BLANDFORD, or BLANDFORD

See also:

• FORUM (Lat. from foris, " out of doors ")

FORUM  , a market town, and municipal borough in the northern parliamentary division of Dorsetshire, England, on the Stour, 19 M . N.W. of Bournemouth by the Somerset & Dorset railway . Pop . (1901) 3649 . The town is ancient, but was almost wholly destroyed by fire in the 18th century . The church of St Peter and St Paul, a classical building, was built in 1732 . There are a grammar-school (founded in 1521 at Milton Abbas, transferred to Blandford in 1775), a Blue Coat school (i729), and other educational charities . Remnants of a mansion of the 14th century, Damory Court, are seen in a farmhouse, and an adjoining Perpendicular chapel is used as a barn . There are numerous early earthworks on the chalk hills in the neighbourhood . The fine modern mansion of Bryanston, in the park adjoining the town, is the seat of Lord Portman . The municipal borough is under a mayor, 4 aldermen and 12 councillors . Area, 145 acres .