and breeding continues under Alastair, 3rd Baron. The stud has produced winners of several major races: the Nassau Stakes (Spree, 1963); the Oaks (Juliette Marny, 1975 and Scintillate, 1979); and the St Leger (Julio Mariner, 1978). Geography Most dwellings, and the parish church, are along or near the minor road between Tisbury and Hindon. Greenwich hamlet lies north of the village. Woodland known as Fonthill Abbey Wood covers much of the south of the parish. Churches The Church of England parish church of Holy Trinity was built in 1864–66 to designs by the Gothic Revival architect T.H. Wyatt