The Cowley area has been inhabited since
Roman times. The line of a
Roman road runs north-south along the eastern edge of Cowley. It linked a
Roman town at
Dorchester-on-Thames with a
Roman military camp at
Alchester near
Bicester. A road called Roman Way follows part of its route. It is behind the
Mini car factory, starting opposite the
Stagecoach in
Oxfordshire bus garage. Cowley coalesced from the former villages of Middle Cowley, Temple Cowley and Church Cowley (around
St James church), though the ancient
parish of Cowley covered much of the area now known as
East Oxford. The western portion of the original parish of Cowley was split off and became part of the city of Oxford in 1889, and was given the name of Cowley St John, though today it is often called the
Cowley Road area, after the road across the fields from
Oxford to Cowley villages. The term Cowley today usually refers to the remainder of Cowley (the parish of Cowley
St James where the original Cowley villages stood), which became part of the city of
Oxford in 1928. However, because the settlements of Cowley were situated within the larger Cowley parishes, there are still some modern contexts (such as the Cowley Fathers mentioned below) when the term "Cowley" is used to refer to other areas in
East Oxford outside of Cowley proper. Cowley was a
manor from
Medieval times, and a 16th-century manor house stood on Oxford Road near the corner with Hollow Way. In 1139,
Matilda of Boulogne founded Temple Cowley here for the
Knights Templar. The house became part of the
Oxford Military College which was built on its grounds in the 19th century. In 1864, the
Wycombe Railway between
High Wycombe and
Oxford was built through Cowley, but at this time the village was so small that the railway company did not provide it with a station. Cowley
St James C of E school, situated on Beauchamp Lane adjacent to the church, was established in 1834 and continued to operate as a primary school until 1975. Its most famous pupil was William Morris, later
Lord Nuffield, who founded
Morris Motors which was the source of a great deal of local employment leading to substantial growth in the area. A
public house is named after him located in the nearby Templar Square shopping centre. Another well-known pupil of the school was the actress
Dame Maggie Smith. In 1859, the vicar,
Richard Meux Benson, erected a new parish church dedicated to St.
John the Evangelist. In 1865 two priests joined Benson in Cowley to begin community life under the name of the Mission Priests of St. John the Evangelist with Benson as the
superior. In 1866 the
Society of St. John the Evangelist, a
Church of England religious order, was founded near
Cowley Road in the parish of Cowley. SSJE was the first long-lasting Anglican religious order for men since the
Reformation. The members were frequently known as the "Cowley Fathers". In 1868 the Eddison and Nodding Company factory was founded in Cowley. John Allen bought it in 1897 and renamed it the Oxford
Steam Plough Company. He later renamed it again as John Allen and Sons, and diversified into manufacturing other agricultural and horticultural machinery including the successful
Allen Scythe powered by a small
Villiers petrol engine. The works closed in the early 1980s, and the Templars Shopping Park formerly known as John Allen Centre retail park has since been built on the site. The
Oxford Military College bought the former Cowley Middle Class School in 1876. The College hall, a former
manor house, was built in the early 17th century. The
Chapel of 1870 was designed by the architect
Edward George Bruton. An east wing designed by Sir
Thomas Graham Jackson was added in 1877. The Oxford Military College closed in 1896, developed from 1912 by William Morris as the
Cowley plant. During the 1960s, the centre of Cowley was demolished and replaced with
Templars Square shopping center (previously it had been known as "Cowley Centre", and sometimes still is). In the same decade the railway between
Princes Risborough and
Oxford closed, but the track between Kennington Junction and Cowley remains open for freight in and out of the car factory. Between 1980 and 1992 the headquarters of the
United Kingdom Warning and Monitoring Organisation (UKWMO) was located in a converted barracks building at
Cowley Barracks on
James Wolfe Road, Cowley. The UKWMO was the organisation responsible for initiating the
four-minute warning in the event of a nuclear attack on the UK and was disbanded at the end of the
Cold War. Co-located with HQUKWMO was the Headquarters of No 3 Oxford Group
Royal Observer Corps whose underground protected nuclear bunker at the Cowley site opened in 1965. Parts of the bunker were demolished in 1995, however most of it was refurbished including the air filtration systems. The site now belongs to
Oxford Brookes University who built student accommodation on the site, and now use the former bunker as a storage facility making it the only student halls in the country with its own nuclear shelter. In 1921 the
civil parish had a population of 2790. On 1 April 1929 the parish was abolished and merged with
St Giles and St John.
Morris Motors The Cowley area was transformed after 1912 when
William Morris bought the former
Oxford Military College and moved
Morris Motors Limited into it from its former premises in
Oxford. He expanded into "The Old Tin Shed" in 1914 and then into a huge complex of purpose-built production lines in Cowley, as Morris pioneered
Henry Ford-style
mass production in the UK. The
Great Western Railway, which had taken over the
Wycombe Railway, opened a station called
Morris Cowley to serve some of the thousands of workers commuting to the factory. In 1933, a goods yard was built beside the line to bring supplies into the factory and take completed vehicles away. This yard still exists and serves the current vehicle-manufacturing plant, though the railway beyond has long been lifted. From the 1920s through to the 1960s, Cowley expanded into a huge industrial centre. In the
Great Depression many people left areas of high
unemployment such as
South Wales and moved to the Cowley area to work in Cowley's factories. Large areas of housing were built and rented out to the migrants. Florence Park was one area built in the 1920s for a private
landlord to rent to new workers. The houses looked nice but they were poorly built and maintained, until the tenants held a
rent strike and forced the landlord to make repairs. Most Florence Park houses are now owner-occupied, and the area's tree-lined roads are now a popular neighbourhood in which to live. In
World War II the Morris factory produced many
de Havilland Tiger Moth training aeroplanes for the war effort and there was also the No 1 Metal and Produce Recovery Depot run by the
Civilian Repair Organisation to handle crashed or damaged aircraft and even the wreckage of enemy aircraft was processed here.
Paul Nash was inspired to paint
Totes Meer based on sketches he made of the recovery depot. Despite successive company
mergers and name changes, "Morris's" is still often used as the name of the car factory to this day. In 1952,
Morris Motors became part of the
British Motor Corporation (BMC), in 1968 BMC became
British Leyland, in the 1980s the group was known as
Austin Rover, in the 1990s it was
Rover Group and since 2001 the factory has been owned by
BMW. But the name "Morris's" is ingrained in local culture and speech habits, particularly amongst older inhabitants. By the early 1970s, over 20,000 people worked in Cowley at the vast Morris Motors and
Pressed Steel Fisher plants.
Unipart is also a major employer in Cowley, with premises next to the car factory. In later years Morris Motors and Pressed Steel became one company. Subsequently the Morris's site was closed down, demolished, and redeveloped as the Oxford Business Park. ==Cowley today==